Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate not meet from Monday, 28 November to Wednesday, 30 November 2011.

I indicate at the outset that I do not intend to speak for very long. We do have bills before the parliament and the opposition, the cross-benchers and the government should be given an opportunity to debate them. I foreshadowed this motion when I spoke on Monday on the motion that established the program of legislation in the Senate for the following week. This week included extended hours. It is not unusual at the end of a sitting period that we have, firstly, extended hours to provide an opportunity to debate bills, and, secondly, an additional day on Friday to allow debate. Of course, today is Friday. I remind people of that, because it is not a usual day of sitting. The motion does remove the final three sitting days previously scheduled for the Senate, as with the House, where they were scheduled as well. Mr Albanese indicated at the time that those three days in the House were only 'if required'—and the House, as we know, has adjourned to allow members to return to their electorates to do their electorate work.

Senator Abetz interjecting—

There are no surprises with this motion; it has been on the Notice Paper. I do expect the opposition do take the opportunity to express confected outrage in relation to this matter; however, I do think that they will also want to return to their constituencies to do their work, given that we have had a long sitting period over the last three months. I take this opportunity to congratulate the opposition for being part of a parliament that, as of this morning, has passed 226 bills in 175 packages of government legislation. I expect that number to be added to before the Senate adjourns for the year. Since September last year, under the Gillard government, this has been a productive parliament, and I anticipate the productivity of the 43rd Parliament will continue next year. The Senate has made a steady progress through legislation this week.

I realise that many senators of the opposition have rallied and railed against the constraints that have been imposed this week under the procedural motion, but it is not unusual. When those in opposition were in government, they used the same devices; they used the same procedural motions. My recollection is that I rallied a little less than those opposite at this juncture but history will show whether I did or did not. In this way it does allow the constructive work of the Senate to be dealt with this week.

The opposition have had the opportunity to use the time available to them to debate the substantive bills. In many instances, they chose to debate procedural matters, not substantive bills. That was their choice, not mine. They were well aware of the extended hours for the week, which gave them the opportunity to debate the substantive bills and to manage their time accordingly. However, in many instances, they chose to debate procedural motions, as we have seen this morning as well. That, of course, then detracts from their ability to speak on the bills. So, with that, I think in many instances the complaints about not being able to debate bills are in fact crocodile tears from the opposition.

However, I do not want to take any of the time available to the opposition to organise their time today to debate the substantive bills. With the House now adjourned for the 2011 parliament, it is time for the Senate to also conclude its business. This will allow senators to go back to their constituents, finalise the year's work and also finalise the remaining work of the Senate committees. I recommend the motion to the chamber in the knowledge that—

Senator Ian Macdonald interjecting—

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. Again Senator Macdonald has referred to the minister as a 'fraud'. I think he should withdraw that remark.

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I did not hear the remark.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw.

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Macdonald.

Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I recommend the motion to the chamber in the knowledge that, despite how senators might vote, I think they will be pleased with the outcome, which does allow them to return to their Senate work in their home states.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

(Tasmania—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (10:03): The Green-ALP government is drunk on its own arrogance and hubris in closing down this parliament three days early. Twenty bills by the end of today will have been guillotined through this place without one single word being allowed to be spoken in relation to those bills and not a single word being allowed to be spoken in relation to amendments to those bills. The reason is that the ALP-Green government alliance is vacating three days from the parliamentary schedule. When the parliamentary calendar was issued at the beginning of this year, it was clearly set out that 28, 29 and 30 November would be three sitting days. If those three sitting days were still available to us, the Green-ALP alliance would not have needed to have done their grubby deal, a terrible deal, which abrogates the responsibility of this parliament and abuses the parliamentary process by forcing through 20 bills, without a single word being spoken in relation to them.

Let us be quite clear: the Australian Greens have always portrayed themselves as the purveyors of political purity, as the sort of people who will always stand up for freedom of speech, who will always allow parliamentary process to be undertaken in a proper, transparent manner, and here they are as duplicitous as one can get in voting for 20 bills to be guillotined without a single word being spoken on them. I do not know how they can look at themselves in the mirror of a morning for the duplicity, the hypocrisy and the double standard. But of course those of us who have observed the Australian Greens in particular know that that is their modus operandi. If they want to debate a bill then it is absolutely essential in the cause of democracy that they be given all the time in the world to debate it, but if other people want to debate a bill then democracy does allow it to be guillotined without a single word being spoken on that bill. Their double standards are now there for all to see.

But what is worse is that the ALP have become complicit in these games, and that is why the conservative Labor voters around Australia are deserting the Australian Labor Party in droves. The Australian Labor Party have sold their political soul to the Australian Greens. Let us make no mistake: why can't we sit for those next three days at the beginning of next week? We know why. The Greens want to get to Durban, increase their carbon dioxide emissions and make fools of Australia. But why doesn't the Australian Labor Party want to sit? They have just had the embarrassment of knifing-off their own Speaker to replace him with somebody else. I simply ask this question of the Australian Labor Party and of the Australian people: do you honestly believe that Mr Slipper is a better choice as Speaker than Mr Jenkins?

Answer that question honestly. Every Labor member that I have asked that question of and every political commentator I have asked that question of have not been able to say clearly that Mr Slipper was the better choice. So if you cannot come to that conclusion, why get rid of Mr Jenkins? Why do you want to run away from the parliament for parliamentary scrutiny over the demise of a Speaker?

We also know the chances are that potentially the Mid-Year Economic and Financial Outlook, known as MYEFO, will come out next week. Oh no! The Green-Labor alliance would not want the parliament to be sitting when the Mid-Year Economic Financial Outlook comes out, because that might allow for some scrutiny. Further, the Green-ALP alliance do not want the parliament to sit so that there can be further exposure of the unravelling of the carbon tax.

