English Bill: Points of Order — Privileges of the House and Speaker’s Actions 
English Bill: Points of Order — Privileges of the House and Speaker’s Actions 
[Volume:611;Page:8603] 
Hon BILL ENGLISH (Leader of the Opposition) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I want to raise two matters with you related to events of recent days. The first is the question of whether over matters of order you regard it as appropriate to address the House first before you address the media. I refer to the press conference given yesterday by you as the Speaker of the House and also to the public comments made towards the end of last week regarding the actions of my colleague Shane Ardern MP. On a number of occasions in recent weeks I as Leader of the Opposition and as a parliamentarian have asked you to explain various decisions you have made related to the order of the House. On a number of occasions you have simply decided not to give an explanation—for instance in the matter of Harry Duynhoven MP and his disqualification from Parliament. 
Yet it seems that when there is media interest in a matter as opposed to parliamentary interest you are willing to comment on matters of order publicly before they are dealt with in the House. That happened in the case of your public comments on Shane Ardern last week then again yesterday when a matter of order arose when GE protesters came into the House and disrupted its proceedings. In my view you could have given an explanation today. But the matter of order was communicated by you through the media in what would have to be regarded as a very unusual process—that is by the Speaker calling a press conference regarding something that had happened in the Chamber. 
I have to say that that is leaving the Opposition perplexed. When we have asked for legitimate explanations of matters of privilege and order in this House you have at the very least given us brief and unsatisfactory explanations and on occasion offered us no explanation at all yet on other matters you have decided that it is fine to go out and make a range of public statements about matters of order even before bringing them to the House. I ask you to outline for us whether your taking these matters up with the media rather than with Parliament amounts to a change in procedure for the Speaker or whether we can regard the recent events as aberrations and that legitimate matters of order will be dealt with by you in the House where they are directly relevant to the processes of Parliament. That is the first matter. 
The second one is the subject matter of the press conference yesterday. As you will know the Opposition has expressed concern about the charge of disorderly behaviour being brought against a member of Parliament Shane Ardern. We understand that that decision was made by the police and there has been debate about the circumstances in which the police decision was made. Yesterday there were actions in this Chamber that by any definition fit disorderly behaviour. In addition to the fact that that behaviour disrupted the proceedings of the House in a way that is really quite unusual you saw fit to make public comments about the nature of that behaviour. We understand that the result of whatever processes occurred is that those people will not be charged with disorderly behaviour but that they have been issued with trespass notices. I believe that in light of different treatment for two sorts of protest actions—one by an MP and the other by members of the public—you owe this House an explanation about your role in the decisions that have been made. You have brought that requirement on yourself by making public statements yesterday about the nature of the protests and what actions you believe should flow from them. That is the second matter I want dealt with.