Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

because it empowers voters to direct their preferences to relevant groups of parties, including when voting above the line.

Some people have complained about the fact that we are supposedly rushing this through. Let me just remind the senator: this debate has been going on ever since the last election, in September 2013. There was a comprehensive original inquiry by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters. There was a set of cross-party unanimous recommendations, supported by Labor, the coalition and the Greens. There was, of course, a call from none less than the shadow minister for electoral matters, Gary Gray, for the government to get on with it! Indeed, in his opinion piece, which I have just tabled, his final words are:

The government should act now without delay …

That is Labor's shadow minister on electoral matters, Gary Gray, in the newspaper in Western Australia, calling on the government, 'to act now without delay,' in relation to these matters. And he is not the only one.

Senator Carr, during his contribution earlier this week said that this was part of a conspiracy between the coalition and the Greens which started 12 months ago to bring this on. This is what Labor's deputy chair of JSCEM, Alan Griffin, said just under 12 months ago:

The government should be acting on these recommendations and, if they’re going to, they need to hurry up because they’re running out of time.

The debate has been going for well over two years. In fact, Labor—and I think this point was actually made by one of the Greens senators—promised Senate voting reform to the Greens back in 2010 when they were looking for Greens support to form government.

Senator Jacinta Collins interjecting—

Well, this is the point. Labor actually signed a formal agreement with the Greens as part of their agreement to form government in 2010, to deliver Senate voting reform in the 2010 parliament. And, of course, Labor failed to act on this agreement as on so many other agreements.

Senator Jacinta Collins interjecting—

Labor says this legislation does not implement 100 per cent of the JSCEM recommendations. Well, let me address that point, because that is true—it does not implement 100 per cent of the JSCEM recommendations. It does implement 100 per cent of the material and acceptable JSCEM recommendations, of course.