Indeed, this running away from the parliament has all the hallmarks of the ALP Sussex Street tactics. Remember how Ms Keneally shut down the New South Wales parliament when things got a bit difficult? Well, Ms Gillard and the Green-Labor alliance are doing exactly the same to this place.

Earlier today we had the Greens seeking detailed explanations as to why certain people were seeking leave. Can I simply remind Senator Brown that in the past he himself has moved leave for Senator Siewert for personal reasons?

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Shame!

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Fifield says 'Shame,' not because Senator Brown moved for that but because of the duplicity and hypocrisy in his contribution this morning. It is similar to his notice of motion in relation to a matter going before the Privileges Committee, saying that my commentary in public about him being referred to the Privileges Committee might somehow prejudice the matter. Excuse me? Who was all over the TV screens, all over the radio airwaves and all over the print media when the ALP-Greens and a few others joined to refer me to the Privileges Committee? None other than Senator Brown himself! But, once again, it is the double standard that we have come to expect from the most duplicitous leader of any political party in this country.

I can understand why Senator Brown would want to leave this place early and not sit for three days, because his own leadership has been surreptitiously undermined day after day this week—three days in a row—by one of his own. Senator Lee Rhiannon has done doorstop after doorstop after doorstop this week, complaining about corporate donations to political parties and saying how that undermines the democratic process at the same time as Senator Helen Kroger has moved to refer Senator Brown to the Privileges Committee about receiving the biggest corporate donation in Australian political history. So here we have Senator Lee Rhiannon in the background, beavering away very busily, undermining her own leader.

So Senator Brown thinks, 'How can we stop doorstops of a morning?'—and Senator Rhiannon was at it again this morning—'Ah! Stop the parliament from sitting, that way we stop Senator Rhiannon's doorstops.' So we know that the Greens have certain reasons as well.

But I do suggest that the main reason is this: the ALP want to run from the parliament because they do not want scrutiny. That is why governments run away from the parliament, because they do not want the parliamentary process to keep on exposing their weaknesses. We have had that on display now day after day, week after week, month after month with this hopeless Gillard Labor-Green government—or Gillard-Brown government, as I should call it.

The reason the Greens also want to desert the parliament and cut short the parliamentary year is so that they can go to Durban so that they can, somehow, parade Australia on the world stage as the dunces of Durban. Why on earth would they want to go on the world stage and put up in lights, 'We're mugging our job market, we're mugging our economy and'—what is worse—'we're not going to be doing anything for the environment. In fact, we will be making things worse.' So the real reason is that the Greens want to go to Durban and we have this pathetic ALP outfit once again selling out to the Greens and doing that which they ask for.

What will be on display at Durban? The Australian Greens and the ALP saying, 'How smart are we? We have just put in a package second to none in the world that will destroy the Australian economy.' Of course, the example I use is Coogee Chemicals. Coogee Chemicals was the promise of 150 jobs, the promise of a $1 billion investment and the promise of $14 billion in export earnings, to be set up in the Prime Minister's own electorate to be the biggest methanol plant in the Southern Hemisphere. It is now junked to go to China. And in China that plant's carbon footprint will be four times as big as it would have been in a pre-carbon tax Australia.

Everybody in the world knows that, and that is why all the other countries are slapping Australia on the back and saying, 'Good on you, good on you—keep on with it!' I am sure that Canada is there, rooting all the way for the Australian carbon tax. I am sure Brazil is, I am sure Russia is, I am sure India is and I am sure China is. They are all slapping the Green-ALP alliance on the back and saying, 'Great move! This is world leadership at its best.' And then behind their hands they whisper to each other and say, 'Aren't these the dunces of Durban? Why on earth would you do that to your own economy? Are you going to have a carbon tax? Are you going to have a carbon tax this big? Of course not—we wouldn't do something that silly. But we will say how good Australia is doing it, so they keep on with it to give ourselves a market advantage.' This carbon tax will be toxically destructive of our Australian economy. Senator Ludwig, in general terms, just reads out the scripts that are provided to him by his staffers in these debates. I suggest to him that he actually read the script before he comes into the chamber to see if there is a break in logic in that which is put in front of him, because he said to the Senate very generously, very graciously, 'I don't want to debate this for long because I want to give the opposition time to debate issues.' If he is genuine in that belief, in that thought of being generous to us, wanting to give us time to debate the issues of the day, can he explain why this motion is designed to take three days away from the opposition's time to discuss the issues of the day? Do not come in here suggesting that somehow the ALP-Greens alliance is being generous because the minister only spoke for a few minutes in an attempt to shut down the parliament three days early. It is this sort of behaviour by a government drunk on its own arrogance, believing its own propaganda, that has made them slip so badly in the polls. The Australian people see through that nonsense. How can any self-respecting individual come into this place and say, 'I'll only speak for five minutes on this issue so the opposition get more time, but in doing so I'm going to deny them three days of debate'? The logic is not there, nor is the supposed genuineness of that which the Manager of Government Business tried to sell to the Australian people.

It is a matter of great regret that the ALP-Greens alliance in this place is combining day after day, week after week now, to guillotine legislation. They guillotined the carbon tax bills through this place, yet we now have three extra days at the end of the parliamentary sitting. You could make out an argument that you needed to have a time management process, you needed to guillotine certain bills through, because the timetable that had been set for the year was about to expire. But we have got three extra days that are now being denied to the parliament, three days that were set at the very beginning of this year for parliamentary debate. Why are they being denied to the Senate?

