Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

The first point I wish to make is to place on record not only our disappointment but also our opposition to having a discussion about children in detention used in order to further the government's attempt to rearrange the business here in the Senate. It should be very clear to everybody that if the minister, Mr Morrison, chose to allow children to leave detention, he could do so. He could do so today; in fact, he could have done it yesterday.

Senator Madigan hit the nail on the head after a profoundly important question, where he also put to Minister Cash that it was not an appropriate thing, it was not a compassionate thing and it was not a principled thing to use the issue of children in detention to try to gain some advantage for a Senate program. I want to associate myself with the sentiment that was expressed by Senator Madigan.

But this is not a debate about the substantive bill. This is a debate about whether this government can suspend standing orders in order to move a motion about the hours that the Senate should sit and about the bills that the Senate should consider. I want to, in the brief time I have, just remind the Senate of the history of the way in which this government has run this chamber.

As I previously indicated, I wrote to Senator Abetz on the Monday of last week. I asked him for an indication from the government as to what were their priority bills, I asked him for an indication as to what additional time would be required and I asked him for an indication of how they wanted to structure this last week and whether any additional sitting days would be required. I did not get a reply to that.

A week later, along with every other leader and whip in this place, I got an invitation to Senator Abetz's office. It was very nice office. We all sat around a table. We had three meetings. In each of the three meetings, Senator Abetz's indication to us about what his priority legislation would be was changed. It changed depending on, as he said, 'It depends whether we have got the numbers. It depends what happens. We have to have a discussion.' He also refused on Monday to tell us what additional hours were required.

Now, because of that frankly chaotic management of the chamber, his solution is to come in here after question time on Thursday and to up-end standing orders in order for him to be able to now move a motion, because he has finally decided which bills are actually priority and what the hours should be. We had the Manager of Government Business in this place lodging a motion yesterday that will require, if passed, the Senate to sit every day—tomorrow and over the weekend—until a range of bills were passed. That was lodged without notice to anybody. We had three meetings on Monday where you might have raised this, but you do not want to talk to anybody about how long you want the Senate to sit. You do not ever want to even approach the opposition—I do not know if you approached the crossbenchers before you lodged that motion—and say, 'Look, we would like to discuss how we might rearrange things et cetera'. No, there was nothing like that. We had a chat in Senator Abetz's office three times on Monday where none of this was discussed, and then we get lobbed with a motion, put in yesterday without notice, that the Senate is going to sit every day of the weekend for a whole bunch of bills in order to get legislation passed.

Senator Abetz also put out a press release talking about the Mr Fluffy asbestos issue, trying to suggest that we have to sit to deal with that, when I told him on Monday that we would do that in non-controversial legislation and get that through.

Senator Ian Macdonald interjecting—

I told him on Monday. So do not try and use children in detention or asbestos removal to cover up the fact that this Senate leadership team—and goodness knows where Senator Brandis is, because he never seems to be around on these issues—has presided over chaos and mismanagement when it comes to running this chamber and a refusal to engage in adult, responsible dialogue with other members of this Senate in order to facilitate how this last week was to be handled. (Time expired)