It's quietening down around the corridors. Time for a wrap up of the day and then an adieu:
* much of the day was spent dissecting the PM's decision to ban the advertising of odds during live sports events;
* we'll see tomorrow whether it was enough to see off a private member's bill by government backbencher Stephen Jones who has promised to raise the issue during the caucus meeting;
* the Greens are dissatisfied with the government's measures and will try to raise support for further restrictions;
* budget estimate hearings are being held this week and next;
* Hansard reporters will no longer sit on the floor of Parliament (except during Question Time); and
* kind words were offered from both sides of politics to mark the death of Hazel Hawke.
Big thanks, as always, to photographers Andrew Meares and Alex Ellinghausen for their fabulous work. My pic(k) of the day is still the 2.15pm post/shot of Joe "George Clooney" Hockey.
And thanks also to everyone who joins in the conversation each day.
We'll be back tomorrow. Please join us.
And Heath Aston has also been listening in on committee hearings. He has filed this story in which evidence was given suggesting as many as 200,000 roof top solar panels may not have been properly installed.
More from budget estimates committees.
Immigration correspondent Bianca Hall has the story about how the Department of Immigration vastly underestimated the number of asylum seekers expected to arrive in Australia this year. Up to 25,000 are now expected - almost five times more than initial forecasts.
Earlier today Tim Lester recorded this mini debate between Labor Senator Louise Pratt and Coalition MP Kelly O'Dwyer. The pair have a robust exchange over the need for a full debate on a Greens bill extending marriage rights to same sex couples. Mind you, they both support the concept even if one is bound by her party's position and one is not.
The selection of bills' committee has not yet decided whether to recommend the bill for a vote. If it gives the bill the green light then it is up to the Leader of the House, Anthony Albanese, to set a date for a vote.
The Greens argue a full debate is not needed because several bills dealing with the issue have been recently dealt with. They want a vote asap.
PM 'cute' on gay marriage?
Same-sex marriage supporters Louise Pratt (Labor) and Kelly O'Dwyer (Liberal) clash over the need for a conscience vote on the Greens bill to be debated in Parliament this week.
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That would be a "no" to the question of a no confidence motion today.
After 15 questions the PM calls time on Question Time.
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
The Attorney-General, Mark Dreyfus, has written an open letter to Mr Abbott asking him to back away from a pledge to repeal part of the Racial Discrimination Act.
Breaking news reporter Judith Ireland filed this story on the issue a short time ago.
i-bench 2.0
Opposition frontbenchers Peter Dutton, Malcolm Turnbull and Kevin Andrews during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares
The power and the passion.
Schools Minister Peter Garrett during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
The Treasurer, Wayne Swan, accuses the opposition of trying to create "a Trojan horse that will cover up the fact".
Hmmm, let's think about that image for a while.
Except we can't do that for too long because opposition stalwart Bronwyn Bishop has counter accused the government of speaking with "the clang of an empty vessel".
The wit.
i-bench
Opposition frontbenchers Peter Dutton, Malcolm Turnbull and Kevin Andrews during Question Time. Photo: Andrew Meares
It seems Mr Thomson was not happy with the PM's answer (see 2.32pm post):
Seems only way to protect our water supply is to treat this years election as a referendum on future of our water. Vote to save our water
— Craig Thomson (@DobellThommo) May 27, 2013
Who likes families more? The opposition with its paid parental leave scheme or the government with its school kids' bonus (and status as party that introduced paid parental leave)? The government has now devoted two questions to arguing its case.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares
Labor MP Michelle Rowland (who represents the Sydney seat of Greenway) asks the Minister for Families, Jenny Macklin, what the government is doing to help families.
Geddit? It was only at the end of the last sitting week (barely ten days ago) that Ms Rowland was denied a pair by the Opposition so she could return home to look after her sick baby. Subtle as a sledgehammer, as my grandfather would have said.
The PM receives a question about coal seam gas and water security from, ahem, the member for Dobell, Craig Thomson.
Ms Gillard says the government will not support his private member's bill on the issue but points to recent changes made to federal environment laws on the matter.
We are in the fourth last week of Parliament before the election. Was that Mr Thomson's last question?
Craig Thomson asks Prime Minister Julia Gillard a question during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares
We've been waiting for this a long time. Thanks to breaking news reporter Judith Ireland for tweeting in.
Truss up now. Has a question for ... Transport Minister Albo (on Ford). Hurrah!! Albo says he's waited three years for it #qt #thepulselive
— Judith Ireland (@CanberraCamper) May 27, 2013
Can you believe the budget was handed down less than two weeks ago? It seems like much longer.
But not in Question Time which is focusing on economic management.
Which side of the chamber is more damaging to the economy?
The leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott, has accused the government of being pretty hopeless given its track record on the mining and carbon tax. His industry spokeswoman, Sophie Mirabella, lays the decision of Ford Australia to cease operations in Australia at the feet of the government.