There is no reason, no explanation, that the Manager of Government Business wants to share with us. It was not out of generosity of spirit that he only spoke for five minutes, repeating the one line about five or six times to make it look as though he was providing an explanation. There is no explanation. There is no rationale other than that the ALP-Greens alliance wants to run from the parliament with its tail between its legs after the grubby deal of getting the mining tax through the House of Representatives with the Australian Greens, doing a side deal that the Labor caucus knew nothing about and the so-called 'Independents' in the House of Representatives knew nothing about but, lemming like, voted for. They voted for a deal of which they knew nothing. Where is their self-respect? Where is their personal integrity, especially the Independents'? They are the ones who are supposed to, as Don Chipp famously said, 'keep the bastards honest'. Well, excuse me, but how is it keeping the government honest when you deliberately allow them to do a side deal with the most atrocious political party, the Australian Greens? The Independents had no idea, Labor backbenchers had no idea, but lemming like they ran across the chamber to vote in favour of the mining tax.

That was the first grubby deal this week. Then we had the grubby deal in relation to the Speaker, and that will unravel. One thing the Labor Party are good at, I must say, is getting the initial good headline on issues. But then it all starts unravelling very quickly, and I have no doubt that that is what will happen in relation to this grubby deal on the Speakership. I simply ask the question again: is there anybody anywhere in Australia that honestly believes that Mr Slipper is a better choice than Mr Jenkins as Speaker of the House of Representatives? Not a one. Not one person has said, 'Yes, he is.' So one wonders what was behind that grubby deal. Then there is the third, completing the trifecta for this week, and that is what we are debating now—that is, this grubby deal to shut down the Senate three days early.

Senator Ludwig patronisingly told us that we could go back to our electorates and do the people's work. Well, excuse me; I do not know what the ALP do in here, but we in the coalition—and, I am sure, the DLP senator and Senator Xenophon—believe that we are doing the people's work in this place. It is quite obvious that Senator Ludwig sees his role in this place as doing the ALP's work, as opposed to the people's work. Senator Ludwig, it might come as news to you, but we on the coalition side believe that we are actually doing the people's work when we are in this chamber, and that is why we condemn the ALP-Greens alliance in their attempt to close down the parliament three days early in circumstances where they have deliberately guillotined through, without a single word of debate, 20 bills—20 bills. It is unparalleled in the history of this parliament to so ruthlessly use numbers.

This is indicative of Ms Gillard and Senator Bob Brown being drunk on power, without any consideration of what they are actually here for. It is not for them to play politics. It is not for them to engage in self-aggrandisement. It is about doing their best by the people of Australia. And how can they honestly say to the Australian people that, this week, they have done their best by getting through the sleazy mining tax deal without telling anybody but forcing it through the House of Representatives, doing the sleazy Speaker deal and now doing their sleazy deal to cut short the sitting of the Senate? How can they claim that all these things are somehow in the best interests of the Australian people, who we are sworn to serve?

Senator Brown and Ms Gillard are simply using this parliament as a plaything for their own personal agendas, often against the express wishes of the Australian people and often against the express commitment made by Ms Gillard to the Australian people. Exhibit A in that list is the carbon tax. We as a coalition are willing to come back next week to serve the interests of the Australian people and to ensure that matters are properly debated in this Senate—as they should be—and the Labor-Green alliance stands condemned. (Time expired)

Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will make a short contribution to this matter of variation to sitting days. It is fair to say that we as a chamber have not covered ourselves in glory in the last few days. I say this without rancour and without seeking to make any political points. I believe it is completely unsatisfactory that we had a situation where many bills went through without any debate, without any positions being put and—particularly for controversial pieces of legislation such as amendments to the Family Law Act, which will literally affect hundreds of thousands of people in this country in the years to come—without a committee stage. There was no consideration given to fundamental amendments, no opportunity to ask the government key questions about how the new act will operate, no opportunity to properly scrutinise that piece of legislation and no opportunity to deal with a whole range of other legislation relating to issues of crime, corruption, air cargo, air security and pollution of Antarctica—just to name a few. That is unsatisfactory.

I would like to foreshadow—and I will consult with my colleagues, with the government, with the opposition, with the Australian Greens and with the DLP—a reference to the Procedure Committee of the Senate so we do not repeat what occurred. We are meant to be the house of review. We are meant to be the premier legislative body in this country when it comes to reviewing legislation to ensure there is appropriate scrutiny of the laws put up by the executive arm of government. We have not done that. The fact that the coalition may have guillotined debates in previous years when they were in government, to me, is not an excuse for what has occurred this week.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We were not as bad!

Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That may be the case.

Senator Bernardi interjecting—

Helpful as always, Senator Bernardi said, 'We were ethical guillotiners.' Maybe there is a line there about Madam Defarge but I won't go there. I am not sure there is such a thing as an ethical guillotine. I cannot imagine Senator Bernardi knitting while the guillotine is being applied.

What has occurred in the last week is completely unsatisfactory. We need to do better as a chamber. We owe it to the people of Australia. I will be putting a reference to the Procedure Committee, but before I do that I will consult with my colleagues from all sides so that we get this right. Let us not repeat the debacle of the last week. I look forward to debating some legislation this morning and asking a series of questions about competition and consumer law.

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I know that you are a student of political history and that you would have read many of the words of former Prime Minister Paul Keating. Like you, I do not agree with much that Paul Keating said, but one thing he said time and again which I absolutely do agree with is that the Australian people expect value from their parliament, and the Australian people are definitely not getting value from this Australian parliament.

We had the farce during the carbon tax debate where the government initially passed through this chamber a guillotine, which was bad enough. That was outrageous in and of itself. Coming on top of the breach of promise to the Australian people not to introduce a carbon tax it was bad enough, but they compounded it by seeking to deny this parliament its rights and prerogatives to properly debate and examine that legislation. So the government put a guillotine in place. But then they one-upped themselves. They put a gag on a gag by bringing forward the date of that guillotine. The Australian public did not get value from the Australian Senate on that occasion with the carbon tax debate.

