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senate vote 2023-11-28#1
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2024-05-31 11:25:12
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Title
Business — Conference with House of Representatives- Business - Conference with House of Representatives - Suspend the usual procedural rules
Description
<p class="speaker">Jacqui Lambie</p><p>I seek leave to move a motion relating to a conference with the House of Representatives, as circulated.</p>-
- The majority voted in favour of a [motion](https://www.openaustralia.org.au/senate/?id=2023-11-28.4.2) to suspend the usual procedural rules - known as standing orders - to let another motion be put. This motion was put by Tasmanian Senator [Jacqui Lambie](https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/senate/tasmania/jacqui_lambie) (Jacqui Lambie Network).
- ### 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 matter, namely a motion to allow a motion relating to a conference with the House of Representatives to be moved and determined immediately.*
<p>Leave not granted.</p><p>Pursuant to contingent notice standing in my name, 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 matter, namely a motion to allow a motion relating to a conference with the House of Representatives to be moved and determined immediately.</p><p>In September of this year Senator David Pocock and I stood with first responders to ask Minister Burke to split four elements of the industrial relations legislation, what the government calls its closing loopholes bill. The first amendment would mean that federal police, paramedics and firefighters wouldn't have to prove that they have PTSD and go through those traumatic circumstances. The second amendment would protect victims of family and domestic violence being sacked or discriminated against in their workplaces. The third amendment protects redundancy payments for workers when a large business becomes a small business due to insolvency. The fourth amendment brings silicosis into line with asbestosis. These amendments shouldn't have been put into industrial relations legislation in the first place. It was a low-down act to do so, and I call that out this morning.</p><p>We have urged Minister Burke to split out these four uncontroversial elements so that we can put these protections in place for vulnerable Australians and so that we can do it this year, because, especially when it comes to PTSD and domestic violence, these areas are so important, according to the Greens and the Labor Party. We've kept asking the minister to do right thing and he's kept stubbornly refusing, pretty much to the point where he doesn't even come and speak to us now.</p><p>So we split the bill and we got the support of the coalition and the crossbench, and I thank them both for that. We even gave the minister the split bills, and we were talking about our intentions in the media. In the last Senate sitting we brought the bills on and they passed. The government didn't vote against them. They were silent. That's right—they were silent. God forbid, wouldn't that look bad on social media, eh? Imagine that on social media—voting against legislation dealing with domestic violence and PTSD being brought in, effective immediately.</p><p>Then the bills went to the House, where all the government had to do was vote on their own legislation. Senator Pocock and I were hoping, and I was praying, that the minister and the government would finally wake up to themselves and do the right thing, instead of worrying about right of entry having to start on 1 January. Apparently, right of entry for any union is more important than PTSD. It's more important than domestic violence. It's more important than silicosis. What do you know? The bills are not even on the <i>Notice Paper</i> today. But that doesn't matter. They've passed the Senate and can be passed by the government right now in the other place.</p><p>Today we are asking the Senate to seek a conference between the Senate and the House because it seems that the minister is not big enough or man enough to man up and get this resolved. I mean, it should be damn embarrassing for the government that we have had to go to this extent to get this done. That is where we are at today. This conference would allow the chamber to seek agreement on a bill when the procedure of exchanging messages fails to promote a full understanding of the issues involved.</p><p>Senator Pocock and I are serious about this, we want these protections in place by Christmas, and there isn't one damn reason why they shouldn't be—not one reason, apart from you using those four things as hostages so you can get the rest of your bill done, which is absolutely shameful in itself. We all want what is best for the Australian people and sometimes that means admitting your mistakes and fixing them.</p><p>We are about to come into a fire season. We are going to be heavily relying on those first responders. That is what we're going to be doing. But you don't want to give them some relief before Christmas time so they can stop fighting a bureaucratic system that, I can assure you—take it from somebody who knows—not only destroys you as a person but destroys your family and those around you; that is what it does. It is time to stop making these sorts of people—our first responders and people in the AFP—prove that they have PTSD from their jobs. This is beyond a joke, and you should be ashamed of yourselves. So now that is what I am calling for.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>The government won't be supporting the suspension of standing orders. This is a similar approach.</p><p>Look, I am not going to take lectures on industrial relations from those opposite. Let me say, this is the most you have been concerned about workers' rights for the entire history of the Liberal Party. You couldn't give a hoot about it. Let's be clear, what you care about is disrupting the program and not dealing with water. That is what you care about. You are the party of WorkChoices—remember that? You are the party that has opposed improving workers' rights with every bone in your bodies since you were elected into this place. That is the approach you take, so don't start getting to us about workers' rights because history will show, and history does show, the approach that you have taken on industrial relations. It is convenient for you, I accept, to align yourself with Senator Pocock and Senator Lambie. I accept that. It is convenient. It is a stunt from your point of view. You have no commitment to the issues that are being debated.</p><p>The government has a program this week that we are working through. We have important legislation, including water—which, again, I accept you guys don't want to deal with—that you would like to delay. That is the program we have set up. The Senate passed a motion last week which we voted against. The House has its program and that determines how it will deal with matters that are before the House, so we won't be supporting this suspension of standing orders. I know that the minister has been seeking to work with crossbenchers on these important reforms. We were very happy to deal with them this side of Christmas—let's not forget that—but what has happened is people have selected certain elements that they want to deal with but not deal with other parts of the bill and take out those bits. We wanted to deal with this bill; you didn't. You didn't want to deal with the bill. That is what happened. You delayed it through the Selection of Bills Committee report. You kicked the bill off it so it couldn't be dealt with.