Roger Price (Chifley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I acknowledge that, Kay—I mean, Member for Riverina. But the point is this: what is being conducted on a Friday is exclusively for private members. Member for O’Connor, let me make the point that the amount of business is increasing quite dramatically. There will be something like 40 hours of extra time if you are moving a delegation report or a committee report or a private member’s motion. It is about 40 hours extra time compared to the time that you provided in the last parliament and what would still be the case if there had not been an election—40 hours of extra debate. That means every backbencher, should they decide to put in a notice of motion of concern to their constituents or about a particular passion of theirs, will be able to get that into the House and debate it. In this government you are going have more opportunity—

Debate interrupted; adjournment proposed and negatived.

We are going to get more time. Private members can come to the parliament and talk about the passions that interest them. It may be about the situation in East Timor. It may be about the provision of a drug on the PBS. I do not know what they may raise, but they are free to raise it and they will have more time to raise it. Isn’t that an important responsibility that all of us share—that is, the backbench members, not the executive? There is no extra time for the executive, no extra time for parliamentary secretaries, no extra time for ministers; it is all extra time for the backbenchers. And, by the way, your shadow ministers, just as we did in the last parliament, can also move private member’s motions, so they will have more opportunities. How can you possibly argue, as the Leader of the Opposition argued, that somehow this is less accountable?

The point I want to make is as follows. What state does the Manager of Opposition Business, Mr Hockey, come from? New South Wales. What state does the Leader of the Opposition come from? New South Wales. What state does the shadow Treasurer come from? New South Wales. And what has been happening in the New South Wales parliament since 2002? They have got private members’ Fridays. If the Manager of Opposition Business were half fair dinkum, he would be getting on to the Leader of the Opposition in New South Wales and saying, ‘Are you going to promise to bring in a question time on Fridays if you win the next election? Are you going to bring in ministerial statements on Fridays if you win the next election?’

Under these proposals, there are no fewer question times in the sitting pattern. We are still having a question time on Monday, we are still having a question time on Tuesday, we are still having a question time on Wednesday and we are still having a question time on Thursday. Why would you have a question time when a day is especially devoted to the backbench, with more hours to the backbench?

See this speech in context