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senate vote 2014-11-26#5
Edited by
Henare Degan
on
2014-11-29 09:09:34
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Title
Motions — Minister for Defence; Censure- Censure motion against the Minister for Defence may be moved immediately
Description
<p class="speaker">Penny Wong</p><p>I seek leave to move a motion censuring the Minister for Defence, Senator Johnston.</p><p>Leave not granted.</p>- A majority of Senators agreed to Senator Penny Wong's motion:
- >That a motion to censure the Minister for Defence, Senator Johnston, may be moved immediately and have precedence over all other business this day and be determined without amendment.
<p>Pursuant to contingent notice, I move:</p><p class="italic">That so much of standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion relating to the consideration of a matter, namely a motion to give precedence to a motion to censure the Minister for Defence, Senator Johnston.</p><p>It is a surprise that the Leader of the Government in the Senate did not have the courage to take this censure. It shows how little this government actually wants to defend the Minister for Defence. This is a serious motion to move. I say to the Senate: the opposition does not move this lightly. What we have is a Minister for Defence who, over and over again, in the management of his portfolio has demonstrated that it is untenable for him to continue in the office of Minister for Defence. That is not only the view of the opposition; that is the view even of the gentleman described as a 'fine man'—that is, the Liberal leader in South Australia.</p> <p class="speaker">Ian Macdonald</p><p>Mr President, I rise on a point of order. I should not have to do this with the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, but clearly this is a motion to set aside standing orders; the debate has to be on why we set aside standing orders, not the substantive motion. The Leader of the Opposition should be aware of that and I ask you to bring it to her attention.</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Parry</p><p>Thank you, Senator Macdonald. You would be also aware that it has been long practice in these debates that the debate is wide-ranging and does tend to cover other matters concerning the suspension purpose.</p> <p class="speaker">Penny Wong</p><p>I thank Senator Macdonald for his assistance.</p> <p class="speaker">Claire Moore</p><p>Worthy assistance!</p> <p class="speaker">Penny Wong</p><p>His worthy assistance—thank you, Senator Moore. We are seeking to suspend standing orders because, quite frankly, the Leader of the Government in the Senate did not have the courage to take the censure motion. That is what has happened. If anybody has a look at the way in which this matter has been debated and discussed in the last 24 hours in Australia, I think most reasonable observers would say this is a legitimate matter for debate here in this Senate.</p><p>We have a minister who has, first, insulted the men and women of the Australian Submarine Corporation by stating he would not trust them to build a canoe. We have a minister—a defence minister—who has gone out, via his comments, and undermined confidence in the nation's defence capability. What message does it send to the community and to the international community that the Minister for Defence says, about the people who maintain our submarines and who are building our air warfare destroyers, that he would not trust them to build a canoe? What does that say?</p><p>Another reason why we are seeking to censure is the demonstrable bias that this minister is bringing to this project. As I said earlier today, this is the largest procurement the Commonwealth will make, and it is important that it be above reproach. What we saw yesterday in question time—and really the minister has done little but compound it with his answers today—was a minister demonstrating clear bias against one of the potential bidders in that procurement. He is effectively knocking out, by his comments, one of the potential bidders. In the substantive debate, I think it is reasonable for us to ask why it is that the government is doing that.</p><p>Again today, the Minister for Defence was asked by me—and the opposition has asked this on a number of occasions—to do nothing other than to make clear that he will deliver on the promise he made to the people of South Australia, standing outside the ASC with Mr Marshall, where he made a clear and unequivocal commitment to build 12 submarines in Australia, at the ASC. Today we heard again the minister—and I ask him to consider whether he might have misled the Senate when he did this—keep asserting that he said something different. I read out today—and I will do it again if he requires it—the direct quote from his transcript on 8 May 2013, and all of the footnotes and all of the qualifications that he sought to add today in question time are not there, because what has occurred is that we have a minister who is going to break a promise. In fact, one wonders whether there is a promise that this government is not prepared to break.