</p> <p class="speaker">Matt O'Sullivan</p><p>Are you serious?</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>Yes, I am serious. That is the position that was taken.</p> <p class="speaker">Andrew McLachlan</p><p>Through me.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>Sorry, Deputy President.</p> <p class="speaker">Andrew McLachlan</p><p>Senator Henderson, on a point of order?</p> <p class="speaker">Sarah Henderson</p><p>I was going to raise the point of order about speaking through the President.</p> <p class="speaker">Andrew McLachlan</p><p>I have it in hand. Minister.</p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>I know the truth hurts but, when the selection of bills came here, you organised for a longer referral so we couldn't deal with them this year. The government wanted to deal with them. We wanted to deal with them in their entirety, even if there were parts that people didn't support. You have that debate and you move those amendments. You don't select the bits that are convenient for you that you want to deal with and trash the rest of it. Let us be clear about what happened two sitting weeks ago when the bills were sent to the House of Representatives. No motion was moved to make them an order of the day, meaning they fell away.</p><p>This is not the responsibility of the government. They were not government bills. Instead, the Manager of Opposition Business in the House of Representatives conducted a filibuster rather than moving a motion to put them on the <i>Notice Paper</i>. No arrangements were made to put the bills before the House, so no bills exist in the House of Representatives because the opposition stuffed up the procedure and no other member of the House of Representatives was arranged. I understand that this has been explained to Senator Lambie around how that procedure was stuffed up—</p><p>Honourable senators interjecting—</p><p>It was on your heads, actually. We will not agree with this. We see it for what it is, which is a delaying tactic and a disrupting tactic. That's why you're aligning on this, because you do not agree with positive industrial relations reforms. Otherwise, some of these things might have been done when you were in government, except they weren't. What a surprise! Your history shows the approach you've taken on industrial relations. You are trying to disrupt the program. We accept that we've lost half an hour and that we'll perhaps get to order before question time, if we're lucky, but that is not the government's position. We will not agree to the suspension. We do not support the motion that's been circulated.</p><p>I would encourage crossbench senators to continue to work with Minister Burke to try and secure the successful package of this important set of reforms. They're important for working people across the country, and we want to work with the crossbench to ensure that they get done—all of the reforms, not just part of the reforms, all of them done together.</p> <p class="speaker">Simon Birmingham</p><p>The Albanese government is proving again and again that it just doesn't listen; that it doesn't listen to Australians and their concerns; that it doesn't listen, as Australians are feeling pain in a range of ways; that it doesn't listen to the business community and those expressing genuine concerns about the enormous complexity and the real risks that exist in their large industrial relations reform proposals; and, in this debate, that it doesn't listen to the crossbench and it doesn't listen to the Senate. It won't listen and is unwilling to budge. It's showing not only that it doesn't listen but that it is stubborn—relentlessly stubborn.</p><p>The government has now for weeks had a crystal-clear opportunity to pass key parts of its industrial relations agenda, to pass the very issues that Senator Lambie spoke so passionately about in relation to small-business redundancies, protections against discrimination, asbestos safety and first responders. All of these matters could pass the parliament and be law by Christmas, and the only people standing in the way is the Labor Party. The Albanese government is standing in the way of their own legislation. What's their justification? Their justification is that, on their basis, it's all or nothing. It's our way or the highway. That's the Labor Party approach. And what is their way? Well, of course, a raft of new union powers, a raft of measures that have been identified as being of deep concern in the way they will hurt the Australian economy and of deep concern, in particular, in the way they will hurt productivity. Has anybody heard Treasurer Jim Chalmers talk about the need to lift productivity?</p><p>An opposition senator: No!</p><p>I have heard him say it. The problem is that the only piece of major economic reform this government has is one that will harm productivity and that will drive productivity down, not up. Senators Lambie and Pocock have wisely identified issues within the government's bill that could progress that identify and address genuine issues, as Senator Lambie has spoken about so passionately. If the government were not so stubborn, they could get these matters past, and then other parts of their bill could still be considered in the normal way. Senators Lambie and Pocock have made clear that they are willing to work with the government in terms of addressing these matters. All they have asked for is time in relation to things in the government's legislation that won't come into effect until the middle of next year or until the end of next year, or even, in some cases, until the year after. Senator Cash has outlined to this chamber previously that there is no urgency for many of the things in the government's bill, but there is urgency for some of the things in the bills presented by Senators Lambie and Pocock. It is the Labor Party's stubbornness, their trickery, their feeling of the wrong priorities, that is seeing the Labor Party oppose these efforts.</p><p>So we support this suspension and consideration of what is a historic motion being proposed by Senators Lambie and Pocock. It is a historic motion calling for a conference between the two houses. No such motion has passed this chamber since 22 June 1950, but that is the passion Senators Lambie and Pocock feel in deploying a tactic that will force representatives of both chambers together. That's necessary because what the government is doing in the House of Representatives is basically sweeping the crossbench proposal under the carpet and just saying, 'Not really here, not going to look at it, just going to ignore it.' They haven't had the courage or the guts to vote against what the crossbenchers have done. They haven't had the courage or the guts to put on time for it to be debated or listed. They're doing a see-no-evil, hear-no-evil type of act and not even looking at this proposal or these bills.</p><p>Congratulations to the crossbench for calling out the trickery, the contempt and the stubbornness of the Albanese government. The chance is here for the government to change course and get these bills passed by Christmas. This motion shouldn't even be necessary, but we absolutely support it as a means to resolve this impasse.</p> <p class='motion-notice motion-notice-truncated'>Long debate text truncated.</p>-
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