Senate debates

Monday, 30 November 2015

Bills

Australian Citizenship Amendment (Allegiance to Australia) Bill 2015; First Reading

9:26 pm

Photo of Richard ColbeckRichard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Tourism and International Education) Share this | Hansard source

A simple lesson for the newbie: this is the next piece of legislation on the Notice Paper. I am sorry, Senator, but, despite that 20 minutes of Greens' conspiracy—which is all very nice and we are all quite used to it; we have heard it any amount of times before—the way that the legislative process generally runs is that you work down the Red, and this is the next piece of legislation on the Notice Paper. That is why we have brought it on for debate now.

You have had a lovely vent for 20 minutes, and we have all sat here and enjoyed it. You have had an opportunity to have a crack at the opposition and have a crack at the government and to suggest that there is some dark and mysterious conspiracy theory around this whole legislation. That is complete bunkum. This is the next piece of legislation on the Notice Paper. Therefore, when we finished the last piece of legislation, we moved to this piece of legislation as it came up from the House of Representatives. It is not that complicated. So, despite all of the conspiracy theories—

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