Page 3217 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 16 August 2011
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Speaker, if you do not protect your position as Speaker, then you should go. (Time expired.)
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (11.26): I rise to speak, not unexpectedly, against Mr Smyth’s amendment. I was absolutely astounded at his first statement. He said that everyone in Canberra would regard anything that Mr Rattenbury said as being said on behalf of the Assembly. Mr Rattenbury is a member of the Greens, as I am, so from some points of view I think it would be great if all the people of Canberra thought that everything Mr Rattenbury said was said on behalf of the Assembly as a whole. Unfortunately, that is not the case. I think it is abundantly clear to everyone in Canberra—apart from, possibly, members of the Liberal Party—when Mr Speaker is speaking as Mr Speaker and when Mr Speaker is speaking as Mr Rattenbury.
I also found it very interesting that in Mr Smyth’s speech he did not once refer—according to my memory and my notes of it—to any of our standing orders. He did not refer to any standing order that Mr Rattenbury is alleged to have broken, because he has not done so. There is nothing in here that Mr Rattenbury has in any way even slightly offended.
Mr Smyth talked about other documents which mention the role of the Speaker. I will quote two of them because I managed to write them down. Mr Smyth stated that a Speaker should have a deep-seated reverence for the role of the parliament. I put it to you that Mr Rattenbury, in fact, has this. I also ask you: what actions on his behalf would make you think any other way? I actually thought that we were all here because we all believe very deeply in the role of parliament. Why else are we dedicating at least four years of our life to being members of the Legislative Assembly if we do not believe in the role of parliament? Why would we be doing it?
Mr Smyth also said that the Speaker should be impartial in their execution of the office. I also ask members of the Assembly to name an instance when this Speaker has not been impartial in his execution of the office. He has been. I personally believe that Mr Rattenbury has been a very good Speaker of the Legislative Assembly. Mr Smyth talked about needing to uphold the dignity of the parliament, the Legislative Assembly. I totally agree with that. I think the things that are putting it down are not in any way the actions of the Speaker.
I would draw members’ attention to an article in the Canberra Times a few months ago which listed the number of interjections during question time over a three-day period. I think there were about 700 of them. Members, I would put it to all of you that it is things like that that are reducing the dignity of the Legislative Assembly. We do not seem to be capable often of having a civilized debate. I will say that today it has been better. We are having fewer interjections, but even today the Speaker is being forced to intervene and say to fellow members that they should be obeying the standing orders. The standing orders say that members should be heard in silence.
I think that we should all be reflecting today on the dignity of parliament. From the point of view of the dignity of parliament, we should start by obeying the rules of the parliament—the standing orders. I do not believe that there is any way that the Speaker has broken any of these. I think that the censure motion against him is totally without foundation.
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