Senator James Webster who was a shareholder in and managing director of a company founded by his late grandfather. The company supplied timber and hardware, by public tender, to both the Postmaster-General's Department and the Department of Housing and Construction. Barwick CJ considered the history of the section and its predecessors, describing it as a vestigial part of the constitution. In his view, it had been inserted not to "protect the public against fraudulent conduct of members of the House", but rather to protect the independence of the parliament against influence by the Crown. On this basis Barwick CJ concluded that the interest "must be pecuniary in the sense that through the possibility of financial gain by the existence or the performance of the agreement, that person could conceivably be influenced by the Crown in relation to Parliamentary affairs". The decision has been criticised as taking a narrow approach to the construction of the section that robs it of most of its efficacy, rendering it almost useless as a check upon would-be fraudulent politicians and offering "little practical protection to the public interest or Parliament's reputation". If Webster had been found to have sat while ineligible, he would have been liable to a daily penalty under section 46 of the Constitution, which could have accumulated to more than $57,200. One consequence of the question about Webster's eligibility was the passage in 1975 of the Common Informers (Parliamentary Disqualifications) Act which limited any penalty prior to commencing the suit to $200; although, after the suit has commenced, there is a daily penalty of $200. Warren Entsch (1999) The issue arose again in 1999 concerning Warren Entsch and his interest in Cape York Concrete Pty Ltd who had a $175,000 contract to supply concrete for RAAF Scherger. Kim Beazley, the Leader of the Opposition moved that the Court of Disputed Returns should decide whether Entsch's seat in the House of Representatives had become vacant because he had a pecuniary interest in an agreement with the Commonwealth. The motion was lost and the House passed a resolution declaring that Entsch did not have a pecuniary interest within the meaning of section 44(v). Whether the House had power to pass the resolution has been questioned. Re Day (2017) On 1 November 2016, Bob Day resigned his seat as a Senator for South Australia, with immediate effect. Shortly after Day's resignation, the Senate referred the