Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Well, Senator Polley was not there but she is saying a lot now! Why didn't you come along? If you had questions you could have raised them there.

There have been more than 20 hours of debate so far and the Labor Party would suggest to anyone who might be fooled by them—and there would not be too many—that there has been no debate on this. Well, there have been 20 hours of debate so far on this particular bill and I anticipate, as the lead minister has said, that this will go for another 40 hours. And we are happy to sit here and debate it.

But you know where it is going to end. I have been here for a while and many of you have—Senator Ludwig has. We know that there will come a stage when you will all say, 'Look, we know what the result is going to be, why are we punishing ourselves, sitting here to make a childish point?' It is not even student politics, it is pupil politics—I think it is 'pupils' who go to primary school, isn't it? That is what will happen. It is pure childishness.

We have had 20 hours of debate already and had two committee hearings that thoroughly investigated every single aspect of this bill—two full committee hearings!—and we are being told by the Labor Party that there has been no debate and that they have not had a chance to look at it. What have you been doing in the last 20 hours, if you have not had the chance to investigate it? What have they been doing?

I know what they have been doing: they have been attacking their old mates in the Greens all the time! That is what it has all been about. (Time expired)