Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to very quickly jump up and wish everyone in my electorate a merry and safe Christmas. It is a wonderful festive season in which families and friends get together, but we need to remember to stay safe on the roads and safe in the water. I want to put that message on the record, but also I really want to take the time to thank all the Speaker’s Panel members for their excellent work during the year. I know other people will be saying this downstairs but, as my office and I deal with the panel members, I really do want to express my sincere thanks, on behalf of myself and my staff member Lindy, for all the phenomenal work that the panel members have put in this year, and the flexibility that they have shown as we have sat an extraordinary amount of additional time at very short notice. So I really do want to say a very big thank you to them for all that work and, through the panel members, to their staff for the assistance they have given in juggling people’s diaries. We realise and appreciate how busy we all are up here with additional commitments to committees and people visiting. So I really do want to say a very large thank you to them and their staff for all the work that they have done, because it really does facilitate the operation of the House. Many people do not appreciate—and I do not think I appreciated this until I actually sat in the chair—how much goes into that and the fact that if we are not here doing it the place almost literally falls over.

Our thanks go to all the clerks at all levels who give us assistance and guidance while we are in the chair. We actually appreciate and understand who runs the place! They are the font of all knowledge and we are guided by them. Our thanks go to the people in the Table Office who prepare the material for us, the attendants—who assist us greatly when we are in the chair and often when we are stranded, when issues are going on in our office, and they assist us with getting notes in and out—the security guards and all the other people who make this wonderful place tick. I want to say thank you very much and wish everyone a merry Christmas. I hope that everyone does get a break over this Christmas because, as we know, next year we are going into an election year and we are all going to be very busy.

Question agreed to.