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

Let's see if we have any more luck with this motion. I ask that general business notice of motion No. 247 standing in my name for today, relating to Myanmar and the plight of the Rohingya people in particular, be taken as a formal motion.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Formality has been denied.

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to make a short statement.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is leave granted?

Arthur Sinodinos (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes!

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am looking for noes rather than yeses, Senator Sinodinos. There being no objection, leave is granted for one minute.

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In line with the government's longstanding view, motions that cannot be debated or amended should not deal with complex foreign policy matters. The government welcomes Myanmar State Counsellor and Nobel Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi's agreement with all recommendations of the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State led by the former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. Myanmar has said it will properly implement a majority of recommendations.

Discussions in the Human Rights Council are fluid and ongoing. Australia's aim is to encourage an outcome that improves the human rights situation on the ground rather than to focus on a particular mechanism. Australian ministers and officials continue to raise the government's deep concerns about the situation in the Rakhine State directly with the Myanmar government.

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

I seek leave to make a brief statement.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for one minute.

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

I appreciate that. Thank you, colleagues, and thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. It is extraordinary that today the Australian government has decided this is a complex foreign policy matter. It was only the last time the Senate convened that in fact we had a unanimous agreement by this chamber—including by government senators—that the Australian government would consider a United Nations commission of inquiry.

The human rights abuses that are being perpetrated in Rakhine State at the moment are utterly beyond belief. More than 1,000 people are estimated to have been killed in the recent crackdown, and nearly 100,000 people have been displaced.

If it was good enough for the Australian Senate to vote unanimously for an international UN commission of inquiry then, what has changed? Within less than a fortnight the Australian government turned tail and suddenly decided it was fine for the government of Myanmar to investigate itself. Colleagues, this should be above politics. This should have again been a unanimous resolution of the Senate. We must place human rights and the defence of the innocent people who are being subjected to this persecution higher than the partisan squabbles in this place.