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

Labor's changes to the standing orders are in direct opposition to their so-called commitment to accountability and transparency, which they have been going on about for nine years. But now the Albanese government has set up the 47th parliament to be the gag parliament. But it's no joke. Labor's new and unprecedented gag orders are designed to end parliamentary debate in order to dodge scrutiny and accountability, with ministers given unfettered and unprecedented power to enact a gag by labelling legislation urgent, without even the need for justification. The government is clearly aware of how dangerous this is; it only released these late last night. The crossbench complained they only saw the changes this morning.

The effect is that bills can be deemed urgent by a minister at any time, without debate and without any justification to the parliament. Once declared urgent, the bill is subject to an automatic guillotine. This collapses the consideration in detail phase of debate on legislation, and any amendments, government or otherwise, are moved together and voted on immediately. During his time in opposition, the now Leader of the House opined on the supposed trashing of parliamentary norms, but nothing compares to what the Albanese government has now imposed on the parliament. Labor is so far away from the so-called new tone for politics the Prime Minister supposedly wants to deliver.

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