Anne McEwen (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The government is opposed to the motion moved by Senator Parry to suspend standing orders. As Senator Parry said, the opposition's intention is to bring back the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Bioregional Plans) Bill, which was on the Notice Paper and, indeed, debated this morning during private senators' bills time, which was the appropriate place for a private senator's bill to be placed and debated. It is not the appropriate time to be debating a private senator's bill now when the Senate is in the last hours of the last day of the last sitting week of June and there is significant government legislation that needs to be debated, including the incredibly important appropriation bills and other time-critical legislation that has to be implemented by 1 July.

But no, we have seen, as Senator Ludwig has quite rightly pointed out, a stunt on the part of the opposition, trying to accommodate one of its members whose only interest, I believe, is to force the Senate into a vote one way or the other on this very important bill so that he can, I presume, issue a press release or something before the media takes off at approximately five o'clock. People listening should be well aware that this is a stunt by the coalition to try to force something to happen with this bill.

Senator Colbeck in his contribution rightly pointed out that this is significant legislation. I admire Senator Colbeck's dedication to this issue. He is usually a very reasoned and thoughtful contributor to debates and was a good participant in the Senate committee. He is right. It is significant legislation and it should be given the dignity of significant legislation and be allowed to be debated in full, and the debate should be able to be contributed to by all senators who want to make a contribution to it.

I am one of those. I participated in the inquiry on this bill and I have been walking around all day with my speech ready to give. But I was prepared to give it in private senators' bills time. Now is not the time for me to be making a speech about this bioregional plans bill—and I know that there are government senators who also wanted to contribute, because we understand how important it is.

We also understand how the people of Australia have been misled by the fear campaign whipped up by those opposite on the basis of their claim that, if this bill is not passed, somehow Armageddon is going to be visited upon the marine industry, on com­mercial operations that rely on the marine environment and on recreational fishers and other people who use our beautiful marine environment for many and varied purposes.

As Greens whip I should also say that, while the intent of this stunt is painfully obvious to everybody here, it is not correct, as Senator Boswell continually says, that there was some arrangement entered into by the government to ensure that private sena­tors' bills are brought to a vote. There was never an agreement that that would happen. There was an agreement that there should be private senators' bills time, and in fact in that time we have seen a number of government bills brought to the vote including, I clearly remember, a vote on the Defence Force retirement incomes bill. I clearly remember a vote on Senator Nash's social security legislation, and I clearly remember a vote just this morning on Senator Xenophon's palm oil bill. So it is outrageous for the coalition to claim that somehow the govern­ment is not allowing private senators' bills to be debated to fulfilment. It has happened and it will continue to happen.