Motion: Government Business Program

MOTION:

‘GOVERNMENT BUSINESS PROGRAM’.

Tuesday, 17 March 2026.

Mr NEWBURY (Brighton) (12:18):

I rise to speak on the Government Business Program, and the Coalition will be opposing the Government Business Program.

For the Parliamentary weeks this year we have done a little bit of a dance in this Chamber on the Government Business Program. Each week we have done a little bit of a dance, where the Government has said they have a program and have said they have legislation that Victorians should feel is important and that this Parliament would debate it – and then we have got part of the way through the week and the Government has stopped debating their motions and have gone to random sledge attacks on the Opposition. Of course they have. Each week we have played this little game where I have called out, on the Government Business Program, the fact that the Government would be doing this, the Government has denied it, and then halfway through the week that is where we have got. The Government has wasted this Parliament’s time with debates, often procedural, of waste-of-time sledge substance. The Leader of the House is hoping that I engage in procedural debate this week.

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: Order! Member for Brighton, through the Chair. Leader of the House, I call you to order.

James NEWBURY: I take up the opportunity and always stand ready to speak
to a procedural debate, as you would know, Speaker. So, each week we have
played this silly little game, and the Government has then wasted the Parliament’s
time with political sledge motions. I have to pay the Leader of the House a
compliment.

Members interjecting.

James NEWBURY: Yes, I know. Everyone get ready. The Leader of the House has admitted on day one of the Parliamentary week that she is going to be wasting the Parliament’s time this week.

So, you have to give the Leader of the House a compliment in saying that two sledge motions are going to be debated this week and that the Government is going to waste the Parliament’s time doing that – as they said, because it is an election year. I mean, how much more raw, straight politics can you get that the –

Mary-Anne Thomas: On a –

James NEWBURY: I am speaking to what you spoke about.

The SPEAKER: Order! Member for Brighton, when someone stands to raise a point of order it is not appropriate to interject.

Mary-Anne Thomas: On a point of order, Speaker, the Member on his feet is required to be truthful in all that he says, and he is misrepresenting my contribution.

The SPEAKER: Order! That is not a point of order.

James NEWBURY: I am speaking directly to the substance of what the Leader of the House spoke to in her contribution, and that was that the Government agreed and revealed to Victorians that for multiple occasions this week the Parliament would not be debating legislation, we would be debating political sledge motions. No surprise there. So, as I said, we call out the fact that the Government is doing this – and what a disgrace it is.

The one thing that the Leader of the House did not note is that during this Parliamentary week what I suspect and hope is that a Private Members Bill that is being considered in the Council will pass and be brought back to this Chamber. I hope there is a very long debate about increasing IBAC’s powers. I hope that the Council passes that bill this week, and I look forward to looking in the eyes of the members on the other side of the Chamber as we vote on that bill, if it passes. Because there will be two types: there will be the type that do not want IBAC to have new powers and there will be Members who do it because they have to. We on this side of the Chamber, I can assure you, are going to be speaking very strongly to it.

Back on the Government Business Program, we are concerned by the way the Government is being political. I know that in only a handful of weeks’ time this Government will stand up on the Government Business Program and say they do not have enough time to pass all the legislation. That is what they will be saying in a few weeks’ time. Yet they are wasting weeks and weeks of this Parliament’s time on dirty little sledges – and Victorians can see it. Victorians can see that these are just nothing short of political sledges. It is a waste of the Parliament’s time. We will not support a government business program when we know – and the Leader of the House has flagged – that is her intention. It is a shame. It does not stand this Parliament in the stead that it deserves to be and in the historical standing that it has for the Government to be playing games in the way it is in this Chamber, so we will oppose the Program.