We have seen the same approach taken to this sitting week. The legislation which we have before us this week, those 33 bills, are of a different magnitude in their impact to the electorate—to the Australian public—on the economy. They are of a different magnitude. In this place, as senators, as members of a house of review, we take the view that every piece of legislation should receive proper scrutiny. Every piece of legislation should be subject to the processes of inquiry, the processes of examination, that this chamber provides. That is regardless of whether a particular piece of legislation has the support of all senators or is a matter of great contention. We have legislation before the chamber this week, some of which we are in heated agreement about and other items which are matters of some controversy. Regardless of which of those two categories it falls into, each piece of legislation does deserve to be properly examined, and we have been denied that opportunity. The government seeks to further compound that by eliminating the three sitting days next week, and that is the subject of this particular motion.

I agree with Senator Xenophon in saying that this chamber has not covered itself in glory in this past week. The situation as the guillotine was applied each night this week was farcical. There is no other way to describe it. If we want an explanation as to why the public are from time to time a little cynical about politicians, a little cynical about the parliament—and I am a great defender of the parliament and of my colleagues in this and the other place—we need look no further than each night of this week. We had an incredible situation—a situation I have not seen in my seven-and-a-bit years in this place—where senators were called to vote upon legislation in a circumstance where there had been no opportunity for debate, no opportunity for speeches on the second reading and no opportunity for amendments to be debated. There was no opportunity of any sort for the legislation to be debated.

As Senator Abetz said, of the 33 bills that were the subject of that guillotine, 20 proceeded to conclusion without any discussion of any sort. When those bills were racked up, when they were stacked at the end of the day, and all stages of the legislation were dealt with one bill after another, with no breaks, no discussion and no examination in between, it is absolutely no surprise that on occasion the government made the wrong call as to which way they were voting. It was extremely difficult for senators to know what the question before the Senate was, what matter we were being asked to cast a vote on. It was no surprise at all. I hope we never see again that farcical situation where senators essentially do not know what they are voting on. So, if we want a bit of an insight into why the Australian public are a little bit cynical from time to time, we need look no further than each night of this week.

The Manager Of Government Business referred to the three sitting days scheduled for next week as occurring 'if required'. Those three days were part of the motion which established the sitting schedule for this year. I think the House took a different view from the Senate. I think they took the view that they were not real sitting days and would only occur if there was urgent business. But in the Senate we did not take that view. We took the view that the motion that was passed through this chamber was what would happen—that on those days that were scheduled we would sit. Senator Ludwig, in his contribution, said he did not want to speak for long because he did not want to take up the opposition's time to debate the bills today. The reason we do not have time to debate those bills today is—

Ursula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That we talked for an hour.

Nick Sherry (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Minister Assisting the Minister for Tourism) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Because you're talking too long!

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No! You cannot have it both ways. You cannot say, 'We're pulling three days out of the parliamentary sitting schedule next week and we're instituting a guillotine each night of this week on 33 bills, but the reason you don't have enough time to debate is that you're actually debating the motion which is seeking to deny sitting days.' No, the reason we do not have adequate time to debate is that you have instituted a guillotine; the reason we do not have time to debate is that you are axing three sitting days next week. Us being here performing the function of seeking to defeat a motion which is intended to deny the chamber three sitting days next week is not the reason we will not have adequate time to debate. That is perhaps the most pathetic and feeble argument I have heard Senator Sherry put—and Senator Ludwig for that matter. Let us be clear: we want to defeat this motion. We are endeavouring to persuade those opposite to defeat this motion. We are endeavouring to persuade the Australian Greens to defeat this motion. It is this very motion which is denying the Senate the opportunity to apply appropriate scrutiny to bills. The reason we have this truncated debate is that we are being squeezed between a guillotine and an axe intended to do away with the sitting days next week. So Senator Sherry and Senator Ludwig, if you are going to mount an argument, please do a little better than that. It would be appreciated.

We want the Senate to sit as scheduled next week for two reasons. The first reason is that this chamber still has legislation to debate. If we were sitting for three days next week there would be no need for the guillotine which is in place this week. We are a house of review and we should do our job. We should apply scrutiny, we should ask the appropriate questions of government ministers in the committee stage and we should hold the government to account. That is the first reason the Senate should still sit next week.

The second reason is that the government will be releasing very shortly their Mid-Year Economic and Financial Outlook, the MYEFO. But this year the MYEFO is in effect going to be a minibudget. This government has made a lot of its commitment to bring the budget back into surplus in 2012-13. Well, it was a commitment, but it has slipped and slided a bit since then. It became an objective, it became an aim, it became a hope, it became a dream and it became a fantasy—and now it has come back to being an objective. I still think it will end up being a fantasy, but we will have to wait and see.

The government have placed great emphasis on that commitment to a surplus as being the foundation of their economic credibility. But the deterioration in the state of the budget is not because of revenue shortfalls—although that is what the government always cites—but because of policy decisions by this government. What that means is spending; it means decisions taken by this government to spend more money, more money than they received in taxation revenue. That is why the budget is going pear-shaped. That is why the MYEFO next week is going to be more in the style of a minibudget than a mere economic update. A minibudget of that significance needs to be appropriately examined, and the place for it to be appropriately examined is here in the Australian Senate and over in the other place. The government should do two things. Firstly, they should withdraw this motion and allow the Senate to sit next week, as scheduled, on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Secondly, they should recall the House of Representatives so that it too can examine the MYEFO. There are two reasons that the Australian Senate should sit as scheduled—to allow it to do its job of examining legislation in order that it can do its job of being the house of review and to allow the House of Representatives to re-examine the MYEFO. I add a third reason: to allow us have the question times which were scheduled for next week. Question time in this Senate and in the other place is one of the great accountability mechanisms of the Westminster system. We have a few more accountability mechanisms in the Australian Senate. We have our estimates committee system, which is the envy of parliaments around the world and is a robust and fantastic accountability mechanism, but the centrepiece of government accountability to the parliament under the Westminster system is question time, and we and the Australian public will be denied three question times—on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday—next week.

