Allegra Spender
Wentworth · Independent · Australia
“Estimates are between 0.5 per cent and two per cent of all abortions over 20 weeks. They are generally because of late diagnosed anomalies, genetic syndromes or severe fetal growth problems.”
“The bill is useful, it is technical, it's incremental, it has useful schedules, it has 'tell us once', it has streamlining and it has technical fixes. These are all good things, and I do not underestimate the effort that goes into getting useful changes like this.”
“Across Australia, we're seeing rising threats to women's access to abortion care. We see it in bills in state parliaments. We see it in the way some politicians talk about this issue, using misinformation and scare tactics to drive divisions, tools straight out of the Trump playbook.”
“They're saying they're waiting up to 18 months for the ATO to make a decision on how an investment would be treated, so the foreign capital just goes away. We need to change the culture here, and this is why—while I support this government's actions in this space—I urge the government to go further. This isn't about bad people.”
“I've seen firsthand how drone technology is at the forefront of some of these problems because government is slow to make decisions. There's no accountability from many government departments in terms of the speed of their decision-making.”
“I support the government's work on the fund, but I think it's currently around one tenth the size of the original 1990s National Competition Fund. If we expect that to move the dial, as it did back in the 1990s, we are going to have to put more firepower behind it.”
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“A Senate inquiry last year confirmed that Jewish students are withdrawing from university life. Parents are questioning whether Australian universities remain safe and welcoming for their children. That is a tragedy for all of us. Each quarter I meet with students from across my community in primary school and high school. Last year I remember very vividly that, when I was asking the year 11 students what's on their mind, every single time antisemitism came up, and this student said, 'I'm just not sure if I'm going to be welcome on Australian university campuses.' As a child of an immigrant, as someone who values multicultural and multifaith Australia, I recognise that any group feeling excluded from our institutions and not feeling welcome is a tragedy for all of us.”
“The stories I heard were distressing—Nazi symbols graffitied on buildings and slipped into student backpacks, food thrown at students wearing a kippah, Jewish students afraid to grieve publicly or speak out for fear of social or academic repercussions. In meetings with students from my local area, I heard about Nazi posters pasted next to university rooms and about stickers across campus that read 'Zionism is terrorism', yet those same students are working to build an understanding. One young man set up a campus store titled 'Judaism and Zionism—come and ask us anything', trying to engage constructively despite a lot of hostility. These are difficult times, but these students are trying to do the right thing, and, in some cases, they are being met with intimidation and abuse, and this is unacceptable.”
“I want to recognise that gender based violence is not the only form of harm that students experience on campus. I'd like to talk to you about one form of harm that is of particular concern to my community and particularly in recent times, and that is specifically about hatred and harm directed at Jewish students on our university campuses. Over the last two years, I've heard from dozens of young people about the rising tide of antisemitism on Australian campuses. Following the tragic events of October 7, I conducted a national survey with Jewish students to understand what, if anything, had changed on campus.”
“Most importantly, universities must engage students, staff and those with lived experience in designing and reviewing their responses to complaints. Often, it is particularly in the responses to complaints that the greatest challenges lie. A trauma informed, student centred complaints process will be a core obligation. I welcome the government's close collaboration with its expert reference group, comprised of university leaders, gender based violence experts and victim-survivor advocates, because policy works best when it is shaped by the people it is designed to protect, and trauma informed approaches are essential to both healing and prevention. While I commend this bill, and I commend it strongly, I would like to acknowledge the work that still is to be done.”
“This is an institutional failure, and it's why I support this second step on reform, the creation of a higher education code to prevent and respond to gender based violence. What does this bill do? This bill aims to embed national standards for how universities prevent and respond to gender based violence. It introduces a new legislative instrument requiring higher education providers to adopt evidence based strategies and practices to ensure student safety. It includes meaningful accountability. Vice-Chancellors and CEOs will be required to implement a whole-of-organisation response plan to be reviewed every six months by their governing bodies. Staff and students must be given education and training on prevention. Universities must consider a staff member's history of gender based violence in recruitment and promotion processes.”
