Order of Business - 28th June 2005

Perhaps I might raise two more questions very
briefly. I compliment Senator Leyden on introducing
his Bill, which is extremely important. It
addresses a real human problem regarding the
location of wills in the aftermath of someone’s
death. He explained it extremely well on the one
o’clock news. As a long-time member of this
House, I very much welcome the positive publicity
gained for it through a Government
Member, who described himself with uncharacteristic
modesty as a backbencher, using this
House’s facility to introduce a Bill. I am glad the
Senator got Government support and that of
coalition colleagues. I am sure that support will
also be forthcoming from this side of the House.
As a member of the Independent group, I will be
reintroducing a new version of the Bill that I put
forward, the Civil Registration Bill 2003, since the
Government has once again shown an inability to
grapple with the issue, and has characteristically
kicked it into a committee. I am waiting. The
committee will have reported by the autumn at
which stage I will go to work on this matter hammer
and tongs. We are lagging behind disastrously
in the area of civil registration. Switzerland
recently became the sixteenth country in
Europe to introduce legislation in this regard. It
is disgraceful that we are so far behind because
the Government will not bite the bullet.
I ask for a continuing debate on Iraq. Thisis
particularly important in light of recent international
reports, published in the United States,
which have begun to focus on the use of Shannon
Airport in the process of extraordinary rendition.
We must clean up our act now that the outside
world has got wind of this story. I and others
informed police about a prima facie case involving
the criminal use of the aircraft in question,
but nothing was done. As a Parliament, we are
entitled to some answers on these issues.