Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I am sure the opposition will get an opportunity to provide comment when they sum up, but I think the interjections from the opposition really portray their ignorance about how this chamber works, about the procedures that should be adopted and how an alternative government should act. This is an extraordinary stunt to do—to eat up significant time that the government requires to get its legislation through. Notwithstanding that yesterday the opposition were complaining about not having sufficient time to debate these matters, to come in here without notice to perform what you could not call anything other than a political stunt is just extraordinary.

But the choice is for the opposition, the Greens, and Senators Xenophon and Fielding to make. We will clearly not win this debate—the numbers are not with us. The choice will be what you do with the disallowance motion: whether you agree or disagree with it. If you agree to disallow the MBS item, that is the choice you have clearly made—to remove the item from the schedule—but let us be clear about this: there is no other course, no other position and no halfway house. You cannot legislate from this chamber to direct government policy on the run. That is not permissible, it is not responsible government and it is not the Westminster system within which we exist. We do not operate under that principle. In this chamber you do have a clear right to either agree or disagree to a disallowance motion. Those are the choices this chamber has. The alternative government is not the government and should not be encouraged to undertake this madness that is now being perpetrated in the chamber of trying to direct the executive government away from making appropriate decisions on policy which were clearly made some time ago and which were clearly enunciated in the May budget. That is the position that should be adopted, recognised and understood.

In conclusion, I would like to reiterate that this bill should not be supported. It is nothing short of a stunt. It will have no effect. The opposition know that and the Greens should also be aware of that. Senator Xenophon clearly knows what it is and he recognises something that is always close to his heart as well—a political stunt.