Senator ROBERT RAY (8:05 PM) —I always take a slightly more sanguine view of sitting hours than some of my colleagues; I take a much more iconoclastic approach than they do. It has been a rather curious debate. We have had Senator Carr talk about throwing around epitaphs, so I would duck in future if a gravestone comes your way. I am sure he will correct the Hansard record to that effect. We have also had Senator Carr accuse Senator Ian Campbell of being a member of the Democrats, which I know not to be true.

Senator Carr —It is true.

Senator ROBERT RAY —It is not true, Senator Carr. He campaigned on their behalf but he was never a financial member. He was recruited into the Liberal Party by an ex-senator of the Liberal Party. The preselection of Senator Campbell depended on his largesse, and in his moment of despair Senator Campbell denied him thrice.

Senator Ian Campbell —It's not true either.

Senator ROBERT RAY —But he was never ever a member of the Democrats. He knew to draw the line somewhere. And I really think that Senator Carr at some stage should be forced to withdraw that accusation.

Senator Hill, playing the good cop, comes in here tonight and in that reasonable, reasoned manner of his—in that sort of urbane, laid-back style—makes a plea for goodwill. I tell you where goodwill starts, Senator Hill: before you decide to have an extra sitting week with government business only, five days with three late sitting nights, you should trot around to visit or ring up the Leader of the Opposition and the manager of opposition business and have a little discussion with them. You at least test the waters.

Nothing we have said tonight indicates that we oppose sitting next week. We have not said that we oppose sitting next week. We have said that there would have been at least two discussion points in those negotiations that should have occurred. The first point would have been whether it would be government business only for the week, and the second point would have been the order in which we deal with legislation.

But no—yesterday, in a burst of machoism, the Manager of Government Business barges into this chamber and gives notice of motion for an extra five sitting days of government business only with long sitting hours. What gave him the courage to do that? What motivated this Manager of Government Business, who quite often does consult and certainly is not beyond smarming up when he wants to get something through, to come into this chamber and do that? I will tell you what motivated him—38 votes. He got his courage up when he knew he could deliver 38 votes, or the equivalent after pairing, in this chamber. So there is no need to consult the riffraff. Senator Brown is irrelevant. The Democrats are irrelevant. As for the Labor Party, we do not mind that sort of treatment; we are pretty robust. But I can imagine the hurt that Senator Brown has suffered through not being consulted. I can imagine the hurt.

I have also heard many speeches in this place from one Senator Harradine who has not been consulted on occasions about sitting hours and times. We have heard him make complaints in this chamber that the major parties have ignored him. Where is he tonight? Why doesn't he come in and justify why we are having government business only for five days next week? Why doesn't he come in and say, `We weren't consulted,' when he has so often complained in the past that he has been either ignored or not properly consulted?

Senator Hill refers to the fact that we had 88 hours on Wik in two major debates. That is absolutely right. But let me put on the record why we had 88 hours on Wik. The reason is that this opposition had the intellectual capability to draw up and move over 300 amendments—along with the Greens and the Democrats. When the equivalent circumstances occurred back in 1993, the coalition did not have the wit, the wisdom or the intellectual capability to develop one amendment. Their approach to the bill was just to oppose it in its entirety—not try to modify it, not try to improve it, just oppose it. That was not a philosophical stance, Senator Boswell; that was because you were incapable of developing coherent and cogent amendments to that particular bill.

Naturally, a bill as big as Mabo or a bill as big as Wik will take time to debate in this chamber. But we are not in a position at the moment even to start developing our amendments. Why not? Because we are told by Senator Ian Campbell that the Wik bill has not even been drafted yet. Yet we are supposed to give it mature consideration. We are supposed to develop all our amendments over the weekend—if we see a copy tomorrow—and be ready to go next week. The same applies to a lesser extent with the Telstra bill, which I will return to.

One fact should be put on the record: as a former Manager of Government Business, I would have killed for the extra hours, the extra days and the extra weeks that we have granted you. As manager, I always used to get whinge after whinge from the coalition parties if we sat an extra hour, let alone an extra day and let alone an extra week. It was because of our experience in coming out of government that we knew that we had to cooperate more than the previous opposition and that we had to be acquiescent to demands for longer hours, for more days and for more weeks. I am not going to go through and repeat that marvellous piece of evidence put on the record by colleague Kim Carr, who detailed it greatly.

Senator Heffernan —Comrade.

