Rebel senator’s poor grasp of legislation is alarming

The suggestion by newly independent West Australian Senator Fatima Payman that she may have to abstain on complex legislation rather than vote on something she does not fully understand raises questions about how well she grasps her role as a member of parliament.

Surely she must understand that the main part of her job is to vote on legislation that governs Australia as a modern society.

“I take my job seriously. I’m not here to just have a cruisy ride for the next four years,” Fatima Payman says.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Payman told the Herald “I’m not here to be an obstructionist”, adding that she wanted to be a “voice of reason and integrity”, squarely focused on what would be best for the people of Western Australia.

But Payman’s quixotic belief that voting is not compulsory can be construed as a self-serving gambit to gain more parliamentary staff. She wrote to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese after quitting Labor on July 4, and again this week, seeking staff in line with her fellow crossbench independent senators, Pauline Hanson, Jacqui Lambie and David Pocock.

She said she had yet to receive a response. Labor may be playing hard ball, but Hanson et al were elected as independents, while renegade Payman joined the Senate in 2022 with the panoply of Labor staff and resources at her fingertips – until she chose to cross the floor to vote against the Albanese government and support a Greens motion on recognising a Palestinian state, then quit the party for the crossbench.

Of course, Payman, whose family fled Taliban-ruled Afghanistan shortly after her birth, is entitled to vote according to her conscience and beliefs, but she also seems to have been a Greens plaything and her rebel stand has had no effect on Australia’s position on the Gaza war.

Payman estimated her workload as an independent was now 10 times as demanding. Not only are lobbyists waiting outside her Senate office door, but she has to get her head around complex pieces of legislation, ranging from reining in the construction union to taxpayer subsidies for critical minerals projects.

“It’s like moving from this massive corporate world to one where you’re a small business owner doing everything on your own,” she said. “It is very overwhelming.”

Her rebellion raised doubts about whether antiquated Labor rules governing MPs’ loyalty to caucus decisions were still fit for purpose in Australian politics, in a time of greater tolerance for dissent. She continued to attract media interest during her first parliamentary week as an independent senator and is the subject of the ABC program Australian Story next Monday.

Amid the attention, she asserted that she took her job seriously. “I’m not here to just have a cruisy ride for the next four years. It’s important I do justice to my constituents, and that requires me to have the resources to do my job,” she said.

She will remain on the crossbench until 2028. Should Labor agree to meet her demands for extra staff, it will be a further cost to taxpayers. Regardless of her staff problems, opting out of voting on legislation is not a prerogative for Payman.

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