Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Oh, bring out the violin strings—there are more questions asked nowadays! I remember saying that, Senator Gallagher, and you weren't at all sympathetic then. Indeed, you said on Monday, in relation to a question from Senator Nampijinpa Price, 'We're doing the best we can.' How is it 'the best you can do' for no answers to have been provided by Minister Shorten and Services Australia? How is it 'the best you can do' for them to be sitting on a desk somewhere when, within the space of 60 minutes, they can suddenly miraculously be turned around and provided to the committee secretariat and tabled but couldn't be provided beforehand? That doesn't sound like 'the best you can do'. That sounds like deliberate evasion, deliberate trickiness and deliberately trying to hide information from the Senate in relation to how these matters are handled.

They're pretty straightforward questions. Senator Askew is asking about compliance with committee directions around the return of questions on notice—indeed, asking about time lines for providing those return of questions. We've got questions that have been unanswered about the provision of answers to questions! You'd have thought that they'd be looking to provide those pretty quickly. Senator Ruston is asking questions about those on the BasicsCard—a matter of intense debate and scrutiny in this place, and a matter where I would have thought the government, in seeking to defend the outrageous policy reforms it's undertaken during this time, would have been eager to make sure it provided answers to some of those questions. Senator Pratt, you asked a perfectly reasonable question: 'Are there limitations of the number of Centrepay payments an authorised organisation can be eligible to receive?' I would have thought it's perfectly reasonable for you to ask that question, and perfectly reasonable for an answer to be provided.

Remarkably, I am informed—it wasn't clear from Senator Farrell's answer before—by those who have been able to check whilst I've been speaking that they've all managed to be tabled—all of them!