Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Hansard source

The reality is that it's not proportional representation if the Independents get one question and we get two every question time. The reality is that we have about five times as many members as them. The Greens are almost in coalition with Labor, so they've got 12. We've got 58. The reality is that the people in my electorate in Petrie and right around the country expect us to be a very well accounted for opposition, and, if we're not getting questions, how do we hold the government to account?

I would expect better from the member for Indi and the member for Mayo and the member for Kennedy and all those members that have been here for some time. The reality is that in my time in this parliament—and I've been here for four terms; three terms in government, the first time in opposition—every member that's come in here and spoken today hasn't been here before. They weren't here when Labor has been in opposition. They weren't here for the points of order that Labor raised, the change in standing orders and the motions moved against the government in the last two terms.

It's really not fair for Australians if we have one question from Independents and then, more or less, two questions from the opposition: The opposition should be getting more questions than that. The Labor Party and the Manager of Government Business shouldn't be supporting this motion. They should be making sure that the opposition gets its fair share of questions and, if they don't want to do that, the Prime Minister should sit question time longer.

I remember that, in the last term, in the 46th Parliament, during COVID, the member for Cook, the former Prime Minister, would quite often have question time going through to about 20 to four. Question time did not end at 10 past three; it went from 2.00 to 3.30 and often 2 to 3.40 to make sure those questions were answered. So really, for all Australians listening, this is not good for democracy. It isn't representational of the 151 members in this parliament.

The Australian people know that the Greens are more or less part of the Labor Party, and that leaves 12 independents. When I look over there, I count maybe one or two of them that perhaps would sit with our side of the parliament. The other 10, through their contributions here today and their reflections on the opposition, really have shown their true colours, and the people of Kooyong and other seats need to be aware that their members are supporting the Labor Party, will continue to support the Labor Party and are not really true Independents. They're also not grassroots members. Through their language, through the way they behave and through their reflections on the opposition, they wouldn't have the slightest clue of what it means to be down here with the people. I'll be really interested to see how these guys go at the next election—

See this speech in context