Rearrangement

Michaelia Cash

I seek leave to move a motion, as circulated, relating to consideration of government amendments to formal business.

Leave not granted.

Pursuant to contingent notice standing in my name, I move:

That so much of standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion to provide for the consideration of a matter, namely a motion to give precedence to a motion relating to the consideration of government amendments to formal business.

You all know why we are here. Day after day, hour after hour, what the government is doing is delaying the Senate by deliberately moving amendment after amendment after amendment, buying itself more time, more time, more time, in notices of motion. It is important today that we suspend standing orders to have a good look at this motion and then, I would hope, pass it. Why? Because the government is wasting the time of the Senate. When you waste the time of the Senate, quite frankly, you abuse the privileges that the taxpayers of Australia have given us to come in here and actually deal with the matters that are of most important concern to them.

This motion represents the coalition's determination to step up and take control of the chamber, because the government is losing complete control of the chamber, and ensure we cut through the fog of delay, because, we all know, when we look at the _Notice Paper_here it is—this is now hours and hours this afternoon doing nothing more and nothing less than each amendment to a motion dividing and the government buying itself more time to, quite frankly and disappointingly, do what it should be doing—that is, debate the very important issues that matter to the Australian taxpayer.

So, quite frankly, if the government won't be disciplined with its time, we will join with the crossbenches to take control of the chamber and ensure we put back in place some form of procedural rules. Motion after motion after motion, hours and hours of delay—this government has seen fit to amend rather than progress, with motion after motion, with amendments delayed and shuffled around the Notice Paper as though, quite frankly, the Senate's time is just something we play with. The taxpayers don't send us here and say, 'Do what you like. Spend hours crossing over backwards and forwards doing, quite frankly, absolutely nothing but pandering to a government agenda that is nothing more and nothing less than delay, delay, delay because they don't want to provide the Australian taxpayer with transparency.'

It is not often I try to suspend standing orders but this is an important item and that is why we need to suspend standing orders. If the government will not debate the issues that matter to the Australian taxpayer, we will help them to do just that. We have a government not willing to stand at the dispatch box and argue for its program, not willing to stand here and answer questions on its legislation so the Australian people properly understand what the government is doing to them; instead, we see procedural motion after procedural motion after division after division. When people say, 'What did you do in the Senate today?' I have to say, 'We shuffled paper on behalf of the Australian taxpayer courtesy of the Labor government that, quite frankly, has no respect for the Australian taxpayer.' So, again, it is important today that the Senate unite, pass this motion to bring a little bit of decorum, a little bit of procedural fairness back to the chamber.

The motion is very simple. All it says is the government has to make amendments to the motion. We accept that. We will not stop the government from making the amendments but we will stop wasting the Senate's time, our time, the Liberal and National Party, the crossbench's time. There is little time in this place to put your case. To the people in the gallery, we are actually doing this on behalf of you, the taxpayer. I assume you don't want us to spend hours of the day just sitting on each side of the chamber because the government does not have the guts to come in here and actually answer questions on transparency.

The motion is simple. You will get to put your amendments, no issues at all; however, you will not divide on each one. What you are going to do is put one amendment. We are going to put them all together—so if you want your amendments to get up, they will—and we will then ensure we dispense properly of the business of the Senate. As I said, if the government are not prepared to be the adults in this chamber and actually properly respect the Australian taxpayer, the opposition will be.

Penny Wong

I will perhaps start where—

Michaelia Cash

It's not often you come down to do this.

Penny Wong

I will perhaps start where the Leader of the Opposition—

Honourable senators interjecting—

Chair, please.

Dave Sharma

Order, please. Senator Wong has the call.

Penny Wong

I know they're your side, but it would be good to call them.

Dave Sharma

Senator Wong—

Penny Wong

Do I have the call?

Dave Sharma

I ask that you respect the chair.

Penny Wong

Yes, I do respect the chair—

Dave Sharma

I was seeking to restore order—

Penny Wong

and I'm asking you to exercise your authority.

Dave Sharma

and I've just asked to restore order. Senator Wong, you have the call.

Penny Wong

Thank you. I will start where the Leader of the Opposition left off, which was: who are the adults in the room? We've seen how adult this opposition, this Greens party and this One Nation party are or are not. We have conflict in the Middle East.

Honourable senators interjecting—

Dave Sharma

Order! Please allow Senator Wong to be heard in silence. Senator Cash was heard in silence. Please allow Senator Wong to be heard in silence.

Penny Wong

We have conflict in the Middle East. We have 115,000 Australians in the Middle East. We have Iran attacking not one, not two, not three but 10 countries—10 countries.

Honourable senators interjecting—

Dave Sharma

Order! Senators, I ask that Senator Wong be heard in silence. That courtesy was extended to Senator Cash.

Penny Wong

We are dealing with a consular crisis 24 hours a day, and I hope I can have some updates for the chamber—

Dave Sharma

Order! Senators, I ask that you listen to Senator Wong in silence. If you want to continue a conversation, please leave the chamber to do so.

Penny Wong

I hope we can have some updates on that later today for the chamber and for the public.