Senator ROBERT RAY —Yes, Comrade Kim Carr. You have had more cooperation on the program; you have had more cooperation on days. But you have not had such cooperation today. Why should we cooperate with you when you ambushed us yesterday and when we know that tomorrow and the next five days there will be no other business but government business transacted? So today we have had to take the time to deal with remaining issues.

Senator Faulkner —Explain our position.

Senator ROBERT RAY —Explain our position, as the Leader of the Opposition says, on a variety of issues. And I think we are only putting—unless the coalition really annoys us—three speakers on this particular motion.

The most recent agreement that we entered into with the government was that we would sit late on the last two Tuesday nights, that we would sit late on the last two Thursday nights and that we would sit Friday last week and Friday this week. In addition—what was never really ever much granted to us when we were in government—we are giving you large slabs of government business at a time. All day on those two Fridays and those two late night sittings were government business only. We also gave up general business today. Until today, and until the insult and ambush yesterday, we had not been moving matters of public interest or urgency motions. Any of those that emerged were from other minor parties in this chamber. We were cooperating.

Senator Hill comes in here and talks about goodwill, but he has ripped up the goodwill. Goodwill according to him is when he needs the numbers and it is a bit difficult he will come and talk to the Labor Party. But, when he has the numbers, he gives us the finger salute. He just sends his manager in to propose this notice of motion and expects us to bow and scrape to the government—no way to that particular proposition.

We have also seen too little regard being given to senators' rights over the next six days. Senator Hill said, `Oh well, back in 1993, the sittings of the Senate were suspended each time to deal with the Wik legislation,' because at that stage it was absolutely urgent that it get through. I do not know on how many occasions when we had to move for extra sitting weeks that we would draw up a relatively generous proposal only to have remits from the coalition saying, `Look, you have allowed notices of motion, you have allowed this, you have allowed that. But we would like to have the opportunity to have matters of public importance added to the list.'

I cannot think of an occasion when I, as manager, did not tick that and insert that in the motions. But what is being proposed for next week is not only that we cannot have MPIs—and I have to say that basically we could live with that; we would like the opportunity but I do not think we would exercise it—but also we cannot even have notices of motion. You cannot have that urgent committee report that might come in debated at all. It is just the draconian regime of government business only.

Senator Sherry —No petitions?

Senator ROBERT RAY —No petitions.

Senator Denman —No adjournments?

Senator ROBERT RAY —Yes, we are to have adjournments and I congratulate the government for leaving that in.

Senator Carr —No government documents.

Senator ROBERT RAY —But we don't have petitions.

Senator Carr —No noting of questions?

Senator ROBERT RAY —I am not so sure about that. I think we do have noting of questions. I think a little bauble has been thrown to us, Senator Carr. I think we have been allowed that little privilege in life to have noting of questions after question time. So I have got something to look forward to next week, haven't I—listening to all those speeches on the noting of questions; I am really thrilled about that.

Of course, we do have a provision for moving government notices of motions on Thursday, which Senator Campbell has not explained to this chamber. I am only presuming that that will give the government a capacity to move motions on Thursday to be executed on Friday as government business. I assume that is to do with giving senators leave and those normal mechanical things that this draconian imposition would in fact prevent otherwise. I assume that the government is not intending to misuse its ability alone to move government notices of motion on Thursday other than for the normal mechanical procedures that normally attend the last sitting week in the parliament.

I have to say that the opposition always argued, when we were in government, to have some rights when we sit an extra week—MPIs, notices of motion, petitions and those sorts of things. I think a decent manager of government business could have come to us and said, `Look, we will give a reasonable regime for next week. Can we have a commitment in terms of MPIs, notices of motion, contingent notices of motion to suspend standing orders and that sort of thing?' And Senator Carr, being a reasonable person, probably could have given some guarantees in that regard.

Over the years—15 or 16 years—I have seen all the grandstanding speeches attacking managers of government business in this place. I saw Don Grimes attacked and Senator Evans occasionally attacked. There was the odd mauling and hurtful thing said about my management technique, which was completely different from the previous two. I never hassled anyone. I used to just wait. I was always a very patient manager of government business. I was so patient that I was once able to wait to declare 62 bills urgent, simply because of mistakes made by the opposition.

And then we had Senator McMullan and Senator Faulkner. Time and time again we got grandstanding speeches from those opposite saying how badly they had managed the program. I do not make the same general speeches against Senator Campbell today because I have lived through all that and I know how hypocritical quite often those speeches are and how inaccurate they are, because managing the Senate is not an easy job. Getting the government program through is not an easy job.

It is especially difficult for Senator Campbell, who rarely understands procedural matters in this place and who, the moment he doesn't get his own way, shows all the petulance of Kim Carr's youngest child and absolutely throws—

Senator Carr —What a shot at Seamus!

