The PRESIDENT (Senator the Hon. Scott Ryan) took the chair at 12:00, read prayers and made an acknowledgement of country.
DOCUMENTS
Tabling
The Clerk: I table documents pursuant to statute and returns to order as listed on the Dynamic Red.
Full details of the documents are recorded in the Journals of the Senate.
COMMITTEES
Meeting
The Clerk: Proposals to meet have been lodged as follows:
Select Committee on Administration of Sports Grants—25 February 2021
Environment and Communications Legislation Committee—today
The PRESIDENT (12:01): I remind senators that the question may be put on any proposal at the request of any senator.
BILLS
Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
to which the following amendment was moved:
At the end of the motion, add: ", but the Senate:
(a) notes that:
(i) Australia has one of the most concentrated media markets in the world,
(ii) since the Government's changes to media law in 2017, there have been alarming contractions and warning signs of
market failure in Australia's media landscape, and
(iii) the Bill was introduced 18 months after the ACCC delivered the Final Report of the Digital Platforms Inquiry in
June 2019 and does not address all of the ACCC's recommendations to support public interest journalism; and
(b) calls on the Government to:
(i) do more to support public interest journalism in Australia as a matter of urgency,
(ii) deliver a support and transition package to assist news media publishers unduly negatively impacted as a
consequence of this Bill, and
(iii) make appropriate provision to ensure the viability of AAP newswire as a matter of priority".
Senator McCARTHY (Northern Territory—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (12:01): To give you some idea of the scope of the First Nations media sector, it includes over 230 radio broadcast sites coordinated by 35 licensed community-owned not-for-profit organisations. These radio services are able to reach around 320,000 First Nations people, including around 100,000 very hard to reach people in remote Indigenous communities, or approximately 48 per cent of the First Nations population. They broadcast live shows plus interviews, radio documentaries, news, emergency information, community events, government and other messaging within community broadcasting guidelines. These video and film production services create culture and language based content for broadcast and online distribution. In the TV sphere, we have NITV broadcasting nationally and local TV services at Goolarri TV at Broom and Larrakeyah TV at Darwin. ICTV satellite TV service reaches 240,000 remote households as well as their free-to-air regional locations.
In terms of news production, First Nations media is rich with national, regional and local news and current affairs services for broadcast as well as print and online news media such as the National Indigenous Radio Service, NIRS, with its national Indigenous news and Weekly News in Review, and Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association's news service, including its Strong Voices program. There's Koori Radio's news and current affairs programming, NITV News and Living Black. Print media include Koori Mail and National Indigenous Times, and there is a strong online presence with sites such as IndigenousX.
First Nations media organisations did have a strong social media following and published content online daily. These channels offer a wide range of programming, including news and current affairs, reporting from a First Nations' perspective in over 25 Indigenous languages nationally, including the first language of many people in remote communities. These First Nations media organisations want to keep going from strength to strength.
First Nations broadcasters and not-for-profit community organisations are providing a primary and essential service to their communities. Radio services reach nearly 50 per cent of the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population, but are prevented from providing a primary radio service to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people due to lack of funding and spectrum availability. The sector reaches significant audience share, with 91 per cent of people in remote Indigenous communities being regular listeners to radio services and watching ICTV at least once per month.
In the remote context First Nations media is the most reliable radio and media service available to audiences. I'm very pleased to support First Nations Media Australia and their call for appropriate government reform that fairly treats and invests in diverse creators of public interest journalism, including smaller media organisations and community broadcasters. Many First Nations media organisations have built strong social media followings as a forum for community engagement on topics relevant to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander audiences.
First Nations people are avid consumers of social media. In many ways, Facebook is the new bush telegraph. Certainly a lot of my families and kinship groups keep in touch through Messenger and group chats, with relatives from all over the country joining in, having a laugh and keeping in touch about all sorts of things, even as to whether the flood levels are up and rivers are impassable.
It's wonderful, because, when I'm here doing work in the Senate in Canberra, I can still be in touch with what's going on in Borroloola, Ngukurr, Numbulwar and Urapunga, but it is a double-edged sword, because we know social media can be a prime vehicle for spreading untruths and misinformation. It is especially worrying at this time when we're about to start a mass vaccination campaign in the fight against COVID-19. First Nations communities are among those at the head of the queue to receive the vaccine, and we must make sure First Nations community broadcasters maintain their social media presence and can get out the facts and information to their audiences in the most appropriate way.
At the beginning of this pandemic, First Nations media organisations were at the forefront of getting the information out to communities, keeping them safe and informed. Working with governments and community-controlled health services, the sector used their social media and broadcast channel to spread the word. Whether it was developing jingles in language to promote handwashing, animations that demonstrated the impact of community lockdowns or using local leaders promoting health messages in language, First Nations media literally helped saved lives.
The Chair of First Nations Media Australia, Dot West, said last week, 'Never has our media been more vital than during a global pandemic.' In Dot West's words:
First Nations media services are not the same as commercial outlets and should not be negatively impacted by an industry wide response to corporate interests.
First Nations Media Australia provided input to the development of the proposed mandatory news bargaining code, encouraging flexibility in the legislation to avoid unintended consequences, such as what we're seeing. The financial interests of commercial enterprises should not come at the expense of independent publishers of information vital to community safety and democracy in this country.
The federal government must heed the voice of Dot West and others and the First Nations Media Australia and seek an immediate resolution to its conflict with Facebook and protect the First Nation media industry from further negative impacts. The government must also recognise the importance of First Nations news and journalism by providing support for the production of news content essential to First Nations communities. We must have appropriate government reform that fairly treats and invests in diverse creators of public interest journalism, including smaller media organisations and community broadcasters. I reflect on the Katherine Times and the Centralian Advocate. It is vital that these regional newspapers are supported, but we have seen the demise of many of these across the country. Community broadcasters are vital cogs in our media landscape, producing and broadcasting both hyperlocal and national news for millions of listeners across Australia; creating significant employment, training and career opportunities; and, ultimately, strengthening Australia's democracy by sharing diverse content by diverse and underrepresented voices.
The government contends that one of the reasons for these amendments is to support public interest journalism. I totally agree that it needs to be supported. But that is not happening under this government, which is too busy pandering to the interests of big media business mates to be concerned about what is happening to the broadcasters and journalists who are embedded in our communities and keeping their voices alive when we see so much of our smaller and regional media landscape gutted.
Senator CHANDLER (Tasmania) (12:10): I rise today to make a contribution on the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2020. Last week, we saw a blatant attempt by a foreign owned company, one of the world's largest corporations, to bully Australia. The tactics used by Facebook to make its point included taking down the pages of children's cancer charities, domestic violence fundraisers, state health departments, women's legal services, and even government websites responsible for issuing emergency and weather warnings. The reason for this unacceptable behaviour was that the Australian government is seeking to make laws that ensure that big tech companies do not abuse their market power in relation to Australia's journalism and news industry. Facebook or any other company is entitled to express a view and take a position on legislation proposed by the Australian government. But what kind of company would take down a children's cancer charity page to make their point?
Countries around the world are becoming increasingly concerned about the market power of big tech and the way in which those companies are using that market power. Last year, a US Congress inquiry into big tech found that companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook and Apple wield their dominance in ways that erode entrepreneurship, degrade citizen's privacy online and undermine the vibrancy of the free and diverse press. The committee report from that inquiry was critical of the testimony of the CEOs of those corporations, saying:
… answers were often evasive and non-responsive, raising fresh questions about whether they believe they are beyond the reach of democratic oversight.
Facebook's actions in Australia last week clearly raise the question of whether it believes it is beyond the reach of democratic oversight in this country. Quite clearly, their actions were designed to heavy the Australian government and, indeed, this Senate into not proceeding with this bill that we're discussing here today. They want to send a message that they are bigger and more powerful than the Australian people—that they can press a button and change the minds of those of us elected to represent the Australian people in the nation's parliament. Today, we are here sending the message that that is not the case.
It's hard to deny that massive corporations like Facebook, Twitter and Google have made themselves central to public life and daily communication in Australia. Over the last decade, they have become primary methods for government departments, health and emergency authorities, news media, politicians and political parties to disseminate information amongst the public. It has become a fair expectation that a government health department, for example, has a Facebook and a Twitter account. People have become accustomed to going to these pages to find the information they need. Yes, there are obviously other ways they can find out that information from those organisations. But, if you don't see the information in the way that you are accustomed to, what guarantee is there that you'll go and visit a website and track it down for yourself there?
One could, of course, make the argument that nobody is compelled to use these services and that it's not compulsory for these companies to provide a platform to every individual or organisation. That's true. But nobody could deny that, in 2021, trying to communicate with a large audience without relying to some extent on these big tech platforms—Facebook, Twitter, Google—is going to seriously limit the number of people you can reach. I acknowledge the decision of Google, in this instance, to act responsibly and negotiate with Australian news media organisations to reach a fair commercial outcome regarding the sharing of journalism on its platform. Nevertheless, we still have a situation in Australia where any of these major corporations have the power, if they choose to use it, to destroy an Australian business or to affect the outcomes of a democratic election in Australia.
One of the most concerning actions of Facebook last week was that, in the midst of the Western Australian state election campaign, it suddenly and without warning took offline the page of the Western Australian opposition leader. People from all sides of politics have denounced this action because it reveals a very serious potential problem for our democracy. That problem is that these platforms are so dominant and play such a major role in how our society communicates with each other that, if some participants in an election have access to platforms and others don't, we can reasonably expect that to have an impact on how people vote. What happens if big tech decides that it doesn't want a certain party to form government at the next election or that it doesn't want certain senators elected? Does anyone really doubt that these massive foreign companies could have a major impact on the results of our democratic elections or that, if they thought it was in their commercial interests to do so, they would?
Even before last week, it was clear that big tech companies were willing to take sides on political issues in public debates and remove access to their platforms to people they judge to have the wrong point of view. It's well documented that Twitter, for example, regularly bans accounts of women who tweet about sex based rights for women. One of the most egregious examples that has been brought to my attention by constituents is an account which was banned for tweeting that 'only females get cervical cancer'. Twitter judged this comment to be a violation of its rules against hateful conduct. Is it any wonder, when Twitter bans simple statements of fact like that—a fact which is central to how we fight a deadly disease that kills millions of women—that we see other media censoring the same views in universities, governments and other institutions, developing policies which are increasingly out of touch with reality? It's just one example of how tech giants can and do play a major role in public policy debates by using their power to determine what is seen as acceptable speech and what isn't, and what a politician or a political candidate can say and what they can't.
