Christopher Pyne, the manager of government business in the house, has announced that parliament will not resume on November 27th as originally planned, but will now reconvene a week later on December 5th.
Pyne says the house will sit until it has resolved the issue of same sex marriage and issues surrounding MP’s dual citizenship.
“The Australian people expect their parliament to respect the clear mandate of the marriage survey and legislate for marriage equality before the end of the year,”
The government says it believes that both issues could be resolved in the same week but warns MPs that they may also be required to stay an additional week.
Speaking to the media shortly after making the announcement Pyne said the delay was required because the senate had not yet finished debating the marriage bill put forward by Senator Dean Smith.
The South Australian MP denied the government’s decision to push back parliament resuming was linked to the possibility it could lose control of the parliament due to its depleted numbers.
Pyne said when the parliament resumes marriage equality and the citizenship were the only issues the government would be considering during this time, and would be devoting their time to these issue.
Earlier this morning Opposition Leader Bill Shorten warned government MPs not to delay dealing with the issue.
“Woe betide any of Mr Turnbull’s government if they try and delay marriage equality. The survey is very clear, millions of Australians said ‘just get on with it, lets have marriage equality. I think Australia wants to move beyond the marriage equality debate.”
OIP Staff
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