“I credit the minister for swiftly meeting this group and others on this action and for the action he has subsequently taken, including the introduction of this bill. I would like to acknowledge Senator Pocock and other crossbench colleagues who championed these issues alongside the student activists who continue to speak out, often at great personal cost. The evidence is stark. Over 14,000 sexual assaults occur on Australian university campuses every year—around 275 each week. These are not just statistics. These are young people, overwhelmingly young women, whose confidence, academic achievement, mental health and futures are being shaped by trauma. Fewer than six per cent of students who experience sexual assault on campus report it. Of those who do, only around half feel that their complaint is taken seriously.”
“That was inspired by a group of young, courageous women that I met in 2023, including representatives from Fair Agenda, End Rape on Campus and the Stop Campaign, who came to parliament and shared stories of sexual assault and harassment on campus, stories not just of trauma but also of bravery. I'll be honest that, before that date, I really didn't understand what a problem this was across our campuses, and I was shocked by the extent as well as by the experience of young women seeking to address this on campus. I was shocked by the lack of action. Immediately after that meeting, I, along with other members of the crossbench, raised these concerns directly with the Minister for Education, Jason Clare.”
“I rise to speak in support of the Universities Accord (National Higher Education Code to Prevent and Respond to Gender-based Violence) Bill 2025 and I do so with a sense of pride, having pushed for this action against sexual violence at universities, but also with a strong sense of urgency because, while this bill is a welcome step forward in keeping students safe on campus, the scale of harm facing students demands serious and sustained action. This bill is personal for me as I have been seeking action against campus gender based violence since last term.”
“Sadly, this species is listed as critically endangered on the east coast of Australia due to habitat degradation and the impacts of fishing and mitigation strategies like shark nets. People like Sarah and programs like Spot A Shark are essential in supporting research, building awareness and driving conservation. In a week when many of us have been invited to the screening of Ocean , I echo the spirit of David Attenborough. Let's follow the examples of our surf lifesaving clubs and citizen scientists and protect the extraordinary community and environment we are lucky to share. I'm proud that protecting the oceans is going to be a really important focus for me in this term.”
“It is a privilege to represent some of Sydney's coastal communities, where volunteers not only save lives but also care deeply for the environment. I recently spoke with Sarah Han-de-Beaux, a shark researcher and member of Dive Centre Bondi. Sarah also manages Spot A Shark, a community science project that collects photos of grey nurse sharks from diver interactions along Australia's east coast. Fearsome as they may look in their classic shark physique with pointy snout and visible teeth—I have to say, the first time I ever dived with sharks, I was quite intimidated as they glided passed—grey nurse sharks are, in fact, gentle giants. Some of them are very well known to locals. Phil, Mia, Harry, Megan, Georgie and Winston are just some of the grey nurse sharks that have been spotted at dive sites along Bondi and South Head.”
“These honours are a credit to president Sandra Fox and her exceptional team, and it's pretty incredible they did this all while trying to finalise a really beautiful renovation. I also want to acknowledge other local clubs for their achievements. Clovelly's Glen Clarke won facilitator of the year and Dominic Winkle won volunteer of the year. Bronte won rescue of the month in March 2025. North Bondi won joint rescue of the month in February 2025 with Bondi. Bondi's Dori Miller won masters athlete of the year, Robyn Carr won official of the year and Gareth 'Chop' Robinson won surf lifesaver of the year. These winners now progress to the New South Wales awards in August, and I wish them every success.”
“I want to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the many volunteers in Wentworth who dedicate themselves to protecting our community and our precious coastal environment. First, I'd like to congratulate Tamarama Surf Life Saving Club for their outstanding success in the recent Surf Life Saving Sydney Branch Awards of Excellence. For over a century, Tamarama have welcomed and safeguarded locals and visitors, and their impact is profound. At the awards, Tamarama was named club of the year. The education team won service team of the year, and Amelia Curtis was named administrator of the year. They also received the innovation award for establishing the Women in Lifesaving Network—now embraced by neighbouring clubs.”
