Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

In rising to support this resolution, I recognise that the Australian people are fundamentally disenchanted with the Parliament of Australia. They are disenchanted with this citizenship fiasco. They are disenchanted with the inability of this parliament to actually confirm and resolve if all of its members are actually eligible to sit here. Now, I know that the government says that that's just one side's fault and not the other's. The reason we are moving this resolution is because Australians are fed up with the parliament.

There are legal questions to be determined on eligibility, but there is a political question: does this parliament have the capacity to manage its own affairs? That is what the people of Australia are looking to us to do. This resolution is a proposition which, based upon the steps which Labor has proposed in the last month, is a fair dinkum effort to resolve the matter to the satisfaction not of the government or of Labor and not even of the crossbench but of the people of Australia. It is why Labor proposed, following former President Parry's stepping down and, of course, revelations around Minister Fifield, that we take a step which we previously hadn't contemplated. We proposed that there should be, for the first time, almost a reversal of onus on MPs to prove their eligibility because there have been so many cases of MPs who, for whatever reason, had neglected to confirm their eligibility. So we took the unusual step of saying that members of parliament, to restore confidence of Australians in the parliament, would demonstrate by universal disclosure the circumstances in which they believe they are eligible to serve in this parliament, consistent with section 44(i) of our Constitution. This was not done lightly. The proposition that MPs have to explain how they come to be eligible was only taken as a last step because there had been so many cases popping up, making concern and creating a real frustration with the Australian people.

Labor wants the uncertainty to end. We proposed the disclosure process; we negotiated the disclosure process; and every Labor MP fully disclosed their material. However, when we surveyed coalition material, there were gaps. There was a lack of documentation. There was a lack of argument. There was a lack of detail. This process cannot end this uncertainty of the Australian people in the conduct and legitimacy of this parliament. It will not end until all those MPs with inadequate disclosure, with a debate around them, go to the High Court and have the High Court rule.

Now, the government are saying that this is unreasonable. The government are setting two standards in this House. They are saying that, for Labor and crossbench MPs, the only person who can determine the legal weight, the merit of the legal argument, is the High Court, but, when it comes to the government MPs, apparently we've just got to take their word for it. They can say—

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