Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Government Services and the Digital Economy) Share this | Hansard source

The opposition has serious concerns with these changes to the standing orders, concerns that are only compounded by the fact that the Leader of the House is using his best reasonable voice. That should always put members of the House on notice. As the great Ronald Reagan said, 'Trust, but verify.' We're very concerned about proposed standing order 85 concerning urgent bills, we're very concerned about the reduction of opposition questions and we're very concerned about the way that this has been handled. With the text of the new standing order changes made available only very late last night, here we are, only some 12 hours later, debating these very detailed provisions. This is an extremely problematic way to proceed, particularly by a government that talks about a new kinder, gentler approach to politics. When we think about the furious protests we had from the Leader of the House on many occasions over the last nine years on these matters, this is really quite extraordinary behaviour.

Let's have a look at how proposed standing order 85 dealing with urgent bills would work. The first point to make is that, if standing order 85 is adopted, if a minister declares a bill to be urgent then that has to be voted on immediately by the parliament. There is no debate by the parliament. Under this proposed standing order a minister needs merely say, 'My bill is urgent'—newsflash: having being a minister, I know that ministers regard every bill as urgent—and then that means that the parliament must immediately vote on that proposition with no debate. The standing order as drafted says specifically there is to be no debate at that time about whether it's urgent or not. There are no criteria stated which need to be satisfied and there is no requirement for the House to turn its mind to whether it's urgent on the basis of reasoned debate—simply 'a minister said so'. And, once a bill is declared urgent—and, of course, with its numbers, the government can ram it through without debate—there is an automatic guillotine on the second reading debate at 10 pm that night. The next morning there is automatically a vote on the second reading amendments and a vote on the second reading of the bill itself. And, most concerningly, there are huge changes to the consideration in detail stage. The normal process is hugely condensed—indeed, effectively gutted.

Under the way it works today, consideration in detail is a very important process. An amendment is moved and there is debate on it. Any member of the House can speak for five minutes on an amendment—that can keep going—so there's an understanding of what is involved. Then you vote on the amendment. Then you move on to the next one. This is a detailed process, along with the process of the second reading debate, in which the merits of a proposition before the House are publicly debated and canvassed and considered. It's the House doing what it ought to do. But, under what the Leader of the House is proposing, these standing orders mean that, on the whim of a minister, executive government overrides the proper function of the House of Representatives as a mechanism of accountability and scrutiny. A bill is guillotined and there is no debate and there is no opportunity for the scrutiny that should properly be the role of this parliament. What is also not at all clear is the provision in the proposed standing orders which says that divisions will be deferred unless it's a division called on a motion by a minister, which means that the government and the crossbench can't have any confidence that a minister won't come in and simply move a motion.

This approach is quite staggering, coming from a government which talks, as it does, about a new approach to politics. We can look back at what the current Prime Minister has said on many occasions in this House. In 2015 he said:

The way that legislation has always operated is for there to be proper scrutiny from all sides of the House in order to assess what the real world implications are …

In 2019 he said:

That's why you have proper parliamentary procedure. It's so you actually have analysis and you improve legislation.

That's exactly the kind of thing that this mechanism will now prevent.

When the Leader of the House, in his best reasonable tone, sounding so innocent, was explaining what he is proposing here, he said that at the moment the way it works is that the Leader of the House comes in and 'there are arguments back and forth as to whether the bill is urgent'. There are arguments back and forth—the House doing its proper job. All that will be gone under the mechanism provided by the government, because a minister need merely declare a bill is urgent. We can have no assurance at all—we can take no comfort at all—in the fine words that this will be used rarely. There's nothing in this standing order which says it will be used rarely. It will be open to the government to do this on a daily basis, and the role of the House of Representatives becomes reduced to being a mere rubber stamp for executive government. The 'rubber stamp Reps' is what this government wants to turn the House of Representatives into. Indeed, with this standing order, we'll be right up there with the Russian Duma as a toothless legislative body, based upon what this government is proposing. This from a new Prime Minister who says he wants 'a new tone for politics'. Well, let's be very clear what this new tone for politics evidently means. It means ramming bills through rapidly with virtually no debate or scrutiny, and that is utterly at odds with the claim that the Prime Minister has been making.

We also have concerns in relation to the changes dealing with question time. Under these proposals, the opposition gets only eight questions. As the Leader of the House has just said, again in his most reasonable voice, question time is a bit more than is proportionate for the crossbench. That's an admission: it is less than proportionate for the opposition. Maybe that's based on high-minded motives, or maybe it's because he has a well-founded suspicion of where there is a capacity for deep and effective scrutiny from experienced shadow ministers, and he is very keen to minimise that scrutiny and accountability. The change in the rhetoric is quite extraordinary.

I make the point that the process has been completely disgraceful. There are many pages of detailed provisions which affect the working of this House and affect the way that we function as a people's house, as a forum for accountability and scrutiny, as a way that we hold a government to account, and as a way that we test legislation, improve it and offer helpful input. But, instead, what we've seen from this government are these lengthy provisions, dropped out very late last night, now being rammed through this morning, only some 12 hours later. It has been over two months since the election. There have been many, many weeks in which the government could have shared with the opposition and the crossbench the terms of these changes to standing orders. Frankly, the sheer conduct of this is a disgrace. But it is the content which is most troubling, in the way that it materially reduces the effectiveness of the work of the House of Representatives on the sheer say-so of a minister.

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