“I believe it is already enshrined in the Fair Work Act and that it actually removes choice for workers, which is important, and also makes our industrial relations system more complex, which has a burden that is hard to quantify but is significantly there. I believe that if we are serious about boosting productivity then we need to be absolutely rigorous in scrutinising every piece of legislation that comes through this House and to view it through a productivity lens as well as all the lenses of the other issues that this piece of legislation is trying to address.”
“It is for that very reason that we determined to have a Fair Work Commission, an arms-length organisation that can take the politics out of these sorts of decisions, in the first place —industrial relations are too important to squabble over for political games. I come back to the workers I spoke about at the very start. I will be honest with all those people in my community who do rely on penalty rates and overtime rates. If I believed that this bill were critical to protecting you getting what you deserve in terms of those penalty and overtime rates, then I would be voting for this bill. But I'm not, because I don't believe it is critical.”
“If we could look at our system not through a political lens but through a productivity lens—a lens of just understanding how the system works, how it doesn't work—and then better understand our choices and our trade-offs when we choose to make them, then we could have a better chance of making all workers better off, which is certainly my objective in coming into this House. The simplistic message the government is espousing is that anyone who opposes this bill must want to slash wages. That is an unfair argument, and it is not worthy of what is actually a really important debate. It just demonstrates how politicised IR has become. I don't want to see industrial relations be an ideological battle between the major parties to the extent that it is virtually impossible to have the sensible debate around IR that we need.”
“No single action is a panacea for productivity, but we cannot pretend to have a comprehensive discussion about how to lift our lacklustre productivity without acknowledging that there are balances to be struck, and, frankly, we need a better evidence base to assess whether changes to the industrial relations acts make a difference, a negative or positive difference, to productivity and the cost or the benefit that that imposes on the community. While I'm talking about this, I have been urging the government for some time to ask the Productivity Commission to specifically look at industrial relations through a productivity lens.”
“We all know that productivity is the only way we can get a sustainable lift in wages over the long term. In fact, the Intergenerational report suggests that it has represented around 80 per cent of real wage growth since the 1980s. If we don't lift our sluggish productivity levels, all of our wages go backwards. All this negotiating, all this fighting over the pie means so much less if the pie isn't growing. How do we grow that pie? We have to grow productivity. You might not notice it, you might not feel the benefit of productivity, but as Ken Henry outlined in his recent Press Club speech, 'The average full-time Australian worker has been robbed of around $500,000 over the past 25 years,' because of our failure to lift sluggish productivity. I know industrial relations and tax reform are no panacea for productivity.”
“It argued for 'explicitly enshrining productivity as an objective of modern awards'. I move: That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: "whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House: (1) notes: (a) Australia has just had the worst decade for productivity in the past 60 years; (b) boosting productivity is the only way Australia can sustainably increase wages over time; (c) the Government's agenda to lift Australia's productivity is not comprehensive without considering the role of Australia's industrial relations system; and (d) in 2023, the Productivity Commission's report Advancing Prosperity recommended that the Fair Work Act be amended to explicitly include productivity as an objective of modern awards; and (2) calls on the Government to amend subsection 134(1) of the Fair Work Act such that productivity is an objective of modern awards, as per Recommendation 7.13 of the Productivity Commission's report Advancing Prosperity ".”
“This change, while modest, adds to the complexity and makes it harder for people trying to do the right thing to make sure they are doing the right thing or they are being paid the right amount. It also makes it potentially more complex to engage with and enter into designing enterprise bargaining arrangements, which I know is a key desire, frankly, of the Labor government and of many employers. This brings me to my second reading amendment. The government has shown today how easy it is to open the Fair Work Act and legislate provisions to, in the minister's words, 'get wages moving for Australian workers'. Well I ask them, while we're at it, to please consider recommendation 7.14 of the Productivity Commission's report entitled Advancing prosperity , which I referred to earlier.”
