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senate vote 2017-10-17#1
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2018-03-16 13:10:41
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Title
Motions — Suspension of Standing Orders- Motions - Suspension of Standing Orders - Let a vote happen
Description
<p class="speaker">Richard Di Natale</p><p>I move:</p><p class="italic">That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion to give precedence to a motion relating to climate change.</p>- The majority voted against a [motion](http://www.openaustralia.org.au/senate/?id=2017-10-17.4.1) to suspend the rules to allow a vote to happen. In parliamentary jargon, they voted against suspending the [standing orders](https://www.peo.gov.au/learning/fact-sheets/standing-orders.html).
- Greens Senator [Richard Di Natale](https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/senate/victoria/richard_di_natale) had introduced this motion so that he could move *"a motion to give precedence to a motion relating to climate change"*.
<p>What we've seen today is the total and complete capitulation by Malcolm Turnbull to the hard right of his party and to his big coal donors—a total, complete and utter capitulation by a cowardly and spineless Prime Minister, who doesn't have the ticker to stand up to the pro-coal lobbying side of his own party and stand up to the likes of the Nationals, who are more interested in doing the bidding of Gina Rinehart and the mining lobby than they are in standing up for their rural constituents. We've got the Nationals over there who are basically in this place doing a three-year long job interview so they can nick off and do the bidding of the coal and gas industry. Let's see who is part of the coal and gas industry in this country? It's a who's who of the National Party and the Liberal Party: Mark Vaile, John Anderson and Ian Macfarlane. Of course, Labor's not immune. They've got Martin Ferguson on the other side.</p><p>Do you know what today is, Mr President? It is payday for those fossil fuel companies who have given millions of dollars in donations to all sides of politics for one reason: to get an energy policy in this country that serves no-one other than the big fossil fuel companies. This plan that the government has announced today will result in the death of the Great Barrier Reef. It will kill the Murray-Darling Basin. It will kill the jobs that rely on them. It will drive up pollution and it will drive up power prices.</p><p>The evidence is very clear. The energy regulator made it abundantly clear what would happen if the government had the courage to take on those big network companies: we would actually make some progress in bringing down power prices. The experts have made that abundantly clear. Yesterday, the ACCC said that power prices are so high because of market concentration. What we have got is a handful of energy generators who are milking Australian consumers dry and we have a government who says: 'We want you to have more of it. We want you to keep shafting consumers in the way that we've just shafted the Chief Scientist Alan Finkel.'</p><p>Imagine what Alan Finkel would be thinking right now? There he was bending over backwards to write a plan, with riding instructions from this government so that all he could come up with was a plan so narrow that it would have meant more coal in the system by 2050 than business as usual—but at least there was some incentive for clean energy. But Malcolm Turnbull has turned around to the Chief Scientist and said, 'Well, stuff you. We don't want a bar of what you are presenting us. We don't believe in science. We don't believe in what is absolutely crystal clear and what the business community is telling us and what the general community wants. What we want to do is keep propping up the business model for our coal and gas mates'. That's what this plan is.</p><p>This is a plan written by the coal and gas industry that shafts the people that the Nationals over here say they stand for—people living in regional areas, farmers, regional communities. So, instead, what do the Nationals want to do? They want to open up more farmland for coal seam gas. They want to see more of their constituents having to fight those big gas companies who want to frack land, contaminate their water and, ultimately, turn Australian farmland into an industrial-scale wasteland. Why do they do it? It's because they're in the pocket of the coal and gas industry., and they get those big cheques coming in. That's why you see Barnaby Joyce taking international flights with Gina Rinehart rather than—</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Parry</p><p>Senator Di Natale, could you refer to members in the other place by their correct titles. I've allowed you on more than one occasion now to refer to members incorrectly, so please refer to members by their correct titles.</p> <p class="speaker">Richard Di Natale</p><p>That's why we see the Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby Joyce, flying around the countryside with the likes of Gina Rinehart—because he's more interested in doing the bidding of the mining and gas industry than he is in looking after farmers.