[LINK] It is Time for Parliament to Follow the Rest of Australia Online

[Antony Barry]

On Sun, 30 Aug 2020 at 9:42 am, Tom Worthington <tom.worthington at tomw.net.au>
wrote:

> On 25/8/20 10:48 am, Brendan wrote:
>
> Yes. I found it interesting having appeared before a few inquiries that
>
> much of the business happens in the breaks, around the coffee and
>
> snacks. Also there is an interesting dynamic at the parliamentary cafe,
>
> with people meeting, and people watching who is meeting who.


I worked at Old Parliament house for 14 years, in the Legislative Research
Service, the Senate Committee Secretariate and the Prime Ministers Office.
During the Parliamentary Session most of the time the Parliamentary
Chambers are almost empty.  The members and senators are off doing other
things. Then, and no doubt now, the debate in the Chambers are being piped
to all offices in the Parliamentary. Division bells are installed every
where to call Parliamentarians to their respective Chambers when a vote is
needed. Flashing red or green lights indicates which chamber is having the
Division.

If a chamber gets below a quorum it would often get ignored unless, a
member of the chamber called the presiding officers attention to it in
which case the Division bells would be rung and every body would it hurry
back. This is a tactic often used by the opposition as the government
members had to get back to form the quorum, disrupting their business, as
the opposition embers might be tardy. No quorum and the chamber could not
continue its business which is embarrassing.

Most of the work of the Parliament takes place at Parliament when people
are NOT in the chamber.

Tony

> --
null