The government begs to differ offering as evidence the Opposition's paid parental leave scheme and other decisions such as not keeping the school kids' bonus payments. It get a gift when Mr Abbott mentions Olympic Dam, a project which Mr Abbott got himself into a spot of bother during a well publicised interview last year.
"You seek to whip up fear but you never seek to acquaint yourself with the facts," the PM says.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard arrives for Question Time on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares
About that no confidence motion, Tony.....
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and deputy opposition leader Julie Bishop during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares
To us he's the Opposition's treasury spokesman, Joe Hockey. But he'll always be "the George Clooney of Australian politics" to Tony Abbott.
Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares
MPs are now marking a minute's silence to remember Hazel Hawke.
The leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott, has also paid tribute to Mrs Hawke. She was "an adornment to our national life," he said.
Back to Question Time as usual.
Prime Minister, Julia Gillard: "Being married to a driven and complex man wasn't always easy.....We deeply admired the independent persona she forged both beside his side and beyond his shadow. Hazel Hawke lived and thrived in her own right."
Had Mrs Hawke been born twenty or thirty years later she probably would have gone into public life herself, Ms Gillard says. But she embraced difficult issues such as drug abuse, women's reproductive rights, indigenous rights.
Hazel Hawke was a "quiet warrior" for women's rights and one of the many women who "blazed a trail for women like me," the PM says.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard during Question Time on Monday. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
But first we have condolences for Hazel Hawke, the wife of former prime minister Bob Hawke.
Love the way MPs start speaking super fast as their time runs down (particularly when they are speaking just before Question Time from which we are but five minutes away).
I don't normally link away from politics but here is the link where you can see Cardinal George Pell giving evidence to Victoria's child sexual abuse inquiry.
A few things to direct you to before we head into the maelstrom:
* National Party Senator and lower house wannabe Barnaby Joyce says the weekend result for the NSW state seat of Northern Tablelands shows people want to be represented by a party not an independent. The seat covers much of the same ground as the federal seat of New England which Senator Joyce is determined to take away from sitting independent MP Tony Windsor;
* The Sydney Morning Herald's redoubtable economics editor, Ross Gittins, has written this pithy piece of commentary about the Coalition's strategy of leaving people in the dark about all their policy costings until the election campaign; and
* a spokesman for the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, says Ms Gillard will serve the full term of the next Parliament if she is re elected. The statement was issued after an interview Ms Gillard gave to Guardian Australia in which she would not guarantee staying in Parliament if Labor was in opposition.
There's about half an hour to go before the bells start ringing for Question Time.
Since it's a betting kind of day - what are the odds the Coalition will move its much-discussed motion of no confidence?
Sometimes bipartisanship pops up in the most surprising of places. Like budget estimates committees for instance.
Labor Senator John Faulkner and Liberal Senator Helen Kroger combined forces to shed some light on the upcoming trial of removing Hansard reporters from the parliamentary chambers (see 10.39am post).
Carol Mills, who runs the Department of Parliamentary Services, which oversees Hansard, told the committee it was all a bit of a storm in a tea cup. Hansard reporters stopped writing word-for-word accounts of everything that is said back in the late 1990s.
"They don't record the words as they are spoken," Ms Mills said. "They take a log of who is speaking. They then return to their office and they listen to the recording of that seven-and-a-half minute period and they transcribe it....The work that is done in the chamber is not actually taking Hansard, it is taking notes of who is speaking."
Senator Kroger raised the issue of interjections, which can be very difficult to hear inside the chamber and nigh on impossible from a broadcast.
Ms Mills said interjections would be examined as part of the trial. "Officially our view is we only record an interjection when someone responds to it so we are not there to record every interjection," she said.
Ms Mills said if the trial conditions became permanent they would save half a million dollars a year largely because Hansard staff could save an hour a day by not walking to and from the chamber (which would reduce overtime).
And as for the senator who raised the issue of equipment blocking people's sight? Senator Faulkner eventually managed to get Ms Mills to name Tasmanian Liberal Senator Stephen Parry (deputy president of the Senate and chairman of committees) as the responsible person. Ms Mills said Senator Parry was concerned equipment such as laptops were obscuring senators' view of the chamber.
Snaps to economics reporter Peter Martin who provided me with back up during the hearings this morning.
The head of the Department of Parliamentary Services, Carol Mills, appears before a committee hearing at Parliament House on Monday. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
This gentleman is Phil Bowen, officer with the Parliamentary Budget Office.
You may remember his name from a couple of weeks ago when his office was dragged into a stoush over the cost of the Coalition's paid parental leave scheme.
Mr Bowen told an estimates committee this morning his office had recently experienced a "surge capacity" to deal with a doubling of the number of requests from parties and MPs for policy costings.
Mr Bowen said an extra $1.5 million in funding had allowed his office to expand to 34 staff. In addition six private contractors have been employed and another six would be needed in the lead up to the election.
As of May 17 the PBO, as its known around the traps, had received 418 requests for costings of which 280 had been completed. It takes an average of 15 business days to cost a policy, Mr Bowen told the hearing.