Senator ROBERT RAY —Well, I apologise to Seamus. I withdraw that particular allegation, Senator Carr, and hope you won't pass it on to Carole because I am more scared of her than I am of you. That is not the way. Petulance does not get you anywhere in this chamber. Sitting there, throwing out the odd insult, whingeing, rolling your eyes, abusing us does not get the task done.

It would not happen to an old pro like Senator Brownhill, who is sitting there as duty minister at the moment. If he wanted an extra sitting week, he would come around with a bottle of red in his hand, wouldn't he, Senator Carr? He would have some reasonable propositions. He would say to us, `Look, a bit of turkey on our plate, a bit of turkey on your plate; let's all get the last plane home on 10 July at 4.50 p.m.' or, in the case of Acting Deputy President Chapman, the direct flight to Adelaide at 4.15 p.m. That is what Senator Brownhill would have done. And we would have succumbed to his charms and come to some agreements. But, of course, that does not happen with the petulance kid, the ex-supporter but not member, Senator Carr, of the Australian Democrats, the ex-protege of Senator Crichton-Browne who then turned on him. It would not have happened with the current Manager of Government Business.

Our attitude, in summary, is that we have put up an amendment that concedes five extra sitting days because, if that amendment is carried, we will then vote for the motion. And that amendment, which Senator Faulkner moved, is in two parts: part one is normal sitting procedures next week; part two dictates that Wik be debated first and the other legislation that is remaining second. That amendment is also capable of being split. If the government says, `Look, we really cannot concede on having them as normal sitting days; we insist on government business only' and if they then indicate to us, `We will knock that part off, but we will accept the second part of the amendment', again, we might be in a position to support the motion by the Manager of Government Business with that one amendment.

You see, we have this suspicion: having done their revolutionary deal on Wik, having drafted it and after pumping it through the House of Representatives tomorrow—even though we cannot see the legislation—why wouldn't they deal with that first? Why would they give priority to the privatisation of Telstra? We would have to be suspicious on this particular matter. After all, it was on 23 January 1996 that Mr Howard said on the John Laws program:

During the first term of the Howard government, that's over the three years from whenever the election is called, we will privatise no more than one-third of Telstra and we will retain the remaining two-thirds fully in government ownership. If we decide at the end of our first term to privatise more of Telstra, then we will go to subsequent elections seeking an explicit mandate to do it.

Senator Faulkner —Non-core promise.

Senator ROBERT RAY —A non-core promise by the Prime Minister (Mr Howard). But I will tell you why he is doing it now. He is doing it for two reasons. The first reason is the old agrarian socialists have threatened to jump the fence on the issue. You have only to look at the remarks in the press release of Miss De-Anne Kelly MP, the federal member for Dawson, who says she is going to cross the floor. On the 7.30 Report tonight, she indicated that Uncle Ron might jump with her. We know that Senator Sandy Macdonald has made all sorts of threats on this issue. So the whole idea of the government is, `Wik is important. More importantly, we can use it as leverage on Telstra. So let's get the debate up, the legislation carried, before the momentum hits for them to jump the fence.'

There is, of course, another reason why Mr John Howard, the Prime Minister of Australia, wants this matter resolved. He knows that this Senate is a perverted Senate. He knows that the numbers do not accurately reflect what the voters voted for. He knows he has one person in this place who is an Independent now who was elected on a Labor ticket.

So there are two reasons the Prime Minister wants to get Telstra up first. What a cynical attitude. He says Wik is the issue of the decade, but he is willing to put it off. He is willing to put it off for petty, cynical reasons, for party reasons, so he can get the Telstra stuff through before everyone jumps out of the paddock, before they all disappear off into the horizon, cross the floor and vote against the legislation. That is what he wants. He is not concerned at all about cementing Wik in as the first major item in the debate next week.

We have had the manager tell us that we cannot see the Wik bill because it has not been drafted. That shows you how much they think of the House of Representatives because they are going to whack it through that chamber tomorrow. That is the forward plan, isn't it? So no-one is going to get to see it until tomorrow morning, but I bet it will be through so they can get on the 4.50 p.m. flight out tomorrow. I bet it will be through that particular chamber.

Just to reiterate our attitude on this: we are saying that, yes, we will cop the extra sitting week, reluctantly because of the discourteous way it has been put. But it should be a normal sitting week. If the government refuses it to be a normal sitting week, at least it should give a commitment that it will begin the Wik debate on Monday as the first available piece of government legislation.