In which Australian House of Representatives Speaker Bronwyn Bishop appears to invent or ignore standing orders as she pleases

Federal Liberal Party MP and Speaker House of Representatives, Bronwyn Bishop, asserts that Abbott Government ministers are not obliged to answer questions during Question Time, then decides that standing orders relating to relevance don't apply and makes a mockery of the point of order rule by not immediately addressing the point but turning instead to ask a question of the prime minister.

Australian House of Representatives Hansard 20 March 2014:

Sinodinos, Senator Arthur

Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Leader of the Opposition) (14:26): My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to Senator Sinodinos's statement to the Senate in February 2013 that he played no role in the awarding of the January 2012 contract to Australian Water Holdings by Sydney Water. Was the Prime Minister aware that Senator Sinodinos had in fact arranged for a letter from Premier O'Farrell to help secure the contract? When did the Prime Minister become aware of this?

Mr ABBOTT (Warringah—Prime Minister) (14:27): These are all matters that will quite properly be canvassed by the ICAC inquiry.

Mr Burke: Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

The SPEAKER: Has the Prime Minister finished his answer?

Mr ABBOTT: Yes.

The SPEAKER: He has finished his answer. Do you have a point of order?

Mr Burke: Yes, under standing order 104(a), Madam Speaker.

The SPEAKER: The Prime Minister has finished his answer.

Mr Burke: Madam Speaker, it cannot be the case that the moment—

The SPEAKER: You were very quick on your feet.

Mr Burke: I am given the call, you then, instead of hearing the point of order, turn to the Prime Minister for advice.

The SPEAKER: I point out to the Manager of Opposition Business that that is coming close to a reflection.

Mr Burke: Well—

The SPEAKER: Resume your seat! The member would also know that, under the standing orders, ministers are not obliged to answer questions.

Mr Burke interjecting—

The SPEAKER: No, they are not, as you well know. Merely because you do not get the answer you wish does not make it outside the standing orders. [my red bolding]

Excerpts from House of Representatives Standing and Sessional Orders (44^th Australian Parliament) concerning questions to government ministers and points of order:

98 Questions to Ministers

(a) A Member may ask a question in writing of a Minister (but not a Parliamentary Secretary), to be placed on the Notice Paper for written reply.

(b) During Question Time, a Member may orally ask a question of a Minister (but not a Parliamentary Secretary), without notice and for immediate response.

(c) A Minister can only be questioned on the following matters, for which he or she is responsible or officially connected:

(i) public affairs;

(ii) administration; or

(iii) proceedings pending in the House.

(d) Questioners must not ask Ministers:

(i) for an expression of opinion, including a legal opinion; or

(ii) to announce government policy, but may seek an explanation about the policy and its application, and may ask the Prime Minister whether a Minister's statement in the House represents government policy. [my red bolding]

Point of order and Speaker's ruling

86 Point of order

(a) Subject to standing order 104, a Member may raise a point of order with the Speaker at any time. After the question of order has been stated to the Speaker by the Member rising to the question of order, consideration and decision of every other question shall be suspended until the matter is disposed of by the Speaker giving a ruling thereon. [my red bolding]

Excerpt from Parliamentary Library Research Paper, 22 November 2013, on the subject of relevance:

Standing Order 104 was amended on 29 September 2010 in relation to relevance as follows:

(a) An answer must be directly relevant to the question.

(b) A point of order regarding relevance may be taken only once in respect of each answer.

(c) The duration of each answer is limited to 4 minutes.

Hitherto the requirement had been for answers to be 'relevant to the question'—meaning 'relevant in some way or relevant in part, rather than directly or completely relevant', with the result that 'provided the answer is relevant and is not couched in unparliamentary language Ministers may virtually answer questions without notice in any way they choose'. [my red bolding]

The fact that the Speaker is so visibly partisan does not earn her the respect of her own party.

It is becoming increasing obvious that government ministers, from Prime Minister Abbott down, are cutting short her remarks or directions from the Chair by interrupting/over talking her whenever the mood moves them.

Yet another Abbott Government attack on workers' wages

Australian Government Dept. of Employment 20 March 2014:

Repeal Day - revocation of the Fair Work Principles and the Commonwealth Cleaning Services Guidelines, including the requirements applying to textile, clothing and footwear manufacturers.

