Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

‘Proven today,’ says the senator opposite; let me explain that. I also predicted, when it was found that the government was going to get a majority, that the heat would go off people on the crossbench, who have traditionally had to make up their minds and determine what happens in this place. One cannot forget Senator Harradine, who on a number of occasions walked down this very aisle while everybody waited to see which side he would sit on, because he had the casting vote and had been through a long and tortuous decision-making process. But that does not happen anymore because the government has the majority. The government did not expect, because it did not have an experience of this—