Senator LUDWIG (Queensland—Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Manager of Government Business in the Senate and Minister Assisting the Attorney-General on Queensland Floods Recovery) (14:20): Not in the least— Senator Bob Brown: Mr President, I rise on a point of order. You have called for Senator Wright to state the question rather than make a preliminary statement, which is allowed in standing orders. I asked yesterday about a long series of comments made the day before by Senator Abetz in leading to a question. I ask you, if you would, to look again at the rules regarding preliminary statements to questions and make the judgment from the chair consistent. Senator Chris Evans: On the point of order, I think Senator Brown raises the other side of the issue that I have raised with you a number of times, which is the way that senators have debated an issue and made derogatory remarks and then asked a question. I think it might be useful for the Senate if you could distribute to all senators a summary of what is acceptable practice as to the framing of remarks in the lead-up to a question, given that there has been quite a bit of debate about this in recent months. Obviously it is up to you to rule on this point of order but I think it might assist all senators if we could pull that together into one piece of advice.