Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

Like Senator Di Natale, I wasn't intending on making a contribution, but I've got to call out that last contribution for the poppycock that it was—absolute hypocrisy itself from the Leader of the Greens. We've got a situation where Senator Di Natale is saying everybody is acting with integrity except for members of the government that he opposes—oh, and except for this other bloke called Mr Feeney, who the Greens almost certainly will be running a candidate against in any subsequent by-election. It is all for political purposes. To everybody up there listening, to everybody watching, it's all theatre for Senator Di Natale. It's got nothing to do with integrity, nothing to do with what should happen and what is the right thing to do—it's all a political opportunity that the Greens now see in the seat of Batman.

All power to you, Senator Di Natale, and good luck down there in Melbourne if it comes off. But, I must say, your two classes, or your two buckets, don't make any sense either. Here in the Nationals party, when we found out we referred ourselves. Senator Gallagher will go to the High Court now, and that is the right and proper course of action, but let's be very clear that Senator Gallagher apparently became aware that she had issues with her citizenship in April last year, while she sat as a senator, and did absolutely nothing about it. She complains about the time taken by the British bureaucracy to get back to her. If she had done what we did in the Nationals party and had a press conference and told the world about it, I bet you the British bureaucracy would have come back a bit quicker than 118 days. They would have, because she was a sitting senator and they would have acted. But she did not do that. The facts will be established by the High Court—