While Facebook is clearly front of mind at the moment because of its misguided behaviour last week—and we've heard extensively across the chamber from other senators expressing their views about this—we shouldn't overlook the fact that Twitter also has huge market power over the flow of information. As others have pointed out, these tech companies, like Twitter and Facebook, have very poor records at tackling illegal content on their platforms. Both have, frankly, been repeatedly too slow to take down accounts distributing child abuse material. Both have hosted material promoting violence and terrorism. When this is pointed out to them, they claim that it's too difficult to find and take down these accounts. Yet Facebook had no problem pushing a button last week and banning all Australian news content. And Twitter has no problem removing an account that tweets that only females get cervical cancer.
Of course, if Facebook or any other company doesn't wish to offer news content on their site, that's up to them. Ultimately, if that's the path they're going to pursue, then it's up to their customers to determine whether they will keep using a platform which doesn't offer any real news or journalism. But what wasn't acceptable was the decision by these companies, by Facebook, to try and bully the Australian government and the Australian parliament into making a different decision by suddenly and arbitrarily banning all sorts of pages, as we saw last week. In my own state of Tasmania, the Facebook pages of our Women's Legal Service and Sexual Assault Support Service were both shut down. This is an absolute disgrace. It's been well documented that charities and essential services were also taken offline without any justification or prior notification. Mark my words: this is not the behaviour of a good corporate citizen.
It has been interesting to note the reaction from around the world to Facebook's actions. Much of the commentary has focused on the fact that what Facebook is trying to do is to send a message to the governments of other countries. As I referenced earlier, the issue of the dominance of big tech and the impact those companies have on businesses and on our democracy is one which many countries are grappling with. Other nations may or may not choose to pursue the same type of law we are debating here today, but it's clear that many nations will be taking steps to curtail the abuse of market power by big tech. That's why leaders from other countries have urged Australians to stand our ground and not to back down. Once again the world is looking to Australia as a leader in standing up to attempts at coercion, and once again the Australian government is showing leadership by demonstrating our sovereignty and our commitment to making laws which this parliament deems to be in the interest of the Australian people. As the Prime Minister has said repeatedly over the last 12 months, Australia does not respond to threats. We are a sovereign nation and we are not going to be bullied or coerced by other nations or by foreign corporations worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
It has been pleasing that politicians from all sides have supported this principle and made it clear that Facebook's actions last week were utterly unacceptable. I sat in the chamber last night and listened to a range of contributions, and it would appear that the concerns I have raised in my short remarks in the chamber today are widely shared. It's one of those unfortunately rare moments in this place when we, as parliamentarians, come together and, while we might disagree on the manner in which we determine to solve a problem, agree that a problem exists and something must be done to rectify it. That's why, as a nation and as a parliament, we will continue to pass laws which are in the interests of our society, our economy and our people. After the events of last week, it might be the case that in the future we need to make further laws to tackle the undue influence of massive tech companies on our democracy. If that is the case, I'm confident that the government will, as it has always done, take advice from the experts and consult at length with the public and all affected participants and businesses before passing legislation.
It would be remiss of me, in making these remarks to the chamber today, not to mention the good work of the Senate Economics Legislation Committee, chaired by Senator Slade Brockman, who is in the chamber. The inquiry that they undertook into the very piece of legislation we are discussing here today canvassed many of the issues that I have raised in my contribution, around the market power that these big tech companies have and the pervasive and somewhat disruptive impact they have had in terms of both our media landscape in Australia and, more broadly, our democracy.
As one of the younger senators in this place, I am of the generation that effectively grew up with Facebook and Twitter and, before that, Myspace, although that is not necessarily what we're talking about here today. When I was compiling my notes to speak on this bill, I was thinking about how social media has changed the way that we communicate with each other and, more importantly, how we get information. Fundamentally, it has changed massively in the last 10 to 15 years as fellow millennials have grown up and embraced social media. We've seen all of the good that it can do but we now see some of the challenges that it raises, and I think it's really pertinent that this government and this parliament have turned their minds to some of these issues and are looking to address them with the bill we are debating here today. I suspect more needs to be done, but this is an incredibly important space for government to be proposing solutions in.
Senator McDONALD (Queensland) (12:25): I would also like to acknowledge the presence in the chamber of Senator Slade Brockman, who has chaired the Economics Legislation Committee so ably through this process. Indeed, I acknowledge all of the senators who have been a part of the Economics Legislation Committee hearings on this issue of considering a news media and digital platforms mandatory bargaining code. As a member of that committee, I had the opportunity to see firsthand the quite extraordinary behaviour of Google and Facebook. It was, in many ways, a terrific example of just why this legislation has been considered and why it's so important. The churlish actions of both companies prior to the hearings and during the hearings into the Australian media landscape and, of course, Facebook's latest actions show that the attempts by the Morrison-McCormack government to bring fairness to the sector are exactly the right thing to do.
In Australia we have a relatively small population, and this is not the only example where we've had to address a market imbalance through the introduction of a code. There are many agricultural industries and supermarkets that have benefited from a rebalancing of the market. The evidence from the ACCC and Professor Allan Fels was quite startling in its directness about how there was a market failure and how important it was to have a mandatory code in this space because it was only the threat and then execution of a mandatory code that would force these digital megacompanies to come to the table and negotiate with Australian media businesses.
I want to clarify again, for anybody who is unsure, the purpose of this code. It is a world first, and we will have much of the world looking at Australia and the success of this binding code that will address the bargaining power imbalance between news media businesses and digital platforms. The bargaining code has been developed after extensive public consultation, which has gone on for nearly three years. The code will ensure that news media businesses are fairly remunerated for the content they generate, helping to sustain public interest journalism in Australia. It is the role of the fourth estate, the media, to hold business, the government and other politicians to account as well as to manage the very important process of informing our communities. The idea of hyperlocal media is so critical to the success of our communities. If there's something that's come out of COVID, it is our desire to feel more connected, to understand more of what's going on in our streets, suburbs, towns, regions, states and nation. In a world of increasingly global events, it is so important that we have a media capable of doing that. The code will support a diverse and sustainable Australian news media sector, including Australia's public broadcasters. The most important part is to encourage the parties to undertake commercial negotiations outside of the code, and I am very pleased to note they have commenced.
One of the things we heard during the evidence was a lack of connection being made by these digital platforms around what their impact has been. They were proposing that they were merely a platform that provided media to be read, but what they failed to address was the number of Australian businesses who have been lured away from traditional advertising media. By that I mean advertisements in the local paper, advertising on the local radio and this move to advertising and promoting on Facebook and buying Google ad words.
I've spoken to so many businesses that have invested a significant amount of their marketing dollars into these global tech giants but it has come at a price, and that price has been that our local media outlets have lost that advertising revenue which then allowed them to pay for their journalists, pay for the news content. What we have to understand is what percentage of the market that Facebook and Google have now obtained of the digital advertising space. We have to exclude things like billboards but understand, of the marketing dollars being spent in Australia, how much it is and where it is going.
Senator Chandler made some terrific points as she spoke just then, particularly around Facebook making commentary around how difficult it was for them to manage content on their pages and yet they were so quick to shut down so many pages just recently. Charities; emergency services; important weather information, like the Bureau of Meteorology; women's legal centres; community noticeboards—all of these have been in the situation of providing really important local news and media to their communities. That was a really unfortunate own goal. To Facebook's credit, much of it has been quickly rectified, but it has demonstrated the extraordinary power and reach that these businesses now have. I know how important these pages are in my regional parts of Queensland. Senator McCarthy talked about the Facebook groups and news groups that connect her across her people around the north and it is the same for me. The shared joy and despondency as people read the 'who got the rain' Facebook page. Those who have got it are very happy and those who don't manage to contain their despair. In some ways it's no different to the old phone party lines where people used to ring up and share news of rain.
I personally know Queensland journalists who were made redundant in recent years as advertising dollars went from regional newspapers to the big tech companies and offshore, instead of being reinvested into the industry. As advertisers devoted more of their budgets to Google and Facebook, News Corp made the decision to stop printing newspapers in the smaller centres—Charters Towers, Bowen, Whitsundays, Port Douglas, Atherton, Mareeba and Innisfail just to name a few—resulting not only in job losses but in the loss of key local information sources in those communities.
I just want to call out a few of those incredible community leaders who have continued, people like Colin Jackson, the tireless editor of The Longreach Leader newspaper, who by his own admission has made his life so much tougher by expanding into other towns in Central Queensland. The leader now covers a vast area from the Western Queensland border right down to the south-west corner. Now with papers operating in Emerald and elsewhere in Central Queensland it's great to see that local news is still a hot commodity in the bush. Colin's brother David has also started a paper in Home Hill in North Queensland and each edition is voraciously consumed by the town's folk. You'll be all be interested to know that there is a North Queensland businessman by the name of Scott Morrison—not our own Prime Minister but a very active businessman who recently started the Burdekin Local News. I acknowledge Carl Portella at the Mareeba Express, who has weathered the storm and continues to service the Atherton Tablelands. I'd also like to acknowledge the commitment to local news of Al Kirton, the group general manager of North Queensland radio, which covers Innisfail, the Gulf of Carpentaria and all points in between. I couldn't go on without mentioning Ben Dobbin, who on his Rural Queensland Today show covers so many of the important issues that stretch across our state. Derek Barry, at The North West Star in Mount Isa, is one of the most committed newspaper editors I've seen when it comes to ensuring that everything, from the very important to the very trivial local events, is covered.
We heard evidence from Country Press Australia, a terrifically important organisation which represents more than 160 independent, regional and local mastheads across Australia. This organisation is more than a hundred years old and has mastheads within its membership that are more than 160 years old. So it is terrifically important that as part of this process we continue to consider regional newspapers and other regional media and the role that they play in holding local members, local organisations and local issues to account and that, when the code is reviewed 12 months after its introduction, we also consider how those community papers and media organisations are being treated.
Google and Facebook have now negotiated to pay Australian media outlets for the content they promote on their sites, and the ABC will be a beneficiary of this. During the hearings, the ABC said it was committed to spending extra revenue on regional journalism, which is so important. The ABC likes to promote itself as covering weather events and other important issues around the nation, but, of the ABC's 3,273 content makers, just 537 are located outside of capital cities. This is a staggering disparity and it brings into sharp relief the work that is being done by journalists such as Charlie McKillop and Tom Major in Far North Queensland. I never cease to be amazed by the miles they do and the important events they cover. There are also ABC North Queensland's Michael Clarke and ABC Far North Queensland's Adam Stephen, with whom I have regular contact through their radio shows, as well as Krystal Gordon and Zara Margolis at ABC North West Queensland, Shirley Way from Resonate regional radio, Paula Tapiolas in Townsville and Eric Barker—just to name a very few more.
