Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Vice-President of the Executive Council) Share this | Hansard source

I think all senators know the framework for the program for the week. There's a time to deal with private senators' business—that is, Monday morning. If Senator Faruqi wanted to pursue this with urgency, she would have known about this on Monday and she could have made appropriate arrangements at that time. She waited until Wednesday, which says to me it wasn't quite as urgent as she's now trying to suggest. This is an attempt to disrupt the orderly operation of the Senate.

At the best of times, there is not actually that much government business time. This is an attempt to interfere with the time for government business. There is business of the Senate to be progressed, and indeed we've got an important set of bills on our agenda this morning. We will not be supporting this suspension. There are ways and means available to Senator Faruqi and other senators in the chamber to progress the matters that she has raised substantively, and we would strongly encourage her and others who support the substantive proposal that she's put forward to pursue those other opportunities in the appropriate fashion.

Australia is going through a pretty difficult period, and this is not the time to play procedural games. This is a time to get the job done that the Australian people have elected us to do, and part of getting the job done is to progress the items of government business at the time that the Senate, by consensus, has scheduled for government business to be dealt with.

Let's be very clear: Senator Faruqi is not bringing this on now because there is some sort of urgency to deal with it now. If it was a matter of urgency she would've dealt with it on Monday. Senator Faruqi is bringing this up now to disrupt the agenda of the government during government business time this morning. That is not something that we can support or facilitate, and we won't. I will not take my full five minutes so that the Senate can get back to its business, as scheduled on the agenda, at the earliest opportunity.