Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I am sorry I do not have more time, but I will confine myself to two minutes. My point is that this is a committee meeting of which all coalition senators are participating members. It is a very important piece of legislation being dealt with by these committees, and I—and I am sure many of my colleagues—would love to be in attendance at these committee hearings that are going to take place during a sitting of the Senate, when we all have obligations and duties to perform within this chamber.

I think it is bad form that is increasingly obvious and increasingly relied upon in this Senate these days to run committee meetings where the senators should be in the chamber. I hope that at some time in the future ourselves and the Greens will stop the Labor Party from continually running committee meetings when senators should be in the chamber. As our leader says, we are agreeing with it on this occasion, but I think it is very poor form—form that is all too prevalent these days—and the Labor Party should take a serious look at how it organises the chamber.

Question agreed to.