Local Government Bill 2019 – committee

 

Ms PATTEN: I would like to just make a couple of comments now that we are in schedule 1 of this bill that we quite rightly have debated for nearly 25 hours—and it has been in committee for nearly 25 hours. And guess who has been in that committee for that 25 hours? The Independents and the small parties—the crossbench. Guess who has colluded to introduce a bill that will not be equitable, that will not improve democracy and that will not improve grassroots? It is the two major parties. ‘Get out of politics’, they tell us. The crossbench is saying this will lead to less diversity. This will lead—

 

Mr Somyurek: On a point of order, Deputy President, this is a serious misleading of Parliament. She, the Independent, sorry I have forgotten the name—

 

Members interjecting.

 

Mr Somyurek: Ms Patten—see, that is why you should be a member of a political party. Ms Patten knows that I did not tell the Independents to get out of politics. I said grassroots council politics—

 

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Minister, sorry; it is not a point of order. It is a debating point. I just ask Ms Patten if she could come to her conclusion, thank you.

 

Ms PATTEN: I would say that this has been a travesty. This was an opportunity to change a 30-year-old piece of legislation into a modern, 21st-century piece of legislation that represented the diversity of our community, and what we have done is quite the opposite. Mark my words: we will be saying this after the 2020 elections when we see less women elected into council, when we see less diversity and when we see less people from the cultural backgrounds elected into our local government. You talk about grassroots, and you are undermining that. I mean, the fact that you put up amendments that were word for word the same as your political opposition—collusion.

 

Fiona Patten MP

Leader of Reason

Member for Northern Metropolitan Region

Committee of the whole 5/3/19

 

Second reading speech here.

 

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House divided on question:

 

Ayes, 32

Atkinson, Mr
Grimley, Mr
Pulford, Ms
Bach, Dr
Jennings, Mr
Rich-Phillips, Mr
Barton, Mr
Kieu, Dr
Shing, Ms
Bath, Ms
Leane, Mr
Somyurek, Mr
Bourman, Mr
Lovell, Ms
Stitt, Ms
Crozier, Ms
Maxwell, Ms (Teller)
Symes, Ms
Davis, Mr
McArthur, Mrs
Taylor, Ms
Elasmar, Mr
Melhem, Mr
Terpstra, Ms
Erdogan, Mr (Teller)
Mikakos, Ms
Tierney, Ms
Finn, Mr
O’Donohue, Mr
Vaghela, Ms
Garrett, Ms
Ondarchie, Mr

 

Noes, 7

Cumming, Dr
Meddick, Mr
Quilty, Mr
Hayes, Mr
Patten, Ms (Teller)
Ratnam, Dr
Limbrick, Mr (Teller)

Question agreed to.