The Hon. Chaminda Wijesiri
Chaminda Wijesiri argued that decisions at a Party Leaders’ meeting cannot override statutes or parliamentary rules, and said the Government has no mandate to bypass approved laws. He stated that the Opposition was not opposing payments to public servants but insisting that such actions be taken in accordance with the law. He also commended the Speaker’s ruling and independence, cautioning against misuse of the Government’s majority.
Verbatim record (translated)
Machine-translated from Sinhala / Tamil / English¶ 01 Hon. Speaker, we come here consulting the books. I do not think the Hon. Leader of the House and the Hon. Chief Government Whip in the front row are persons who have not read these books; they have done as many TV shows as possible.
¶ 02 My point is this: where is the law that says a law can be bypassed at a Party Leaders’ meeting? Power was not given to this Government to break statutes and rules. We are not saying do not pay public servants; we say, act according to the approved laws. Do not guide society in some other way. It will not be good for you either, Hon. Speaker. This morning you made a clear ruling; we appreciate your independence. In history we have not always seen independent Speakers. Sometimes we see the Leader of the House trying to direct you; we respect you for not allowing that. If we depart from the laws, we are not thinking of the Government’s majority; we are guiding society to ensure the given mandate is not misused.
Provenance
- Source
- Hansard, Thursday, 5 December 2024 ·No. 1734081038099638 ·English daily/uncorrected Hansard
- Page · column
- not yet extracted — page/column anchors are not in the current dataset; the source PDF is the citable location.
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/lk/speeches/12529
Cite as: The Hon. Chaminda Wijesiri. 10th Parliament, Parliament of Sri Lanka. Hansard, 5 December 2024. No. 1734081038099638. Politick, https://staging.politick.io/lk/speeches/12529