</p><p>The bottom line is that we have thousands of jobs that are being sacrificed right now because of this government's commitment to the coal and gas industry. We're losing that great innovation here—it's going overseas—because we're locking ourselves into the sinking ship of fossil fuels. That's what it is. And it's a huge tragedy, because this could be a good news opportunity for Australia. We could be talking about bringing in jobs and investment and making sure that we've got a pathway for those people in regional communities. Instead, this government has locked us in into rising power prices, job losses and skyrocketing emissions. This is a disgrace, and the Prime Minister should hang his head in shame.</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Parry</p><p>It would be helpful, Senator Di Natale, if you could provide in writing the words of your motion.</p> <p class="speaker">Richard Di Natale</p><p>I'm happy to do that.</p> <p class="speaker">George Brandis</p><p>Another stunt from the Greens, with all of this confected outrage from Senator Di Natale, pretending to be the friend of working Australians—this wealthy medical practitioner who lives in inner-city Melbourne and retreats to his hobby farm for the weekend, with every gesture, every posture of a left-wing hipster, pretending to be a champion of working Australians. Well, Senator Di Natale, I'll tell you what working Australians want. They want affordable energy electricity prices and they want reliable supply. That's what they want. And there is only one political party represented in this parliament that will give it to them—and that is the government parties of the Liberal Party and the National Party.</p><p>Senator Di Natale, you spoke about an announcement. There has been no announcement. So your entire speech is based on press speculation that you have, no doubt, tried to trick up into a speech. However, I can tell you, Senator Di Natale, having come from the government party room a short while ago where this matter was discussed, that I am expecting the Prime Minister and the Minister for the Environment and Energy, Mr Frydenberg, to be making some announcements in the coming hour or so. When those announcements are made, contrary, Senator Di Natale, to what you have just so foolishly asserted, you will learn that the announcements the government is making—which, out of courtesy to the Prime Minister, I will not be anticipating in these remarks—are informed by science, are informed by engineering and, more particularly, are informed by the most experienced experts in the field. But, as I say, out of courtesy to the Prime Minister and Mr Frydenberg, I won't be anticipating in this speech anything that they may shortly be about to say. What I can also tell you, Senator Di Natale, is that when the announcement is made—</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Parry</p><p>A point of order, Senator Di Natale?</p> <p class="speaker">Richard Di Natale</p><p>I have a point of order, and it relates to addressing senators by their correct name. I have heard Senator Brandis consistently refer to me as Senator 'Di Na-ta-lay'. I know Senator Brandis prides himself on his diction, but my name is 'Di Na-ta-li', not 'Di Na-ta-lay'. So if he would like to refer to me by my proper name I would be most appreciative.</p> <p class="speaker">Stephen Parry</p><p>Thank you, Senator Di Natale. You have made that very clear, and I think the Attorney-General has heard you.</p> <p class="speaker">George Brandis</p><p>I have. And I mean no offence, Senator Di Natale, but that is just the way I pronounce the English language. I am sorry if my pronunciation is imperfect. In any event, Senator Di Natale, I can assure you that when the announcement is made you will discover that what has fallen from your lips in the last few minutes is completely wrong. And you will be ashamed, Senator Di Natale, when you learn on whose advice and guidance the policy measures about to be announced have been based.</p><p>Senator Di Natale, if I may address you and the Greens, we know the political game you have been playing—and if I may say so you've been playing it pretty well. You have got the Australian Labor Party on the run, because you are in a competition with them for the inner-city green hipster vote, and you are winning. You are taking the Labor Party to more and more extreme positions every day. It probably does the Greens a lot of good, but it is devastating for the Australian Labor Party. Unfortunately, it is also a recipe for bad policy. The ultimate victims of your political strategy, driven by ideology—and, as the Prime Minister unkindly said the other day, driven by idiocy—are the Australian people themselves.