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

You did not have to be Nostradamus to predict last week that this motion was going to come before this chamber. Last week I predicted that, as sure as night follows day, Senator Collins would move a motion seeking to guillotine debate in this place. I urged Senator Collins at the time to resist the calls from Mr Albanese in the other place. I gave Senator Collins the benefit of the doubt, that she actually held this chamber in some regard. I urged her to say to Mr Albanese in the other place: 'No, Mr Albanese, I will not move a guillotine motion in the Australian Senate, because I believe the Australian Senate, as a house of review, has a job to do. I won't do that, Mr Albanese. That might be how you play things in the House of Representatives but it is not how we do things in the Senate.' I urged Senator Collins to stand up for this chamber, to stand up for its rights, to stand up for its prerogatives—but, clearly, she was not up to the task. She wilted at the first phone call from Mr Albanese.

What is clear from Senator Collins' contribution to this debate is that the government views the legislative process in the Australian Senate as somehow a courtesy that the executive extends to the Senate chamber, that it is not the right of this chamber to fully examine and debate legislation. That was very much the Paul Keating view of the world: that question time was a courtesy extended by the executive of the parliament. And now we are seeing this government say that debate on legislation is a courtesy extended by the government to the Senate, and that courtesy may be taken away when it suits the government of the day. It is a manifestation of arrogance and of incompetence.

Governments from time to time will say, 'Look, we don't know when the election will be; we need to get a program of legislation through the parliament—who knows when the election may be'. But that is not the circumstance here. This government set the date of the election at the start of the year. If there were ever a government that had the opportunity to plan and to manage, it is this government—they have known from the start of the year the date of the election; they set the sitting schedule; they have had every opportunity to manage their legislative program through this place.

And let it not be said for a second that the opposition have in any way been anything other than cooperative and responsible during this term of parliament. I will take just last week as an example. The opposition facilitated the passage of 23 pieces of legislation. Where legislation is not controversial, or where legislation has been thoroughly examined, we are very happy to facilitate the passage of legislation. If we feel that only one contribution is required, then that is all that will be made in this place. We have not sought to frustrate, to thwart, to filibuster legislation in the Senate in this term of parliament—on the contrary, we have been highly cooperative. If you look at the legislative score card, the amount of legislation that has passed through this place bear that out.

The government cannot have it both ways. They cannot say, on the one had, as they have, day after day, that this parliament is working extremely well—they cite the hundreds of pieces of legislation they have got through the chamber—and then on the other hand say that the opposition is being obstructive, that the opposition is filibustering, that the opposition is delaying and thwarting debate and discussion. You cannot hold those two propositions at the same time. One of them is right and one of them is wrong. You cannot hold both of those propositions at the same time.

There has been a lot of bad legislation that has passed through this parliament; I grant you that. But the opposition cannot be accused, in any way, shape or form, of denying or delaying the passage of legislation in this place. We have a perverse situation here where the government are saying that they want to extend hours in order to allow for further debate. That is wrong. The government are seeking to extend hours so that they have the opportunity to guillotine more bills. What is given with one hand is taken away with the other. I could understand if someone was listening to the proceedings of this place thinking, 'It sounds a reasonable thing to extend the hours of debate.' It might be a reasonable thing if the purpose of extending the hours of debate was not to force more bills through this chamber and to guillotine more bills in this chamber. We do not have a particular issue, as such, with sitting longer, but we do when the sole purpose of adding a few extra hours to debate in this place is in order to guillotine more legislation and gag more debate. We cannot support that.

I just want to tackle something that Senator Collins said about how our side of the chamber when in office handled the guillotine or 'time management', as she more euphemistically puts it. There are 55 bills that are listed in this motion to guillotine. There are 55 bills where debate will be gagged. Of those 55 bills, there are 49 bills that will have less than one hour of debate. There are 30 bills of that 49 that will have less than 30 minutes of debate. Of that number, there are 17 bills that will have less than 15 minutes of debate. Actually, it will not be 15 minutes of debate. That is 15 minutes for all stages—debates, divisions, everything. When you add those 55 bills that will be guillotined by this government to the bills that have already been guillotined by this government in this parliament, it will take the total number of bills guillotined in the Senate by this government to 216. If you compare that three-year period to the three years that the coalition had control of the Australian Senate when we were in office, we guillotined only 32 bills. That is 32 bills compared to 216.

There will always be a role for some judicious use of the guillotine by the government of the day, but it is something that should be used sparingly. It is something that should be used in exceptional circumstances. This government use the guillotine as a routine tool of governing. When the numbers are used in the chamber for a guillotine as a routine part of governing, that steps over into an abuse of process. That steps over into denying the voices within this chamber the chance to have their say on behalf of the Australian people. Obviously I am very protective of the rights and prerogatives of this chamber and of the senators within, but I am even more protective of the fact that senators in this place are the voices of the Australian people. If you are denying Australian senators the right to properly debate and scrutinise legislation, you are denying Australians the right to have legislation scrutinised. You are denying their entitlement to have their representatives scrutinise legislation on their behalf. So, while we are obviously offended as senators out of concern for this chamber and its processes, we are even more offended on behalf of the Australian public that their right to have their legislation scrutinised is being denied.

If there is one piece of legislation in this package of 55 bills where the denial of the opportunity to scrutinise is emblematic, it is the bill to provide for a referendum question in relation to local government. If there is any type of bill that should be sacrosanct, if there is any type of legislation where debate should not be curtailed, surely it is legislation that proposes a change to the nation's Constitution. It is bad enough that this government seeks to deny equal funding to the 'yes' case and the 'no' case for a referendum. That is bad enough. That is unprecedented. In fact, I am still having difficulty coming to grips with the fact that there is an Australian government that would deny equal funding for a 'yes' case and a 'no' case. I never thought I would see the day when an Australian government would seek to pervert and to skew the mechanics and the processes of an Australian referendum to obtain an outcome that it desires.

It is completely immaterial whether the parliament as a whole supports that particular outcome. It is completely immaterial if 90 per cent of the parliament support that particular outcome. What matters is that there is a fully informed public debate in relation to a referendum question. While the parliament may be of largely one mind, that is not to say that the Australian public have the same mind or share the same views. Even if they do, that is not to say that, in the course of a referendum campaign, their mind may not be shifted from where it was before. So I am still struggling with the fact that this government is denying the opportunity for equal resources for the 'yes' and the 'no' cases for the proposed referendum.

But, if that is not bad enough, this motion contains a guillotine that would seek to terminate debate on the local government referendum bill at eight o'clock tonight. At eight o'clock tonight, it does not matter how many senators still wish to contribute on behalf of their constituents and their states. At eight o'clock tonight, it does not matter if there are questions that senators want to ask in the committee stage about the mechanics of this legislation and about the consultation process that led to the referendum question or if there are questions that they want to ask in relation to the wording of the referendum proposition. It does not matter if senators have those questions. It does not matter if senators still have contributions to make. This government wants to guillotine, this government wants to terminate debate, forthwith at eight o'clock tonight.