Points of Order — Orders of the Day—Standing Orders

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I wonder whether you would be kind enough to give us an indication of how you view the Government’s practice of, without notice, deciding to change the Order Paper in order to accommodate its own business. This is a House of Representatives. It is a House where the balance of votes is reasonably finely tuned, and members should expect to be able to make their various arrangements around the Order Paper as it is provided by the Government. I realise that today has been a very bad day for the Government. It has, to a large extent, lost control of the House process through its own clever behaviour, but to exacerbate that situation by taking the course of action that it has this afternoon, invites the Opposition to use whatever mechanisms are available to it in order to protect the rights of members of Parliament. That is what I am doing. If you want to rule against that, Mr Assistant Speaker, that is fine. I accept that you have told me that by seeking to table the Standing Orders or Speakers’ rulings I am trifling with the Chair. It is an interesting decision, but none the less I accept it. But I do ask you to reflect on the question I have put in front of you.

The interesting debate we have in front of us here is that Mr Brownlee, who it has been suggested is trifling with the Chair, is defending himself by saying that to change the Order Paper is somehow something that he should now indulge himself in moral outrage about. I direct his attention to Standing Order 71, which states: “(1) An order of the day may be discharged or postponed—(a) on motion without notice, or (b) by the member in whose name the order stands informing the Clerk accordingly. (2) There is no amendment or debate on the question to discharge or postpone an order of the day.” I have been here for 16 years, and I have seen that done by both Governments on a number of occasions. If other members have decided they want to cause some disruption in the House, it sometimes does result in the kind of thing we have seen from Mr Brownlee, but there is no Standing Order that states it cannot be done. Therefore, the views I am hearing from members around the Chamber hold water: that this is clearly being done by Mr Brownlee because he personally just does not like it, and therefore essentially wants to trifle with the House at this time, in order to take up time,. The Standing Order is there; he knows that. He has been here for a shorter time than me, but a long enough time to know that. Mr Brownlee is the shadow Leader of the House, and he understands the Standing Order. He knows it is there; he can read it. So clearly Mr Brownlee is doing what members say he is doing.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you. I am going to rule. I have looked at Standing Order 71. It provides for any member to move the postponement of an order of the day. A Minister did so, and the House has agreed that the order of the day be postponed. It is the decision of the House; the House has made that decision. I declare the House in Committee—

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Mr Brownlee, I have made a decision.

Yes, you have, and it is an interesting ruling. But we have also learnt today that it is possible for any member to move the discharge of a bill at any time. I cannot think of a Standing Order that could allow the House to become more unruly than that one, if every time a bill was called we were to go through that sort of process. There is always, in any circumstance, a desire to allow a Government to transact its business. But Governments should not ride roughshod over members of the House in the way we have had this afternoon. The Order Paper, as far as I can make out, was changed about 40 minutes ago. The Government casually said it had given too much leave to the people who were supposed to discuss the Insolvency Law Reform Bill, so it would oblige itself by using its parliamentary majority to simply change the Order Paper. That, Mr Assistant Speaker, cuts right across the rights of other parties to have people in this House participate in debates at a reasonable time, with reasonable notice. That is why we have a problem and, frankly, will continue to have a problem, because we do not think it is fair that the Government goes ahead with this proposal.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you, Mr Brownlee. You have made your point. Again I refer you to Standing Order 71, and I reiterate that an order of the day may be discharged or postponed. If you look at Standing Order 71(2), you will see that it states: “There is no amendment or debate on the question to discharge or postpone an order of the day.” I now declare the House in Committee for consideration of the Te Arawa Lakes Settlement Bill.