It is not as though this is a particularly good government. You might not concede that, Madam Acting Deputy President Stephens, but I think the majority of the Australian public would agree with it. Governments which are this bad need scrutiny. They need the scrutiny of question time and the opportunity it affords to shine the light upon them, and that opportunity will be denied us next week. We need to have those question times next week because this government should go scarcely a day without examination. It is bad enough already that the Australian parliament this year is sitting on fewer days than in almost any non-election year in its history, but this government is seeking to further curtail the number of days that the parliament sits and further curtail the opportunities for scrutiny through question time.

We need to have the opportunity to continue to examine this government for a number of reasons. This government has perfected the crafting of bad policy—they have made an art form of it. You will recall, Madam Acting Deputy President, Fuelwatch and GroceryWatch. One of those got up for a while, and the other never got off the ground. They were very badly crafted policies. This government's border protection policy is a debacle. This government has made an art form of bad policy, and one of the reasons that we need to have the Senate sitting and to have question time is so that we can continue to examine and probe bad policy. Another reason that we need to have those question times is that, although this government's policy crafting is bad, they are even worse at implementing it. So there is bad policy, which is not a great way to start, and then there is absolute incompetence in administering that bad policy. There is hopelessness on top of bad conception, and it is a really bad combination. We need to have the opportunity in this place, in question time, to find out if there are further administrative blunders—to try to protect the government from themselves and to try to expose some of this bad policy before it goes too far. We need to have the opportunity to ask about badly crafted policy; we need to have the opportunity to inquire about program administration.

Scott Ryan (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Small Business and Fair Competition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And programmatic specificity!

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And programmatic specificity! If you could encapsulate the crafting of bad policy in one phrase, it would be Kevin Rudd's—the former Prime Minister's—'programmatic specificity'. There is an even more important reason, though, that we need to have question time next week, and that is the very basic principle of the accountability of a government to the parliament. This government evade accountability at every opportunity. They evaded it on the carbon tax when they lied to the Australian people—they did not want to be accountable to the Australian people, so they fibbed. They then evaded accountability by curtailing debate in this place on the carbon tax, and they have sought to do that again this week with the 33 bills before us. They take every opportunity to evade accountability.

It is also important to have the parliament sit in order to hold the government to account because we know that they are specialists in deceit. This government promised that they would be better than the coalition. They promised that they would set new standards of accountability and integrity. We have heard Senator Faulkner talk a great deal about that. I do not doubt Senator Faulkner's sincerity on that point, but I tell you: I do not think many of his colleagues share it. This government is characterised by deceit.

Perhaps the most disgusting example of deceit that we have seen in recent times is what happened over the other side of this building yesterday. This outfit really have a taste for guillotines. They guillotine legislation, and yesterday they guillotined a Speaker. That has not happened for centuries. Off with his head! Boom! It came off, it was clean and it was quick—it was a guillotine. His head is gone; he is gone; it is over—we have a new Speaker there. The reason I say that it was one of the most disgusting things I have seen since I have been in this place is that one can only wonder—though I am not going to cast aspersions on anyone—about the circumstances that led to the former Speaker's resignation. I am tempted to take the former Speaker's words at face value, but I can tell you, Madam Acting Deputy President, that there are many who will not, including most members of the Australian public and including the Australian press gallery. I do not think they will take his words at face value. There could be no clearer example of why it is important that the parliament sit every day on which it is scheduled to do so than the events of yesterday. Nothing this government does is straightforward. Nothing this government does is as it seems. This government has perfected deceit. This government has turned it into an art from.

We need to have this Senate sit next week. We need to have it sit so that we can appropriately debate the remainder of the 33 bills which are still before us. We need to have the Senate sit next week so that the MYEFO minibudget can receive appropriate scrutiny. We need to have the Senate sit next week so that we can perform the function of holding the government to account. We need to sit next week so that the government is answerable to the chamber that the people have elected. We need to sit next week so that the Australian people get value from this chamber.

As Paul Keating always said, the Australian public should get value from their parliament. We need to sit next week so that we can ask this government questions about their badly crafted policies. We need to sit next week so that we can ask the government questions about their administrative competence and about the programs which they are seeking to deliver. We need to sit next week so that we can make sure that this government does not continue in its deceit of the Australian people.

This—the curtailing of the sitting of parliament—is not a minor matter. People have fought for centuries over the rights and prerogatives of parliaments. People die for the opportunity to have their parliaments meet, sit, be elected. We should not be cavalier in dismissing sitting days of the Australian parliament. We are elected to do a job. On this side of the chamber we want to do that job. The government should withdraw this motion. The Australian Greens, if this motion is put, should vote with us. This motion stands condemned.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I recognise that there is a great deal of interest in this debate. It goes to the very core of what we, as members of parliament, are doing here. I understand that there are very different motivations for why people come to the Senate—it is a very important house, as has been pointed out—and how they actually get here. I recognise that some get installed in the Senate because they are being pensioned off from the union movement or because they can no longer see the fulfilment of their dreams in other aspects of their lives. I recognise that for some this is just a retirement plan. But for many of us the decision to come to the Senate, and the opportunity to do so, is driven by a real desire to review legislation and to consider the implications for the Australian people of the direction of our nation and the direction of our economy.