</p><p>The opposition would say this to the chamber: the minister's conduct in the last 24 hours, on top of his conduct in the months to date, is deserving of the debate of a censure motion. We are seeking to suspend standing orders to have that debate because we think this minister's performance yesterday, when he sought to traduce the workers whom we trust to keep our submariners safe, is deserving of a censure debate in this chamber. We say to the crossbenchers, 'We ask for your support for the suspension of standing orders for this debate.' <i>(Time expired)</i></p> <p class="speaker">Eric Abetz</p><p>You can tell it is only one month until Christmas. The groundswell of goodwill coming over to us from the Labor Party is just unbearable! Let us have a look at what this motion is all about. It is about trying to get at a very capable defence minister who, while in opposition, saw the demise of a Labor Minister for Defence—one Mr Joel Fitzgibbon—who had to resign from the portfolio. Why? Because he was in breach of Labor's own very weak ministerial code of conduct. Where were Senator Conroy and Senator Wong when all that was ventilated at estimates? They were running defence until finally Mr Fitzgibbon had to resign.</p><p>I simply ask the Australian people and the crossbenchers to do a compare and contrast. Do the juxtaposition: somebody who had so grievously breached the ministerial code of conduct and was brought kicking and screaming to a resignation, compared with this minister's alleged offence which is self-admittedly an overstatement during the heat of question time. That is all that is at issue here—an overstatement during question time. That is the compare and contrast I would put to the crossbenchers. I say to them, quite honestly, it is like chalk and cheese.</p><p>Indeed, if you say that Mr Fitzgibbon's case is too far in the past, I would not agree, but let me give you something a little bit closer at hand—this year, when the shadow minister for defence attacked a man who had a distinguished 30 years of service in uniform, one Lieutenant General Campbell. When he was called upon to apologise, Senator Conroy said to the chair of that committee, 'Take it to the floor of the Senate.' That was the arrogance, that was the viciousness with which he attacked this man in uniform, whom he accused of being 'engaged in a political cover-up'. Disgraceful! Where was Senator Wong then? Nowhere to be seen. Where was Senator Conroy's apology? Where was Senator Conroy's mea culpa? Nowhere to be seen or heard. So I say to the crossbenchers, have a look at Mr Fitzgibbon, have a look at Senator Conroy—both more grievous offences, without apology, than that which Senator Johnston, on his own admission, did yesterday at question time.</p><p>If we are to have censure motions each and every day when somebody overstates their case in this place, there will be censure motions against each other all day every day because, regrettably, in the heat of debate, some of us are wont to overstate our case. Indeed, I have needed to come into this place from time to time to withdraw words that I had previously spoken. It is part and parcel of the robustness and rigour of debate in this place. When somebody has the decency to put up their hand—as Senator Johnston did at 9.30 this morning, at the first opportunity when the Senate resumed and even earlier this morning he was on the airwaves admitting his overstatement—what more can a man or woman do other than acknowledge that which they had done incorrectly? It was simply an overstatement. That is all we are talking about. So I say especially to the crossbenchers, if you are to vote for censure and suspension of standing orders in relation to a senator's overstatement on one occasion—</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Conroy</p><p>Serial offender.</p> <p class="speaker">Eric Abetz</p><p>which he withdraws the very next day, then we will be debating these matters all the time. Finally, I will take Senator Conroy's interjection. He says Senator Johnston is a serial offender. Senator Conroy, look in the mirror and you will see the biggest serial offender this place has. <i>(Time expired)</i></p> <p class="speaker">Christine Milne</p><p>I rise to support the suspension of standing orders—</p> <p class="speaker">Government Senators</p><p>Government senators interjecting—</p> <p class="speaker">Christine Milne</p><p>I will support the suspension of standing orders because I think we should have a debate on the competence of the minister in this portfolio in relation to this matter. We have before us a procurement process that is going to be incredibly important and serious for the future of Australia's defence forces and we have a minister who has demonstrated that he does not have the capacity to deal with that procurement process. It is very well known that that is the case and that is the view within the government itself.