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

The opposition does oppose this motion that has been put by the Leader of the House to manage this debate. That's the code for reducing speaking time and materially and particularly reducing the operation of the consideration in detail process.

Again, I say to the House—as I issued a warning last week—when the Leader of the House is using his reasonable voice it's important to scrutinise very carefully what, in fact, he is putting to the House, because substantively this is yet another use of the gag procedures that the government has adopted. Notwithstanding the rhetoric from the Leader of the House in his previous role and the rhetoric from the Prime Minister in his previous role of the past few years, what we're now seeing is the use of procedures where the executive government determines a much compressed speaking time.

We heard from the Leader of the House about the generous way in which he has provided for everybody who might possibly want to speak to speak. Of course, what he didn't highlight so much in what he had to say was that the normal speaking times of 15 minutes will be compressed to 10 and then they can be further compressed to five, and that means that people don't have the chance to make out the arguments in the detail that they would ordinarily want.

Particularly I would highlight the, frankly, quite disgraceful crunching down of the procedures that would normally apply for consideration in detail. Consideration in detail, of course, is the process that is normally used in this House for amendments to be moved. They can be moved by any member. Also during that process questions of detail can be put to a minister—during the consideration in detail phase. The standing orders provide that any member can speak for five minutes to raise a question, make a point. The standing orders also provide that there is no limit on that. That's intended to allow an examination of amendments that are proposed, either by government or by opposition or by crossbenchers, and a full and detailed back and forth. The Leader of the House told us that, very generously, what he was now proposing is to allow a grand total of 10 minutes for each amendment. That is a very, very substantial compression of what normally would be available under the standing orders. I say to the crossbench in particular that the changes that were put to you—the new processes in relation to bills declared urgent—were put to you before most members of the current crossbench have had the opportunity to participate in a parliamentary debate involving the consideration-in-detail process. That means that you are essentially being asked to agree to changes at a time when you might not have had the opportunity to experience exactly how that process works when the parliament is doing its work as it should. I also make the point to the crossbench that what's before the House now is not a use of standing order 85—I accept and agree with that—but it is a motion that replicates a great many of the provisions of standing order 85, with some changes, as the Leader of the House has informed us. But that means there is an opportunity for all of us in this House to consider again, on its merits, the mechanism that is being proposed and consider whether it is in fact appropriate, in view of the fact that there are, as is evident, a large number of people wanting to speak on this, wanting to express views and, very possibly, wanting to move amendments.

The Leader of the House has presented this in terms of the government being extraordinarily reasonable and making every possible effort for people to have the opportunity to speak. The constraint here is an artificial one. The constraint is that this government has come up with a sitting timetable involving 40 sitting days. That is a record low number of sitting days, even for an election year, if you go back and look at the record of recent years. So this is a constraint that the government has imposed on itself, because it's minimised the number of days of sitting for this parliament, and, as a consequence, we are now seeing members constrained in the time that they have to participate in debate.

Don't look just to my words to assess the veracity of what I am saying. Let me give you some other observations that have been made on this topic over the years:

… this is a chamber made up of people's representatives and it is constituted for the purposes of discussion, scrutiny and debate of legislation and other important matters …

Here are some words that might well be appropriate to be used tomorrow morning: 'I do not think anyone can pretend that a bill that was introduced yesterday and is now going to be rammed through is going to have any of the scrutiny that this parliament is here to provide.' Here is another quote: 'The parliament should be given the opportunity to ensure that these bills actually give effect to their intended purpose,' or, 'On the issue of general scrutiny and general governance, it is the interest and responsibility of every single member of this place.' That is a statement with which I hope everybody in this House would agree. Every one of those observations came from the Leader of the House when he was in another role in this place.

I say to the House: the role of the parliament is important. The role of the parliament in scrutinising legislation, in holding the government to account, and in putting forward amendments—if it's the judgement that amendments are required—is important. I also say to the House that what's been proposed by the Leader of the House is neither necessary nor desirable. What should happen is that the parliament should consider this bill using its normal procedures: giving all who want to speak the opportunity to do so for the normal speaking time of 15 minutes; and giving all who want to the opportunity to move amendments and to have them considered in the consideration-in-detail process that normally applies in this parliament. The fact that that is not being done is very unfortunate. It is, in substantive terms, the second use within the first two sitting weeks of this parliament of this new gag mechanism where the government has used its numbers to give itself the power to do this.

I say to the House that that is unfortunate, is to be regretted and is not consistent with the high-minded rhetoric we've heard from the Prime Minister and from the Leader of the House in relation to how they will be bringing in a new kind of gentler politics. In fact, what we're seeing is, in substantive terms, a gag being applied that is very much to be regretted. It is not necessary. There is more than adequate time to debate this bill using the normal processes. Those are the reasons why the opposition will not be supporting this motion.

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