I take that responsibility very seriously. I am not from some fringe group that has stumbled into it, as have members of the Greens party. I am someone who came here to make a difference. And I know that many of my colleagues on this side of the chamber actually take this very seriously. In accordance with that it is appropriate that there are times when 'time management', as it is euphemistically called, or the 'guillotine', as it has been referred to in this instance, can be applied, in the interests of the Australian nation. That is something that governments have to use on occasions. They have to use it wisely.

But where this motion put forward by the government rankles—it contradicts the common sense that should be with us all—is in the simple fact that we have scheduled three sitting days for next week in which we could fully explore the plethora of legislation or bills that has been put before this Senate and has been cut off without a single word of debate or discussion. That has effectively neutered the role of all of us in this parliament to critically examine and assess what is going on. We have had an example of some of this with the family law bills, which are very contentious. I know that there are many people in this place who have received numerous emails and communications about problems with the family law bills and how they could be amended. But we did not even have a debate in the committee stage on the legislation. This is an outrage; it is a travesty. The people in this place have a democratic right to critically examine legislation.

So I am not against time management but I am against the abuse of what I believe is our democratic process. I am against the government being held hostage by a group of fringe dwellers—the fairies at the bottom of the garden known as the Greens party. That is exactly what is happening here. We know that the Greens leader, Senator Bob Brown—who is currently before the Privileges Committee for allegations of misconduct in pursuit of his duties—has basically said to the government, 'My team and I are going to Durban to crow about this great green tax that we have placed upon the Australian people, that we have forced upon the Gillard government, and we are going to trumpet it around the world,' notwithstanding the fact that the rest of the world has said that this is a joke. Just today, and yesterday, there was a release of a stack of emails which highlighted, once again, the folly of the climate change movement and the zealots within it. In the emails they overstate their case—it has been reported by the IPCC—about the climatic effects of carbon dioxide, if any, and also celebrate the deceit they have played out upon people around the world. It is a monumental hoax and a monumental fraud that will be exposed.

But, notwithstanding the facts and the evidence, the Greens movement are going to triumph about their re-engineering of the Australian economy in Durban. They are going to fly there first class, I am sure. I am not sure which one of their sponsors will be paying the way but I will look forward to reading their declarations of interest.

As a result of that, we have to truncate and remove three days of debate in this place. Senator Fifield accurately described why that is a misuse of the parliamentary numbers in this place. Let's not pretend that these three days were annexed last week or earlier this week in case we needed them; they were part of the sitting calendar. We have all prepared for them. We have managed our ability to discuss bills and to deal with the government's requirements according to the parliamentary calendar. But what happens today? Senator Ludwig is told by Senator Bob Brown to come in here and guillotine those three days of the sitting period. This is not time management. This is a government held hostage and playing right into the hands of their greatest enemy and their greatest threat—that is, the great threat to Australia: the radical green movement. Yesterday was the four-year anniversary of perhaps the most belligerent, backbiting, nasty, incompetent and just generally hopeless government that this country has ever seen. We have seen butchery of a scale unprecedented. We saw, of course, the knifing of the first-term Prime Minister, Mr Rudd. He was not a particularly good Prime Minister, but certainly the annals of history now reflect very well upon him given the fact that Ms Gillard is proving to be even worse. So after four years not only are they butchering their own, not only are they now controlled by the Greens party, but they are butchering our right and the right of every Australian to have a critical examination of the bills that are facing us.

Next week is a lost opportunity to examine the 20 or so bills that have been chopped off in this place without any debate or discussion. Can we believe that? I just put that to the Australian people: does it pass the probity test? Does it pass the commonsense test? Does it sit well with you that 20 or so bills in this parliament that affect the future of our nation, that direct our laws and our conduct and behaviour have gone through this place without a single word of debate, without a single word of examination, without a committee period in which we could ask questions of the government to determine whether this is in the best interests of the Australian nation? I would put to you, Acting Deputy President Stephens—and to the people of Australia—that this sits so uncomfortably with our freedoms and our democracy, which people have fought and lost their lives to defend. And what is happening now? The legacy, the message, the traditions, the conventions of this place have been killed just as surely as the Speaker of the House of Representatives was politically killed yesterday.

This is a time in which the world is facing a number of critical challenges, and Australia is not immune from those challenges. Australians want from their parliamentarians not just a cursory tick and flick, which is the process which has infected Europe and caused such a devastating impact on so many economies there. It has seen the bureaucrats taking control of the legislative agenda and the parliamentarians merely sidelined as puppets on the stage to the bureaucratic bungling. We cannot afford to have that in this country, and yet that is the path we are going down when we have legislation brought into this place and passed through this place without a single word of debate or discussion. Is that the future we see for our nation, where parliamentarians are ineffective, where the brutal numbers of a government are used in deciding what is going to come in and what is not, and what can be talked about and what cannot?

It is the new style totalitarianism on display. It is the social democratic movement which is stifling freedom of speech, stifling the democratic process in this country—all in the name of appeasing a very, very dangerous political movement, and that is the Greens party. We know they have a radical social agenda. By Senator Bob Brown's own admission he would like to see global government and the centralising of bureaucracy, where everyone in the world has one vote and one voice—and, of course, only some voices are allowed to be heard. This is the tragedy of what we experiencing. It is the very first stage of this. Three scheduled parliamentary sitting days are being removed from the calendar by the government's representative, by the mover of this motion, Senator Ludwig.

