Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I know that you are a student of political history and that you would have read many of the words of former Prime Minister Paul Keating. Like you, I do not agree with much that Paul Keating said, but one thing he said time and again which I absolutely do agree with is that the Australian people expect value from their parliament, and the Australian people are definitely not getting value from this Australian parliament.

We had the farce during the carbon tax debate where the government initially passed through this chamber a guillotine, which was bad enough. That was outrageous in and of itself. Coming on top of the breach of promise to the Australian people not to introduce a carbon tax it was bad enough, but they compounded it by seeking to deny this parliament its rights and prerogatives to properly debate and examine that legislation. So the government put a guillotine in place. But then they one-upped themselves. They put a gag on a gag by bringing forward the date of that guillotine. The Australian public did not get value from the Australian Senate on that occasion with the carbon tax debate.

We have seen the same approach taken to this sitting week. The legislation which we have before us this week, those 33 bills, are of a different magnitude in their impact to the electorate—to the Australian public—on the economy. They are of a different magnitude. In this place, as senators, as members of a house of review, we take the view that every piece of legislation should receive proper scrutiny. Every piece of legislation should be subject to the processes of inquiry, the processes of examination, that this chamber provides. That is regardless of whether a particular piece of legislation has the support of all senators or is a matter of great contention. We have legislation before the chamber this week, some of which we are in heated agreement about and other items which are matters of some controversy. Regardless of which of those two categories it falls into, each piece of legislation does deserve to be properly examined, and we have been denied that opportunity. The government seeks to further compound that by eliminating the three sitting days next week, and that is the subject of this particular motion.

I agree with Senator Xenophon in saying that this chamber has not covered itself in glory in this past week. The situation as the guillotine was applied each night this week was farcical. There is no other way to describe it. If we want an explanation as to why the public are from time to time a little cynical about politicians, a little cynical about the parliament—and I am a great defender of the parliament and of my colleagues in this and the other place—we need look no further than each night of this week. We had an incredible situation—a situation I have not seen in my seven-and-a-bit years in this place—where senators were called to vote upon legislation in a circumstance where there had been no opportunity for debate, no opportunity for speeches on the second reading and no opportunity for amendments to be debated. There was no opportunity of any sort for the legislation to be debated.

As Senator Abetz said, of the 33 bills that were the subject of that guillotine, 20 proceeded to conclusion without any discussion of any sort. When those bills were racked up, when they were stacked at the end of the day, and all stages of the legislation were dealt with one bill after another, with no breaks, no discussion and no examination in between, it is absolutely no surprise that on occasion the government made the wrong call as to which way they were voting. It was extremely difficult for senators to know what the question before the Senate was, what matter we were being asked to cast a vote on. It was no surprise at all. I hope we never see again that farcical situation where senators essentially do not know what they are voting on. So, if we want a bit of an insight into why the Australian public are a little bit cynical from time to time, we need look no further than each night of this week.

The Manager Of Government Business referred to the three sitting days scheduled for next week as occurring 'if required'. Those three days were part of the motion which established the sitting schedule for this year. I think the House took a different view from the Senate. I think they took the view that they were not real sitting days and would only occur if there was urgent business. But in the Senate we did not take that view. We took the view that the motion that was passed through this chamber was what would happen—that on those days that were scheduled we would sit. Senator Ludwig, in his contribution, said he did not want to speak for long because he did not want to take up the opposition's time to debate the bills today. The reason we do not have time to debate those bills today is—