These journalists epitomise the commitment to regional journalism that must be admired and respected. They are the ones who act as the photographer and the sound producer. They write and edit their own stories. They drive thousands of kilometres every year to get around, yet they are so poorly resourced by the ABC. I make it very clear that, as part of the Senate inquiry, the ABC made a commitment that this additional revenue would flow to these kinds of content makers and journalists. I intend to hold them very carefully to that commitment. During the hearings, the ABC said it wanted to move 75 per cent of the Ultimo Bay staff out of Sydney within next five years. But, given that Parramatta in Western Sydney is considered regional, I am not holding much hope of them getting too far. But, again, I'm sure that they will be making a very valiant attempt to commit to genuinely regional Australia.
The government running this agenda during COVID was terrifically important, because we know how important it is to know what happens in your local community and we need qualified and trained journalists to gather this information. We need it distilled, we need it presented, we need it fact-checked, and these journalists need to be paid for this important work. The code provides a framework for parties to reach commercial agreements so that news media businesses are fairly remunerated for the content they generate. The central feature of the code is that it encourages parties to undertake commercial negotiations outside the code. It's encouraging to see recent reports that that is exactly what's happening. The code, as I said, will be reviewed by Treasury one year after its operation to ensure that it is delivering the outcomes that are consistent with the government's stated policy intent.
Senator SMALL (Western Australia) (12:40): I rise to address the chamber today on the very important matter of the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021. It should come as no surprise to honourable senators here today that, yet again, the eyes of the world are on Australia and on the Morrison government because not only in our response to the global COVID-19 pandemic, but also in this very important area, the Morrison government is at the very forefront of progress on important matters.
This bill, as we've heard around the chamber today, establishes a world first mandatory code to address the bargaining power imbalances between digital platforms and Australian news businesses. As someone who grew up in regional and rural Australia, I found that Senator McDonald's comments resonated very strongly with me as someone who understands fundamentally the importance to the Australian people of access to journalism that represents them, their lives, their communities, the places in which they choose to bring up their children. So it is absolutely right that it is a priority of the Morrison government to ensure and sustain the accessibility of quality public interest journalism across Australia.
I guess the reality of this situation is that regulation around large digital platforms is a very new thing. When I first went to high school iPhones and iPods were not yet a thing. Yet now Facebook and Google are ubiquitous in our lives not only online in the content that we consume but in appliances and in a sweeping connectivity thanks to the Internet of Things. So the very real question for governments not just here in Australia but around the globe is: how do we appropriately regulate those businesses in a way that doesn't undermine their business models, and doesn't undermine the business models of other sectors, yet allows fairness, transparency and the integrity that we've come to expect in all aspects of Australian business, including the fourth estate?
Consumers are obtaining more and more news online. That reflects the broader shift in the way Australians consume much of the material that we see, listen to and read. For instance, I long ago stopped my hardcopy newspaper subscription and instead read Australian journalism on my iPad. I think that makes me not an outlier but very much in line with most Australians—traditional business models have been disrupted by the rise and rise of technology.
It is very clear from the bill before the parliament that it is the Morrison government's intention to ensure that the sustainability and future of Australian media outlets is embedded in a mandatory code that will enhance, not undermine, public interest journalism. It's no bad thing that the digital platforms are thriving. In fact, that's a very good thing for Australians. But the reality is that their advertising revenues are growing in leaps and bounds. Those very same advertising revenues were once what supported quality journalism in rural, regional and urban Australia.
My very first job was, in fact, delivering a regional newspaper. I was particularly grieved to see that the BunburyMail, which provided me with that very first taste of what it is to be employed in Australia, was unfortunately suspended at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Those are very fond memories of mine: rising early in the morning, heading down to the warehouse with my long-suffering mother, collecting vast bundles of newspapers and advertising pamphlets, which we had to hand insert into each paper, and delivering them across the neighbourhood, all before turning up to school bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and ready to go again.
The point, there, is that quality journalism is important to me and is important to the Morrison government. That's why we encourage parties to undertake commercial negotiations, either inside or outside the provisions of this code. The code itself does, however, set a minimum standard for commercial negotiations between Australian news and media businesses and the digital platforms to address that power imbalance that was so clearly evident in the ACCC report and has been the subject of further inquiry with the good work of the Senate committee, ably chaired by my colleague and fellow Western Australian Senator Brockman.
The minimum standards in that code are an advance notice of major algorithm changes, and it's quite important that we recognise the bill contemplates only a content algorithm and not an advertising algorithm. Good-faith bargaining is a principle that upholds all business relations in Australia and, where a commercial deal cannot be reached, a process of fair and balanced arbitration. That process of arbitration—as we've seen some uncertainty eliminated in recent days and weeks—is a lump-sum payment. It is no disincentive to businesses doing well in Australia today.
Senator McDonald raised a very pertinent question, I think, in reflecting on just how much of that advertising revenue goes to the big two digital giants, being Facebook and Google. Honourable senators would be startled to know that $81 in every $100 of online advertising spend in Australia goes to Google and Facebook. In any other market where we saw two players with 81 per cent of the market, Australians would rightly expect that there'd be mandatory provisions within Australia to ensure that good-faith element and uphold the sorts of things that we expect in the course of life.
The code provides for digital platforms to publish standard offers, which are a way for smaller news media businesses to avoid the cost and time of going to arbitration. That's a very real disadvantage for small businesses, which I know too well, and so it's a great thing. Enforcing clearly defined and open standards allows for greater transparency for both parties. I think the Treasurer has been clear that, at this stage, the code will only apply to the Facebook News Feed and Google Search. That very much reflects this 81 per cent share of the market they currently enjoy and, therefore, they have the ability to clearly impact Australian society and Australia's place in the world. Indeed, we have seen an unprecedented level of interest internationally in this Australian legislation, precisely because of the fact that these platforms do have such an ability to influence life here and elsewhere.
I can think of no better example than, as Senator Chandler raised—and this is something that I guess stunned myself, Minister Reynolds and Senator Brockman as Western Australians, along with our fellow WA colleagues—Facebook's egregious breach of faith in blocking access to Zak Kirkup's Facebook page whilst maintaining full rights for the Premier of Western Australia, Mark McGowan, to publish his material. This comes in the midst of an election campaign. It goes to fundamentally undermine an important democratic process that's underway, and so, whilst it might be funny for some to refer to Zach Kirkup as being 'zucked', the rest of us look on aghast. The reality is Zach Kirkup was not alone. WA has recently been struck by very serious bushfires in the Perth hills, so access to Western Australia's Department of Fire and Emergency Services page was blocked, along with the Hobart Womens Shelter. Dare I say, I'm probably not going to come to the assistance of the ACTU in this place very often; however, even the ACTU was deprived of its ability to communicate effectively as a result of Facebook's actions.
We are seeing a response from the Australian people to come out strongly in support of this bill, to come out in support of what is fair and decent and in support of what protects journalism and the generation of quality news content in Australia, particularly regional and rural Australia, and that's welcome. But it is also worthy of reflection that we actually encourage Facebook and Google to continue their important roles in Australia. We contemplate that this bill provides for continued presence in Australia where they and media businesses are able to thrive and prosper together. That is a good thing for all Australians. The actions that they took in retaliation to the Australian parliament contemplating in this provision were rightly egregious; they have since been wound back. So we see that the way forward is to reflect on the provisions of the bill, which have been subject to significant scrutiny. This was not a thought bubble. This was not an idea that the Morrison government has rolled out in undue haste, as honourable senators have previously reflected on; this is a matter of some three years now of reflection, inquiry and careful consideration.
So, with the transparency of due process, with the support of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, with the good work that's been done by the Senate committee, with the support of the House of Representatives and, hopefully, the support of the Australian Senate, we will see a piece of legislation through this place which will absolutely see Australia in global headlines. It will be in global headlines for introducing a world-leading and binding code that not only addresses the power imbalance between news media businesses and digital platforms but also allows for those businesses to continue in Australia. It allows for those businesses to undertake commercial negotiations outside the code. In fact, we have already seen that, long before the passage of this bill through the Senate, and that is a fantastic show of faith by the Australian business community.
Seeing media businesses with an efficient pathway to finalise those agreements and without inhibition for small- and medium-size enterprises to reach deals with global giants will be something that Australians will applaud. Ensuring that an independent arbiter is able to determine the level of that remuneration that should be paid under a fair and balanced final offer arbitration model in the event of a dispute or the failure to see an agreement reached is an appropriate safeguard. Setting clear and workable minimum standards for digital platforms, including requiring 14 days advance notice of deliberate algorithm changes, is again something that Australians will see as fair; Australians will see that as reasonable. Most importantly, Australians in rural and regional Australia will continue to be able to enjoy news content that's generated in rural and regional Australia, news content that's meaningful to them, their families and their communities.
In short, we see only good things coming from this bill but, as any responsible government would, we've undertaken to have a review of this legislation just 12 months after its implementation to verify that the operation of the bill is delivering outcomes that are consistent with the very genuine policy intent with which this government acts. It's on that basis that I commend the provisions of the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 to the Senate.
Senator BROCKMAN (Western Australia—Deputy Government Whip in the Senate) (12:55): Well, we've seen so much change. I would never reflect on your age, Mr Acting Deputy President Sterle, or mine, but standing up after Senator Small, one of the more recent arrivals to this place and someone who is a little younger than me, and following Senator Chandler, I will reflect that perhaps you and I saw a different telecommunications environment, particularly when we were growing up. Admittedly, I was a little tacker, but I very well remember the fights in the seventies and early eighties over just getting connected to the phone system. The battles then were over access. The battles now, and the challenges that we face as a government and as a society, are over something very different.
The mobile phones that we all carry in our pockets now have a level of connectivity that was unimaginable half a generation ago. They have access to information and news sources that was unimaginable half a generation ago. They are ubiquitous across our society in a way that was unimaginable just half a generation ago. I remember in the early nineties a group of friends and I had one of the first modems in Western Australia and, literally, there were a few bulletin boards that you could access. Today, obviously, the internet allows people, through their devices and their computers, to access news sources not just in their own backyard but right around this planet. That puts an enormous pressure on our regulatory framework. It puts an enormous pressure on society. It puts an enormous pressure on us as lawmakers to make wise choices in an environment where, quite frankly, technological change outpaces the ability of the legal system to keep up.
