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senate vote 2022-12-15#1
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2022-12-22 11:51:51
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Title
Business — Days and Hours of Meeting- Business - Days and Hours of Meeting - Let a vote happen
Description
<p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>I seek leave to move a motion relating to the hours of meeting and routine of business for today.</p>-
- The majority voted in favour of a [motion](https://www.openaustralia.org.au/senate/?id=2022-12-15.11.2) to suspend the usual procedural rules - known as [standing orders](https://peo.gov.au/understand-our-parliament/how-parliament-works/parliament-at-work/standing-orders/) - to let another vote take place. It was introduced by ACT Senator [Katy Gallagher](https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/senate/act/katy_gallagher) (Labor).
- ### Motion text
- > *That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion to provide for the consideration of a motion relating to the hours of meeting and routine of business immediately.*
<p>Leave not granted.</p><p>Pursuant to contingent notice standing in the name of Senator Wong, I move:</p><p class="italic">That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion to provide for the consideration of a motion relating to the hours of meeting and routine of business immediately.</p><p>I would like to begin by thanking the Senate for coming back and having this urgent sitting of the Senate so soon after we adjourned for the year. It is important that the Senate consider the bills that have been passed by the House of Representatives today and that we deal with this today. It is no surprise that those opposite are using a procedural motion to avoid debating these bills today. These bills are about saving jobs—</p><p>Opposition senators interjecting—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Minister, please resume your seat. Senator Hanon-Young?</p> <p class="speaker">Sarah Hanson-Young</p><p>A point of order—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Order, Senator McKenzie! I've got a senator on her feet with a point of order.</p> <p class="speaker">Sarah Hanson-Young</p><p>A point of order, Madam President: even with the microphone on, I couldn't hear the minister speaking.</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Thank you, Senator Hanson-Young. It was my intention to call the senators to order. I would ask that this debate be heard in silence.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>Thank you, President. These bills that come before the Senate as urgent bills that must be dealt with today are about saving Australian industry and business. They're about saving Australian manufacturing. They're about saving Australian—</p><p>Opposition senators interjecting—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>I just asked the minister to sit and asked senators that the debate be heard in silence, and the minute the minister was called back to her feet the interjections started. They are disorderly and disrespectful.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>Thank you, President. They're about supporting cost-of-living pressures for Australian families, for households and for individuals who are struggling under these increases in the cost of energy.</p><p>The government has been working on this—a solution for some of these cost increases—for the last couple of months.</p><p>Opposition senators interjecting—</p><p>After a wasted decade—we hear the laughter over there. The reason we are here dealing with this is an illegal invasion of Ukraine and 10 years of dysfunction and denial and the failure of those opposite on energy policy. They are the two reasons we are here.</p><p>Opposition senators interjecting—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Order! Minister Gallagher, please resume your seat.</p><p>Thank you, Senator Canavan and Senator Watt. Calling out across the chamber is disorderly. We have a minister on her feet. I'm going to ask you again to listen.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>I hear those over there laughing, but last Friday the Prime Minister struck an agreement with every state and territory government in Australia, with governments of different political persuasions, governments that are responsible for dealing with issues as they arise, who understand the pressure that businesses, industry and households are under and who see the urgency behind these reforms that we are bringing forward. They are from all sides of politics. They see it. And here we have this mob over here on the wrong side of history, and we will remember this. Don't you forget: we will remember this. Your names will be recorded in <i>Hansard</i>each and every one of you who are going to stand in the way of support for industry, support for jobs, support for small business and support for households. Let us not forget.</p><p>Honourable senators interjecting—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Senator Gallagher, please resume your seat. Once again, I've had to call the Senate to order. I would ask that the senator be heard in respectful silence. Senator, please continue.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>What you're seeing from this government, responding through this legislative reform package today, is a responsible government that has sat down and worked across the table with industry, with different stakeholders and with state and territory governments to provide some urgent solutions with a longer-term reform package, working across the parliament, talking to different senators and members of parliament about the right thing to do to bring forward this package, and you over there don't even want to debate it. You're not even going to give leave for us to bring this bill forward to debate it today.</p><p>We're going to see this. I can predict that over the next few hours we are going to have all the process arguments in the world raised. We're going to have, 'Oh, we didn't get this and we didn't get that.' But they will avoid the fact that, when they vote in opposition to this bill, they will be voting for higher power prices and for no cost-of-living relief for households and for business. That is what you will be voting for if you choose to continue on this path today.</p><p>This is an urgent sitting. It is urgent to deal with this to avoid the big price increases. Twenty-two failed energy policies—that is your record, and now you're going to try and stop us implementing one here today. That is what you're all about: opposition and refusing to deal with the challenges.</p><p>Head in the sand, Senator McGrath—that's where you like it. Avoid the issues. Don't deal with them. Don't support households. Don't support industry. don't support business. That is the position that you are taking today.</p><p>Well, over here we want to work with the parliament. We want to provide solutions. We want to work with Australian businesses and manufacturers. We want to take the pressure off households. We want to deal with the challenges that we're seeing—the energy crisis that we inherited from you—and you can't hide and avoid this decision today. No matter how hard you try, you are going to vote, and you're going to be on the wrong side of history.</p> <p class="speaker">Michaelia Cash</p><p>Colleagues, I hope Senator Gallagher gets the irony of the statement she just made today in the Senate given that, when in opposition, this was one of Senator Gallagher's favourite quotes: 'The Senate must stand up for itself.' I thought that's what you were all doing. 