Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

Our principle here has been one that I believe every member of this parliament should reflect on because it will have a bearing on the nature of debate in this parliament for some time to come. It is appropriate to deal with this issue today because the findings of a court have been made. Those findings mean that we have a decision of a court that says what was presented as fact to this parliament was not true. It was not true in a way that has caused offence to people who were named in that speech and not true in a way that is deeply offensive to the members of the Health Services Union, to the union movement generally and to the Labor Party.

With that in mind, I hope in the first instance that we do not find ourselves with a new motion in a couple of days time as a further attempt to say, 'Maybe we'll find something that Labor won't vote for.' I hope that at this point we can leave the Privileges Committee to deal with the remaining issues related to this matter.

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