Mr ADAMS (Lyons) (15:28): My question is for the Minister for Regional Australia, Regional Development and Local Government and Minister for the Arts. How has the Fair Work Act restored the rights of Australian workers? Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Lyons will resume his seat and I will get him to start again. The member for Sturt will withdraw. Mr Pyne: Mr Speaker, if it assists the House, I withdraw. The SPEAKER: The member has withdrawn. With the withdrawal goes an apology. It is taken as an apology. Mr ADAMS: My question is for the Minister for Regional Australia, Regional Development and Local Government and Minister for the Arts. How has the Fair Work Act restored the rights of Australian workers? How were the rights of workers affected by individual statutory contracts before Fair Work, and what is the future of statutory individual contracts in Australia? Mr Pyne: I rise on a point of order. On the basis of the ruling you gave last Wednesday in this place, I put it to you that that question is simply an invitation to the minister to attack the opposition. You have ruled questions that I have put in the last week out of order and I put it to you that the question that has been put to the member for Hotham is not within his responsibilities and invites an argument and debate in the answer. Mr Fitzgibbon: On the point of order, surely an admission of guilt is no defence. The SPEAKER: The chief government whip is warned. I do not wish to add addenda to questions but I take it that the question on the issue of whether it is within the minister's responsibilities is that he is the minister acting for the minister in the other place with those responsibilities. On the other matter, which was the first point that the Manager of Opposition Business has put to me, the question was in order. I simply indicate to the minister that he should decline the invitation.