Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I am not going to make urgent inquiries into every representation by Mr Thomson to every minister. That would take a very long time and I am not sure on what basis I could justify that. Do Mr Thomson and every other member and senator in the parliament make representations on behalf of their electorates? Yes. The good ones do, more so than the poor ones. I assume Mr Thomson has made representations to ministers about all sorts of things. Am I going to conduct a trawling expedition to try to ascertain how many, who to and when by tomorrow for you, Senator? Obviously not. That is not a good use of ministerial or public servants' time. If you have a particular question you want to ask we will endeavour to help you with an appropriate answer. (Time expired)