Matt Johnston: Fireys bill an unholy fiasco
WHILE new lows seem ever-achievable in state parliament, the “whatever-it-takes” standard has been exposed through the Bill’s showdown, writes Matt Johnston.
Opinion
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THE end justified the means. This was Opposition Leader Matthew Guy’s response to questions about why two of his MPs lied to parliamentary opponents last week, in order to defeat a Bill that would dismantle the CFA.
What the Coalition did, Guy argued, was save the CFA by whatever means it could.
The defeat of the Bill came after Liberal MPs Bernie Finn and Craig Ondarchie shredded a deal with two Labor MPs.
Finn and Ondarchie had been “paired” with Labor MPs so they didn’t have to remain in parliament on Good Friday, a sacred day for their Christian faith.
OPPOSITION STUNS PARLIAMENT TO VOTE DOWN FIRE REFORM
This meant the two Labor MPs would also abstain, so the proportion of votes for and against the Bill remained the same.
Shortly before the final votes were cast, Finn and Ondarchie skulked back into the chamber.
Labor and Greens MPs — some in tears — could not believe this “new low”.
While new lows seem ever-achievable in state parliament, Finn and Ondarchie’s contributions during the debate are incredible to re-read.
“There are a lot of people out there who look to us here in this house as role models. They look to us and they say, ‘Well, if the parliament is doing it, it must be okay’,” Finn said while attacking the government for sitting into Good Friday.
The reason the government was pushing into Friday was to force a vote on legislation to restructure Victoria’s fire services.
The urgency was because Australian Conservatives MP Rachel Carling-Jenkins, who had been an opponent of the Bill, said she was too ill to attend parliament.
GOVERNMENT SEETHING WITH LIBERAL PARTY ‘CON-TRICK’ ON FIRE REFORM
While the Coalition’s grubby tactics surrounding this saga were laid bare on Friday, Labor’s have been more opaque.
The fire services bill — which would remove career firefighters from the CFA and merge them with MFB firefighters in a new body called Fire Rescue Victoria — was created after the government was blocked from stitching up a CFA EBA that gave the firefighters union more control of the agency.
Supporters of the new Bill say it’s about modernising the fire services and increasing safety.
Opponents say the proposed changes diminish the successful integrated model of the CFA and reduce safety.
Meanwhile, there has been a mass exodus of leaders from the CFA and MFB.
The restructure legislation has been lying dormant for months, but was withdrawn from the government business schedule last year because not enough Legislative Council MPs backed it.
Greens MPs and Reason Party MP Fiona Patten supported Labor. Those against were MPs from the Coalition, the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party, independent James Purcell, and Dr Carling-Jenkins.
Last month the government, which doesn’t introduce legislation in the Upper House it thinks will be defeated, announced the Bill was a priority again.
So, who changed their minds?
Publicly, no one blinked.
Every MP who supported the change remained supportive, and every opposing MP publicly reiterated their position.
On Monday of last week, Emergency Services Minister James Merlino met all crossbench MPs to discuss the Bill.
On the Tuesday, Dr Carling-Jenkins fell ill, and revealed on social media on Wednesday that she had been admitted to hospital and discharged pending more tests.
“My position on the fire services legislation remains unchanged,” she declared. By Thursday, the Australian Conservatives MP said she could not attend a vote, and Coalition MPs asked if the government had “paired” her.
The government said no request had been made. Labor MPs kept a straight face, pushing towards a vote they thought they would win.
Enter Finn and Ondarchie.
Despite the turn of phrase used by Guy to justify his duplicitous actions, he knows the matter won’t “end” here.
One option for the government is to resubmit a similar Bill to the Lower House. There are questions about how to do this, under parliamentary law. Another potential option is for the Upper House to call for a fresh vote.
In 2011, a little-known mechanism was used in the Legislative Assembly enabling the Baillieu government to recommit a Bill — effectively getting a second go at a defeated piece of legislation — after one of its MPs missed a vote. The Liberal Party’s Robert Clark argued it was allowable when “a member misses a division by accident or misadventure”.
It had been done before, by “suspension of standing orders to allow the Speaker to direct the House to consider the Bill as a ‘new’ question”. All eyes would be on Upper House president Bruce Atkinson, and on Dr Carling-Jenkins, if this was pursued.
In the aftermath of the Good Friday debacle, government MPs warned Liberals to “stock up on vitamin C” to avoid illness now that pairing is dead.
The Coalition hopes Dr Carling-Jenkins is stocking up, too.
While the “whatever-it-takes” standard has been exposed through this Bill’s showdown, it has been building more broadly in modern politics.
A new vote on this Bill, and the next state election on November 24, will be a blip on the timeline.
There is no end in sight.
Matt Johnston is state politics editor.
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