It is a challenge, and getting the balance right in these things means that we must always be nimble, flexible and willing to try a new approach. But, then, we must also be willing to see if it is working and, if it is not, willing to see where it is working and where it needs to be changed. I think that in this bill, the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021, we see a willingness to embrace the need to address what is a clear and dramatic issue in the media environment. It is an environment where technological change, the platforms people use and the way people interact with the internet is also constantly changing and evolving, so we cannot stand still. As a government, we cannot pretend, and we do not pretend, that this is a one-step process where all the problems that we currently see in the news media environment will be solved by this legislation. In fact, the ministers involved—the Treasurer and the Minister for Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities and the Arts—understand fully that we need to look at this area constantly and we need to keep focusing on what is working and what is not working. We need to make sure that we deliver an environment in this country where we balance the needs of the commercial sector with the needs of the fourth estate to maintain a strong journalistic presence that delivers high-quality, factual, evidence based journalism to the Australian people.
People have a thirst for local news in this country. It is one of the great shames of the transition to a new, much more digital world that we've seen those small, regional media outlets—radio stations, TV stations, but, in particular, newspapers—become a severe casualty of the technological change that has washed over the world in the last generation or so. Without those local media sources, people look around at what options are available to them, and, unfortunately, we have an environment where some of the options that are available are not necessarily positive in terms of how those people interact with society, the political environment and information. We see the growth of sources of information that are, at best, dubious and we see the need for high-quality sources of information become much more dramatic.
A few people in this place have mentioned that the Economics Legislation Committee had a look at this bill. As the committee's chair, I come to the examination of an issue like this with the fundamental belief that if we can avoid regulation we should do so; that we should step in not merely because there is a problem but when there is a problem and also a way the government can solve it without overly constraining people's ability to operate in a free and open society. Very telling through that inquiry were some of the comments made by Facebook. But, before I go into that, I wish to acknowledge the other members of the committee. We've already heard from Senator Bragg and Senator McDonald, who are my colleagues on the committee, but I also want to particularly acknowledge Senator Alex Gallacher, who's the deputy chair of the committee. Alex always comes at these issues with a very fair perspective and a very open and inquiring mind. Senator Jenny McAllister and Senator Rex Patrick are also on the committee.
One of the things that really stood out the day we heard from Google and Facebook was Facebook's answer to a question from my colleague Senator Bragg. He basically asked them what high-quality, objective, independent Australian news was worth to them. The answer was: well, not very much. That was a shocking answer on a number of counts. It's shocking on the surface but it's also shocking because Facebook, at the same time as saying that, had done deals with media companies to pay them for content. So on the one hand Facebook were saying that high-quality content had no commercial value to them but on the other hand they were paying for the same content. That's a circle that doesn't square.
We've got a situation where the environment in which news media is operating has changed very dramatically. As I said, when we were both younger men, Mr Acting Deputy President Sterle, the newspapers were an inch thick. The classified sections were half the paper, and they delivered the proverbial rivers of gold to the large media organisations. I remember the West Australian was literally an inch thick some Saturdays, with a huge classified section—20 or 30 different pull-out advertising materials, plus the copy adverts. That funded a lot of public interest journalism right around this country at a very granular local level, in cities like Bunbury, where Senator Small comes from, right across the regional areas of Australia. In the large cities, obviously, classified advertising provided a really significant source of revenue to provide the copy that drove sales in those papers, keeping people informed of the events of the day. As those classifieds disappeared, as they went online in a variety of different forms and the advertising drifted away—as Senator Small so rightly commented, now 81 per cent of digital advertising goes to those two large companies we're talking about today—we had a gutting of public interest journalism and a significant diminution of the ability of on-the-ground media providers to continue. Not all of that can be addressed through a bill such as this. It doesn't pretend to address all those issues. Many of those issues are structural issues which, in a fundamental way, can never be addressed. It's difficult to conceive of an environment where all those many hundreds or thousands of regional newspapers will ever exist again in the way they did before. That's not to say they cannot be replaced by something else. In fact, many of them have been replaced by online services of one form or another in those towns, perhaps not running exactly what the newspapers provided but certainly providing a source of news and up-to-date information on local events.
In that frame, we have these very large media companies having an extraordinarily dominant position, and the government, through the work of the ACCC, has developed this mandatory code to address the massive bargaining power imbalance which exists between the digital news platforms and Australian news businesses. As we continue to obtain more and more of our news online, we have to give those news media outlets a way of grappling with the need to find those viable and sustainable business models for the provision of that journalism which is so fundamental to a free and open and democratic society. I think the digital platforms themselves would acknowledge that they are thriving and have an extraordinarily central place within the new digital environment that we're all operating in. These behemoths that have such influence, such control over that digital advertising revenue, earn revenue from the content that's created by the media companies in Australia. This code of conduct is a way of allowing Australian news media businesses to be fairly remunerated for the provision of those services. Again, this all comes back to this massive imbalance of bargaining power.
As I've said, my preference would be for as little regulation as possible, and that is why I am extraordinarily pleased that we are seeing so many deals being commenced and concluded outside the code. I think it is very important that, where a commercial deal can be struck between two players in a free market environment, it is struck as soon as possible and with the least regulatory impost as possible. This was always part of the fundamental design of the code and a really important part of the design of the code, and I certainly acknowledge the work of Minister Fletcher and Treasurer Frydenberg. It is very important that, in line with our principles and the way we approach these issues, those agreements outside the code have standing in their own commercial right. They do not need to reference the code and they do not need to be within the code to still exist.
I think it's very important that we listen to the media companies going forward, but we must also listen to Google and Facebook and the other large digital players going forward. As the committee recommended, and as the government had already acknowledged, this is a complex area of law which does need to be examined on an ongoing basis, and we have the review in 12 months time. It is important that we look to see how the digital environment evolves over the next 12 months. I think it is very fair to say, as Senator Small and many others who have made a contribution in this place today and yesterday have acknowledged, the eyes of the world are on us as we do this. We want to, as a government, get this right. We want to be a demonstration to the rest of the world as to how they can get this right.
Senator McKIM (Tasmania—Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (13:10): This Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 will, if passed, see big overseas tech corporations pay Australian news media outlets for content appearing on their platforms. The purpose of the news media bargaining code is to level the playing field between news media and big tech when negotiating commercial agreements. The code was recommended by the consumer watchdog, the ACCC, after its inquiry into digital platforms in Australia.
Google and Facebook are gatekeepers of the internet. They are massive tech corporations which profit off ad revenue that used to support local and independent media. They also profit by harvesting, aggregating and selling data regarding their users. According to the ACCC, Google and Facebook generate more than $6 billion a year of advertising revenue in Australia—massive revenues, massive profits—but they pay little or no tax in our country. These big tech corporations monetise their audiences, ordinary Australians, by selling advertising alongside the news content that they aggregate and curate on their platforms. At the same time, they are collecting huge amounts of personal data from each user which is then monetised and used to better target future advertising at them. As Tristan Harris, a former Google design ethicist, warned on the documentary The Social Dilemma: 'If you don't pay for the product, you are the product.'
Due to their virtual monopolies, news media have had no choice but to distribute their journalism via these big tech platforms. But let's not fall into the trap of seeing media moguls like Rupert Murdoch as a victim in all of this, because, just like Facebook controls much of Australia's online activity, News Corporation—tragically for this country—controls much of the Australian media.
The similarities don't end there: both are big corporations with offshore head offices that don't pay their fair share of tax in this country and their respective leaders, Mark Zuckerberg and Rupert Murdoch, have far too much influence over Australian policy and Australian politics. That is why the Greens have long called for the government to show courage and will to deal with media concentration and online ownership by implementing new tax measures funding public interest journalism and increasing media diversity. It's also why the Greens went into bat for the real underdogs being exploited by big tech—Australia's public media funded by Australian taxpayers as well as the AAP. We secured the inclusion of public broadcasters, the ABC and the SBS, in the code along with public funding to protect AAP in the short-term. These are important reforms but they are not the only reforms that we need to see in the digital space.
Tech giants have profited from a deregulated global market in which personal data is sold to the highest bidder. Australians are becoming more and more aware of how their personal and private data are being harvested and monetised by overseas big tech corporations. People are learning from everything from the Cambridge Analytica data scandal to documentary films like The Great Hack and The Social Dilemma. They have learnt, for example, about how Facebook has allowed itself to be weaponised by violent extremists and conspiracy theorists due to an algorithm that far too quickly leads far too many people to be swamped by conspiracy theories and exposed to the violent rhetoric of hate groups. Facebook's news feed can operate as a propaganda mill which facilitates the dissemination of vile racism and the incitement of violence. Never forget that Facebook live streamed the Christchurch massacre where large numbers of Muslim people, going about their peaceful daily prayers, were mowed down in cold blood by a white supremacist terrorist. It was live streamed on Facebook. Yet we allow Facebook's billionaire founder and CEO to determine what news millions of Australians are exposed to. What a time to be alive! What a world we live in!
Facebook also jumped into bed with Cambridge Analytica, a tech firm headed by a former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, which had worked with Brexit-leave campaigns. Cambridge Analytica harvested the Facebook profiles of millions of people and used them to build a powerful software program to predict and influence voting decisions and the ballot box. That assisted the campaigns of people like Ted Cruz and Donald Trump, as well as the Brexit campaign. Apologising for this breach of trust caused by Facebook's role in the Cambridge Analytica data scandal, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said: 'We have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can't then we don't deserve to serve you.' I can agree with him on that at least.
Then there's Google with its long history of monopolistic and antitrust behaviour and billions of dollars-worth of tax avoidance around the planet including here in Australia. Google has worked with US federal agencies—the NSA, the CIA and the FBI—to spy on private citizens. It has worked with governments to develop products with censored search results, for example, Dragonfly, a version of Google's search engine that complied with the Chinese Communist Party's demands to censor sensitive speech and comply with China's data provenance and surveillance laws. This is the same Chinese government responsible for humanitarian atrocities on the Uighur people, the death of democracy in Hong Kong and longstanding crimes against the people of Tibet. Google is also one of the single biggest invaders of personal privacy on the planet. Google tracks your movements, viewing and purchasing through its search engine, browser, audio, YouTube, Gmail and devices like mobile phones running Android operating systems and Google Maps. Google's former CEO, Mr Eric Schmidt, once said: 'If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place.' That just shows Google doesn't get it. Wanting privacy is not the same as having something to hide. Anyone who thinks it is shouldn't be trusted with our personal data. This is from a company whose slogan used to be: 'Don't be evil'.
