Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities, Carers and the Voluntary Sector) Share this | Hansard source

I seek leave to recommit to a vote on opposition amendments (1) to (5), (7), (10), (11), and (15) to (20) on sheet 6134.

Leave granted.

This proposition has been discussed and advised to all parties. There was some uncertainty yesterday about the views of Senator Xenophon in relation to these opposition amendments. As a result, there is, I guess you could say, an incongruity in some of the amendments. Recommittal, if successful, would allow these amendments to be brought into line, and it would also allow an opportunity for the will of the Senate to be appropriately expressed and for this chamber to ensure that it was accurately expressed.

It is certainly not our desire, should this recommittal be successful, to imperil this bill. The opposition has been very responsible at every step through this debate. The opposition did not, for instance, seek to divide on the second reading amendment that I moved. The opposition did not support a number of amendments which would have actually given effect to elements of our own policy, because it was clear that the government would not entertain those in the House of Representatives. So we have been very responsible in the way that we have approached this bill.

We do, however, have a number of concerns about the impact on small business of the bill as it is currently drafted—in effect, it makes small business the paymaster for the PPL scheme. The opposition’s substantive amendments were designed to put the Family Assistance Office in that place, to continue the six-month plan which the government has, and to extend that, given the investment in that. So, as I say, it is not our desire to imperil this bill at all. If we were successful, it would not be our intention to insist, but we would hope that it would give the government pause for some thought.