Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Hansard source

Well, if you want me to, that's okay. I have reflected on it and I have, as you'd expect me to do, looked at those examples. What I'm going to rule on is that these motions have been to suspend standing orders, so the question that's been before the House for members to determine is, given there's an order of business for the day, should standing orders be suspended or not to deal with this matter? That is if the substance of the issues that would be debated if standing orders were suspended have not been considered by the House. So my attitude—and I think it's best to make this clear-cut for the certainty of members—is the suspension motions can keep being moved, although not more than one a day, because the House has the opportunity to weigh the business of the House against any suspension. So that, I think, is okay given that it's a motion to suspend standing orders. If standing orders were suspended and the substance of the motion was then debated—that is, debated for a period of time where members of the House were able to consider the arguments of each side—that would then allow the House to make a decision. Then, once that was done, those motions couldn't be entertained any more on the matters that are there. So if there were differing matters in the future that would be a separate question. I hope I've made that clear. As I said, there are only three examples, so the Speaker, I should say, has used that power quite sparingly. But I think that is a fair attitude for the House.

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