Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, this pile of documents does not relate to your ruling; it relates to the Murray-Darling report that will be coming up soon. This debate on the motion of dissent from your ruling, Mr Speaker, has been interesting and I hope it does go some way towards putting in place a bit of a glide path for this parliament. That is not to deny the member's right in this case to bring a bill before the parliament, but we do really need some clarification.

Mr Speaker, your ruling today and the contribution from the member for Lyne have both given some clarification to this issue. If this issue is not determined today, I would suggest that there would need to be maybe a meeting between the two houses or some formal process set in place to try to resolve this issue. It is one that is going to continually plague this parliament, where Independent members in a minority in the parliament have made a determination of the government. The government of the day has a right—and it would have been the same if the determination of the government had been the other way—which we have supported, to access supply and to make its budgetary arrangements.

This bringing on of bills which are essentially, in my view and in the determination of the clerks and you through a number of rulings, appropriation bills does need to be clarified; otherwise, we will just get an avalanche of these bills which will destabilise the budgetary process. That might be all very well politically—I do not think anybody doubts the intent of a lot of these bills that are being introduced—but we saw a successful outcome with the youth allowance bill. That bill did not get through the parliament because of the same issues that have been raised here, but the issues that were raised were of such importance that the government has initiated a review of the process. So I would suggest that maybe that is a way through this. But, if it is not a way through this, maybe at some stage the House has to pass some sort of appropriation bill, for $1, so that it can be tested in the courts for future reference. By that time, the hung parliament will probably be well over and done with. But I would suggest that if we cannot find a formal process that resolves this and we have this continual round of debates over this issue then maybe that is a way forward. I went through exactly the same experience with a different form of government in the hung parliament that I was in in New South Wales. I supported the Liberal Party on that occasion. The country Independent was subjected to a whole avalanche of country bills, as we used to call them, to put that member of parliament in a difficult position in terms of the determination and the politics that could be played in relation to that. But on all of those occasions I supported the government of the day in its responsibility for supply. So I will not be dissenting from your ruling.

Whilst I have a few seconds, I recognise that there is a Chinese wall between the Speaker and the executive. It has been spoken about on a number of occasions. The member for Braddon has been very vocal on that issue of having a Chinese wall between the executive and the Speaker. I think the Speaker knows what I am referring to. I apologise for not being in the House on the occasion the other day when the vote was taken in relation to the Speaker's ruling. In all the parliaments that I have been in, on all occasions I have always supported the Speaker of the parliament, irrespective of their political tone. I will continue to do that because I think the independence of the Speaker is something very special in our parliamentary system.

See this speech in context