Ok, so as was always going to be the case (but oppositions always do this) Michael Sukkar’s motion to suspend standing orders is knocked down by the government.

Nationals turned independent Andrew Gee is now giving the suspension of standing orders a shot, to try and bring on debate about his ‘keeping cash transactions in Australia’ bill, which seeks to, well, keep cash transactions in Australia.

Regional MPs such as Gee and Bob Katter want to make it a law to force businesses to continue to accept cash, given the move to electronic transactions only in a lot of businesses was turbo charged by the pandemic shut downs.

Katter had his own version of this play out in the parliamentary staff cafeteria, known as the ‘trough’ (everyone pays, although the prices are a few dollars cheaper than you would find in a private cafe) when he was told it was card only and had a Katter style reaction to it. The Speaker, Milton Dick, who is one of the presiding officers of the parliament (the people who make the rules about the parliament) was getting his own salad at the time, stepped in, and established that at least one cash register still had to accept cash (as a trial, which we understand is still underway).