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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2018-09-18 Daily Xml
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Members

Member for Lee, Naming

The SPEAKER: The member for Lee is named. The member for Lee has been named. The member for Lee has an opportunity to explain himself.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee) (14:51): Thank you, Mr Speaker. My points of order today have been raised after six months of behaviour in this chamber overseen by you, Mr Speaker, where we see a tactic by this government not only to take government questions, which of course they would not be Robinson Crusoe in doing so in taking government questions during question time, but they do so on information which has previously been reported to the house, published in the media and released by the government in their own press releases. Previously, Speakers have ruled—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: I have a right to explain myself without interruption.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Not only have previous Speakers ruled on this matter but when they have done so they have sat the minister down at the time and moved on to another question until the issue can be resolved, and the reason why is to stop the government of the day running down the one hour of scrutiny which the opposition is afforded in question time from being erroneously used. And—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! I will listen to the member for Lee. He has a right to be heard in explanation, or to make an apology, but I don't think it's coming. The member for Lee.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. So I raised that point of order not once, not twice but three times, and we have had previous rulings during question time by previous speakers which were to prevent the wasting—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Members on my right will be quiet.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —of time to enable the house to move on. Now, Mr Speaker, I absolutely respect your right to rule on these matters, and I absolutely respect your right to rule in accordance with the sessional orders and remove members from this house for infringements of the standing orders so deemed by you, Mr Speaker. I also accept—

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner: That gives you the right to yell at the Speaker on your way out?

The SPEAKER: Minister for Education, you are called to order.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Indeed, Mr Speaker, the member for Morialta's interjection goes to the nub of this because he accuses me of yelling at you on the way out, and indeed I wasn't.

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner: You were yelling at everybody.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: I was yelling at the member for Morialta and I was also yelling at the Premier, and the reason why—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, members on my right!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —is because, while I was departing the chamber, they were giving me what in cricket terms would be called a 'send off'. Now I understand, Mr Speaker—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: I understand, Mr Speaker, that is wholly unparliamentary and not provided by the standing orders. I should not have done it and I unreservedly apologise.

The SPEAKER: The member for Lee has apologised. The Minister for Education.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Sir, that was a rant at great length. It was not an apology, in my view.

The SPEAKER: Are you moving one way or another, sir?

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta—Minister for Education) (14:55): I move:

That the member's apology not be accepted.

The SPEAKER: There is an opportunity for a 10-minute debate either side, I am advised. Minister.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Sir, I have no intention of using the 10 minutes. I would like to give the opposition an opportunity to build on the 10 questions they have so far had to ask the government questions. The member was yelling across the chamber as he left. That is disorderly and it was appropriate that he be named. He was given many, many opportunities to raise the points of order in an orderly fashion. When he refused to do so, you gave the opportunity, under the relevant standing order, for him to withdraw from the chamber. On doing so, he was seeking to undermine the good order of the house and you used the relevant standing order to name him.

When given an opportunity to explain or apologise, he attempted to justify his behaviour for a full three or five minutes, and it was not a sincere apology. A sincere apology, in the order of which namings have not be acted on in the past, starts with 'I apologise to the house', potentially contains some clarifying material and then involves a sit down. What we just saw was a rant. It was a predetermined speech from a member who clearly is seeking to gain some relevance in the house. It does not merit the house granting an acceptance of the apology because it was not presented as a real apology. I therefore encourage the house to indeed not accept the apology.

The SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition has the call. He is the final speaker on this matter.

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (14:56): I am not too sure if those opposite have become unaccustomed to listening. It would certainly be evident from the government's budget that listening is not something they have decided to do too much of very recently. Indeed, their incapacity to listen has been demonstrated by the member for Morialta, the Minister for Education, because clearly the member for Lee in his response to being named made an unequivocal—in fact, I think he used the word 'unreserved'—apology for what was being referred to.

I am not too sure how much clearer the member for Lee could have been in offering an apology as a result of being named, so the suggestion by those opposite that somehow the member for Lee had not apologised when he did so unreservedly clearly demonstrates a complete and total level of incompetence in terms of the member for Morialta's capacity to indeed listen. There is no way that any rational judgement on behalf of this house could conclude that the member for Lee has not apologised and this motion should be voted down accordingly.

Motion carried.

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