Chris Ellison (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice and Customs) Share this | Hansard source

As Senator Macdonald reminded me, they were not at the committee hearings. For the record, when you compare this government to the previous government, we have a record of scrutiny of legislation in the Senate which is a much better one than that of the previous government, which applied the guillotine rule more than double the number of times we have. It is essential that we manage the government’s legislative program for the remainder of the year. We have some three sitting weeks left and some 40 packages of legislation left, we have an estimates week and we have a week designated specifically for the therapeutic cloning bill. We really do have a heavy schedule for the rest of the year, and I remind senators of that when considering time management of legislation in this chamber.

I totally reject Senator Ludwig’s concocted outrage in relation to the arrogance and dismissal of the Senate powers by this government in Senate scrutiny. We have demonstrated time and time again that we are willing to accommodate Senate committee references. We have allowed time for debate and time for committee scrutiny of bills. When I first came into this chamber as an opposition senator, we used to have a Friday committee and that was the total sum of scrutiny of bills that was given. I remind senators of that. But I will not hold things up, and I commend the motion to the Senate.

Question agreed to.