Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the member for Sturt from moving the following motion immediately:That this House:

(1)

condemns the Member for Bendigo for:

(a)

failing to understand the difference between Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, and Australia in 2009;

(b)

displaying a total lack of regard for the sensibilities of Jewish Australians and other minorities in Australia who were persecuted in both Germany and other conquered territories by Hitler’s war machine and found their home in our country after World War II;

(c)

finding a moral equivalence between the death camps of Reinhard Heydrich and the legitimate Parliamentary debate surrounding this Government’s budgetary policy—

and you should be making him apologise for this—

(d)

being unable to comprehend the affront to Jewish Australians and others, who were the target of Hitler’s grotesque policies, in his own electorate of Bendigo—

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: given that the member for Sturt has departed from what he has got in writing and therefore has begun his speech, I move—

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You stand by this, do you?

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat. The minister.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, given that he has begun his speech and departed from the motion, I move:

That the member be no longer heard.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will resume his seat. The Manager of Opposition Business will complete reading his motion.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The motion I am moving continues:

(d)

being unable to comprehend the affront to Jewish Australians and others, who were the target of Hitler’s grotesque policies, in his own electorate of Bendigo;

(e)

embarrassing the House through the senseless, base and tasteless attack on the Coalition; and

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat. I want to give him guidance. I gave some allowance on the point of order by the minister on the basis that, regrettably, you probably replied to an interjection whilst reading the motion.

Roger Price (Chifley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is not true!

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Chief Government Whip, in what is a very serious situation, is not assisting. There is an inevitability about what is going to happen, but I would advise the Manager of Opposition Business just to read his motion. Then, at the end of that, he can start the debate.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I believe he had completed what is in writing.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, I had not.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will listen.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. And, finally, the opposition invites the member for Bendigo to do the right thing and come into the House and apologise for describing the coalition as having ‘all the compassion of the Third Reich’.

Mr Speaker, it is unbelievable that the government would not—

I move:

That the member be no longer heard.

A division having been called and the bells being rung—

I wonder how Michael Danby feels about this. What a disgrace. The member for Bendigo should come into the House and he should apologise for this. What an appalling performance. Mark Dreyfus must think this is a real scream, does he?

Opposition members interjecting—

We’re voting about Gibbons apologising for calling us Nazis.

That’s not what he said.

Mr Pyne interjecting

Order! Can I suggest to the member for Sturt that we just settle down.

Question put.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion. The whole of the Labor movement has—

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the member be no longer heard.

Question put.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question now is that the motion for the suspension of standing and sessional orders be agreed to.