Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

That was a very pious response from Senator Smith, in terms of the allegation that the government are the ones frustrating the process here. The government have put this bill forward. This bill is here to amend the income limits for the Commonwealth seniors health card. The bill that amendments the income limits and threshold for pensioner earnings is currently still in the other place, and we're not supposed to actually debate these kinds of issues concurrently. What we have here is a legitimate need for the government to go: 'Right. We've suddenly been lumped with these amendments, and we're canvassing to see what level of support they will get so that we can work out what is going to happen in this place.' We're not here to frustrate the Senate. We're here to be a good government.

The simple fact of the matter is that Senator Smith's amendments belong to the other bill. They don't belong to this bill, which is about lifting the income limit for the Commonwealth seniors health card. It has nothing to do with the income thresholds that affect how much your pension might be discounted depending on how much you work. They're entirely separate questions, which this government—our government, the Labor Party—has rightly chosen to pursue in two different pieces of legislation.

Senator Smith has sought to be the one frustrating this process by moving these amendments to an entirely different bill and landing them on us in this point in time. Given the fact that Senator Smith did in fact have a private member's bill on these very questions, I fully expected him to be diligent in pursuing them. But it's not being diligent in this bill, because it's not relevant to this legislation.

The legislation that it should have been pursuing in terms of proper process is still to come to this place. What happens, for example, if the other place makes amendments on the same legislation that affect the income limits and earning capacity of pensioners? They are still playing with that bill in the other place. They're still debating it and looking at it. It is entirely inappropriate for this Senate now to be at cross-purposes in terms of what the legislative outcome might be. It is simply not sensible to proceed in this way today.

If there is any reason that I had to stand up 10 minutes ago, while we were trying to work out what the opposition's intentions were, and filibuster for a few moments, it might simply have been a legitimate purpose to work out: What is the opposition playing at here? What is the right process for us to go through here? What is the purpose? The simple fact is that the other place is dealing with that legislation. I know it's due to come before them. Is it actually before them?