</p><p>We will be announcing a suite of measures the effect of which will be to reduce electricity prices and guarantee reliability of supply. I know, Senator Di Natale, you have a problem with that, but the Australian people don't have a problem with that, because that is what they want. They want their electricity prices reduced and the reliability of their supply guaranteed, and that is precisely what the effect of the measures the Prime Minister is shortly to announce will be. They are informed by science, informed by engineering and informed by economics, but avoiding like the plague the ideology that drives you. We are not interested in Green ideology, Senator Di Natale; we are interested in outcomes. That is what the Australian people are interested in too. So when the next election comes around in about 18 months or so, there will be a stark choice: the Green-Labor Party alliance, with higher electricity prices and insecure supply, or the government's policies, with lower prices and secure supply. <i>(Time expired)</i></p> <p class="speaker">Katy Gallagher</p><p>After those very unkind remarks by the Leader of the Government in the Senate, I feel like changing Labor's position on this suspension. However, I think for good reasons the Labor Party will not be supporting the suspension of standing orders today. I point out that it seems like at the beginning of every Tuesday of every sitting week we have a suspension motion by the Greens party on the issue of the day, to chew up time without much notice—probably 10 minutes notice to other parties that they are moving a suspension.</p><p>From Labor's point of view, it is premature to have a debate on a motion that condemns the government's latest energy announcement when that announcement hasn't actually been made. Don't get me wrong—we can debate for hours the failure of the Turnbull government on energy policy, and we would look forward to debating that. We would look forward to debating the dumping of the work of the Chief Scientist at the behest of the former Prime Minister. For four years this government has trashed energy policy and turned itself inside out, fighting amongst themselves on climate change and energy policy. It hasn't been able to govern in the national interest, putting the interests of Australians first. I think it is fair to say we will all suffer from that, not just those of us in this place but generations to come. Looking at the different positions the government has had on energy policy, I remember the time when the Prime Minister supported a price on carbon, an EIS and a CET, and now all of a sudden he is walking away from all of that because the former Prime Minister and his supporters in the coalition party room not only hold the government to ransom; they hold the whole country to ransom and they are still stuck in a vortex where they're discussing whether the science of climate change is actually settled yet.</p><p>We will need to see the detail of the next iteration of the government's energy policy prior to debating it in this place. As I said, the Prime Minister has had a number of positions. We don't hold much faith that this new policy will last any longer than those that have come before it. We want to see a responsible energy policy put in place. We want to reach agreement. We have offered to talk with the government on the clean energy target through our own preferred mechanism, through an EIS. We did that very early after the Finkel report came out. That was us prepared to compromise, but, unfortunately, the government have refused to talk with us because they haven't actually settled the issue between themselves. We want to see households given relief from the rising cost of bills. We want certainty in the policy so that the investment strike ends and, importantly, so that Australians can get their fair share of the jobs that are being developed in the rapidly expanding global renewable energy industry. All of that is for debate.</p><p>I note the Greens have all of Thursday morning as time for private senators' bills and business. We could spend the whole morning debating the policy once the actual policy has been released and we have the detail of that policy. We are not at all scared about debating the policy. We welcome debate on the policy. There are a range of mechanisms within the Senate through which we can pursue that this week—MPIs, urgency motions, questions, senators' statements, the adjournment debate and, indeed, all of the time on Thursday morning. There is more than enough time. However, our job here is also to progress legislation on the <i>Notice Paper</i>, whether we agree or disagree with that legislation. That is the job we have been asked to perform by the Australian people. This wastes that time. It wastes time for debate on other important bills. It is premature in terms of being able to debate seriously and honestly the policy that this government may or may not have finally resolved for themselves—for the time being, until it is nobbled by Tony Abbott again. But the form being used and the mechanism being used by the Greens to suspend the program today to have this debate, prior to a package being released, is not appropriate, and we won't be supporting it.</p> <p class='motion-notice motion-notice-truncated'>Long debate text truncated.</p>
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