Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

I think the really important issue here, which everybody seems to be missing on the other side of the chamber, is the importance of the freedom of senators to be able to make a contribution in this place. There are many times that we have debates in this place where I don't agree or I don't like the debate or the particular position that is being put forward by the government or another member, but I think the most important thing that we need to realise is that public debate and the exchange of ideas, whether we like them or not, are the fundamental reason that we are elected to the Senate. We are elected to the Senate to represent the views of the people that we represent. We're not here to have some sort of cancel culture, 'Close down the debate if you don't like it,' activity.

That's why I think this is so important that we are debating this suspension motion. Quite frankly, it is not necessarily about the issue that we have sought the suspension on. That actually doesn't matter here. It's the fact that this chamber is trying to silence elected members of this parliament and prevent them having a discussion about a matter that they think is particularly important. It actually doesn't matter what that issue is. Unless you can have transparency in this place and you can share all your views, you cannot possibly have a debate that reflects the views of every Australian. If we are only allowed to debate the views of those that sit on the other side of the chamber, we'll have a very left-leaning view of the public debate. We seek, on this side, to put forward the views of the people that we represent.

In this chamber we have now moved into the realm where apparently transparency doesn't matter anymore. We saw this morning, only because the government knew that it could not pass its bill in relation to its draconian measures to try and shut down access to freedom of information, that that particular bill was gotten rid of. We have a pattern of behaviour in this place of shutting down debate, of denying transparency and of refusing to allow this Senate to do its job, which is to investigate the details of what the government is proposing. The government still is accountable to this chamber and the other chamber, and it's accountable to the people of Australia. You have got to stop trying to shut that down.