Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The Greens will be supporting the amendment to the motion proposing that the Senate sit on the Monday before budget day. I think that this will be the first time since I have been in this chamber that we have sat on the Monday before the budget. There is a reason for that: there is a lot of preparation and work done in the lead-up to the budget and a lot of talk about it before the budget. So it will be the first time that we have sat on the Monday.

When we sit on Fridays in this place, it is usually considered a rollover of the Thursday. Despite the fact that the Greens have argued for question time and other business to be transacted on a Friday, when we sit on Fridays in this place we have always been told, 'No, this is just a rollover of Thursday.' We have failed to get question time and some of the other business that we consider important on the Friday. However, this Monday is the beginning of a sitting week. It should be treated as a normal sitting day that allows us to do the normal business of this place. That includes consideration of documents and clerks documents; authorisations for committees to sit; question time, which is about the only thing that the original motion of the government allows us to do; petitions; taking note of answers; postponements; rearrangements; formal motions; and any matters of public urgency.

If we are successful in amending the motion to vary hours, the amended motion will provide the government with plenty of time to deal with the bills that it specifically wants to deal with. Of course, we know that the bills that are listed in the government's motion are the Construction Industry Amendment (Protecting Witnesses) Bill 2015, which is about the ABCC; the Limitation of Liability for Maritime Claims Amendment Bill 2015; and the Tribunals Amalgamation Bill 2014. The government has plenty of time to debate these bills. We have already extended hours.

I acknowledge that Mr Fraser's death and the adjourning of this place as a matter of respect of course needed to be taken into consideration. We sat late last night; we are sitting late tonight, which we very rarely do on a Wednesday night; and we will be sitting late into the night, potentially, tomorrow until adjournment to consider the bills that the government has asked the Senate to consider. There is extra time to make up there. If the government's motion on sitting hours is amended, there will be plenty of time for the government to consider its business. Of course, if the government was not so intent on ramming through the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Amendment (Data Retention) Bill 2015 this week, it would have had more opportunity to deal with the other bills that it claims are urgent.