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

I think the member for Bradfield should stick to those little five-minute contributions. What they have done when they came before this chamber is say that they want all of their priorities, but whenever the opportunity arises from those opposite, what they do is delay, move suspensions of standing orders.

You might take their suspensions remotely seriously had they not done it day after day after day. Indeed, they have proposed more suspensions of standing orders in the 43rd Parliament than were proposed in the previous 42 parliaments put together. It is a strategy that they have. We have all had to engage in what we have seen from the Leader of the Opposition: the longest dummy spit in Australian political history. They have had one strategy, which is to not engage in serious debate, in spite of the fact that this parliament has presented unique opportunities not seen since the period during the Second World War, because a government that does not have a majority on its benches has to engage by definition with the whole parliament in order to secure the passage of legislation. But those opposite, rather than put up alternative pieces of legislation, rather than ask serious questions during question time, rather than engage in serious issues and put forward an alternative vision for this nation, have chosen instead relentless negativity day after day.

If anything symbolises the relentless negativity of those opposite it is the day-after-day suspensions of standing orders. How do I know it is Wednesday? Because this is the third suspension of standing orders this week. How will I know it is Thursday? Because tomorrow will be the fourth. Every day they come in here like clockwork. It has changed a little bit; it used to be that they did it at 10 to three, just before Playschool came on at three o'clock, so that the Leader of the Opposition got the 10 minutes prior to three o'clock in terms of broadcast time. We have had a slight change in the timing but no change in the strategy. Why? Because, in spite of the fact that we have a minority government dependent upon winning the arguments, the intellectual arguments, for our program of action, whether it be the education reforms that have gone through this week, whether it be DisabilityCare, whether it be the mental health package, whether it be the jobs bill, whether it be the infrastructure legislation— (Time expired)

See this speech in context