Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I have just been reminded that the department—and I stand to be corrected on this—actually said that the Smith decision was a one-off decision. I presume that then makes sense, because if it were only a one-off decision then that would lead the department to say that there will be no impact following on from this legislation. I do not want to spend all night on this—that is not entirely true. I would be happy to do so because it is a matter of great seriousness. I am very anxious to see schedules 1 and 3 go through but I do not want to continue this debate longer than need be. The concern of the ESOs, the ex-service organisations, and their refusal to support schedule 2, even on the back of this, is that they see this as a transfer from the parliament to the department. Parliamentary Secretary, do you at least acknowledge that is the nature of the concern of the ESOs, that that is what is driving it?