Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Women) Share this | Hansard source

As the Manager of Government Business in the Senate has just pointed out, chamber management relies on cooperation amongst all people in this place but, most particularly, the responsibility for maintaining the process in this place must lie with the government. We have always said that. We have worked very hard to facilitate an effective operation of the Senate.

As we all know, this is the first session of the new Senate. We are not in the last week of the Senate moving towards the conclusion of business; we are in the first fortnight. It has been an extraordinary first fortnight. I do not believe—and we have been here for a fair time now—I have seen so many procedural motions coming before the Senate in a couple of days as we have seen in the last couple of days in this place.

We have facilitated the arrangements that are in the motion that the Manager of Government Business has moved. There has been considerable cooperation extended in this process. As the manager has explained, we have worked towards extended hours on a couple of nights of the session and we have given up private senators' business and our general business in the afternoon to allow appropriate consideration of a range of bills.

It still is a worry that there is a list of bills the government is wanting to put through in the short time that we have. We believe that every senator must have the right to contribute to debate on important pieces of legislation. There is a considerable list here that the government expects it will be able to fulfil in the next couple of days with the extended hours. It is important that with any agreement it is understood that there is still an opportunity for senators in this place to appropriately participate in the full process of considering legislation, including the committee stage.

We have a range of bills here, not only the group of bills around carbon, which people have been waiting on expectantly now for a number of days—and there will continue to be some debate in this area. We are also doing the Asset Recycling Fund Bill and we will go back to the Minerals Resource Rent Tax Repeal and Other Measures Bill, where I know there will be amendments moved. I know senators in this place have deep interest in being involved in effective discussion around the Qantas Sale Amendment Bill and the Land Transport Infrastructure Amendment Bill.

We are more than happy to cooperate to ensure that the Senate does the job that we are here to do, which is to consider legislation. We do not believe there is any opportunity here for rushing through debate. We believe it has to continue in good faith. We are aware that the expectation is that the House will be sitting, waiting to respond to any action that happens in this place. This is a meaningful session of our Senate. We have an expectation to do our work.

Over the last couple of days it has been almost chaotic wondering what will be on the agenda. The red produced each morning has been no help at all because we changed it with abandon. We now have an extended hours motion before the Senate. It includes the things that the Manager of Government Business pointed out—extended hours and the legislation moving into the future. We will be doing our part to ensure we do our job in the Senate to consider the legislation. There will be no rubber-stamping going on here. It is a full and I think necessary part of our job to look at this legislation as we move to complete the first session of the new Senate—hopefully, without any further procedural motions that divert from the business of the Senate.