Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I can say as Leader of the Government in the Senate and having also held Senator Ruston's role as Manager of Government Business in the Senate that it is indeed often one of the deep frustrations for governments—and I suspect it was even the case during the years of Labor governments—that the finite amount of time that exists for government business and government legislation to be considered in this chamber can be eroded by all manner of things. Certainly the use of general business motions had become a very substantial point of erosion in relation to the time that it took in the chamber. But the chamber provides for senators to do many things by leave, for senators to pursue suspending the standing orders and for senators to use urgency motions and other things. That all adds up frequently to an erosion of the amount of time available to consider government legislation.

There are a number of factors at play in terms of the consideration of general business motions, not the least of which being the concern felt that increasingly there was complexity coming into those motions—and there not being an opportunity for individual senators to debate the content of those motions was a problem—and that was inconsistent with the original intent of the way that those motions were expected to be handled. There are still ample opportunities for all senators to have their say—be it through the take note of answers debate that will ensue shortly, the urgency motion that will happen this afternoon, the adjournment debate that will happen this evening, the matters of public importance debate that happens at other times in the Senate schedule, or the debate of legislation.