Just as a bit of background, there has been a lot of debate and a lot of discussion over quite a long time about the length of sitting hours and sitting days. At one stage we were finishing at 8 p.m. because of this focus on family-friendly hours, and that did last and was quite effective for a while. In fact, going back in time, the House used to sit till 11 p.m., so the reduction to 8 p.m. was obviously very, very welcome. I think the 9 p.m. finish is a bit of a compromise between where we used to be a number of years ago and where we got to in response to this concept of family-friendly hours.
It does relate a little bit to the point that I made about members just wanting, when they're here in Canberra, to get the Canberra business done as effectively as possible. For example, if shorter hours meant that we would then sit on Friday, I think you'd probably find that most members would prefer to be sitting the slightly longer hours and then not have to sit on the Friday to make up the additional hours. It's all a bit of a compromise.
I think the current sitting hours are probably quite a good balance, and they do seem to work quite effectively for members. Don't forget that in terms of members, we only have four members who are actually local members. There are only four members who represent the Canberra area, and those are two senators and two members, so there aren't a lot of members who need to go home and put their children to bed, if you like. Obviously, women who are bringing very young children have issues with the longer hours. I'm not exactly sure what sorts of arrangements they make.
In terms of staff, again, the days are very long. That is true. There aren't really any breaks because we don't have any formal meal breaks in those sitting hours, either, so it does mean a long day for staff. We try to ensure that staff are able to get a break at various times during the day. The 9:30, at least, is a reasonable compromise, I think, much better than 11 p.m., which I think it is starting to get a bit late. These things are all a bit of a compromise. The government, clearly, has a certain number of hours they want the House to sit each week, and then you try to squeeze that into four days and work out how best that's done.