Senator BARTLETT (Leader of the Australian Democrats) (6:02 PM) —I seek leave to make a brief statement before I give leave or do not reject leave or something like that.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator McLucas)—Leave is granted on the matter of seeking leave to speak.

Senator BARTLETT —I do not intend to refuse leave, because I think it is important to have the debate. I think most of the debates we have had today actually have not been that important, but the one that it is proposed to have now is important. I am happy to have it. I would just like to wrap up the debate that I had almost wrapped up twice before I give leave for the MPI. I seek leave to have two or three more minutes to finalise that.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Senator Bartlett, you are seeking further leave to speak on another matter; is that correct?

Senator BARTLETT —I want to give leave to Senator Ludwig, but I want to actually finish making my point.

Senator Faulkner —Madam Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. Senator Bartlett actually has leave and is on his feet. I think he is entitled, given that he has got leave—I think he hinted at this—to deal with the issue that Senator Ludwig raised. Senator Bartlett has leave; I do not think he needs, when he has got leave, to ask for leave again—

Senator Ian Campbell —Double leave.

Senator Faulkner —Double leave, yes. I do not think it is necessary. Unless I am missing something, Senator Bartlett, you have got leave and away you go.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Senator Faulkner, I think you are correct.

Senator BARTLETT —Thank you. Now I realise that I have unlimited leave, I have a good three hours of speeches in my pocket that I shall now give! Due to a range of circumstances, there are a few points that I want to make in quick succession which I hope a few people take note of, because they are suggestions for the future. As somebody said to me earlier on—I think it was Senator Faulkner—`The Senate today has been dysfunctional.' Usually it is not dysfunctional, but today it has been a complete and utter debacle. I think the Senate's complete operation from 9.30 this morning should be referred to the Procedure Committee as a case study of how not to have the Senate run. There are plenty of issues as part of that.

Obviously, by virtue of six o'clock kicking in and preventing divisions from taking place—unless one wanted to move to suspend the standing orders for that as well—I am not completely naive enough to suggest I did not realise that that was what was happening. I am sure there are not too many tears being shed on any side of this place at the prospect that perhaps they will not have to sit and do business next Thursday or Friday—

Senator Faulkner —Speak for yourself: our position is clear.

Senator BARTLETT —Your position is very clear indeed, and, as I said, I am sure there are not too many tears being shed—

Senator Faulkner —We don't descend into tears, Senator.

Senator BARTLETT —indeed, you will not—at the fact that we will not be doing business next Thursday or Friday, other than sitting and listening to presidents. It is curious for Senator Ian Campbell to say he has been seeking to be cooperative all day and getting consensus on this—and then at the end of it all saying he is going to oppose it. Ideas of consensus and goodwill are always curious, but they are always ones that are worth remembering for the next time goodwill and cooperation are sought.

I think a couple of other things have come up, but the fact that we did not do any government business today at all because of the Bali ceremony—and I do not dispute the desirability of that at all—has meant that we are now another day down on the number of days that we have considered government business. We are now definitely at a record low of Senate sitting days for government business in a non-election year for about 30 years. I hope the government remember that next time they complain about the Senate holding up the program. Now another opportunity to have two more days of government business has been thrown out the window. It is worth remembering that a couple of weeks ago we removed another couple of days that would have had government business so that we could have estimates committees instead. At the start of the year, the Democrats were complaining about the lack of time that we had been given to consider government legislation—it being amongst the lowest ever. Since then, we have gone backwards probably four or five days. This opportunity, of course, occurs—

Senator Faulkner —But what about giving Senator Hutchins a go for his matter of public importance now?

Senator BARTLETT —I thought it was unlimited and open-ended.

Senator Faulkner —It is unlimited, but let's hope you don't make what has been a dysfunctional day even more dysfunctional by your dysfunctional speech.

Senator BARTLETT —That is a bit harsh.

Senator Faulkner —It's a bit harsh, but it's warranted.

Senator BARTLETT —I think it is not warranted—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Order! Interjections are inappropriate.

Senator BARTLETT —If you want to suggest my speech is dysfunctional, I will have to speak longer to fix up the dysfunctionality, so it is probably best not to provoke me.

Senator Faulkner —All right, I won't provoke you.

Senator BARTLETT —I know we try to work cooperatively and that we have pairs. That is all very good and it is part of ensuring that we can have the parliament running whilst enabling some of us to attend to other duties. I am not disputing that. But this idea that we cannot consider anything significant on Thursday afternoons because everybody has already gone home sends a pretty dangerous signal, I suggest. The public expects us to be here. Senator Ian Campbell suggested that it is not really fair to bring this on now because people have already gone home. If that is what people want, maybe we should make it a reality and go home at 3 o'clock, rather than have Thursday afternoons treated as a joke. Taxpayers pay us to be here and they expect us to deal with serious business.

It was suggested that somehow the process of the proposal to have extra government business has been a debacle. The proposal was first put up last week, of course, and was knocked back for reasons that had some substance. It was again given notice of yesterday. It was prevented from coming up this morning because people wanted to chew up time doing other things that suited them. The outcome—not without some deliberate planning which I did not go out of my way to resist—is that, as Mr Latham quite rightly said, we will have a bunch of people not doing a full day's work for a full day's pay—`parliamentary job snobs', to use his phrase, who will not be putting in a full day's work for the money they take from the Australian taxpayer. The government has quite clearly stated that they want that outcome. Indeed, the whole issue would obviously have been put straight to a vote if it were not for Senator Lees preventing it from coming to formality and, from the sound of it, Senator Murphy not liking it either. So we have a situation where the government and Senator Lees have prevented the Senate from doing some work. I certainly will be reminding the government of that later in the year when they try and get consensus—and I noted that word `consensus'—about extending sitting hours.