Australia has a Privacy Act but, in the digital world, it is clearly unfit for purpose. There is no greater contrast than between our Privacy Act 1988 and the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation, which came into force in 2018. The GDPR is considered the gold standard for the protection of consumer information. Whereas our Privacy Act provides very limited protection over personal information, the GDPR provides protection over 'any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person' who can be identified directly or indirectly by personal data.
The differences between the European regime and that here in Australia are born of basic philosophical differences—like the difference, for example, between neoliberalism on the one hand and civil libertarianism on the other. Unlike Australia's neoliberal approach, focused primarily on corporate profit and corporate greed—adhered to both by major parties in this place since it was turbocharged 40 years ago by the Australian Labor Party under Mr Hawke and Mr Keating and then built on and expanded even more rapidly by the arch neoliberals inside the LNP—the European regime takes a human rights approach, which is actually focused on people. What a refreshing change to see people focused on, rather than corporate profit and corporate greed.
Unlike Australia's Privacy Act, the GDPR applies to all organisations, regardless of location or size, who process or control any personal data of EU residents. It requires consent to be given for an organisation to process or control a resident's personal data, and it provides individual rights, such as the right to data portability, the right to object and the very important right to erasure, otherwise known as 'the right to be forgotten'.
The GDPR's regard for data protection as a fundamental right reflects data protection being a constitutionally enshrined right in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. But, unlike the EU—or every other liberal democracy in the world—Australia alone does not have a constitutionally or legislatively enshrined charter of rights. We need one desperately. We actually needed one long ago, because, as Justin Warren from Electronic Frontiers Australia has warned, you can't ever get privacy back.
We can't change the past, but we can change the future. We need to start legislating privacy protections now in this country. We need to stop the bleed and protect future generations from being exploited and monetised by big tech, like our generation has been. That's why I'll be moving a second reading amendment that calls on the government to implement data protections equivalent to the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation. Ever since Cambridge Analytica, calls to nationalise social media and big tech have increased in frequency and force, and rightly so.
Colleagues, I ask you to come with me on this. Just imagine we had a publicly owned search engine which did not have to make a profit by selling our data and did not track people's online behaviour and which had an algorithm that prioritised accuracy rather than popularity. Just imagine we had a publicly owned social media platform, one which did not retain data, or perhaps one which did offer the option of retaining people's data but provided it only to the user so that a person could decide, if they wished to, to sell their data or to donate it to a research institution for the public good. Just imagine how much stronger our democracy would be. Just imagine how much stronger and more cohesive our society would be.
The problem we've got is that algorithms on platforms like Google, Facebook, and YouTube are driving the destruction of our very democracy. They are bastardising elections. They prioritise things that get a reaction over things that are factual and truthful. When we look back on this time, not only in our country's history but in our world's history, we will see abundant evidence that these algorithms, developed and kept secret by companies like Google, Facebook and YouTube, are responsible for so many of the evils and the challenges of our world today. We need to rein in big tech. We need to properly regulate big tech. We need to break up some of the monopolistic big tech companies. It is not an exaggeration to suggest that the future of our democracy and our society depends on doing that.
Senator SCARR (Queensland) (13:25): I always enjoy following the previous speaker, Senator McKim, because I know that, if I've come in here with five minutes worth of material, after listening to Senator McKim I will probably have five hours worth of material to debate. At the outset of my contribution on the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 I would like to take advantage of the opportunity which Senator McKim has afforded me and deal with at least three of the points he raised.
The first point I would like to make is to congratulate everyone who was associated with the pressure that was imposed to ensure that our public broadcasters were brought within the ambit of the code. I actually think that was incredibly important. I think it's very good that the ABC and the SBS are captured within the code, so I'm certainly on the same page as Senator McKim in that regard.
I'm also on the same page with Senator McKim in relation to the importance of the Australian Associated Press. I think it is important that that institution continues. It provides an invaluable service to our community and, from my perspective, it encapsulates everything important about public interest journalism. I certainly agree with you on that.
Senator McKim: But?
Senator SCARR: Senator McKim knows me well; there's always a 'but'—well, not a 'but' but an 'and'. I must say I diverge from his drawing of a dichotomy between neoliberalism and civil liberties. I intensely disagree with his characterisation of neoliberalism. I'm quite happy to call myself a neoliberal and also a classical liberal. My philosophy is based in part on a book called On Liberty, written by a fellow called John Stuart Mill. It means—and I'll use Senator McKim as a bit of a prop in my analogy—that, if Senator McKim is one of a hundred people in a room and Senator McKim is of one view and the other 99 are of a different view, the 99 have no more right to silence Senator McKim than Senator McKim has to silence the 99. That goes to the absolute core of my beliefs in terms of classical liberalism. For me, it actually comes down to the individual. It's not about big corporations. Indeed, if one reads a lot of the work of great neoliberals such as Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek, one finds they actually decry the power that the big corporations had, as rent-seekers, to get subsidies et cetera from government. They actually attack that on the basis that in a free society it should not occur. So I do diverge quite strongly from Senator McKim's view that neoliberalism and civil liberties are dichotomous. I actually think they should be on the same page, although maybe they're not always practised that way.
Lastly, I must say it caused me to smile when Senator McKim referred to people donating their data to research institutes in some sort of noble public view. Great idea! I doubt, Senator McKim, that my data would be interesting enough. I'm sure it would take a lot of time for whoever was looking at my data to come to any great view with respect to its importance in the context of whatever they were looking at. Maybe Senator Ciccone's data would be far more interesting than my data. Goodness knows what people would find among Senator Sterle's data, but it would be extraordinarily interesting as well. I was thinking of Senator Sterle when Senator Brockman was making his contribution and he referred to the huge Saturday newspapers we used to receive. I can remember seeing the paper, as a boy growing up, when the retail classifieds used to be in there and it was half a foot thick. I was thinking Senator Sterle would have needed his truck to transport that paper back to his home for his morning cup of coffee—there you go.
I think we as a country should be proud that we are at the forefront of making sure that companies like Google and Facebook, and potentially others, pay their fair share for news media and that they fairly remunerate the news media organisations that produce that data. I genuinely believe we should be proud as a country that we are at the forefront of that. Of course, when you're at the forefront of something, the introduction of it and discussions relating to it can get pretty willing. We've seen that recently. I would like to commend Google with respect to the extraordinarily constructive approach they've adopted in dealing with news media providers. They should be congratulated, and strongly so.
With respect to Facebook, I note that discussions are perhaps continuing. In this regard, I would like to quote from a good friend of mine, Mr Sam O'Connor MP, who is the state member for the seat of Bonney on the Gold Coast. Mr O'Connor is an outstanding young state parliamentarian. I am sure Senator Stoker would agree with me when I make that observation. When I wanted to get some information about the sites that are being blocked by Facebook because of its concerns with respect to this legislation, I thought there was only one place I would need to go. I'm sure Senator McGrath would agree with me. I knew that Sam O'Connor MP, state member for Bonney, would be all over it. And, sure enough, he was. I want to quote from a Facebook post—a bit of irony there; I probably don't need to spell it out—on this issue from Sam O'Connor MP, member for Bonney, posted on 18 February at 10.49:
Like many of you, I get a lot of my news through Facebook.
It's even better when that news is written and fact-checked by actual journalists.
Sadly none of that reliable, trustworthy, accurate news will be on Facebook anymore.
As of this morning, Facebook has decided to block all Australian news organisations from posting on here.
… … …
They're clearly trying to bully the Federal Government into changing its proposed laws to make social media companies pay for news content.
This is where it gets interesting, because he actually lists some of the sites in Queensland that were blocked when Facebook adopted this strategy, which I think was totally unproductive. To continue:
Facebook has even banned and hidden all the posts of important sources of information like Queensland Health, Gold Coast Health, TransLink, the Bureau of Meteorology and domestic violence support service 1800 RESPECT.
Even the Betoota Advocate has been caught by the ban!
This means many people won't see alerts about breaking news or even live-streamed press conferences by these outlets.
With their absence, it adds fuel to the fire of misinformation that already runs rampant here.
Yes, I realise the irony of posting this on Facebook but that's kind of the point—Facebook is a vital source of information for most of us.
We need what we're seeing on social media to be from reliable and trustworthy sources now more than we ever have.
UPDATE—The pages I mentioned have thankfully all been unblocked but this still doesn't resolve the issue with our news outlets being banned from one of their main mediums of communication.
I couldn't have put it better myself.
I would also like to make a few comments with respect to the contribution from my good friend Senator Brockman. As is typical in this place, I agreed with everything Senator Brockman said; I don't have any divergence of opinion with what he said. One thing in particular he said which triggered something in my own thoughts was with respect to the importance of our regional newspapers. From my perspective, when the review of this legislation is conducted one year hence, one of the touchstones will be this: has this legislation worked for smaller, regional news providers and regional newspapers and news outlets? That is of key importance to me.
There are two outstanding publications in the vicinity of where my office is in Queensland, in the city of Springfield, which is part of the fastest-growing region in Queensland, the greater Ipswich region, and they are, firstly, The Queensland Times and, secondly, the Fassifern Guardian & Tribune. They are two outstanding local community newspapers. One of the touchstones, for me, as to whether or not this legislation is successful will be whether or not it gets the desired result for those smaller regional newspapers so that they can continue to provide—as they're doing at the moment to the utmost professional standards—local content for local communities. That is just so important, from my perspective, and that's something I'll be looking closely at with respect to the review of the legislation in 12 months time.
There are a few other comments I want to make with respect to the legislation. In particular, I would like to commend the Hon. Paul Fletcher MP with respect to the amendments which were made to the legislation. From my perspective, we have an absolutely outstanding minister for communications in the Hon. Paul Fletcher MP. I congratulate him for working through these issues with all of the stakeholders and making a number of amendments. I'd like to set those amendments out now. The first was to streamline the requirements for digital platforms to give advance notice of algorithm changes to make them more workable. It is a technical issue, but it is very, very important that that technical issue is sorted and it's effective, it's efficient and it's going to work in practice. The second was to clarify the arbitration criteria so that they consider the reasonable costs of both the digital platform and news media business and amend the legislation to remove any doubt that arbitrated remuneration is to be in the form of lump-sum payments. Again, this is an important clarification.
Before proceeding to the other two amendments, I want to say, in relation to the arbitration, that this legislation is extremely well crafted. The reason I say that is that it provides an incentive to the provider of the platform to negotiate with the news media organisation and come to an agreement. Then, if they can't come to an agreement, there is a process where they go to arbitration. But I can tell you, with my experience in matters of commercial negotiation, I would fully expect that both sides of that commercial discussion will want to come to an agreement rather than take the risk of an arbitrated outcome. So I think the appropriate tension is included in this legislation to get the right result.
