Brendan Nelson (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

The first thing that I think we need to do here is specifically have a look at what is being proposed. It is common when new governments are formed or there has been a change of government for there to be some changes in standing orders. It is equally common for the opposition of the day to take exception, for various reasons, to the changes to those standing orders. I think it reflects the depth of concern that we on this side have in relation to this: we are here at just after 8 pm on the first sitting day of this the 42nd Parliament preparing for a debate that is likely to go into the early hours of the morning about something that we feel very deeply about. This is no trivial change. These are precedent-making changes, including changes to the standing orders, which will for the very first time reduce the accountability of the government, through the parliament, to the people of Australia.

We are also considering this on the eve of a very large event which we understand will occur tomorrow and which is the centre of national attention. We are debating this on the evening of the first sitting day of the parliament, where there has understandably and quite rightly been a focus on other things. I have had a senior member of the government say to me today, ‘Can you try and keep it short, because don’t forget we’ve all got our families here.’ In one sense, we would like to keep it short, but we would not be doing the right thing by those families or the rest of the country if we were not to take up this debate.

Let us just have a look at what is being proposed here—and we were informed about this through the media, which increasingly appears to be the way in which this government will work, with a significant army of people massaging that media message. We were told through the media in December—just before Christmas when understandably people were focused on other things—of an order of business that would include five sitting days, four question times and three matters of public importance. To the average person listening to Neil Mitchell on 3AW—the Leader of the House may not have a high regard for Mr Mitchell and his listeners but we do—I say we will be very happy to put questions on behalf of members of the Australian community to the Prime Minister and other ministers as we go through the course of this parliament. That is what this debate is all about. This is the Australian community’s parliament. We were told at Christmas we would go to five sitting days. The message that was delivered to the average Australian, who may not pay a lot of attention to what happens in the parliament, was: the parliament sits for four days and your MPs are going to sit for five days. In other words, the Australian public was being led to believe by the incoming Prime Minister that we were going to work harder.

Let us make it absolutely clear: everyone on this side is very happy to work five days a week in the parliament. We know that we have obligations and responsibilities to our constituents, who expect to see us on a Friday. The constituents of the member for Kalgoorlie expect to see him on a Friday. The constituents of the member for Kennedy expect to see him on a Friday. I also suggest the constituents of the member for Leichhardt certainly want to see him on a Friday. I would expect that all three of those members want to hear what their constituents think and want said on their behalf on a Friday. Having said all that, I note we are very prepared and very committed to sitting on a Friday. We on this side have no difficulty with sitting five days a week. Our concern is that Australians are being led to believe that it is a fair dinkum five-day sitting week. In fact, it is not.

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