Senator Andrew Bartlett
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
 
Six Days to go and Senate Valedictories

Income tax cuts and more asylum seeker controversy dominated most of the Senate debate today.

The negotiations between some Liberal backbenchers and the Prime Minister about making meaningful changes to the laws surrounding immigration detention sound like they are at a critical stage.

The debate on the income tax cuts started. One vote was held on a motion of the Greens aimed at preventing any income tax cuts for anyone and proposing the equivalent amount of money be spent on health, education, etc. I didn't support this as I believe providing extra money for lower and middle income earners through income tax cuts is important (particularly given they got none last year), and there is still plenty of surplus left over to spend wisely on health, education and other infrastructure. Pitting one against the other seems counter-productive to me.

Tomorrow morning we move on to Democrat and Labor amendments to make the tax cuts fairer (naturally I think the Democrats' are better but they will not be successful, so we will have to vote for Labor's as a fall back). I expect a final vote on the tax Bill will happen late in the afternoon and I expect it will pan out as I predicted in this item.

We also had some meetings to cut back the number of pieces of legislation the Government will try to get decided before the end of next week. The list is still too long, but now it's just unrealistic rather than ridiculous.

We have the extra problem of an unprecedented number of Senators all finishing up at the same time. As we have fourteen finishing at the end of next week, that means lots of people wanting to make a final speech and lots of things that the remaining Senators want to say about those who are leaving. This Senate custom of valedictory speeches may look self-indulgent to some but I think is quite important in its own way.

It is a way of showing respect and acknowledging the contributions that people have made and encapsulating some aspects of the mark they have made. As the media 'debate' on the income tax cuts has shown, there is a lot of very narrow and shallow focus on what happens in the Senate and much of the other contributions that people make is lost. But just because it is not noticed or understood by the press gallery or the public does not mean it is unimportant or doesn't make a difference.

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Tuesday, June 14, 2005 Permalink
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