Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the amendment moved by Senator Abetz. What we now have is this—and I would not have expected to see it here: the Selection of Bills Committee has been unable to determine when a committee should report. The government has used, and will use, its numbers to force its position in the Senate. It is highly unlikely that this instance will not be repeated. The government has been reducing the ability of the Senate to scrutinise legislation. What it has done in this instance is seek to refer the Stronger Safety Net bill without the bill. No bill has been introduced into the Senate—none at all.

The coalition is going to support a referral to the Senate for scrutiny based on, we can only assume, the advertisements and the release by the Prime Minister, because we do not have a bill. We do not have a view yet from the government as to when the bill will in fact be introduced. I hope the government will be able to tell us that. If it cannot, we will have a position where the bill will be referred at some indeterminate time. The government has said: ‘We will refer it today and have a committee hearing on 8 June with or without a bill. It will then report on 14 June.’ Presumably—we can only presume—there will be a bill by that time. That means we will have to advertise to the public to make submissions based on, it seems, the statements by the Prime Minister and the public campaign this government has now funded. It seems that they have managed to get the campaign in motion well before writing the bill. That does not surprise me when it comes to this government.

We find ourselves in a position of being asked to support this motion. It is a piece of legislation that Labor think needs scrutiny. Labor believe it needs to have a Senate committee report and be dealt with. We are not here to deny the process; we want to engage in the process. We want to have a look at the bill; we want to have a look at what this government is doing in terms of the AWAs. Therefore, we are not going to oppose the motion. We expect the government to bring on the bill as early as it can so that stakeholders can have a look at the bill, what is contained within it and see whether the provisions that the Prime Minister has said will be dealt with are being dealt with appropriately.

The government has sought to introduce a fake safety net. Even if we consider it to be unfair, we want to see the black letter law, we want to be able to argue about those issues and we want to be able to ensure that the government is held accountable. That is the appropriate role the Senate plays in this place. Again, a one-day hearing is inadequate. The government knows that, but the coalition is going to ram it through.

They are now treating the Senate like a sausage machine. One day they will introduce the bill—and we do not even know whether we will have a copy of the bill—and we will be expected to deal with the legislation in the last two weeks before we rise. The stakeholders will have to provide submissions and deal with the legislation—and, as I have said, deal with what legislation? The government needs to commit to ensuring that stakeholders have adequate time to deal with the legislation, to read it and to provide submissions, and that the committee has sufficient time to hear those submissions and deal with the legislation in an appropriate way. (Time expired)