The third of the four amendments that the Hon. Paul Fletcher MP made to the legislation was to clarify the role of the ACCC, ensuring its focus is on providing factual information to assist the arbitrator. I think that's an extraordinarily important amendment, because, in terms of this legislation and how it's crafted, the ACCC shouldn't be seen as an actor in the process. It's a regulator. So I think it's important that the ACCC's role and standing in this respect is protected. Again, the legislation is well crafted with this amendment to make it clear that the ACCC isn't an actor in this process; it's simply providing factual information to assist the arbitrator. That's important, because it's terribly important that the arbitrator gets all of the relevant information needed, if it gets to that—and, as I said earlier, hopefully it doesn't get to that; hopefully the parties can come to a commercial agreement. But, if it does go to arbitration, it's very, very important that the arbitrator gets access to all the information and analysis that the arbitrator needs.
The fourth and final amendment I'd like to speak to was to adjust the effect of anti-avoidance provisions so that they take effect from the commencement of the code and ensure that the government's policy intent of not interfering with existing contractual rights under the code is achieved. Again, that's important on a number of levels. There need to be anti-avoidance provisions in this regard, to keep all the parties honest in relation to this process, but there also needs to be a recognition with respect to commercial arrangements that have been entered into before the adoption of the code. Again, I commend the minister with respect to the changes which he has proposed in that regard.
Finally, I think that this legislation achieves the right balance, and I think we're seeing that in terms of the contributions from around the chamber. What I'm hearing generally is that there is broad support with respect to this legislation. I think the instances of overreach—if I can describe and characterise it as that—by Facebook over the last week or so have also led to greater community interest and public interest in this legislation. I'm quite happy to commend the bill to the Senate.
Senator CANAVAN (Queensland—Deputy Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) (13:40): The Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 is, effectively, amongst some very important and historic laws and regulations that are going through this parliament, and I support it. In fact, this is historic, because I think Australia will perhaps be the first nation, or at least one of the very first nations, in the world to effectively establish a new right for people in the profession of journalism, those who do the hard work and write our news, that ensures that they get fair payment for their hard work.
I note that there are some from my own team with whom I've discussed this, and there are certainly those who support the Liberal and National parties, who are a little cautious about establishing a new right like this, because I suppose the government is, in a way, creating a new market here. It's establishing some new property rights. Normally, on our side of politics, we think that rights and property are best left to individuals to work out. But it's at times like this that we must reflect that there is a level of government involvement in all markets and in the establishment of all property rights. At some point in the past, there had to be rules established around who owned certain land, who had the right to develop areas of real estate and who had the right to build buildings and do other things that created economic activity. While we have forgotten how a lot of those rights were established at different times in our history—they have become natural—almost invariably there was some degree of involvement with government agencies, whether that be through the judiciary in a common-law process or, sometimes, through a legislative process in the parliament. So what's happening here, while historic, is not unique.
Those are things that were done in the past, involving other types of rights and intellectual property. This is just updating those rights for the modern age, because prior to the last 10 years or so this wasn't really an issue. It has been very, very recent. I don't know when I got on Facebook, but it was probably sometime in only the last 10 or 15 years. There was a certain framework established so journalists could be compensated through advertising and charging for newspapers and what have you, but a completely different information model has cropped up in the last decade or so. Rights have to evolve. Rights have to change.
When you think about what we're establishing here through a news media and digital platforms code, it's very similar to other types of intellectual property in a way, because, in the end, what journalists create is intellectual property. We have traditionally consumed that intellectual property in a physical version—a newspaper or a magazine or something we can see and touch. But it's not really the paper that has the value; it's the words that are written on the paper that create the value that makes you want to pay $3 for a newspaper or 10 bucks for a magazine at the newsagent. It's the intellectual effort of writing those words and putting them together in a certain way that creates value.
Other types of intellectual property are protected and regulated to ensure that the creators of the property get a certain fair level of compensation. Every time you switch on your radio or, increasingly these days, open up Spotify and play a song, the artist who created that intellectual property will get a payment. You cannot just set up a radio station and start broadcasting whatever music you like for free. There are rules, regulations and laws around the fact that the creator of the song has that intellectual property right, and they deserve a royalty payment every time their song is broadcast over the airwaves or, now, over the interwebs through our phone.
This is very similar to this code. We now have a situation where people's intellectual property, the articles they write, can be shared through social media—extracts of them, parts of them, can be shared through Facebook or Google. I think those people deserve to have some compensation. I was talking to a friend the other day who bemoaned the implementation of this new media code because their way of accessing one particular newspaper in this country has been stopped. Previously, they could just google an article and a link would let them bring up the full article and read it without any need to subscribe, without any need to pay compensation to get through the paywall. Apparently, in just the last few weeks, that particular method of accessing intellectual property created through news has been blocked. I realise that people would love to continue to get their news and media for free, but that model is not sustainable. If journalists are not given fair pay for the work they do, we will have fewer journalists and fewer newspapers, and we will all be the poorer for it. We can all see that. It is happening before our eyes. Journalism is a tough industry right now and, unfortunately, many journalists have lost their jobs in the last decade or two. Nothing in this code will guarantee or protect all of those jobs. The industry is going through an enormous transition which will seemingly continue for some time yet. We've had the printed versions of some newspapers cease. In my area, in regional Queensland, The Morning Bulletin, a great paper for over 100 years, is no longer in print. That is a great shame and a tragedy. Unfortunately, the historic changes we are making here are unlikely to bring it back. But I don't want to lose more. I don't want to see the online version of The Morning Bulletin shut, I don't want to see more newsrooms close their doors and I don't want to see more journalists lose their jobs if we can avoid it.
This code will provide a lifeline to an essential industry in this country that deserves to get fair compensation for its work. We are in effect setting up a royalty payment for news articles, for news content, for news media—and for TV as well. All that content can now get a revenue stream from those who wish to share that content through the internet. There is no doubt that this code will not be perfect on day one. As I said, we are doing something here that is globally unique. I don't think it's unique in the world of intellectual property, but it is the first time any country is doing this and it is a very complicated area. So I support the code, but I recognise that some degree of adjustment will need to be made over time as we learn and develop how this code works in practice.
I think it is right that the government has sought to focus the code initially on the very large digital platforms. I believe just Facebook and Google search are those identified. I don't think it would be right to try to extend it to the many different digital platforms at this stage, particularly in its early years. Google and Facebook are very large companies with the means to navigate this process. Google reported revenue in Australia of over $1 billion in 2018-19 and Facebook reported revenue of $582 million. That is just in Australia. So I think they have the means to navigate what no doubt are difficult regulations for them to get their heads around given that, as I said, they are unique.
I think it's important to make the point, though, that Google and Facebook don't pay a lot of tax on that revenue they generate in Australia. I recognise that the figures I've quoted are revenue, not profit, but revenue is kind of a fact and profit is the fiction of the accounting world. There are lots of different ways of getting a profit from your revenue lines. Apparently, Google made $1 billion in revenue in Australia but only $200 million of taxable income. That might be true, but they probably made a lot more revenue than $1.1 billion, I reckon. Some of that would be hidden overseas. They paid just $50 million in tax on that. Facebook, of that $580 million in revenue I mentioned, declared taxable income of just $50 million and paid just $15 million in tax. I think Google and Facebook are probably making higher profits than that from their dominance of the advertising market in Australia. I'm not accusing them of doing anything illegal. I'm sure they're legally seeking to minimise their profit, as most taxpayers would seek to do. But I do think there's probably some ability for those two very large companies to make contributions to the news content that is shared or hosted on their websites.
I think it's positive that Google themselves have reached a voluntary agreement with news media organisations. That's what this code was seeking to encourage and it's positive that that's occurred. It's unfortunate that Facebook chose a different course of action, but it's not terminal. I think we're right to push ahead with this, despite Facebook's actions last week, which were the biggest own goal in politics for some time, given they themselves couldn't restrict their prohibitions to the news media industry. As has been well documented, they caught up emergency services, health services, coronavirus information in their news media net. For an organisation that says that it can't get rid of child pornography from their website to overban news is a bit galling for all of us here in Australia. The bullyboy tactics of Facebook last week deserve to be called out. I don't think they were fighting this code; I think Facebook were trying to make an example of us to try to stop other countries from doing the same. Their actions were not so much about Australia. Apparently, Facebook only paid $15 million in tax and only made a $50 million profit in Australia. They're one of the biggest companies in the world. Do you reckon they would threaten their whole business for 50 million bucks? I don't think so. I think that they were trying to make an example of poor little Australia to the rest of the world.
But I'm heartened that we stood up to them last week. I'm heartened that the government has not decided to back down as a result of these sorts of tactics and I'm also heartened by the support we have received from around the world. I read over the weekend that Canada is seeking to progress laws similar to those we're discussing here today, and it seems like Facebook's tactics and actions have only redoubled the commitment of the Canadian government to continue down that path. If we were to buckle to these kinds of tactics from Facebook, we would be outsourcing the political decisions of our country to a US based company. I love America. It is a great friend of this country. But I believe that an American based company should not decide what laws are passed here in this country. They should certainly not have the control to regulate our speech and our political discourse in this nation.
While I support this code and its protection of news media, there is a larger agenda here that we need to focus on about how we protect the free speech of everyday Australians. It is right and proper for us to be protecting the free speech and the rights and the property rights of Australian news media companies to make sure we continue to have Australian content. But I think it's also right and proper that we seek to protect the free speech of everyday Australians so they don't have their thoughts and ideas banned by a company based in America. That would be particularly unfair.
I also believe that, after this law is passed—and I think we have widespread support for it—we need to turn our attention to appropriate restrictions on overseas based companies involving themselves in our media landscape. We have, I think, well established and principled restrictions on foreign ownership of our domestic media entities—our newspapers and our TV stations. They are longstanding arrangements in our laws, but there are no such restrictions on foreign ownership of social media. A foreigner can have 100 per cent of a particular social media platform. Indeed, I would suggest basically 100 per cent of our social media footprint in this country is owned by foreigners—almost 100 per cent. I have been contacted in the last week by a few Australian based social media companies, and I wish them well. I think it is about time we seek to support them, because I would like to see Australian social media companies have a footprint. Australians use Australian IT businesses to discuss issues, to share things with friends and to make sure that we continue to be sovereign and independent of other countries when it comes to the protection of our rights and our speech.
