Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

At that time, I think Simon Crean was Leader of the Opposition, Labor did a deal in exchange for a promise on other reforms, which never happened. I thought it was an appalling deal, and the Democrats opposed it. I think it was incredibly inequitable. We can all point to others. I did not support an agreement that my own party made on one particular issue back in 1999. You put forward your position and you make your arguments on the basis of the facts, out in the open. You do not deny the fact that it is happening.

The most extraordinary thing is how Family First can keep getting away with saying, ‘Family First doesn’t do deals,’ with big, unblinking eyes. We saw it repeated again, and greatly insisted upon, on Crikey this week. The only reason Senator Fielding is a senator is that Family First did a deal with the Labor Party. It may or may not have been a good deal, but they did a deal. To keep saying, ‘We don’t do deals,’ and the only reason you are in the Senate is because of a deal, I find extraordinary. Those preferences did not come by accident.

Just to be completely open, the Democrats did a deal when I was leader. I did a deal with Family First, so I do not know which Family First party Senator Fielding represents which does not do deals, but it was a Family First party that I did a deal with on preferences—a deal that, with the benefit of hindsight, I think was a great mistake. I completely underestimated what Family First were about, and they have proven that, sadly, in their performance in this chamber. Frankly, we got greater openness and consistency from former Senator Harris, the One Nation senator. I am certainly not saying that I agreed with all his policy positions, but at least he was intellectually consistent with regard to his position and at least he was open about what he was doing. I thought he made some terrible agreements—one of which was supporting dramatic increases in university fees. I think the agreement that he and all of the then crossbenchers reached on allowing university fees to go up was a terrible and very poor deal. But at least they were open about what they were doing.

To continue to insist that you do not do deals when your whole presence here is as a result of one is extraordinary. To reaffirm, whilst I very much regret it now and think it was an incorrect decision, I fully admit I was part of a deal done by us. We all do deals. The Democrats and Greens do deals all the time on preferences; the Liberal Party does deals with other parties, whether they are on legislation or on preferences; the Labor Party does it. The key issue is that the deals are open, not that you deny that they are being made, and that is really the problem here.

Frankly, I think it would be much better if we just had some transparency about what is going on rather than this continual denial and secrecy. Secrecy, deceit, dishonesty and the breaching of promises are all the things that bring politics into discredit. Lack of due process is another. They are all things that I think are becoming more and more prevalent. They are certainly not unique to this government or the federal parliament. But the federal parliament is where we are now, this government is the one in power now and the actions before us are the ones that we describe. I am certainly not going to shy away from describing them as I see them.

I think there are significant problems with the process, regardless of some of the policy issues before us. I will say again that we could have had the vast majority of the gains wanted by the business community, large and small, 12 months ago if it was not for the Treasurer and his intransigence. I do not see getting them 12 months later than necessary via shabby processes as a particularly good thing.

Finally, I will just repeat the biggest problem that the Democrats have with this particular bill, which this message refers to. It is actually not schedule 1—although we certainly were not 100 per cent thrilled with that. I think from memory it was schedule 2—it was a year ago now—which perverted the government’s own so-called principles with regard to choice on these matters. I do think it should be recognised that if this motion before us is agreed to that very unconscionable component of the legislation will pass into law as well.