Thursday 20 March 2014

News

As part of Repeal Day, the Coalition Government announced that it would cease a number of regulatory arrangements that are administered by the Department of Employment and apply to Australian Government procurements. These changes will take effect from 1 July 2014.

These arrangements create different requirements for suppliers to Government than those required in the private sector. The requirements under the Government’s mainstream procurement framework (such as the Commonwealth Procurement Rules) and the mainstream workplace relations framework will continue to apply.

The changes involve revoking the Fair Work Principles, which currently apply to all procurements above $80,000. The Fair Work Principles require tenderers to complete a declaration of compliance with the Fair Work Act 2009. Existing Government procurement policies and processes that require decision makers to ensure tenderers comply with laws and policies of the Commonwealth, including the Fair Work Act 2009, are not affected.

The Fair Work Principles also create specific obligations for tenderers from the cleaning services industry and those that manufacture textile, clothing and footwear products. These include the requirement for textile, clothing and footwear manufacturers to have accreditation under the Homeworkers Code of Practice administered by Ethical Clothing Australia, a joint union-industry non-government organisation. The Department’s funding agreement with Ethical Clothing Australia will also cease on 30 June 2014 to coincide with the end of this regulatory requirement.

The Fair Work Ombudsman investigates and prosecutes any allegations of underpaid wages or breaches of the Fair Work Laws.

As well as the cleaning services provisions in the Fair Work Principles, the associated Commonwealth Cleaning Services Guidelines (a legislative instrument under the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997) will also cease on 30 June 2014. Cleaning services providers tendering for Government work from 1 July 2014 will still be required to comply with all relevant workplace laws and the Modern Awards set by the Fair Work Commission.

Queries in relation to the revocation of the Fair Work Principles and the Commonwealth Cleaning Services Guidelines may be directed to the Fair Work Principles mailbox at: FairWorkPrinciples@employment.gov.au

The Sydney Morning Herald 23 March 2014:

Some of the country's lowest-paid workers could lose almost a quarter of their weekly wages under changes quietly introduced by the Abbott government.

Thousands of workers will be hit by the changes, which will strip between $172 and $225 a week from the pockets of full-time contract cleaners who work in government buildings.

The changes are among the 9500 regulations to go under Prime Minister Tony Abbott's red tape ''repeal day'' on Wednesday.

Buried in more than 50,000 pages of regulations and acts of parliaments to be scrapped is the revelation the government will abolish the Commonwealth Cleaning Services Guidelines for cleaners employed on government contracts from July 1.

The regulations are a form of collective bargaining introduced by Labor that lift the wages of workers hired by businesses that win government cleaning contracts, by between $4.53 and $5.93 an hour above the minimum wage. This brings their weekly wage from $664 to $836 for a 38-hour week for level 1, and from $724 to $950 a week for level 3 workers.

United Voice, the union representing cleaners, would not comment on the changes before consulting its members. It is understood the union was not aware of the changes and is trying to negotiate with contractors and the government in an attempt to mitigate the effects on its members.

Labor introduced the Cleaning Services Guidelines in 2011 to tackle the exploitation of vulnerable workers in the contract cleaning industry. A 2010 Fair Work Ombudsman audit of cleaning contractors found that 40 per cent of audited businesses did not comply with workplace laws. It recovered almost $500,000 for 934 underpaid workers…..

Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse: Cardinal George Pell exposed as being selective with the truth

The Sydney Morning Herald  11 March 2014:

Mr Ellis came away from a pivotal meeting with then Archbishop Pell in 2009 with the impression that the litigation had been “a runaway train with nobody at the wheel”. This was after years of legal action that had crippled Mr Ellis mentally and financially…
“No, it left me with the impression that Cardinal Pell was completely out of the loop on all of that decision making,” Mr Ellis said…

The Saturday Paper 15 March 2014:

But on Monday morning, just minutes before Ellis entered the witness box, counsel assisting the commission Gail Furness, SC, in her introductory remarks, dropped something of a bombshell.

She referred to a witness statement by Cardinal George Pell, not yet public because he was not due to appear until later in the week, in which he expressed “some concern” about the way the litigation between the church and Ellis had been handled. She quoted Pell:

“Whatever position was taken by the lawyers during the litigation, or by lawyers or individuals within the archdiocese following the litigation, my own view is that the church in Australia should be able to be sued in cases of this kind.”...