Senator McLACHLAN (South Australia) (13:55): I rise to speak to the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021. This bill has been technically described as a mandatory code with mandatory requirements with which the registered Australian news business corporations and designated digital platform corporations must comply, including provision of information and non-differentiation, and may bargain about the amount to be paid for making available certain news content on designated platform services—quite the bureaucratic speak. In essence, the mischief it is seeking to address is the imbalance of market power, as identified by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the ACCC, between traditional journalism and the distribution through platforms such as Google and Facebook.
In essence, this bill represents a market intervention. I know Senator McKim in his contribution had much to say about Liberals worshipping profit and nothing else, but anyone with a glance through the history of the Liberal Party would realise that we hesitate before market intervention. We do not resile from it, but we make sure that the circumstances are right for intervention so that there are not unintended consequences. In this case, the tipping point has been reached, and we have seen that with the behaviours of Facebook, which have been well articulated in this chamber by many speakers. As I said, the purpose of the code is to address the bargaining power imbalance, identified by the ACCC, between digital platforms and news media businesses. The aim of the government through this legislation is to support a diverse and sustainable Australian news media, which must be able to get a fair day's pay for a fair day's work.
The code creates a framework for commercial arrangements, and that is why I described it as a 'market intervention', but, in my view, it is a measured response, and also with a caveat of a one-year review. Unlike the previous speaker, Senator Canavan, I draw comfort from the fact that this will be reviewed and it will be an ongoing legislative reform process as we grapple with the implications of big tech and how it influences our lives and the marketplace.
The government has based this legislation on accepting the ACCC's conclusion—that there is a need to reform to better protect consumers, improve transparency, recognise power imbalances and ensure that substantial market power is not used to lessen competition. I'm reminded of the words of Clive James, who said, 'The last stage of fitting the product to the market is fitting the market to the product,' which seems to have been a mantra of those founding these large tech giants. I would say to honourable senators that we've been here before; this is not a new situation we face. There have been developments with monopolistic power in the US and even before that.
I would like to thank the Economics Legislation Committee for its work. I found its report enlightening and good reading for the preparation of this speech. I may have an opportunity to enlighten you more later on this afternoon if you pay attention, honourable senators! My wisdom needs to come out in the one go, not necessarily one minute to the axe ahead of question time. I did draw comfort from the public utterances of the minister in relation to this bill and also the fact that this bill hasn't come, as the saying goes, out of the head of Zeus. This morning in our party room we agreed on further amendments, which will be considered in the committee stage.
An honourable senator interjecting—
Senator McLACHLAN: I would look forward to you joining the Liberal Party. Then you can come to the party room and I won't need to articulate to you across the Senate chamber.
The PRESIDENT: We have hit 2 pm. You will be in continuation. We move to questions without notice.
QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Defence Equipment
Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (14:00): My question is to the Minister for Defence, Senator Reynolds. Workers at ASC in South Australia have been left to endure two Christmases without any certainty from this minister about the future of their jobs after she broke her promise that a decision on the future location of full-cycle docking work would be made at the end of 2019. Why does this minister continue to keep 700 South Australian naval shipbuilders in the dark, because of her broken promise? Will she now commit to making a decision this year?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:00): I thank Senator Wong for this question on the important issue for our nation's security. This government is absolutely committed to keeping Australia and Australians safe. As an island nation we rely on maritime trade for our security and our prosperity. That means Australia's naval capability is essential to our enduring national interest. The Morrison government is keeping Australia safe with our $183 billion Naval Shipbuilding Plan, which is the largest regeneration of the Navy since World War II. More than 70 vessels will be built right here in Australia using Australian workers, and this—
The PRESIDENT: I have Senator Wong on a point of order.
Senator Wong: Direct relevance—this relates to this minister's commitment, this government's commitment, to make a decision by the end of 2019. Workers have been waiting for two Christmases. I am asking about when a decision will be made as to the location of full-cycle docking. It's a very specific question.
The PRESIDENT: I've allowed you to remind the minister of the specific nature of the question. I call Senator Reynolds to continue.
Senator REYNOLDS: Like so many of these important issues, context is absolutely critical. It is absolutely critical, because this government is creating over 15,000 direct jobs in our naval shipbuilding industry. We will make all of these decisions, every single one of them, in relation to the build of more than 70 vessels—the sustainment and maintenance of our current fleet and our future fleet—in the order and at the time they need to be made, which is what this government has done continually. As has been said at estimates and publicly, even if we did make a decision to change, it is still five to six years away. In the meantime, what is this government doing? We have fixed that valley of death of jobs you created in South Australia. You commissioned not a single, not a single, Australian built vessel in our nation. You commissioned not a single one. You didn't progress a future submarine program. This government has done it. We are creating 15,000 jobs. There are not going to be fewer jobs in South Australia. There are already thousands more than when you left government.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Wong, a supplementary question?
Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (14:03): This minister has also broken her promise that the strategic partnering agreement for the future submarines would be amended by the end of last year to include a 60 per cent spending commitment for local content. Can the minister tell Australian naval shipbuilding workers and businesses why she has broken yet another promise to them?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:03): I will tell you one thing: I will never, ever, ever, in any of our Defence procurement contracts, agree to any terms or conditions that go against Australia's interest in delivering this capability. I am frustrated and I am very disappointed that Naval Group have yet been unable to finalise this contract with Defence, but it will not be done at the expense of Australian jobs and Australian industry. This capability is far too important for our nation to do such.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Wong, a final supplementary question?
Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (14:04): The Morrison government has also broken its promise to release an update to the Naval Shipbuilding Plan by the end of 2020 which was to include 'further detail on the critical role of Australia's shipbuilding industry in delivering this plan'. Why has this minister broken yet another promise?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:04): Can I reiterate, to everybody here and everybody in Australia: every single cent we spend of the taxpayers' money, every single contract we enter into for our Naval Shipbuilding Plan—over $183 billion worth over the next few decades—and every single thing we do is about sovereign capability and about building sovereign defence capability in our nation. You do not have to wait for a piece of paper, Senator Wong, to see this government's commitment of 15,000 jobs and 70 vessels. That is our commitment.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Wong, on a point of order?
Senator Wong: The point of order is about this minister and this government's own commitment to release the update to the Naval Shipbuilding Plan. I'm asking why it hasn't been released by the time she said it would be.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Birmingham, on the point of order?
Senator Birmingham: Senator Wong has repeated part of her question but she has also used the opportunity to extrapolate. In any event, Senator Reynolds is clearly being directly relevant to issues that relate to the Naval Shipbuilding Plan. It is the entire nature of the content that she has had in her answer to date.
The PRESIDENT: I'm listening carefully to the minister's answer but I tend to agree with Senator Birmingham that the minister's answer thus far, while it could be debated after question time as is appropriate, is being directly relevant. She has 26 seconds remaining to answer.
Senator REYNOLDS: I don't know where the opposition have been hiding, but for the past 12 months we have been undertaking, the globe has been undertaking, a large, pandemic-induced economic crisis. The government are working to continue to deliver our Naval Shipbuilding Plan and we are.
JobSeeker Payment
Senator O'SULLIVAN (Western Australia) (14:06): My question is to the Minister for Families and Social Services, Senator Ruston. Can the minister advise the Senate on the changes to working age payments announced today? How they will benefit 1.95 million Australians who are currently receiving working age payments?
Senator RUSTON (South Australia—Minister for Families and Social Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:06): I thank Senator O'Sullivan for his question. The pandemic, as we all know, caused a once in a lifetime disruption to our labour market and we used our comprehensive welfare system to support Australians who found themselves unemployed through the emergency support measures that were put in place last year. Today we announced the transition from those temporary measures into a more permanent setting.
We know that the recovery of the Australian economy is now well underway, so we no longer are relying on those temporary supports which have sustained us over the last 12 months. On 31 March, the coronavirus supplement and associated measures will come to an end. In its place, in recognition that the Australian economy has changed as a result of the pandemic that has impacted our country over the last 12 months, we are seeking to increase the working age payments base rate permanently by an amount of $50 per fortnight per payment. This is the single largest increase in working age payments, or unemployment benefits, since 1986—that is, it will be a 9.7 per cent increase, year on year, from April 2020 to April 2021.
In addition to increasing the payment rate, we will also be increasing the income-free area to $150. This means every Australian on working age payments will be able to keep the first $150 that they earn in a fortnight before their payment is reduced by one cent. What we are seeking to do here is to get the balance right between supporting people as they look for work but also making sure that we put the right incentives in place for people to take up work. We also seek to remove the disincentives that are put in place for people to not take a job. This is a $9 billion investment in working age payments, and it is absolutely essential that we continue to support our working age payment recipients.
The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Ruston. Senator O'Sullivan, a supplementary question?
Senator O'SULLIVAN (Western Australia) (14:09): Could the minister update the Senate on how the Morrison government is incentivising unemployed Australians to seek work?
Senator RUSTON (South Australia—Minister for Families and Social Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:09): Thank you, Senator O'Sullivan. The Morrison government's priority is giving people the support they need to get them into work. That is why we've made the decision today to increase the income-free area to $150 per fortnight. As I said, this means that a recipient can earn $150 without losing a cent of their payment. The income-free area will allow people to work about a day a fortnight at the minimum wage before their payments are reduced.
During the pandemic we saw temporary settings, including the income free area that was increased, deliver very positive results, with a significant increase in the number of people who were reporting earnings. And we know that people who report earnings are twice as likely to transition off payment than those that don't report any earnings at all. So we will continue to support and we are confident that we will be able, through this measure, to get people off payment and into work, because we know that getting people off welfare is important.
The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Ruston. Senator O'Sullivan, a final supplementary question?
Senator O'SULLIVAN (Western Australia) (14:10): Can the minister advise the Senate what temporary measures will remain in place to continue to support Australians as we recover from the pandemic?
Senator RUSTON (South Australia—Minister for Families and Social Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:10): In addition to the ongoing measures that were announced this morning and the measures that Senator Cash also announced this morning, we are also seeking for this parliament, over the coming weeks, to agree to the temporary extension of the ordinary waiting period, which is a one-week period that people normally have to serve before coming on to payment, to make sure that we continue to give direct and immediate access to anybody who's coming on to payments, because we know that localised outbreaks are still, potentially, a risk to this country.
