Mark Arbib (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Sport) Share this | Hansard source

That is an hour and 45 minutes lost that could have been used for debate on legislation. There is a large legislative list, and again the tactics of the coalition are quite obviously to delay and delay further so that they can talk about issues which they believe are important. I will now try to respond to a couple of the points that were raised and try to move this debate on. This is a procedural debate—it is a standard debate that happens after ministerial reshuffles. With a ministerial reshuffle you need to adjust the work that happens in estimates and in committees. This motion matches the new portfolio allocations to the committees and ensures that the pattern established by the portfolio list is reflected in the committee structure. This greatly assists both ministers and departmental and agency officials to understand which committees they will appear before, particularly for estimates. It should be a non-contentious motion for the chamber, as it assists the operations of the committees. That Senator Brandis and coalition senators are seeking to make this an issue today only indicates again their preference for making every issue a political point-scoring exercise. It also means that the time of the chamber is again taken up by procedural matters. Without using up more time, I hope the chamber will recognise the logic of aligning portfolios with committees. If there are substantive issues of workload between committees, these should be raised and resolved in the Procedure Committee, which is the appropriate place for such discussions. I have had no indication that this is the opposition's preference, though I am happy to accommodate the discussion after next week's additional estimates hearings using the allocation proposed today.

On the economics committee, my understanding is that extra time has already been apportioned to allow discussion to take place on the Friday morning. But committees are able to take extra time if they think they need it. In response to Senator Heffernan's points about sport and the arts, I say as the sports minister that my ministry is very important to the social fabric of this country. It is an insult for him to say that people in rural Australia would find it insulting that sport sits in the regional affairs committee. Sport is cherished by all Australians, particularly those in regional and rural Australia. The same goes for the arts. I see that day in, and day out when I travel around the country, so I think it is appropriate that those areas lie with the regional affairs committee.