Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

At the heart of the urgency motion before the chamber is the matter of transparency. Question time is all about transparency. It's about non-government senators asking ministers questions and answers being provided. I tell you, sadly, this government isn't in the habit of doing so. What this enabled, again, is for the world to see what this government is really like. The aerating of this motion in front of the media, in front of the gallery, again highlights the aversion to transparency this government has.

Senator Pocock mentioned, of course, that the catalyst for this, which precipitated the question time last week—the longest question time since federation, 3½ hours—when the government lost control of the chamber, was that this government refuses to release a document. That's the catalyst. That's why we're having this debate now in response, instead of releasing the document which brought us to where we are today. This is because the government—the all-powerful government that must be obeyed and will tell this chamber what to do, when they'll do it and who'll get what question at what time—again sought to alter the order of question time. So, of course, all of this comes back to this attitude, which is completely opposite to what the government promised this country they would have, around transparency. Even the answers to the questions that were asked by senators in this place last Thursday and today were not befitting of transparent ministers—one-word answers, 10 seconds here, 10 seconds there. The EPBC Act—