The Sydney Morning Herald 17 March 2014:

Monsignor Rayner who as Archdiocesan chancellor was the official church authority to deal with victim’s complaints, said he told Cardinal Pell about the amounts of money victims of sex abuse sought. But for an agreement to be reached, “finally the decision would have been made by the Archbishop himself”.

The Sydney Morning Herald 18 March 2014:

 Cardinal George Pell was calling all the shots in the notorious case in which the Catholic Church fought off the damages claim of abuse victim John Ellis, his solicitor has confirmed to the child sex abuse Royal Commission. The 2007 Ellis case established the defence which has insulated the church from paying damages to victims in similar cases ever since... 

 Cardinal Pell himself described the litigation against Mr Ellis as “legal abuse”, the Commission has been told. The case caused Mr Ellis harm and suffering, according to senior counsel for the Commission Gail Furness.

 For more than a week, before the Cardinal himself takes the stand, the Commission has been grappling with the question of how much Cardinal Pell knew. Now Paul McCann, the senior partner with Corrs Chambers Westgarth, which conducted the litigation for the church from 2004, has told the Commission he had no doubt the instructions he received through Cardinal Pell’s private secretary Dr Michael Casey came from the Cardinal himself. Cardinal Pell is due to appear early next week.

“What was your understanding of those instructions and whether or not they were informed by Cardinal Pell?’, asked commission chair, Justice Peter McClellan.

Mr McCann replied: “I didn’t have any doubt that the Cardinal was being kept up to date on developments in the case and it is obvious from some of the exchanges that he was in fact seemingly giving instructions as to various steps.’’

According to the solicitor, he was instructed by Dr Casey, who he believed was doing Cardinal Pell’s bidding in relation to several key decisions in the case. These included refusing Mr Ellis’ offer to mediate before the litigation, refusing a compromise offer to pay $750,000 plus costs before the case started and the decision not to put a counter offer to Mr Ellis….

ABC News 18 March 2014:

In a statement presented to the inquiry earlier this month, Cardinal Pell said he was not aware of ex-gratia offers made to Mr Ellis.

But Monsignor Brian Rayner, who represented the Sydney Archdiocese and Archbishop Pell in Towards Healing matters in 2004, has contradicted that statement.

Under cross-examination, Monsignor Rayner maintained the Archbishop was informed.

"I spoke to the Archbishop on every amount of money that was being offered to any particular victim," he said.

Despite saying he did not have authority, Monsignor Rayner offered Mr Ellis a $5,000 increase on the $25,000 payment before gaining the approval of Catholic Church Insurance.

In a lively exchange with the Church's counsel Peter Gray SC, Monsignor Rayner maintained that he had informed Archbishop Pell of the ex-gratia offers made to Mr Ellis.

"My evidence is correct and I've seen the contrary thoughts of the Archbishop and the Archbishop also has occasions when his recollection of events is not clearly accurate," he said.

He also said the Archbishop was very involved in Mr Ellis' case… 

The Sydney Morning Herald 22 March 2014:

The Catholic Church's insurer insisted on being "kept in the loop" in the John Ellis case after lawyers expressed concern at Cardinal George Pell's "tooth and nail" approach, according to evidence at the child sex abuse royal commission.

Peter Rush, then general manager of Catholic Church Insurance Ltd, complained to the business manager of the Sydney Archdiocese about being "kept out of the loop" in the case and warned this could jeopardise the church's insurance, the commission heard…

Dr Casey testified that it was his job to convey instructions to the church's lawyers, Corrs Chambers Westgarth, but the instructions came from Cardinal Pell.

"The general instructions were to vigorously defend the claim and to defeat the litigation, is that right?" asked Gail Furness SC for the commission.

"Yes", Dr Casey replied…

At a 2009 meeting Cardinal Pell told him the church's move from mediation to vigorous pursuit of his case was "unfathomable", Mr Ellis said...

How well do you know Yamba?

A lower Clarence resident asked a friend if they knew which business was going to occupy the refurbished building previously occupied by The Daily Examiner in Yamba .

"Oh, yes!" replied the friend. "Hookers have already moved in!" Since then the place has come to be known in some circles as "the brothel".

On another note, some locals refer to two other places as "the fountain on the mountain" and "viagra village".

 

Images from The Daily Examiner

Journalist John Birmingham asks "Will you miss us when we're gone?"