“If the vast majority—and I am talking about the vast, vast majority—of workers are better off under a different arrangement but a very small handful would be worse off under that arrangement, in whose interest is it for that not to be at least offered as an option for people? That is the question I really am asking as the government puts forward this bill. Finally, my final concern with the bill is simplicity. I understand that awards are simpler than they have been in the past. I have employed many people under awards and I have sat with family members and friends trying to work out what they should be paid, and I can tell you that we have a long way to go to make awards simple for businesses to make sure they are doing the right thing and simple for people to make sure they're being paid correctly.”
“The reasons for this might be as simple as wanting to be able to make applications for credit easier or making it simpler for them to save and budget their weekly wage. Allowing workers the option is exactly what our workplace system, I believe, should have more of rather than less of. In fact, the Productivity Commission's 2023 report Advancing prosperity , explicitly recommended 'introducing menus into industrial rewards' in recommendation 7.14. The additional concern I have on this bill is the bar under which this could be judged—if a single worker would be worse off under a different penalty rate arrangement then it would not be possible for it to be offered. Again, I think we need to think of context.”
“I think that this shows an unreasonable lack of faith in the Fair Work Commission and an unreasonable lack of respect for individuals' right to choose what options suit them best. As I mentioned before, section 134(1) of the Fair Work Act already gives the Fair Work Commission the responsibility to adjudicate on these matters. We want an industrial relations system that accommodates different circumstances and affords workers choice but pushes back when compromises go too far. I believe the current system strikes the appropriate balance, and I believe the bill undermines this important principle. It is entirely reasonable that some workers may want to choose a stable salary over relying on penalty rates, for example.”
“This bill is in direct response to a current application from one sector to the Fair Work Commission to have an adjustment to the award to allow workers to opt in to a higher, yet stable, salary over a lower base rate reliant on penalty rates. This bill is seeking to prevent workers having a choice about whether they get the current arrangements or whether they accept a different arrangement which they would prefer. I do understand that for some people the concern is that this just represents the thin end of the wedge and that, if we introduce a reasonably acceptable change, this will be start of the slippery slope to gradual degradation of penalty rates. I have heard that argument. But, respectfully, I disagree.”
“This section states that, under the objectives of modern awards, they must consider the need to provide additional remuneration for employees working: overtime; unsociable, irregular or unpredictable hours; weekends or public holidays; and shifts. That is already enshrined in the current Fair Work Act, and the Fair Work Commission has to work under those objectives. In other words, the Fair Work Commission is already instructed by the act to consider the provisions the bill seeks to protect. Legislating an additional proposed section 135A represents a lack of faith in the independent Fair Work Commission to adjudicate this matter fairly on the guidance that already exists. This brings me to my next concern.”
“It will prevent reasonable options and menus in awards and, in some cases, hold back an overwhelming majority of workers from accepting better outcomes, and it adds additional complexity to our already complex award system. None of these objections seek to undermine the ability of workers to receive compensation for their tireless work, particularly those that work in unsociable hours. My principal concern with this bill is the deliberate interference with the Fair Work Commission's powers to adjudicate such matters. I think it's really critical to identify that the protections this bill seeks to insert are already explicitly stated in the bill under section 134(1) of the Fair Work Act. These protections exist.”
“This bill seeks to amend the Fair Work Act to insert a new section requiring the Fair Work Commission to ensure that, in making or varying modern awards, penalty rates are not reduced and that new or varied awards will not include terms that substitute penalty rates or overtime entitlements which reduce additional remuneration from penalty or overtime rates. Now, no-one disputes the fact that people who work those shifts and those hours should receive fair compensation for doing so. I think it is disingenuous to characterise any questions on this bill in that way, but I do have serious reservations about the bill—principally, that it undermines the role of our independent Fair Work Commission, who we've entrusted to take politics out of such decisions.”