</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Conroy</p><p>I rise to support this censure motion and the urgency with which we need to bring it on. The sands are shifting underneath Senator Johnston as we speak. The Prime Minister's unofficial press secretary has announced today, online, what is going to happen. The last time that the Prime Minister's unofficial press secretary made an announcement like this, Senator Sinodinos went to the backbench. Here is what Dennis Shanahan has said online today:</p><p class="italic">DAVID Johnston’s position as Defence Minister is effectively over.</p><p class="italic">The only reason he remains in the job for now is that Tony Abbott is manic about not changing his ministry because he wants to appear a stable government after six years of Labor leadership ...</p><p class="italic">Whether Johnston—</p><p>That is, Senator Johnston—</p><p class="italic">goes as Defence Minister now or a bit later depends is a moot point. His long-term standing is mortally damaged, he’s lost the confidence of his Cabinet colleagues and his comments have been publicly disowned by the Prime Minister.</p><p class="italic">Johnston’s remark about the submarine corporation not being trusted to build a canoe is not some simple slip of the tongue or “rhetorical flourish” which Abbott can claim is being blown out of proportion. Notwithstanding ASC’s past difficulties Johnston’s made a huge political mistake.</p><p>I will keep quoting:</p><p class="italic">In itself the remark is bad enough: the Australian government may want to sell its share of the ASC and the responsible minister has trashed the brand; the minister who has to make a decision on Australia’s biggest procurement project appears to have a preconceived opinion and; other nations are confused about his thinking.</p><p class="italic">But what makes it worse for Abbott is that the lack of a public strategy on the submarines and warships and the mixed messages of hope and despair for workers and Liberal colleagues in South Australia and Victoria represent a wider malaise in Coalition management.</p><p>And it goes on.</p><p>The last time we saw a statement like this from the Prime Minister's unofficial press secretary, Senator Sinodinos spent a year on the backbench. We all know what is happening over there, so let's have it on. The government should have accepted this censure motion. It was quite cowardly not to accept this censure motion, and we should be having the debate right now. I look forward to contributing in this debate because this minister has lost the confidence of all of those opposite, particularly the South Australians. I am looking forward to seeing if the whip can force Senator Birmingham, Senator Ruston and Senator Edwards to stay in the chamber to vote to support Senator Johnston, because they have all come out today. Mr Briggs came out today and said that he was wrong. Mr Marshall has already belled the cat on the untenable position that Senator Johnston is in. So we all know where this is going to end soon. We all know they are going to cling to Senator Johnston to try to stagger through until the end of next week and then he will disappear. He is the biggest barnacle to be scraped off by Mr Abbott in the next few weeks. We know it over here, we know it on the crossbenches and you all know it over there. The time is coming to an end.</p><p>So it is urgent that we debate this now. It is important that the Senate expresses its view about the conduct of the minister—about his dealings with defence pay, how he did not stand up to get a fair pay rise for Defence Force personnel, how he allowed others to rail over the top of him, and then he tried to pretend that he had not cut the pay and said that no-one is worse off. It is important for the Senate, right now, to be able to have a chance to debate these issues. I urge all of those in the chamber to support this suspension. Again the government stands condemned for failing to take the suspension on the chin—</p> <p class="speaker">Penny Wong</p><p>Weak.</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Conroy</p><p>Exactly, Senator Wong—a weak government trying to protect its own, but it is all over and you all know it. It is all over for Senator Johnston. Each and every one of you knows what happens when <i>The Australian</i> says you are in the way of the Abbott government. We have to scrape the barnacle off the bottom of the vessel and we have to move on.</p> <p class='motion-notice motion-notice-truncated'>Long debate text truncated.</p>
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