We have an opposition that has not asked a single question on the economy. That says something about their priorities. The Leader of the Opposition in the Senate is here arguing about some Senate procedure but is not interested in asking a question about the economy. We have the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party, who still hasn't asked a question. What I would say, through you, Chair—

Dave Sharma

Senator McKenzie on a point of order.

Bridget McKenzie

It is on direct relevance to the suspension motion in front of the Senate. As the Chair has previously ruled, you must speak to the motion before the chair, which is on the suspension—not on matters in the Middle East or why the government is or isn't focused on what it's doing, but on the suspension order motion that is in front of the chair.

Dave Sharma

Thank you, Senator McKenzie. I'm listening closely to Senator Wong. I believe she is referring to the relative priority afforded to government business, so, Senator Wong, please continue.

Penny Wong

I appreciate that, because that is precisely what I am pointing to. It is precisely the point I am making: this is all happening in the world and this is all happening in the Australian community, but you are focused on issues of Senate procedure. I would invite the opposition: if you want to be the adults in the room, maybe do some of the reflection that your election review, which was tabled—

Dave Sharma

Senator Cash on a point of order.

Michaelia Cash

Again, it is on direct relevance. With all due respect to the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate—again, you're doing exactly what you say you don't like done in the Senate, which is to not address the question and give a speech. I would ask you to direct the Leader of the Opposition to actually answer and reflect on—

A government senator: Government.

Government—the question before the chair.

Dave Sharma

I'm going to seek some advice from the Clerk. The Leader of the Government, Senator Wong, is referring to the relative importance of business before the chamber, which is pertinent to the motion. Senator Wong may continue.

Penny Wong

That is precisely the point I am making—that those opposite, the opposition, are much more focused on their internals and matters of procedure, as is evinced both by the questions that they are engaging in and by this stunt. I accept that the crossbench is going to engage in these sorts of measures. I think the Senate—

Michaelia Cash

Really? Seriously?

Penny Wong

If I could finish, Senator Cash; I did listen to you with courtesy. I think that the crossbench—and I'm sure the manager will say something about this—is using OPDs in a way that, as a senator who has been here for over 20 years, I have not seen. I think that deserves a collaborative discussion. If people don't want to engage in that, it's a matter for them. I would say to the opposition that there was a time when parties of government who actually thought of themselves as parties of government behaved like adults. This opposition is not behaving like adults.

Sean Bell

One Nation will be supporting this motion, because it is entirely appropriate to deal with what is going on. The Labor government is intentionally wasting the Senate's time. That is abundantly clear. There are very important things that we should be dealing with, and the government is wasting this chamber's time. You can say it's a procedural issue, but, at the heart of it, you are intentionally wasting time. This has to stop. It is so disrespectful to the taxpayer. It is so disrespectful to the Australian people to engage—it's childish. It is a childish way that you are behaving. You are dragging things out intentionally, and it needs to stop.

One Nation is prepared to assist anyone who wants to resolve this. This is a perfectly reasonable motion, and I am glad that Labor acknowledges that we need to speed things up. If you want to speed things up, then I would hope that would support this motion, too. It is so obvious what you are doing. You are intentionally dragging things out, and then, at the end of the week, you will come and say, 'We are out of time,' and then you will move a guillotine and seek to rush legislation through. You will shut down debate. You are wasting time now to give yourself an excuse in the future to shut down debate and ram through legislation. That is inappropriate.

We must resolve things now so you can no longer use the excuse of being out of time. You have the time now to fix this. Let's fix it, and let's get on with the business of the Senate that we should be dealing with.

Katy Gallagher

I welcome the opportunity to talk about orders for the production of documents and the way that they are being used in the chamber. I think it requires going back and having a look at what has happened, and I've spoken about that in the chamber before.

In the past, in the early years of the Senate, orders for production of documents were used sparingly, and for a period of time in the sixties, seventies and eighties they weren't used at all. In 2006, there was one that passed the Senate. It was seen as the most significant power available to the Senate to call for documents. As Senator Wong just said, that has changed. It's changed most dramatically in this parliamentary term, where, on Monday, we had 32 orders for production of documents in one day.

If we think back to how they were handled, and it was the way that the opposition used to handle it when they were in government—not when there were that many—the practice was to let orders of production through, which was the approach that we took for a period of time. Then we were criticised and misrepresented by the Senate saying, 'Everyone has agreed to this order for the production of documents, and they are not complying.' So we decided that, yes, we would put our vote on the record every single time we did not agree with an order for the production of documents and have that recorded as a division—as is our right. That was so it could be very clear that, while the rest of the Senate was deciding that documents that had already been published online should be produced for the Senate or documents that maybe covered 130,000 documents should be provided tomorrow, we didn't agree with that. That is why we're dividing and that is why we're amending. We have every single right to do so, just as all of you have a right to move amendments to anything in this place. We respect that right. But don't come in here and say that this is a problem of the government's making. It is not. It is the way formal business is being misused and abused by the Senate.

Bridget McKenzie

You're just time wasting; don't guillotine your own legislation.

Varun Ghosh

Order! Senator McKenzie, your interjections are disorderly.

Long debate text truncated.