Labor to protest parliament shutdown and push for review of Covid-19 response

The political bipartisanship enforced by the need for a united front against Covid-19 will be tested on Wednesday when Labor protests against the shutdown of parliament.

There will be a strong push for a parliamentary committee with powers to review and assess government measures responding to the pandemic.

The attorney general, Christian Porter, on Monday bluntly told the opposition that MPs had “better things to do” than sit in parliament.

Porter, who is also government leader in the House of Representatives, told ABC radio on Monday: “What is the point of that?

“If people want to sit out there during the greatest economic crisis Australia’s experienced and read practice and procedure of the House of Representatives, good luck to them.

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“But we’ve got better things to do.”

But the independent senator Jacqui Lambie said the parliament should be recalled as soon as possible and “as soon as it is safe to do so”.

She told Guardian Australia on Monday: “We should set down some dates and times.

“This idea the government has of calling us in on a whim, whenever they feel they need, it’s not the most functional.

“They’re spending billions of dollars, so it’s time to apply a bit of scrutiny. We’ve been very nice to the government, we’ve played very nice. But with no parliament – is that a sustainable way for a democracy to go? No, it’s not.”

Her stand was reflected in Australia Institute polling released on Monday showing 68% of voters wanted an oversight committee, similar to a body established in New Zealand. Just 13% of voters opposed the idea.

Before it was suspended, the New Zealand parliament established a parliamentary committee including representatives of all political parties, which will publicly broadcast hearings.

“This research indicates the Australian public’s trust and confidence in the decisions of the government in this time of crisis would be enhanced by a powerful parliamentary oversight committee ,” said Ben Oquist, the executive director of the Australia Institute.

“When decisions are being made so rapidly, often with imperfect information, a New Zealand style Covid-19 parliamentary oversight committee will go a long way to giving the public confidence in the decisions being made.

“Australians are being asked to trade away significant civil liberties in the interests of public health. Increased public confidence in how these measures are being determined will go a long way to ensuring Australians take heed.”

The federal houses will return on Wednesday for what is expected to be a single sitting day, the first in 16 days. The relegation of parliament’s importance will be highlighted by a meeting on Tuesday of the national cabinet of federal and state leaders, who have had at least two conferences a week for the past month.

Labor and key crossbench MPs will call for a Senate committee to oversee Scott Morrison’s response to the coronavirus, despite the strong backing in opinion surveys for the prime minister’s performance.

The Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick on Monday backed a proposal for more frequent sittings, with the government and opposition able to suspend the schedule for public health reasons.

The manager of opposition business, Tony Burke, told reporters in Sydney there was a “high likelihood” the proposed committee would be created with the backing of Labor, Centre Alliance, the Greens and Lambie.

Burke said the committee is an “important” development but “it doesn’t of itself though override the importance of parliament meeting”.

He accused Porter of “ridiculing the importance” of his own job, and noted that when parliament last sat it had not been characterised by Labor “sledges” but “questions of detail that the Australian people wanted answers for”.

“At the moment, you’ve got parliament behaving at its best. And the government’s response is they’d rather not have parliament,” he said.

The protest will contrast with Labor’s support for changes to the Fair Work Act intended to efficiently distribute the $130bn jobkeeper payments.

The opposition will argue for the payments to go to a wider group of casual workers but is expected to accept the government’s final decision.

It will be the first sitting of parliament since 23 March and MPs are not expected to be summoned back until 11 August.

Parliaments have closed down around the country. The NSW parliament last sat on 24 March and is not scheduled to meet again until September. Tasmania’s last met on 26 March and is not expected to return until August.

The chambers of Queensland (18 March) and Victoria (19 March), the Northern Territory (24 March) and the ACT (2 April) have no scheduled return date.

The parliaments of South Australia and Western Australia are still operating.