 Senate committees can be affected by the party composition of the Senate . The Clerk of the Senate , Harry Evans , argued that a government majority of seats in the Senate resulted in limitations on what the committees inquired into , and how readily governments responded to their queries and requests for information . Statistics published by centrist political party the Australian Democrats have been used to support the contention that committee operations have been inhibited by government control of the Senate , particularly in respect of selection of topics for committee inquiry . However Senator Minchin , the leader of the government in the Senate in the mid @-@ 2000s , pointed out that their political rivals had previously cut off debate on more bills in the Senate than had his government . 