“I rise to speak on the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Penalty and Overtime Rates) Bill 2025. Penalty and overtime rates are a really important part of our employment system and were, in many cases, fought hard for over the course of Australia's history. In my electorate, I have St Vincent's hospital, one area of the community where I often meet amazing shift workers who give up their weekends, their nights and their public holidays so that the rest of our community are safe and have help when we need them. Shift work is hard enough, but additionally these essential workers have to give up precious time they could otherwise be spending with friends, with family and out in the community. To them, penalty and overtime rates are crucial, and I recognise that. It is with those people in mind that I considered this bill.”
“But I do believe that the government could have done a much better job in terms of designing some aspects of this bill, and this bill still has a significant way to go in addressing some of the problems in our university sector.”
“So it wasn't fair either, and it's a shame that the government hasn't dealt with this problem, because it is a significant problem with the HECS-HELP system, and it is urgent that it be addressed. Another opportunity that has not been dealt with in this bill and was recommended by the Universities Accord was to change the timing of indexation from 1 July until compulsory repayments made during the previous year were deducted from a student's balance. This would help students pay down their loans quicker. In summary, I will support this measure because I believe it is providing relief to a part of the community that really needs it.”
“I'll put one out there that the member for Kooyong raised in her second reading amendment, and that is the job-ready graduates scheme. This is a policy that keeps on coming up when I go around my community and ask them what they think about HELP debts and education. This policy, which was implemented by a previous coalition government, increased particularly the cost of arts degrees to around $55,000. They were trying to disincentivise people from going into the arts and encourage more into STEM. It did not work or achieve its policy objective, but it burdened arts graduates with an education debt that outstripped, frankly, the costs of the university and penalised a group of people who actually have relatively low lifetime earnings.”
“This simple change would have provided $5,500 to all students with a HELP debt, regardless of their year of graduation. The policy would have cost the same, yet it would have mitigated this horizontal inequity based on when a person happens to graduate from university. It would also have given, possibly, the government a longer grace period before pressure mounts for other people to get future cuts to their HECS debt—which is probably going to happen after this one-off debt relief. That is a problem for a future government. I've talked a lot about HELP debt, about what it is and about why this is an important bill, and I recognise that it is important. But I also recognise that there are many other issues with the current HELP system which are problematic and have not been addressed by this bill.”
“I don't think that's a particularly fair way of approaching it. And, frankly, a young person going into uni right now or starting next year is not going to get any benefit from this bill at all. This is part of the challenge here. I believe that good policy requires people in the same situation to, ideally, get equal treatment. I recognise that many people in this House, for instance, had free university, which is a luxury that many won't have. I think it's of concern that this bill is so sensitive to the timing of when somebody completed their university degree. Other options were presented by e61. They recommended that the government pay each student with a debt a flat amount equal to 20 per cent of the average HECS debt.”
“As e61 estimate in their recent research, a graduate who finished the same degree four years ago—and, by all accounts, can be expected to face the same financial pressures and burdens as someone who graduated today—will experience just half the benefit of this policy, relative to someone who graduated last year. So, within four years, one person gets twice the benefit of somebody else because of the way that this bill has been designed. That just seems a shame. Frankly, just because you graduated four years ago doesn't mean you are less worthy of a reduction in your HECS balance, and it doesn't mean that you're less pressured in terms of your finances; it's just the timing. If, right now, you're at maximum HECS debt, you're going to get the full benefit of this bill. If you have paid it off over time, you're just not.”
“So this is why I support the measure in this bill that cuts student debt, because I believe that we do need to find broad ways to try and support young people in what is a really difficult moment for them right now. But I do have some questions in terms of how the government designed this part of the bill, and I wish they had, frankly, approached it a different way. The government decided to offer HELP relief to students by slashing 20 per cent of their account balance as at 1 June 2025. And, look, that's going to help a whole bunch of people—many, many people in my electorate—and I'm extremely pleased about that. However, this policy is extremely dependent on timing, and it is, as economists call it, 'horizontally inequitable'.”