Brisbane Times 18 March 2014:

When protesters do emerge in significant numbers, however, it is the job of the news media to report them. It is indeed one of our most basic functions and one which we abjectly failed to perform on the weekend, first ignoring the twenty-thousand citizens who rallied across rural and regional Australia, before ignoring or underreporting the much larger numbers who rallied in the state capitals on Sunday.

Again, these were not mass protests of the size and style of the Vietnam era. They weren’t as large and certainly not as violent and disorderly as civil rights protests in Queensland in the 1970s and 80s. But they were large enough to be worthy of more basic news coverage than they received. They were arguably more important to community record keeping than a bit of colour and movement on Paddy’s Day. And inarguably more important than the other 'top' stories which enjoyed more prominence; the 'attack' of a body boarder by a dolphin, the "Real Housewife's Toy-boy All-Nighter", and Lara Bingle's insta-boob shot.

This is not a reflection on the politics of the events. If they had been organised by, for instance, a conservative talkback radio demagogue to protest a progressive government’s re-engineering of traditional social values, they would have been just as important to record.

The total disconnect between what might be termed citizen-initiated reportage on social media and mainstream coverage of the weekend’s protests was in no way mitigated by the scramble of the MSM on Monday to play catch up.

Stepping away from the all of the issues captured by a thousand different placards on Saturday and Sunday, the systemic failure to recognise the significance of the story speaks to a deeper fear I have about the news media, which is not that we might die out as Google gorges itself on the last scraps of our advertising based business model… but that it won’t matter.

That you won’t care, and that there will be no reason to care.

Because we failed you, long before we failed to do our jobs. There's a case to be made that new media, in the form of professional blogs and even some of the better amateur sites, have already embarrassed us in a dozen different specialist areas that used to compromise the various desks of the old metro dailies; sport, fashion (the 'ladies pages'), entertainment, science and tech, international politics, maybe even national politics. But the meat and potatoes of local coverage? No, that still belonged to us. Or I thought it did. Increasingly, however, I wonder whether the question, "Will you miss us when we're gone", is one which answers itself.

Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/comment/blogs/blunt-instrument/will-you-miss-us-when-were-gone-20140317-34xtk.html#ixzz2wG98yKdQ

Another Liberal MP runs afoul of media scrutiny of parliamentary entitlements

The Telegraph 11 March 2014:

POLITICIANS have been given the green light to hide the identities of family members who spend millions of taxpayer dollars annually flying around Australia in business class.

In a case that may set a precedent, the Abbott government has hidden records of taxpayer-funded family travel for a Liberal MP Jane Prentice after her family members racked up $20,000 worth of airfares, including business class, between Brisbane and Canberra in her first term in parliament.

The ruling is a different to the disclosure regime for the government's VIP jet flights, in which family members on the publicly-funded flights are identified and reported.

It also comes after Mrs Prentice's spouse, ex-Queensland Liberal MP Ian Prentice, attempted to distance his financial woes from her 2010 election campaign, saying at the time that voters were not electing him.

In 2006, Mr Prentice was forced into bankruptcy over a $1.062 million bill alleged by the Australian Tax Office, later saying he disputed it but could only pay less than $100,000 because of his meagre assets. The couple's Brisbane home was in Mrs Prentice's name only.

Family members are allowed to travel under parliamentary entitlements to help MPs ‘‘balance their work and family responsibilities’’ but the names are not released in the six-monthly travel reports detailing the flights and costs…

The Courier Mail 18 March 2014:

A LIBERAL MP whose ­husband once failed to pay a $1 million tax bill will be forced to show what taxpayer-funded expenses she claimed for him after an embarrassing backdown by the Federal Government.

The Finance Department has backflipped on a ruling that politicians could hide the names of family members who enjoy taxpayer-funded travel after The Courier-Mail appealed the move to block expenses relating to Ryan MP Jane Prentice and her husband Ian.

The agency also admitted its initial freedom of information ruling was wrong ­because its scope was too ­narrow and will now release other travel by Mr Prentice ­beyond just airfares.

In a further embarrassment, the department has admitted it was told by the Information Commissioner that such information should not be hidden.

Mrs Prentice claimed thousands of dollars worth of family expenses during her first term in parliament but ­declined to provide the identity of family travellers in travel reports to parliament…

Quote of the Week

The best way to get a picture of what is going on is to look at all the polls together.

When you do there is no doubt the Abbott government is continuing to have the worst start, at least in its ­polling, of any new government over the last 40 years.

[John Stirton,  Nielsen research director, writing in the Financial Review, 17 March 2014]