Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

The government will not be supporting the suspension of standing orders or, indeed, the amendment that's been circulated. I would say that the hours motion that set up the week passed the Senate without any senator opposing it. There was no opposition to that when it was set up. There has been no request to the government to change the order of business for today. It is a bit ironic that the first thing we do in order to get to a bill is delay getting to the bill through a suspension motion.

The program as it is set up, as agreed by this entire Senate on, I think, Tuesday, has on it the Creative Australia Bill 2023 and the Treasury Laws Amendment (2023 Measures No. 2) Bill 2023, both of which have a very small number of speakers listed. We could proceed very quickly to the Constitution alteration bill this morning if the speakers' lists are adhered to. So on the argument that Senator Birmingham put about the need to have the debate on this important piece of legislation—and it is important, which is why we have extended hours so senators are able to make their contributions, and they have been doing so over the last two nights—it could be commenced within the next half an hour, if people chose that. So I think the argument that Senator Birmingham out about the importance of having this debate done in the normal course of the day can be delivered without the delay that he seeks to impose through trying to reorder the program and delay actually getting to the government's program today.

I think we saw this the last time we sat on a Friday. There was another attempt to reorder the program. It might be something that we just have to live with on Fridays. But the program as it's set out was agreed by everybody. Nobody opposed it. The Creative Australia Bill 2023 and the Treasury Laws Amendment (2023 Measures No. 2) Bill 2023 are non-controversial bills. We should get to them as soon as we can. Then people should be able to move straight into the Constitution alteration bill debate. The importance of this bill is reflected in the fact that the Senate will sit until this bill is complete, because we don't want to cut off debate on this bill; we want everyone to have an opportunity to have a say. We understand that people want a committee stage, and that's why the hours arrangement was set up.

Then we have the appropriation bill, which, as I understand, more than 10 coalition speakers or perhaps more have already spoken on. So, the program as set out is a reasonable pathway to get through a Friday sitting day. It meets all the issues that have been raised by Senator Birmingham in terms of having time to talk and the importance of the Constitution alteration bill. It allows for all of that—if we were able to just get on with it, which is what I would urge the Senate to do.

And I would say to those on the crossbench: thank you for your support for the hours motion that we moved on Tuesday. I would urge you to stick with that, because it is trying to balance up what we took as the will of the chamber. This government isn't about imposing just our view. We reached out to find out what people wanted—how they wanted to handle bills. We took that feedback, and that is what is reflected in the program today, to deal with a number of bills so that next week, when we will still have about 20 other bills to deal with, it can be dealt with in an orderly way, and we could manage to pass a few of those less-controversial bills this week, along with allowing every person in this chamber to have as much time as they would like on the Constitution alteration bill. I see no reason why we can't be commencing that bill by 10 o'clock today, if the Senate chooses to do so.