Ultimately the Australian people will decide whether the conduct of this government is appropriate or not. They will decide whether having a government that is held hostage to a tiny minority extremist movement is in the interests of this country. But in the meantime, before the next election, the very least we should expect is some probity and prudence in our policy making. The problem with this is that, if the government had a track record which was enviable, a track record in which their decisions, their implementation of their policy agenda, had a modicum of success—if they could even highlight three successes—we might give them the benefit of the doubt, but, unfortunately, they have a legacy of waste, a legacy of betrayal, a legacy of butchery, a legacy of failure.

It can be characterised in so many different ways. At the last election, for example, we had the cash-for-clunkers scheme brought in by Minister Carr. That was his suggestion. What a dud that was. It did not even survive the election period. Of course we had, 'There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead,' from a deceptive Prime Minister who did mislead the Australian people, because the carbon tax has been passed—at the insistence of the radical Greens.

Scott Ludlam (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Hear, hear!

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I notice, Senator Ludlam, you say, 'Hear, hear!' which is fine. You might well enjoy re-engineering the Australian economy to satisfy your own bloodlust to take control of the Australian people, but it is not going to actually make any difference to the environment. I think we acknowledge that. The rest of the world is not going down this path. It will disadvantage Australian industry and Australian jobs. You think that is a good piece of policy. I think the Australian people will beg to differ.

So we had this promise by Ms Gillard not to introduce a carbon tax—a broken promise. We had talk of a citizens' assembly on climate change. I still remember that when Minister Penny Wong—who has had such a great track record in this space!—was there, nodding enthusiastically and going around trumpeting the virtues of building a consensus across the Australian people. But, of course, they get into parliament, the Greens tell the government what to do, and the Australian people start saying: 'Hang on, there is no consensus. The science that you have been telling us is settled is not settled at all. You said the rest of the world was going to be going down this path. They are not going down this path at all.' Even their mythical hero, President Obama, is not going down this path. He is taking a direct action plan. In the face of all of that, they ditched their citizens' assembly.

We have any number of other issues that this government has failed to deliver on, and that is building on a track record of failure by the previous government under Mr Rudd and later Ms Gillard in the previous parliament. As Senator Fifield pointed out, we had Fuelwatch, which I do not think managed to even get a start. We had GroceryWatch, in which millions of dollars were invested in a price-monitoring website which did not work. So that the government could do the Pontius Pilate and wash its hands of it, it sent it off to a consumer organisation, but of course that was not sustainable either. Millions of dollars were wasted.

If you examine the stimulus package critically, not only were there aspects of it which were abject failures but the essence of it was grotesque waste. It is as if a billion dollars—that is, $1,000 million—has very little meaning anymore to the government. When they were building school halls, they wasted around $8,000 million of borrowed money. It was not even money they had in the bank. It was not taxpayers' money. It was money they borrowed that future taxpayers will have to pay back. That has mortgaged the future generations of this country. It was not just that $8 billion in waste but a cumulative $150 billion or so in waste in only four years.

We had the $900 payments that were sent out to people. Some would argue that that is taxpayers receiving their money back, but unfortunately it did not go just to taxpayers; it went to people who were living overseas. I am sure that helped to stimulate the Greek economy, the Italian economy or the British economy! It was just wasted. It went to people who were deceased. The $900 stimulus payment went to dead people, if you can believe that. If that does not go against the common sense that means we should be critically examining everything that comes through this place, I do not know what does.

The government is now in a war against gambling and poker machines. That is once again at the behest of an Independent. But I remember when I remarked in this place that sending people $900 so that it could be used simply in poker machines was not really a great use of taxpayers' money, and I remember one senator standing up and saying: 'What have you got against poker machines? It's okay to do it.' Well, I do not have anything against poker machines, but I think that if governments want to stimulate the economy there are some better things they can do with $10 billion than simply giving it to dead people and people overseas and allowing people to blow it on gaming machines. Honestly, if you have taken the tax from them, you might as well invest it wisely. You could even cut taxes for people so that taxpayers actually got a longstanding benefit. But of course we did not see that happen. We do not see those far-sighted applications from the government because it is always a knee-jerk reaction. It is always, 'How can we get a political bang for our buck?' rather than, 'How can this nation get some nation building or get some long-term benefit for the taxpayers' buck?'

Through all these abject failures, the government has never said, 'The buck stops here.' That is a very important thing. Who has taken responsibility for the failures of this government? Have we seen any minister sacked or held to account for the policy failures? Have we seen Minister Garrett, who reigned over some of the worst decision making we have seen, held to account? The answer is no, he is still in the cabinet. Did we see Ms Gillard, who oversaw Building the Education Revolution, held to account? No, she got promoted. She got promoted for knifing Mr Kevin Rudd and she got promoted for wasting billions of dollars.

Have we seen in this place anyone held to account for the massive broadband blowout, the NBN, that went from $4 billion initially, I think, in the original tender to something like $46 billion today? That is not even included in the debt figures of this government. Did we see Senator Wong held to account for the disgraceful and misleading manner in which the government tried to sell the emissions trading scheme to this parliament—for the fakery, the misleading statements, the abuse and the belittling of anyone who dared to question what was going on?

But it has reached a new low now. It is no longer just asking a question and receiving abuse in response because the government does not like the question. We are now not even allowed to ask the questions. We are not allowed to ask the questions that the Australian people want to know the answers to. We are not allowed to ask questions about the bills that this government is seeking to implement that will forever change our country—or while this government is in power—because we cannot rescind them.

And why are we not allowed to do this? We are not allowed to do it because (1) the government has very few questions and (2) the Greens party have something better to do than be in this parliament, according to them. According to them, the Australian people are not as important as the global governance movement that will be meeting in Durban, where they will all be able to slap each other on the back and say: 'Look at us; aren't we good? We're saving the world from the nasty people, the people who care about the local people. We only care about centralising bureaucracy and entrenching power and our influence.' We are seeing what happens as a grotesque misuse of that power. That is why those on this side of the chamber like to see full and free debate.

