Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I oppose the motion, but I want to indicate right now that I will later on move an amendment to the motion: to delete subparagraphs (b) and (c) of paragraph (3); because—although I do not believe it—if those from the other side who spoke about how urgent this is and how it should not be dealt with today are serious, then one would think it should take precedence over question time, motions to take answers and perhaps the other matters as well. But I am not going to deal with them. I am going to move that amendment just to test how genuine the Labor Party and the Greens are on the particular urgency of this motion. I cannot help but be persuaded by, and therefore repeat, the issues raised by Senator Cormann in a previous debate—and that is, as I understand it, that this matter has been dealt with by the Senate on two occasions.

There were some refinements required. Senator Cormann had an arrangement with senators, including Senator Muir and Senator Lambie. I think the arrangement was actually even in writing. They had a written agreement that, if Senator Cormann made certain refinements, they would support the position and the approach taken by Senator Cormann. That of course brings in to question just what the written commitment of Senator Lambie and Senator Muir might be. I hope Senator Lambie will take part in this debate. I hope Senator Muir will take part in the debate too, and I hope he might indicate why his written agreement, his written commitment, is no longer valid. From what I have seen in the media, there does not seem to be any reason at all except a bit of an internal miff.

What the Palmer United Party does is of no consequence to me except, I might add, when they waste the time of this Senate inquiring into another sovereign government in Australia and set up a committee that is so outrageously undemocratic that I cannot believe it. I still pinch myself to think that the Labor Party could have ever voted for this, because the Labor Party should know better than anyone that what goes around comes around.

Labor has set a horrible precedent with the Palmer United Party on that Queensland inquiry, not so much the inquiry but the committee. There are 33 government senators and the government got one vote on that committee. There are 25 Labor senators and Labor got two votes. There are three PUP senators and they got the same as the government, which got only one vote. I have digressed. I should get back to the motion before the chair. We do want to see just how genuine the Labor Party is on the urgency of this.

As Senator Cormann explained—and should have convinced any reasonably open senator: if there is a need to relook at this, and I do not think there is, you do not do it on a midnight phone call the night before saying that the previous written commitment I gave you is now no longer valid. This is a huge industry in Australia, as Senator Cormann has pointed out. It is one of the biggest employers in Australia, as Senator Cormann has pointed out. If this substantive motion is passed, we are going to be leaving the whole industry and all of the clients and all of the people who rely on the advice and the activities in that industry in limbo.

Even if it were obvious that some change had to be made then you do not do it on the floor of the chamber in a hurry without the opportunity for everyone to get good, complete and accurate advice on what should be done; how the arrangement should be recorded; and what motions or indeed legislation or regulation need to be properly drafted to take into account these new things. You do not do that by this gunshot approach to legislation. It seems inappropriate that we should be diverting a day of other urgent government business to dealing with this issue, which, important as it is, cannot be dealt with sensibly in the manner in which it is being proposed.

I refer to the motion before the chair which says in paragraph 1 'the hours of the meeting should be from 09.30 to adjournment' and sets out the disallowance of the substantive issue here. It then deals with the routine of business. This is where the Labor Party, the Greens and some of the crossbenchers are taking the management of this chamber out of the hands of the government. Even in the darkest days of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government, in a time when the opposition often could have thwarted the business of the government, one of the rules we lived by was that Labor were the government and Labor should set the agenda. If the opposition needed to do business, there was a day set aside by the standing orders and by tradition for the opposition to do that. But we always accepted that the government, even though it was not in a majority—as is the case now and was in the Gillard years—should at least set the agenda. The parties could then exercise their right to vote on that agenda as they would.

So what this motion before the chair does is take away from the government its ability to get its legislative program before the Senate. Again, I steal from Senator Cormann's comments or was it Senator Fifield, who said that in a couple of weeks times we will have all of these pious speeches by the Labor Party saying the government cannot manage the program and we are rushing things through. I remember the sort of rhetoric that they will be on about, yet here is the government trying to manage a program.

There are a number of bills to be considered today: the Tax Laws Amendment (Research and Development) Bill 2013, the Business Services Wage Assessment Tool Payment Scheme Bill 2014 and the very important Aged Care and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2014. These were the bills that were to be determined. As well as that, in the normal course of the Senate and by decision of the Senate, many senators will also be dealing with other Senate committee work. How can we be doing other Senate committee work when we should be in the chamber discussing this very important issue of the Corporations Amendment (Streamlining of Future of Financial Advice) Bill 2014?

I do not know what is going to happen now to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, which was going to meet at the request of the Labor Party. As chairman of that committee, I was quite happy to do that. I believe this chamber and this parliament only works if people understand the seriousness of what they do. You have to have a little bit of give and take. On an inquiry into a bill where we had the department appearing but ran out of time—because, quite frankly, there are so many inquiries, particularly for my committee, that we are struggling to find days where we can get a quorum to meet—the Labor Party wanted to have an hour or so extra with the department. I was very happy to facilitate that; I did not have to. I remind people that we do have a majority on that committee and we could have said 'No, that's finished'. I always try to assist the Labor Party in their proper requirements and their proper obligations. They have an obligation to inquire into legislation. They wanted this extra time, and I agreed to it. We set it down for some time later today, but, at the rate this is going, I am not going to be there as chairman, and I guess there will not be a quorum because we will be in here debating this motion and, if it is passed, the substantive issue before the chair.

I say to my Labor friends: 'Don't come to me complaining that the committee is not going to meet at midday today.' I wanted to do that and my colleagues on the committee were happy to go along with that, because we understood the Labor Party needed to inquire into that particular piece of legislation. I am sorry, but I, the government generally across the board, other committee chairs and the leadership in this place bend over backwards to try and allow the opposition to do what they have to do. We do that, I might say, even with the Greens political party and certainly the crossbenchers, because that is the only way this chamber will work: if you have a bit of give and a bit of take. Instead of going to that committee meeting at midday, I will probably still be in here debating this, as I guess my colleagues will be, and then we cannot meet because there will not be a quorum. At the rate we are going, we will all still be here at five o'clock tonight—

Senator O'Sullivan interjecting—

Poor Senator O'Sullivan is stressed by the pressures! I am being cynical. At five o'clock tonight we are supposed to be having a meeting of the farcical Palmer initiated inquiry into the sovereign government of Queensland. At the rate we are going, we will still be here debating this motion when we should be at that committee. I might say that the chairmanship of that committee is such that, I suspect, those niceties will go completely over the head of the chairman. Pausing here, I dislike very much having to take this approach to that committee and its chairman, but as I have said to the chairman, 'You got yourself into this.' It is the most undemocratic committee I have ever experienced in my long time in this parliament. It was a committee set up by Mr Palmer and supported by the Labor Party. I would expect that the Greens would support it. They will do anything capricious, anything they think might in some way hurt the government. I understand the Greens, but I simply cannot understand why the Labor Party supported that.

I remember when that motion first came up, the Labor Party sensibly opposed it. I understand Mr Shorten was opposed to it. I know for certain that the Queensland Labor Party leader, Annastacia Palaszczuk, is not interested in it at all. She well remembers that the Labor Party ran a campaign before the last Queensland election which suggested that Mr—