“We, as a country, will pay the price for that going forward. We are seeing this in our wealth outcomes. In the last 10 or so years, households over the age of 65 grew their wealth by around 50 per cent. Households under the age of 35 pretty much went nowhere. We see that in our tax system. If you take two households both on 100 grand, if one household is retired it is, on average, paying half the tax of a young working household. We all know that it's when you are young and working, when you're trying to buy a house or raise kids—that's when you have the most pressure on your income, and that's when our tax system goes for you the most.”
“As Professor Andrew Norton argued, these measures in principle sound good—graduates will pay less on average every year—but there are some downsides, including in the marginal increase in the average repayment timeframe and an increase in the likelihood of some low-income graduates having their HECS index faster than their ability to repay. So these are good measures but they're not perfect. However, there are a couple of issues with the bill. One is how we are giving one-off HECS-HELP relief to students. I do support HELP relief for students, and that is because I believe that, in Australia, young people are struggling to achieve the same milestones as their parents. We have a birth rate of 1.5. That is the lowest it has ever been, and it is because young people are saying they can't actually afford to have children.”
“Firstly, increasing the payment threshold from the current $54,435 to $67,000 will mean that graduates on lower incomes and lower salaries will take home more pay before having to contribute back to the cost of their education—which is a response to the fact that over time the repayment schedule for HECS has not kept pace with the cost of living, in particular affecting low-income households. Similarly, the Universities Accord identified that the current repayment schedule is unfair since the stepped increase resulted in some cases of people earning less take-home pay after receiving a pay rise. That just doesn't seem right.”
“It is not a perfect bill, but it also doesn't deal with some things that really need to be done. What does this bill do? It reforms the HELP system. This reform of the HELP system will go some way to alleviating financial pressure for many young Australians and so it is a welcome measure to many young Australians. I will support this bill, but I also acknowledge that this bill is far from the best version of the bill it could be. There are a number of measures in this bill, and two of the three measures in this bill, namely the changing in the repayment threshold and introducing the marginal repayment system, have enormous merit.”
“I've tried to make all the good choices, but I cannot see how I'm ever going to have a home of my own. I can't see how I move forward, and I think about this every single day.' This, to me, is absolutely gutting, because this goes to the heart of some of the challenges we have in our country right now where people who are doing everything right. In this case, it was an individual who is working to care for people—she cared for my mother—talked about how she is caring for people, making all the right choices, investing in herself and her education, and she cannot get ahead. This is the problem that we're facing. We're facing it in the tax system, and we are facing it in the education system that we have here in this country. Let's now talk to the bill. This is an important bill.”
“I rise to speak on the Universities Accord (Cutting Student Debt by 20 Per Cent) Bill 2025 that is in front of the parliament, and I rise to speak about Australian young people who are struggling at this time in ways that they haven't in previous generations. It goes to the heart of why this bill is important but also why other things are also necessary as well. I met a young woman recently. She was in her early 30s. She had one little child, about a two- or three-year old, and twins. She came up to me at Kings Cross one Saturday morning when I was standing there. She is a doctor. She said: 'I used to be a nurse; I then became a doctor. I've just paid off all of my HECS debt. My husband is a lawyer; he used to be a policeman. He also retrained and just paid off his HECS debt.' She said: 'I think I've done everything right.”
“My question is for the Deputy Prime Minister. Last week the US Navy told congress that its submarine production continues to be around half the level needed for the US to be able to supply Virginia class submarines to Australia by 2032. Given the real risk that the US won't be able to double its production in time, what is the government's alternative plan to ensure that Australia has the capability it needs, and, if we don't have an alternative plan, why not?”
“First opened in 2012, the Kinghorn brings together researchers and clinicians onto a single world-class site, so that research findings can be rapidly translated into clinical applications for the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of cancer. Trevor Tyne, a patient at Kinghorn, recently came to see me with his oncologist Dr Jenny Liu. I was so moved by the way that Trevor spoke of the kindness and care of the Kinghorn staff, and by both of his and Dr Liu's passion in ensuring that more Australians experience the lifesaving work of this centre firsthand. It particularly focuses on rare cancers, which equate to 25 per cent of cancer deaths, and this is an area that needs greater support.”
