Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on indulgence: it might assist the House if there is an update, which I was asked to give by the opposition, on how we are going with regard to departing this place later today. It is pretty clear that the Senate are moving extraordinarily slowly. They dealt with one bill each day for the first three days and this morning they have been dealing with committee reports. Yesterday afternoon they dealt with valedictories. There is still a substantial amount of government business that has been sent there from the House of Representatives for them to deal with, so at this stage it is pretty clear that we are not going to finish at 5 pm today as scheduled. The Manager of Opposition Business and I will continue to have active discussions about the program and schedule and, of course, as with everything with the Rudd government, we will take decisive and early action to advise the House at an appropriate time.

My view, as Leader of the House, and the view of the Manager of Opposition Business is that we should not be sitting for the sake of it, so it may well be that we adjourn tonight and come back for a short period tomorrow morning. It may also be possible that we will be back here for a short period on Monday morning. In terms of arrangements, I think that is preferable—and I think we agree on this—to sitting into the night just basically filling in time. As soon as possible, I will advise the House of the case after consultation with the Manager of Opposition Business. It may well be that, if it assists the speed of passage of legislation, we will suspend for a break this evening and come back for a short period of time and then send business back to the Senate. I am advised that the Senate has determined that they will not sit past 11 pm this evening anyway. For those of whatever persuasion with influence over in the Senate—

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