Senator POLLEY (Tasmania) (15:08): I move: That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Attorney-General (Senator Brandis) to questions without notice asked by senators today. I want to try and encapsulate the essence of those questions that were put to Senator Brandis, starting with the A to G—that is, the Attorney-General, obviously. A is for the ABC broadcast, and we know how those people on the other side feel about the ABC. B is for books and, I guess, to be precise, it should be about poetry. C is for citizenship and E is for e-security, and we all remember the metadata and the performance by the Attorney-General with that. F is for funding and the funding for arts, which we know he has cut, and we know about the funding of his books to go into his very expensive bookshelf in his office. And of course all Australians remember that G is for Gillian Triggs. This government's performance in terms of attacking Ms Triggs is well known and has been deplored. The Attorney-General's performance in his personal attacks on the credibility of this public servant has been absolutely deplorable. We all know that this government is in chaos, but what we are really not quite sure about is whether it is a matter of the ministers in this government being totally incompetent or just untruthful. There are so many examples of how out of touch this government is, and no-one is more out of touch than the Attorney-General. There was his performance at the recently-held estimates, and the way in which he and his department have dealt with the correspondence they received from Man Haron Monis in relation to the siege at the Lindt Cafe; the fact that he waited for over a week before he corrected the public record. This is a man who comes into this chamber day after day and tries to berate the opposition for our term in government. Senator Ian Macdonald: He does not try to—he does! Senator POLLEY: He tries, but he is not very good at it. For somebody who is the Minister for Arts, he obviously failed his auditions this week. And today we saw a grand performance of how he can slap the lectern when he is trying to make a point, when he can yell and then we have those on the other side, Senator Macdonald, wanting to have the microphones turned up. What a performance—what a pitiful performance from those opposite. Let us turn to the comments that were made today by the Attorney-General in relation to the allegations that this government paid those smugglers. To turn back the boats, the Prime Minister and those opposite have always said that they would do 'what has to be done'. Today we heard that, no, they have done everything within the law; but they still have not answered whether cash was handed over to the people smugglers. They still refuse to say that. But they have not addressed the morality of this act. Senator Ian Macdonald: Mr Deputy President, I rise on a point of order on relevance. I know you allow a very wide range of issues, but this question of turning back the boats was yesterday's series of questions, not today's. The member is speaking on a motion to take notice of Senator Brandis' answers today. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: There is no point of order. Senator POLLEY: It does not matter when we look at the performance of the Attorney-General. Yes, it was referred to by one of the questions in relation to the media speculation about when there is going to be a shift in the ministry and whether or not Senator Brandis will be moved on. But I have to say that, with his performance this week, I think he was trying to audition for what was some media speculation that I do not think is going to be true: that the government will be looking for a new leader in the Senate. I do not think that is going to happen, but I will say that it was not a very good performance. If we turn our mind to something else which is of serious concern to the community—funding to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders—and the fact that this government has yet again, in so many ways, attacked those and cut funding that would support the most vulnerable Australians. Senator Brandis has overseen another strike against this government when they are attacking those who can least afford to be attacked. If we talk about arts funding—and we know that Senator Brandis loves his ballet—and where that funding from this government has gone, it has always been in those areas. (Time expired)