Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Reticent as he is! But that is his right, as it is the right of each and every one of us. You would be very hard pressed to find an opposition that has been as responsible as we are and as cooperative on those issues where we are in agreement. You would be very hard pressed to find an opposition that has been as cooperative. This place works to a large degree on cooperation, but what really strikes a dagger in the heart of cooperation in this place is a guillotine motion on the ninth sitting day of the year. If the government think that the way to have this parliament work better, to ensure appropriate accountability and to engender cooperation is to introduce a guillotine motion on the ninth day of the year, they are wrong. This is an unprecedented act by a government this early in a parliamentary year. Guillotines should be used very, very sparingly, in extraordinary circumstances, and I do not think that the situation we are in today, on the ninth sitting day of the year, meets the criteria of an extraordinary circumstance. What this guillotine represents is disrespect for this chamber. It represents a lack of regard for the role that this chamber has to scrutinise legislation, and it also represents a lazy approach to managing the affairs of the Australian Senate. Any time a government uses a guillotine this early in the year, it is a lazy approach. It is a substitute for cooperation, it is a substitute for collegiality and it is a bar to appropriate scrutiny of legislation.

We are not contributing to this debate just to chew up time. We are not contributing to this debate just to fulminate. We are contributing to this debate because we think it is an outrage that we have a guillotined bill put into this place on the ninth sitting day of the year. We are not going to let that fly by, because to do so would be to be complicit in the denial of this chamber's rights and prerogatives to examine legislation to provide a light on flaws and to provide an opportunity for the public to scrutinise what this government wants to do. We do not want to be complicit in that, we will not be a part of it, and we will oppose this motion.