'It cannot become a patsy of the government.' Guess why we're here today, people. It's literally because of those on that side of the chamber and the Australian Greens—a patsy for the government. But it gets better, colleagues: 'It'—the Senate—'is meant to be here as a check on executive power.' The irony of the motion today! 'That is the role that we are asked to do.' But it gets worse, because then Senator Gallagher talks about our job descriptions: 'To fulfil our role in this place we must stand up for proper process.' Oh, proper process! And then she finishes it off with this: 'We cannot continue to have this chamber used as a rubber stamp for the government.' Bang! At 4.30 today, we will be a rubber stamp for this government.</p><p>You come in here seeking to move a motion that the hours of meeting be from 1 pm until adjournment. And then, colleagues, you read further. It says 'until adjournment. I think: 'Well, that's fair enough. We could sit until midnight.'</p><p>And then you get to part (c), Senator Colbeck: 'if, by 4.30 pm, consideration of the bill has not concluded'. Well, let me tell you: consideration of this bill will not have concluded, because on this side of the chamber all of my colleagues would like to speak. Senator Scarr wants to speak. Senator Colbeck wants to speak. Senator Henderson wants to speak. And guess what? They can't, because you are gagging debate on this particular bill. We need to get into committee stage as soon as possible.</p><p class="italic">Honourable senators interjecting —</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Senator Cash, please resume your seat. Once again, the interjections are disorderly. I would ask that Senator Cash be heard in silence.</p> <p class="speaker">Michaelia Cash</p><p>I have to say, again: in Senator Gallagher's comments, she referred to the Senate being here today to consider the bill. Well, the last time I checked, consideration of a bill meant you don't get it only 24 hours beforehand—</p><p>An opposition senator: Not even that!</p><p>We got it nine hours beforehand. This is one of the greatest interventions in the energy market that this country has ever seen, and there is little to no detail. We are not even given the courtesy of being able to consider this bill.</p><p>But, colleagues, it actually gets even more ironic, because Senator Gallagher has said, 'We have worked with industry.' Well, can I tell you, if you have worked with industry, then you have a major problem, because this is what industry—those who know, the experts—say about this piece of disastrous legislation: 'This is the single worst piece of energy policy I have seen anywhere in the world in almost 20 years.' That's what industry says about this bill. 'The government's proposed gas market legislation risks the very foundations of the east coast energy grid and all who use it.' That is the Australian taxpayer—mums and dads out there. That is Australians who use the energy market. And you are about to decimate it. But it gets worse. So much for working with industry, because they also say this: 'The damage has already started'—Bowen's blackouts are on the way—'nearly all gas contracting has shrivelled up in the last few days.'</p> <p class="speaker">Helen Polley</p><p>President, on a point of order: all comments should go through the chair, and it would be helpful if the senator were to give people from the other place their correct titles.</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Thank you, Senator Polley.</p><p>Honourable senators interjecting—</p><p>Order! The interjections that are being made are very loud, and so loud that it is very difficult to hear Senator Cash. Please continue, Senator Cash.</p> <p class="speaker">Michaelia Cash</p><p>I'd be delighted to use the Prime Minister's proper title, because guess what the Prime Minister said this morning in the House of Representatives, when he spoke to this? He said, 'This is the government's plan for energy price relief.' You've got to be kidding me! But he can't even mention the words '$275', which you said 97 times before the election. But you cannot bring yourselves now to mention the words '$275'.</p><p>Let's see which one of you—Senator Gallagher, I believe it's going to be you—is going to go through how, buried in the announcement of this bill, is that energy prices are now forecast by the government to increase by an extra six per cent in 2023-24. And it gets worse, because, accordingly, on the government's own modelling, bills will still increase by $407 in 2023-24 and a cumulative $702 across the next two financial years. Guess what? That is in your own legislation. The reason you're gagging it is that you don't want to talk about it. This is a complete affront to the processes in the Senate. Quite frankly, going forward the failure of the energy market will be on your heads.</p> <p class="speaker">Sarah Hanson-Young</p><p>I rise to speak to this motion for the suspension of standing orders today. The Australian Greens will be supporting this hours motion. We think it is absolutely important that this place does its job. The sheer hypocrisy of the mob on that side complaining about process, complaining about integrity, complaining that you had to rock up to work and do something! When was it? It was only a few years ago when, at this exact time, rather than be here while the country burnt, the Prime Minister was off having a bloody holiday!</p> <p class="speaker">Bridget McKenzie</p><p>President, on a point of order: we're very, very happy to stay as long as Senator Hanson-Young would like—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Senator McKenzie, what's the point of order?</p> <p class="speaker">Bridget McKenzie</p><p>Well, to be honest, I didn't really have one.</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Senator Hanson-Young, I have not called you back to your feet.</p><p>Senator McGrath, seriously! Your interjections particularly have been incredibly disorderly and disrespectful. You have constantly called out when I've called the Senate to order. I can barely hear Senator Hanson-Young particularly because of your interjections. She has the right to be heard in silence, and that's what I am asking senators to do.</p><p>Senator Colbeck, it is not okay to speak out when I'm calling the Senate to order. Senator Hanson-Young, please continue.</p> <p class="speaker">Sarah Hanson-Young</p><p>Only a few years ago, at this exact time of year, rather than pulling the country together, we know the former Prime Minister, Mr Morrison, was off having a holiday instead of working. Here we are. We've been asked today to come back and pass an important piece of legislation that will relieve pressure for everyday Australians, and this mob over here want to complain. They are squawking like seagulls over here.</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Senator Hanson-Young, please resume your seat. Senator Shoebridge?</p> <p class="speaker">David Shoebridge</p><p>On a point of order, President: I really cannot hear Senator Hanson-Young's contribution over the opposition. Who would have thought a policy that—</p> <p class="speaker">Sue Lines</p><p>Senator Shoebridge, you've made your point of order. I will call senators once again to listen in respectful silence.</p> <p class='motion-notice motion-notice-truncated'>Long debate text truncated.</p>-
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