That brings me back to my initial point. I understand perfectly that there are times when time management needs to be implemented by government. I understand that perfectly and, in a cooperative arrangement, those things can be achieved. But it does not pass the common-sense test and it does not pass the scrutiny and the probity test that three scheduled days of this parliament are going to be abolished under this motion by Senator Ludwig, and yet there are 20 bills this week that we are not allowed to talk about, that we have not been allowed to even question or make a contribution to the debate on. That is an indictment not only of this government. It is an indictment of their Greens masters, and it is a great travesty for the people of Australia. That is why I will be voting against this motion, not in my interests—I would love to go home—but in the interests of the Australian people.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to add my voice of opposition to this motion by the Greens and the Labor Party to cut three days off the sitting time of this parliament. Heaven knows, this is one of the shortest parliamentary years we have had on record. Clearly the Labor Party and the Greens do not want parliamentary debate because they have no interest in democracy. It is clear as well that one of the reasons is that Labor Party politicians, and particularly the Greens politicians, want to head off to Durban to swan around the stage at the COP17 meeting on climate change. Senator Hanson-Young interjected on me before, indicating that Senator Brown, Senator Milne and whoever else from the Greens are not going on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. They are not going until the following week and they are paying their own way over there.

Well, I look forward to their contribution to this debate so they can put on record their argument against suggestions that I and others have made that cancelling three days of parliament is all about the Greens political party getting ready to head off to Durban to wander the world stage on climate change issues. We know that is going to be a farce. The intergovernmental panel that started this off a few years ago was reported this week as coming back on their forecasts of climate change. In fact, the headlines are saying 'climate forecasts have been overstated'.

What has been said by the Greens and the Labor Party for many years about the importance of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which leads to this further junket that we will see next week and the following week, is all based—a bit like the carbon tax itself—on exaggerated comments and on lies in the case of this conference. It is based on what are now said to be exaggerated climate forecasts. I look forward to hearing the Greens tell us when they are going to Durban. Tell us it is not next Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Tell us it is not because you want to head off to Durban that you are cutting three days off the parliamentary year.

The debate in the last few weeks has been guillotined by the Labor Party and the Greens political party. The normal debate that we would have on 20 bills has been not only reduced but also cancelled. We passed 20 bills during this week with not one word being said on them—not one word in favour of the bills, not one word in argument, not one question answered, and no scrutiny allowed of a government which, dear me, requires a lot of scrutiny. Not one piece of scrutiny was allowed by the Greens political party and the Australian Labor Party.

Senator Ludlam interjecting —

I hear 'let's get on to the bill'. Senator Ludlam, why not sit next week so we can discuss these bills?

Senator Hanson-Young interjecting—

I think Senator Hanson-Young said 'more people should be listening to this debate' and I agree with her. (Quorum formed) While we were waiting for the Labor Party, which prior to this had two people in the chamber listening to this important debate—that shows what an arrogant government we have—I heard the Manager of Government Business berating our manager about curtailing this debate. I heard the Manager of Government Business, Senator Ludwig, issue a threat: 'If you want to debate this bill, we are going to guillotine it as well.' This is just typical—

Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Acting Deputy President, on a point of order. I did not say that, you boofhead!

Mark Bishop (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is no point of order.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Do you see how sensitive the Australian Labor Party are when their issues are exposed to the Australian public through the medium of telecommunications that we now have? Today, we have to deal with the Competition and Consumer Legislation Amendment Bill, a very important bill; the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Bill, perhaps one of the most significant human rights bills for some time and I know Senator Brandis is very keen to have a full-scale debate on that; the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation and Other Legislation Amendment Bill; and the Social Security Amendment (Student Income Support Reforms) Bill. That all has to be dealt with by 1 pm today—in two short hours. Why do they have to be dealt with by 1 pm today when there are three days left in the parliamentary sitting calendar? We could be debating those bills at length, as we should in this chamber, on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of next week. In addition to that I understand from having a look at the Notice Paper that there is a bill on migration, the Deterring People Smuggling Bill 2011, that needs to be addressed. I guess we are going to do that after 1 pm. We will start getting these pressures: 'People have booked flights and everyone wants to go home.' I have heard interjections saying: 'Why are you speaking? We have heard this all before.' I am speaking in the hope that someone in the media might actually give a front-page focus to the travesty of democracy that the Greens and the Australian Labor Party have imposed upon the people of Australia. I notice this Courier-Mail headline: 'King Rat'. I would like to see a front page that says, 'Travesty of democracy', and details the bills that have been rammed through this parliament without one person speaking on them, without one person being able to raise objections. I have mentioned that there are several bills plus an important migration bill yet to be done. Here we are guillotining them through so that we have only a few minutes to speak on them. I suspect we will not even get to some of them. They will joining the list of 20 bills that have been dealt with without any debate whatsoever.

I finish on this note: when there is so much business for this parliament to do, why are we taking away three days that have been listed for more than six months as part of the parliamentary calendar? That is a disgrace. It is a travesty of democracy that the Greens political party and the Australian Labor Party would shut the parliament down when there is so much business yet to do. I remind senators that they are paid to be in this chamber. They are paid to debate legislation. They are not paid to be jumping on first-class aircraft and slipping over to South Africa for a jolly couple of weeks, as the Greens clearly intend to do and as a number of Labor Party people intend to do as well. I urge senators to vote against this motion and ensure that we have the next three days for parliamentary debate.

Question put:

That the motion (Senator Ludwig's) be agreed to.

The Senate divided. [12:21]

(The President—Senator Hogg)

Question agreed to.