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Hansard
- Start of Business
- PRIVILEGE
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- PAPERS
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- AUSTRALIAN WOOL BOARD
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- ACCOMMODATION OF PASTORAL WORKERS
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- QUESTION
- BILLS RETURNED FROM THE SENATE
- ASSENT TO BILLS
- POSTPONEMENT OF ORDERS OF THE DAY
- NATIONAL OIL PROPRIETARY LIMITED AGREEMENT BILL 1937
- GENERAL ELECTIONS
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NATIONAL OIL PROPRIETARY LIMITED AGREEMENT BILL
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Second Reading
- BLAIN, Adair
- DEPUTY SPEAKER, Mr
- PARKHILL, Robert
- Division
- Division
- PARKHILL, Robert
- BLACKBURN, Maurice
- Division
- ROSEVEAR, John
- PARKHILL, Robert
- ROSEVEAR, John
- PARKHILL, Robert
- BLACKBURN, Maurice
- MCEWEN, John
- CAMERON, Archie
- NAIRN, Walter
- CAMERON, Archie
- PARKHILL, Robert
- BLACKBURN, Maurice
- GULLETT, Henry
- CHAIRMAN, The
- BRENNAN, Frank
- MENZIES, Robert
- Division
- BLACKBURN, Maurice
- CAMERON, Archie
- BEASLEY, John
- BEASLEY, John
- LAWSON, John
- MCEWEN, John
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Second Reading
- SUPERANNUATION BILL 1937
- AUSTRALIAN SOLDIERS' REPATRIATION BILL (No. 2) 1937
- WAR SERVICE HOMES BILL 1937
- HIGH COMMISSIONER BILL 1937
- SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY RESEARCH BILL 1937
- STATES GRANTS (FERTILIZER) BILL 1937
- DEFENCE EQUIPMENT BILL 1937
- CUSTOMS TARIFF VALIDATION BILL 1937
- CUSTOMS TARIFF (EXCHANGE ADJUSTMENT) VALIDATION BILL 1937
- CUSTOMS TARIFF (CANADIAN PREFERENCE) VALIDATION BILL 1937
- EXCISE TARIFF VALIDATION BILL 1937
- PAPUA AND NEW GUINEA BOUNTIES BILL 1937
- APPLE AND PEAR BOUNTY BILL 1937
- STATES GRANTS (YOUTH EMPLOYMENT) BILL 1937
- CITRUS FRUITS BOUNTY BILL 1937
- DAIRY PRODUCE EXPORT CONTROL BILL 1937
- DRIED FRUITS EXPORT CONTROL BILL 1937
- ADJOURNMENT
- ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
Mr BRENNAN (BATMAN, VICTORIA)
- The honorable member for Franklin (Mr. Frost) asked " who is to be the judge ". I suggest tha t the right honorable the Attorney-General is to be the judge - the Attorney-General with his legal and technical knowledge. He is to set the standard of good manners; he is to be the Chesterfield of this Parliament to say what should be said and should not be said; he is to be the tribunal from which there can be no appeal - the tribunal which declares the Chesterfieldian standard of good manners. Well, heaven forbid that popular rights should ever have to depend on such a rotten reed, or that the standard of popular right and wrong is to be judged by such a law giver ! The Attorney-General proceeded -
That where an offensive statement was made and, upon challenge, was not withdrawn, no parliamentary privilege should attach either to the making of the statement in Parliament or to its publication inthe press.
I point out to the right honorable gentleman that the question of decorum in this Parliament - the mere question of whether what any honorable member said should be withdrawn as being strictly or technically not in accordance with our Standing Orders - is the mere veneer of politics. Behind and beyond that is the ultimate right of Parliament, as the guardian of the public, to express itself freely and in its own way upon public questions.'
Mr Menzies
- Upon private citizens?
Mr.BRENNAN. - Upon private citizens, yes. Parliament is the only place where depradators, spoliators, and fraudulent agents can he brought to book and freely charged and condemned without fear that the moneybags behind them will save them from just criticism.
Mr Menzies
- And the only place where a liar gets privilege.
Mr.BRENNAN. - He is always a liar who says things unpleasant aboutus. The Canberra Times is a liar this morning! The Age is a liar this morning ! It may be that these vehicles of public opinion have their own points of view and think that they are right. The right honorable gentleman went on -
If Parliament was not to become a happy limiting ground of the person who liked to shoot from behind cover, some such reforms would have to be urgently considered. " Who liked to shoot from behind cover !" " Behind cover " means the exercise of the immemorial rights of the people, as expressed in the right of honorable members of this Parliament, to say in it, without fear or favour, the things that an honorable member thinks ought to be said in the public interest. Why is this right so deeply entrenched in popular esteem, and why is it that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition is so naturally and properly sensitive regarding it that he leaps to action the very moment it is challenged? It is because, from time immemorial, money and privilege and influence have been able to beat down the poorer classes everywhere outside the privileged precincts of Parliament.
Mr Barnard
- And do not they know it on the other side!
