Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I wish to speak to the motion of concurrence in the formation of the committees that have been announced. I will not keep the Senate for too long. I just want to indicate to other parties, to whom I have distributed a proposed amendment, why this is not proceeding now, and that is because the government has asked to have a little extra time. I would certainly hope that the government will agree with the amendments that I have moved, which in fact bring the establishment of this committee more into line with the coalition's pre-election promise in relation to Northern Australia.

I will speak at more length on that tomorrow when the motion is dealt with. Hopefully it will not have to be a long speech, because hopefully the government will agree. I have not approached the Greens, the Australian Labor Party or the Democratic Labor Party or Senator Xenophon to lobby for this. I would hope they might have supported it anyhow, and particularly after I explain the purposes of the proposed amendments.

Can I just say in relation to the substantive motion, which deals with other select committees, that I have become more concerned perhaps only in recent times on how the Senate does not always seem to be consulted as fully as it should in relation to joint committees. It disturbs me somewhat—I do not know what happens with the Labor Party—that decisions seem to being made outside of the Senate on what happens in these committees and how they are constituted. That is something I will be pursuing over the next 6½ years that I am in the Senate—God willing.

I want to draw to the notice of the Senate one step forward by the House of Representatives in relation to joint committees, and that is that, in relation to some joint committees now and to the Joint Select Committee on Northern Australia—which is not being debated just at the moment—they have at last accepted the Senate practice of having participating members. I think that is appropriate. Not all of us can be on every single joint committee. Many of us have an interest in various committees, but there is a limit to the number of voting members. I think the idea of having participating members on joint select committees is an appropriate one. With that explanation to others to whom I distributed my proposed amendments on why it is not being dealt with now, I would urge support for concurrence with the motion before the chair.

Question agreed to.