Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler—Leader of the House and Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) (09:27): It is somewhat difficult to speak to this motion, not having a copy of it, but— The SPEAKER: It was actually difficult for me to make learned rulings to your point of order without a copy as well. Mr ALBANESE: Nonetheless, Mr Speaker, your ruling might change when you read the motion. The SPEAKER: No—I doubt it. Mr ALBANESE: The hypocrisy of those opposite in coming in here and moving this motion, which directly contradicts everything that they said when they sat on the government benches, is just extraordinary. I have already indicated the examples of the member for Moreton, the member for Bonner and the member for Bowman. What they said then—the former Prime Minister, the shadow Attorney-General and the now Leader of the Opposition—was that it was entirely inappropriate for the parliament to consider matters which are under investigation. They could not have been clearer. The shadow Attorney-General, Senator Brandis, said: I think people who let us remind ourselves [that we] are entitled to the presumption of innocence ... Particularly since these people are Members of Parliament ... I ask you to compare that rhetoric with what is in the motion moved by the member for Sturt. It has argument and it purports to find outcomes relating to the member for Dobell without any process whatsoever. We in this country have a separation of the judiciary from parliamentary processes. It is a very dangerous slippery slope when the parliament sets itself up for the sort of engagement and grubby behaviour that we are seeing here. Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER: Slow learners! Worry about what is important. Mr ALBANESE: The fact is that former Prime Minister John Howard had this to say about the investigation into his three MPs, one of whom, the member for Bowman, is back in the chamber today, having been investigated by the police, who found no findings against him, and then running for parliament and being duly elected—he had proper process— The SPEAKER: Order! I remind the Leader of the House to relate his remarks to the suspension. Mr ALBANESE: I will, Mr Speaker. He said: A lot of people who are under investigation end up having nothing to answer for. … … … It's a police investigation and the appropriate thing for me to do is to let the police investigation run its course, and then, if it is appropriate, I will have something to say. If this suspension motion is carried, it throws that process out the door completely. We know, of course, that the mob opposite were involved in many issues that were raised over the years, but nothing happened in terms of sacking them even from senior frontbench positions. Wilson Tuckey used a ministerial letterhead to ask the South Australian police minister to review his son's conviction on a traffic charge. Do you remember Peter Reith's $50,000 phone card bill? The family and friends were making thousands of phone calls and taxpayers' money was being used, but he was not sacked over that; he was allowed to sit there. This is what Peter Reith had to say at the time on the ABC PM program: 'I did give the card to my son and I should not have done so.' And John Howard did not sack Peter Reith for misleading the public about 'children overboard'. There is a bit of a history of cards and issues being debated in the parliament. Peter Reith was allowed to sit here as a minister in the cabinet—indeed, as the Leader of the House in the cabinet—but that did not seem to matter. Also, when he was Prime Minister, John Howard did not sack someone for setting up a farm accommodation business at their original Malanda cattle farm just two days after the then Minister for Small Business and Tourism, Mr Hockey, launched a taxpayer funded ad campaign for farm stays. That was back in May 2004. Now the member for North Sydney has sought to engage in this debate. We had Alexander Downer. He said that he was ignorant about kickbacks with regard to the AWB scandal. We know that the member for Wentworth handed out $10 million to the speculative Australian Rain Corporation whose chairman, Matt Handbury, was a member of Mr Turnbull's fundraising body. This motion before us also speaks about payments from the Labor Party to the member for Dobell. That is what this motion says. The SPEAKER: Order! Again, I remind the Leader of the House— Mr ALBANESE: That will be debated if this suspension motion is carried. Yet I am surprised, actually, that there is nothing about the payments this year by the Victorian Liberal Party to one of their senior people, who is now a minister in the Victorian government. He had his legal fees paid for by the Victorian Liberal Party. What did the parliamentary Liberal Party of Victoria, of which the shadow finance minister is a prominent member, have to say about it? 'Oh, that's normal.' I notice that the Leader of the Opposition has not moved this suspension motion, and that is not surprising. To have the Leader of the Opposition stand up and move a suspension of standing orders to speak about late declarations would indeed be problematic for the Leader of the Opposition, because we know that the Leader of the Opposition was also twice extremely problematic with his late declarations about a range of issues, and just said, 'Oh well, don't worry about that.' We know that the Leader of the Opposition has a great deal of form when it comes to these issues, because he established a fund when he was part of the government. This is what he had to say about where the money, the $100,000, came from to go into that fund. Did he come in here and give an explanation to parliament? Did he say that everyone should have a right to know? No. The Leader of the Opposition told the Sydney Morning Herald on 5 September 2003 'there are some things the public has no particular right to know'. That is a mantra he lives his life by. But we also know that he told the ABC that he did not give Terry Sharples a loan guarantee for his costs, even though the Sydney Morning Herald had a copy of a note witnessed and dated 11 July 1998, which had the statement 'My personal guarantee that you will not be further out of pocket'. We never found out where all that money came from or what it was used for. The Leader of the Opposition thought that was fine. But it has carried on. On 20 June this year the Australian newspaper ran a story about jeweller Peter Dracakis, a shop owner in Mr Abbott's electorate, who was complaining about having to pay workers overtime rates—this is something I have raised in parliament before. Peter's father, Paul, was listed as the President and Financial Controller of the Warringah Club, which is the Leader of the Opposition's personal fundraising group, the same group that has raised $110,000 for the Leader of the Opposition since August 2008, probably something that he thought no-one needed to know about. Certainly the Australian newspaper was not told about this before it was splashed on the front page of the newspaper—this innocent small-business owner just having a view out there, not connected to the Liberal Party, not connected to the Leader of the Opposition whatsoever. Once again, this shows the Liberal Party's response and hypocrisy. This is a very dangerous road that the opposition go down. They go down this road because they are absolutely desperate to trash any convention whatsoever. This is not a conservative leading the opposition; this is a reactionary who is prepared to tear up due process, to tear up our parliamentary conventions and to tear up the principles of innocence which everyone is entitled to under the rule of law. As he said himself: 'You do not have to judge me by my words; you can me judge by my actions.' (Time expired)