Speaker Bronwyn Bishop and Senate President Stephen Parry have contradicted Prime Minister Tony Abbott, revealing he did not contact them to ask they reconsider their controversial plan to segregate women wearing a burqa or niqab.
That plan, which was dumped by Parliament's presiding officers on Monday morning, was put in place earlier this month after what Senator Parry said were "credible" concerns that up to 10 men, wearing facial coverings, had planned a protest to disrupt question time.
Hours after the decision to segregate wearers of the garment was taken in the last sitting fortnight, Mr Abbott indicated he would seek to have the segregation plan overturned.
And the next day, Mr Abbott said: "I asked the Speaker to rethink that decision and my understanding is that it was an interim decision, that it would be looked at again in the light of security advice that will come in coming days and I'm sure that the matter will be fully resolved before the Parliament comes back in a fortnight."
But on Monday, at the conclusion of question time, manager of opposition business Tony Burke quizzed Ms Bishop about what led to the segregation plan and its aftermath.
He asked: "Did you, Madame Speaker, receive a request from the Prime Minister to reconsider the policy?"
"In a word, no," Ms Bishop replied. Senator Parry supported that version of events during a Senate estimates hearing when he confirmed he had not received a request from the Prime Minister's office, either.
A spokeswoman for the Prime Minister moved to clarify the contradiction on Monday when she said Mr Abbott and Ms Bishop had had a conversation about the matter and he had made his views known, but he had not formally requested the burqa segregation plan be reversed.
Ms Bishop and Senator Parry are formally charged with running the Parliament.
Mr Burke seized on the contradictory accounts and said that "for all my run-ins with Bronwyn Bishop, if I had to guess who was lying I would say it was the Prime Minister".
As the Senate hearing examined the circumstances surrounding the controversial segregation plan in detail, it emerged that the decision was taken without the advice of external security agencies.
It also emerged during the hearing that the information about a possible protest began with a Nine Network cameraman relaying the information to an AFP officer. The officer then told DPS officials, who told the presiding officers who, later in the day, decided to introduce the segregation plan.
Senator Parry insisted the October 2 decision was "prudent". "The best and most immediate response was to enable us to ensure the identity of those people in the public gallery. I think that was a prudent decision for that particular day," he said.
Appearing before estimates a short time later, the secretary of the Department of Parliamentary Services, Carol Mills, said the Australian Federal Police did, however, advise them "mid-morning" that there could be a protest that day.
"On the morning of 2 October, I am advised that staff in our security operations room were notified, what I will call mid-morning, that there was a potential protest, possibly occurring at Parliament House that day," Ms Mills said. "That advice came from the AFP."
Parliamentary Services officials, the Black Rod, the Serjeant-at-Arms, Ms Bishop, the Senate President and members of their staff were present at a meeting that decided to put the ban in place.
In its statement on Monday morning, the Department of Parliamentary Services said anyone wearing a burqa and trying to enter Parliament House would now be asked to "temporarily remove" their facial covering.
"This will enable DPS security staff to identify any person who may have been banned from entering Parliament House or who may be known, or discovered, to be a security risk," the statement said.
"Once this process has taken place, visitors are free to move about the public spaces of the building, including all chamber galleries, with facial coverings in place."
Senator Parry said he and Ms Bishop had always envisaged the October 2 decision would be "subject to further review".