The PBO is one of four parliamentary departments. Its job is to provide non-partisan and independent analysis of the budget cycle, fiscal policy and the financial implications of proposals.
Parliamentary Budget Officer Phil Bowen appears before a Senate estimates hearing at Parliament House on Monday. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
I should declare I am a bit of a parliamentary committee nerd. I love the way the committees - particularly budget estimates - reveal the administration and bureaucracy behind our system of government.
So bear with me for a couple of posts as I bring you up to date on a couple of things that have been going on in estimates this morning.
Poor old Rob Oakeshott (the independent MP for Lyne). He is trying to be very busy with a private member's bill seeking clarity on the Commonwealth's role in the electricity market.
But he has been distracted by Twitter (haven't we all?) after confusing the Adelaide Crows with Port Adelaide. He was corrected by, among many others, Adelaide resident and Minister for Childcare, Kate Ellis, a woman who takes who wears which short shorts very seriously.
Mr Oakeshott offered this in his defence:
@petefromhaynsw @kateellismp apologies on getting Port Adelaide and Adelaide mixed.Rookie error.I follow league/union normally. Enjoyed game
— Robert Oakeshott MP (@OakeyMP) May 27, 2013
Back to the story of the day so far - sports gambling.
Has the PM gone far enough? What do you think?
Have your say at our online poll here.
The Greens' deputy leader, Adam Bandt, is on his feet in the House of Representatives at the moment introducing a bill that would establish an independent Office of Animal Welfare.
According to the Greens the Voice for Animals (Independent Office of Animal Welfare) Bill would "establish an animal welfare champion to promote animal rights and monitor the regulation of live exports".
Mr Bandt points out that Labor committed to introducing such an office when it last met to decide its party platform. The bill is an attempt to hurry up that process. Since we are now in the fourth last sitting week of Parliament before the September 14 election the bill seems unlikely to be passed unless it receives support from either of the major parties.
The landscape of Parliament is about to change.
Hansard reporters have been on the floor of both parliamentary chambers since 1901 charged with the mission of providing accurate, unbiased and generally verbatim accounts of parliamentary debate to members and senators.
But after this sitting fortnight they may be removed from the chambers and forced to do their reporting from television screens elsewhere inside Parliament House.
When Parliament sits for the final sitting fortnight (the week beginning May 27) a trial will be run during which time there will be no Hansard reporters in either chamber (with the exception of a limited presence during Question Time) and Hansard equipment will be removed from the Senate although not the House of Representatives.
Hansard staff have been given mixed messages about why this trial is taking place. One is the inevitable cost cutting but the other more intriguing suggestion is that a senator complained that Hansard equipment was obstructing his/her view.
So if someone did complain who was it? And why? All suggestions gratefully accepted.
Mr Jones' interview (see 9.46am post) with Fairfax Media's Tim Lester is now available for your viewing pleasure.
Broader gambling ban?
Labor backbencher Stephen Jones applauds the PM for live odds legislation, but reserves the right to argue for a broader ban in caucus this week.
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Labor backbencher Stephen Jones has been one of the most vocal government MPs on this issue.
Mr Jones has told Fairfax Media's Tim Lester that the PM's decision "gets rid of the incessant rattle of live odds promotion throughout the course game (sic) as well".
However Mr Jones says the changes do not go as far as he would like, particularly in relation to some advertising of gambling services during times when children are likely to be watching.
Mr Jones will persist with a private member's bill dealing with this issue (which is also of concern to the Greens) and promises to raise it at tomorrow's meeting of the Labor caucus.
Incidentally, the Coalition shadow cabinet is meeting at the moment and is surely discussing the government's new policy which isn't a hundred miles from its own policy on this matter.
I'll post the full video of that interview shortly.
So is the ban going to do anything?
The NSW Government seems to think not and wants a complete ban. Its reaction to Ms Gillard's announcement leads the story explaining exactly what will happen under the government's new restrictions which you can read here.
If you haven't already found your way to it already Peter FitzSimons' take on the announcement can be found here.
Prime Minister Juila Gillard and Communications Minister Stephen Conroy at a press conference at Kirribilli House. Photo: Dean Sewell
Prime Minister Juila Gillard and Communications Minister Stephen Conroy at a press conference at Kirribilli House. Photo: Dean Sewell
The Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, is rolling the dice on sports gambling reform (I'm really going to make an effort to keep the bad puns down to a minimum).
Ms Gillard has listened to the increasing public disquiet over the prevalence of gambling ads during live sports events and yesterday announced she would ban the spruiking of live odds during sports broadcasts.
However the ban - which is supported by the television networks - stops short of banning gambling ads during breaks in play and will still allow live crosses to gambling representatives during breaks in play so long as they are clearly identified as bookies and are not filmed at the venue where the event is taking place.
Parliament is back for the fortnight this morning but in a slightly different form.
The House of Representatives is sitting as usual however senators will be devoting themselves to budget estimates committees, those gatherings where MPs get to grill ministers and public servants about portfolio expenditure.
It can be a gruelling experience for those involved particularly when a well briefed senator gets the whiff of blood.
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