“I want to take this opportunity to showcase the work of two wonderful organisations within Wentworth. Earlier this month I had the pleasure of meeting Rabbi Alon Meltzer, the director of programs at a not-for-profit called Shalom Collective. This organisation creates contemporary Jewish experiences that celebrate culture, deepen identity and build a thriving community, as well as inviting everyone, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, to come together over literature, art, food and culture. They run a variety of programs, such as performing and visual arts programs, the Sydney Jewish Writers Festival, Jewish Food Festival and the children's book delivery festival, which connects over 26 thousand people across the community and beyond. I also want to celebrate the incredible work that's been done at Kinghorn Cancer Centre in Darlinghurst.”
“In our schools, universities and communities, I want us to be able to have robust and passionate debates with dignity, courtesy, fairness and respect, but, if we're going to hold the community to that standard, we need to start to hold ourselves to that standard as well. I know the government has proposed a variety of changes to the standing orders to set higher penalties in terms of bad behaviour, and there has been a very welcome change in terms of the gender mix in this parliament. But I don't believe that those are enough, nor do I believe that we should be telling the country that you can hold a robust debate without holding those four qualities in hand at the same time. That is what this parliament should expect of itself, and I think that is what the country expects of us as well.”
“This is why I believe that, as was recommended in the Set the standard report, the code of conduct should apply in the House, as well as all around, because you cannot do one thing in the House and then walk out of the room and say, 'This is how we're going to behave.' I did a survey recently on bullying in my electorate, and a comment that came back from one of the mothers affected by bullying was, 'My only comment would be for members of parliament to show more respect to political opponents.' Hear, hear! If we start to show that respect in this place, we can engender that in our community.”
“After Brittany Higgins's terrible ordeal in this parliament, the Set the s tandard report rightly recommended a code of conduct in the parliament that required people to treat people with dignity, courtesy, fairness and respect. But this code of conduct does not apply in this House, and that is a problem because this House is where the community sees parliament. Question time in particular is a time when the community sees the standards that the parliament is in theory trying to set, and the standards that the parliament sets in these times are not the qualities of dignity, courtesy, fairness and respect needed when conducting a robust debate.”
“Australia has one of the most diverse and successful democracies in the world, and this is something that I think we are all incredibly proud of, but our diversity and the success of this democracy relies on our ability to disagree well. In times of conflict overseas, when we have very strong and very different views about conflicts—which is certainly the case in my community and many communities across the country—there is that need to disagree well and robustly but with dignity, fairness and respect. Those are things that we in this democracy need, and we need to start by showing that here in the parliament. This is the fundamental part of this amendment.”
“I move: That standing order 91 be amended as follows: 91 Disorderly conduct A Member's conduct shall be considered disorderly if the Member has: (a)persistently and wilfully obstructed the House; (b)used objectionable words, which he or she has refused to withdraw; (c)behaved in a manner that fails to treat others with dignity, courtesy, fairness and respect; (d)persistently and wilfully refused to conform to a standing order; (e)wilfully disobeyed an order of the House; (f)persistently and wilfully disregarded the authority of the Speaker; or (g)been considered by the Speaker to have behaved in a disorderly manner.”
“My question is for the Treasurer. Tuesday's budget showed our fiscal position in structural deficit for the next decade. That concerns many of the people of Wentworth. What is the government's plan, apart from bracket creep, to address the structural deficit?”
“Since Bondi Junction, many people have shared with me their own lived experience in dealing with chronic mental health diseases among family, friends and members of their community. We need to do more to raise our investment in mental health support, to better integrate services between state and federal providers and to dramatically expand the mental health workforce to provide the best care for those in need. We didn't see enough for mental health in the budget, so I urge both the government and the opposition to push for mental health in the coming election, and I will commit to continue to fight for it.”