Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the following from occurring in relation to proceedings on the Climate Change Bill 2022 and the Climate Change (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2022:

(1) there being a second reading debate on both bills together, and, from the conclusion of the Matter of Public Importance on Wednesday 3 August 2022, the time limit for Members speaking on the debate being 10 minutes;

(2) the second reading debate continuing until either:

(a) no further Members rise to speak; or

(b) a Minister requires that the debate be adjourned at no earlier than 10 pm;

at which point, debate being adjourned and the House immediately adjourning until Thursday 4 August at 9 am;

(3) from 9 pm on 3 August if, in the opinion of a Minister, the number of speakers remaining on the debate means the House will sit unreasonably late, the Minister requiring the time limit for second reading speeches be reduced to 5 minutes;

(4) during the sitting of Thursday 4 August, the bills being called on together and then without delay one question being put on any amendments moved to motions for the second readings and one question being put on the second readings of the bills;

(5) the consideration in detail stages on the bills, if required, being taken together, with any detail amendments to be moved together, with:

(a) one question to be put on all government amendments;

(b) one question to be put on all opposition amendments; and

(c) separate questions then to be put on any sets of amendments moved by crossbench Members;

and one question to be put that the bill/s [ as amended] be agreed to.

(6) should a Minister require, any question provided for under paragraph (5) being put after no less than 10 minutes of debate on each set of amendments;

(7) at the conclusion of the detail stage, one question being put on the third readings of the bills together; and

(8) any variation to this arrangement being made only on a motion moved by a Minister.

First of all, I can explain that, in consultation, there has been a request that we use a slightly different procedure this evening to what is in the standing orders when a bill is declared urgent. I'll explain what the differences are, but I'll first of all explain the reason that has been requested.

The first reason it has been requested is with respect to the second reading debate. We have an unusually large number of people of all different opinions on these bills, who would regard these bills and the issues within them as critical to how they sought election to be in this place. People have asked for a higher level of flexibility to make sure that people get to speak on the second reading.

The second thing is, in trying to minimise the number of amendments, some people have suggested, particularly with respect to the crossbench, that, rather than people moving separate amendments in order for each of them to be able to make a speech at the amendments stage, if we had a limited time where there could be some discussion on each amendment, then, for this particular legislation, that would be a more appropriate mechanism.

If this is carried, then the changes go as follows. The first thing is that the bills I referred to become the only bills that we debate for the rest of the day, once we hit the end of the MPI. That's when this is activated. The second thing is that speaking times, from the end of the MPI, get knocked back to 10 minutes. After 9 pm we'll have a look at the speaking list. If it looks like we're still going to finish within a reasonable period—and at the moment it doesn't—we'll let it run at 10-minute speeches. If not, a minister can inform the House that the speaking times are going down to five minutes, to try to maximise the number of people who speak.

Then, instead of 10 pm being a hard cut-off, the minister would be allowed to effectively make a decision as to whether it is becoming an absurdly late night or whether we're actually close to the end and just letting a few more people speak to go a little bit beyond 10 o'clock is a reasonable call. So both the judgement on the reduction in speaking times and the judgement on finishing times would be made by the minister at the table, which I suspect will be either the Minister for Climate Change or me. But the decisions would be made on that basis. Once again I give the undertaking to the House that I gave yesterday. The capacity for this sort of thing to be changed by a motion moved by a minister has always been there in debate management motions, and this has only ever been done in a cooperative manner, and there is no intention to do anything other than that.

Tomorrow morning, when this bill is brought on, we would immediately have the second reading vote, and we would then go through the amendments. For each amendment, rather than it being only the mover, there would be a minimum time of 10 minutes for each amendment. This effectively allows each amendment to be put, with the mover and one or two others able to speak. We'd be able to do that in a sensible fashion. It means that these bills will have been dealt with in the House, through all stages, well before we hit question time tomorrow. That's what it means.

In anticipation of being told that this is a terrible exercise of democracy and involves the total disruption of debate, I just want to give you the example of what happened last night, because it speaks to what we're looking at now. Last night, every time I turned up the volume—and I'll accept I had moments of the evening on mute—I would hear people open their speech by explaining that they had been silenced. They would then continue to go on for 10 minutes about how they had been silenced. I remember what it was like to be silenced. The microphone gets turned off on you and no-one else gets to speak. But last night we had speaker after speaker tell us how bad it was that they weren't allowed to be heard. We had one member last night, the member for Flynn, open his speech by saying how outrageous it was that it was now only 10 minutes and he wasn't allowed to speak for 15. The member for Flynn finished after eight minutes. Then, after all the conversation that we had yesterday from those opposite saying that the 10 pm finish time was exactly the same as the gag, that it made no difference at all, they ran out of speakers at quarter to 10. Everybody who wanted to speak was able to. Every single person who wanted to put their views on the record was able to. With the procedures we've got on these bills, there is actually a greater opportunity to speak than there was last night, because we've got the option of reducing the speaking time further if required. We're effectively going down to 10 minutes immediately after the MPI; whereas last night we did it shortly before 6 pm. Sensible decisions can be made in terms of the 10 pm cut-off if there are only a few speakers left beyond that.

Compare that to a minister just coming in without notice and moving that the question be put and everybody on the speaking list suddenly getting to say nothing, where we then spend—as we used to—sometimes an hour and a half voting on whether or not people would get to talk, and you would lose an hour and a half that could in fact have been used as parliamentary debating. I have no doubt that there will be many speeches that will happen tonight where I won't like what they say—good! That's what this room is meant to allow. That's what this room has not allowed for nine years.

I want to thank the different members, both across the aisle and on the crossbench, who have engaged with this. I won't pretend that when you are trying to get bills dealt with that you end up with a perfect situation, but I will say that what is in front of us now is better as a result of that consultation, and so I thank those who have been involved with it. I will also say what is happening now is a world away from what this parliament has been like for nearly a decade. I commend the motion to the House.

I will listen with bemusement to the speeches that follow as I get told that somehow allowing people to spend their time explaining why no-one is allowed to be heard is identical to a situation where no-one got to say a word. We've been there. We've got the majority in the House now to behave exactly the same way. We choose not to for a really simply reason: we believe in the parliament and we're not afraid of hearing opposing voices. We think that's a healthy thing to do and I only wish it had been this way for a longer period of time.

See this speech in context