Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Conroy says we are no longer the government—it is very sad for Australia, but that is correct. I just hope that the people of Australia see the mismanagement by the other side, evidenced on a daily basis.

Let us go back to the chronology. The minister or the Leader of the Government in the Senate or whoever is responsible for this mismanagement introduced the bills in the week commencing on 14 September 2009, but the bills were listed last on a Wednesday, not first on Monday or first on Tuesday, in the knowledge that they would never see the light of day that week. We never heard of them again. On 26 October 2009, the bills were listed again not on Monday or Tuesday but last on a  Wednesday. In the week of 16 November, there was an opportunity to list them; however, they made neither the last Wednesday nor even the week. They were not listed for that week. On 23 November, they were not listed either. I make some allowance for the government on this, because they went to a committee. We allowed that to take place and came back in the new year, but in the week of 2 February—that is, after the committee had well and truly reported—the bills, lo and behold, were not listed again! So the urgency of these bills has somehow been diminished on many occasions.

In the week of 22 February, they were listed on Tuesday, but they were listed for that day after the fairer private health bills. Everyone from the most junior person in this place to the cabinet knew that the fairer health measures were going to be debated heavily and strenuously, so listing the bills presently under consideration just after the fairer private health insurance incentives bills might have just been a copout to again not to get to the bills.

In the week of 9 March, what happened? They were not listed. Now they have been listed. This is government incompetence. For some reason, someone forgets about them and they are not listed, so what does the minister do? The minister says, ‘My gosh, we’ve made a huge mistake here; let’s blame the opposition in the Senate.’ You are going to keep doing this until the next election. This is total mismanagement on the government’s part. The government has to understand that the Senate needs to run in a proper and fair manner. The way the Senate should run is, first, that there be adequate sitting weeks planned well before the year commences and, secondly, that ministers understand how the process works and not go to the media thinking: ‘We’ll just do a cover off on this. We’ll just blame the opposition in the Senate.’ The government has been totally caught out again. I put the minister on notice: do not try this cheap political stunt again because we will hammer you every time you misrepresent the truth.