We know also that there are likely to be people who are going to have to isolate because they have contracted coronavirus or are caring for somebody and are required to isolate. So we will also be seeking, in this place, to extend the provision to enable people under those provisions to continue to be able to get access to payment, as long as they meet the existing eligibility criteria. But, we know, 93 per cent of people have got their jobs back, so we look forward— (Time expired)
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (14:11): My question is to the Minister for Defence, Senator Reynolds. Is the minister aware that when asked if she would release the minister from any privacy concerns and allow her to speak freely her former staff member Ms Higgins replied 'Of course'?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:11): The answer is, of course, I have. But, as I've said on many occasions in this chamber, Brittany's story is hers and hers alone to tell publicly. Brittany has said that tomorrow she is speaking with the AFP. I believe—I believed it last week and I believe it this week—to the bottom of my heart, that these discussions should be had with the AFP. And, of course, I stand ready, once Ms Higgins has gone to the AFP, to discuss these matters with her further.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Gallagher, a supplementary question?
Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (14:12): Is the minister aware that her former staff member Ms Higgins has also said: 'The government has questions to answer for their own conduct'?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:12): I thank Senator Gallagher for that question. I think much has been said about this issue publicly and in this place over the last two weeks, and there are many, many issues arising from that commentary. Some of that, rightly, is now an issue for the AFP and for Ms Higgins to pursue that with the AFP. As the Prime Minister has said, there will be an inquiry led by the head of Prime Minister and Cabinet into the specifics and the circumstances of this inquiry. And that is absolutely the right place for all of these matters, particularly the procedural matters, to be discussed. I understand that Minister Birmingham is working with the Labor Party and all parties in this chamber, in this parliament, on a broader inquiry into the cultural reforms and procedural reforms that, clearly, we all agree need to occur. (Time expired)
The PRESIDENT: Senator Gallagher, a final supplementary question?
Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (14:13): Ms Higgins has said in relation to the minister that, 'I don't think she's ever respected my privacy. So, her sudden concern for it now, I find it patently false.' Given Ms Higgins has made her wishes well known, will the minister stop using Ms Higgins' privacy to hide from her accountability to this place and answer questions asked of her?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:14): I respectfully disagree with the senator's assessment of the situation.
Honourable senators interjecting—
JobSeeker Payment
Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (14:14): My question is to the minister for social services, Minister Ruston. Through you, Mr President, Minister, can you live on the new JobSeeker payment of $44 a day?
Senator RUSTON (South Australia—Minister for Families and Social Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:15): Thank you, Senator Siewert, for your question. I think I've said a number of times in this place that living without a job would be extremely difficult, and that is why this government has been so incredibly focused on getting the economy to recover—so that jobs can be created so that we have an opportunity to get people who find themselves unemployed, who are on working-age payments, back into work. This morning's announcement was very much around making sure that we have a targeted response, a targeted package of measures, to ensure we are giving people the best opportunity, the best incentives and the best support to be able to get back into work.
Senator Siewert, we were very concerned about making sure that we got the balance right in terms of being able to support Australians who find themselves on working-age payments. We need to support people while they're looking for work, but we also need to make sure we are creating the right incentives to encourage them to look for that work. We also need to remove the disincentives, which is part of the package of measures that have been announced by Senator Cash, to try and make sure that we don't disincentivise people from working. But, most particularly, we need to make sure that our working-age system is fair and sustainable for the people who need it and the taxpayers who pay for it. So, today, what we have done is we have increased the base level of the payment. But, equally, as Senator Siewert would well know, the Australian working-age payment system, our welfare system, is a very comprehensive and targeted system. We have a range of different supplements and allowances and supports in place that recognise the unique situations and conditions that Australians have, whether they have children and get the family tax benefit, whether they are renters and get access to Commonwealth rental assistance or whether there are a myriad of other— (Time expired)
The PRESIDENT: Senator Siewert, a supplementary question?
Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (14:17): Though you, Mr President, does the government acknowledge that 1.5 million Australians on the JobSeeker and youth allowance payments will be living in poverty from April?
Senator RUSTON (South Australia—Minister for Families and Social Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:17): What I can say to Senator Siewert, through you, Mr President, is that on 1 April, as an ongoing measure, the Commonwealth government will be putting in place over the forward estimates a $9 billion increase in payments to people who find themselves on working-age payments. This includes people who are on the JobSeeker payment and also those on youth allowance, youth allowance other as well as students, young people, single people with children. Every one of the 1.95 million Australians who currently rely on our working-age payment system will receive an increase of $50 per fortnight as of 1 April. But, as I was saying to you in the previous question, Senator Siewert, as you well know, there are a number of other targeted supplements and supports that are available for people that recognise the unique situation that different people find themselves in. (Time expired)
Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (14:18): How long does the minister estimate it's going to take the 1.5 million Australians currently condemned by this government to live in poverty to find work given at the present time, according to the figures that are available, there are only 175,000 job vacancies?
Senator RUSTON (South Australia—Minister for Families and Social Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:19): Thank you, Senator Siewert. Of course, there are a number of measures in relation to job availability and job vacancies, as Senator Cash would well know, and you only refer to one of them. But what we do know is that the most important thing that a government can do is to make sure the settings in the economy are right so businesses can create jobs. Governments don't in and of themselves create jobs. What we do is support our businesses in our economy—our big businesses, our small businesses—so that they are encouraged to employ people. That is why our hiring credits program has been put in place, because we know young people were more impacted than others by this pandemic. That's why we've got the JobTrainer program in place, because we know some of the jobs that were there pre pandemic may not come back post pandemic. But we know there is a great need for other jobs, and that's why we are seeking to retrain and to reskill those people that are on payments now, so that they can take up the jobs of the future.
COVID-19: Vaccination
Senator McDONALD (Queensland) (14:20): My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Health and Aged Care, Senator Colbeck. Can the minister update the Senate on the national rollout of the COVID vaccine, particularly into regional Australia?
Senator COLBECK (Tasmania—Minister for Sport and Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) (14:20): Thank you, Senator McDonald, for the question. This week is a historic week for Australia and all Australians. The mass vaccine rollout began yesterday in aged-care homes, hospital hubs and for border, quarantine and frontline health workers. I'm also pleased to be able to report that a second shipment of Pfizer vaccine arrived in Australia overnight.
This week health professionals will deliver vaccines to aged-care residents across 240 facilities in 190 towns in regional centres across the country. In your home state, Senator McDonald, aged-care residents in regional centres such as Toowoomba, Kearneys Spring, Harristown, Glenvale, Bundaberg, Millbank and Kepnock will receive their vaccines. Under the Australian government's plan for aged-care residents, we're on track for them to be vaccinated by April.
We encourage all Australians, when your turn comes, to take the opportunity to line up to receive the vaccine that will protect you, your families and the whole country, from major cities to rural communities. As the Prime Minister has said, we are going to make our Australian way back through this pandemic, and the Australian way has proved to be, when you look around the world, one of the most effective there is. People are relying on us to protect their livelihoods, to protect their lives, to maintain the health of the country, to make sure we roll out this vaccination program, and we will do that.
The PRESIDENT: Senator McDonald, a supplementary question?
Senator McDONALD (Queensland) (14:22): Can the minister please outline the expert process our medical professionals are undertaking in this vaccine rollout?
Senator COLBECK (Tasmania—Minister for Sport and Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) (14:22): Thank you, Senator McDonald. We want to give confidence to the Australian people, and we're doing that by showing that these vaccines have been through a full and thorough assessment by our medical regulator, the TGA, and that they are safe. As the Prime Minister demonstrated by being vaccinated on Sunday, he is not asking anyone to do anything that he is not prepared to do himself. Today we saw the Leader of the Opposition vaccinated. He, too, is demonstrating his confidence in the vaccine. As more Australians receive it and, as we've seen around the world, it is shown to be safe and effective, that will also raise the confidence across the community and encourage more Australians to get vaccinated. Our key message is that it's safe, it's effective and it will help protect you but it will also help protect your loved ones.
The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Colbeck. Senator McDonald, a final supplementary question?
Senator McDONALD (Queensland) (14:23): Can the minister also update the Senate on the Morrison-McCormack government's plan to record who has and hasn't had the vaccine?
Senator COLBECK (Tasmania—Minister for Sport and Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) (14:23): I can confirm that the Australian Immunisation Register will be the record for all vaccinations for Australians, and that record will form the basis of the vaccination certificate that all Australians will be able to use, including visa holders. Your immunisation history statement, sourced from the Australian Immunisation Register, is available right now. You can access it from Express Plus Medicare or from myGov or call or visit Services Australia and get a paper record. Doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other health professionals will record vaccines given to you or your child on the Australian Immunisation Register. Once you've had the required doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, a COVID-19 immunisation status will show your immunisation history statement, and that can be used as your proof of vaccination.
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator AYRES (New South Wales) (14:24): My question is to the Minister for Defence, Senator Reynolds. Given Ms Higgins has released the minister from any privacy concerns will the minister now answer the question she was asked yesterday? At any time did the minister disclose to any other minister that her former staff member Ms Higgins had made allegations that she was raped in the minister's office? If yes, which ministers and when?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:25): Thank you very much for that question. Again, as I said yesterday, there are a number of these matters that, after Ms Higgins has gone to the AFP tomorrow, I will discuss with the AFP and I will also discuss with the various other inquiries. As I've already said, I did not at any time disclose—
Opposition senators interjecting—
Senator REYNOLDS: Mr President, I'm happy to answer the question.
Opposition senators interjecting—
The PRESIDENT: Order on my left.
Senator REYNOLDS: As I have affirmed in this place, I did not advise the Prime Minister because it was not my place to do so. I also did not advise Senator Cash at any time because, again, it was not my agency to do so. I had a discussion with the Special Minister of State at the time. To the best of my recollection it was not about this matter, it was about my second staff member.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Ayres, a supplementary question?
Senator AYRES (New South Wales) (14:26): Given Ms Higgins has released the minister from any privacy concerns, will the minister now tell the Senate on what date the minister first become aware that her chief of staff had sought advice from the Department of Finance about the handling of an alleged sexual assault? On what date did the minister first see the advice and what action did she take?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:26): I thank Senator Ayres for that question. My understanding is that my chief of staff was provided a report of the access to my office either by the Department of Finance or by DPS and my recollection was that it was on Wednesday the 27th.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Ayres, a final supplementary question?
Senator AYRES (New South Wales) (14:27): I don't think that was the question that I asked. Given Ms Higgins has released the minister from any privacy concerns will the minister now tell the Senate why, when Ms Higgins was asked if she wanted to go to the police at the meeting with the minister and her chief of staff on 1 April 2019, she was told, 'We need to know now'?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:27): Thank you very much, Senator Ayres, for that question. As I have said repeatedly in this chamber, Ms Higgins' recollections and her story are hers to tell. It is not my place in this chamber to speculate further on that—
The PRESIDENT: Senator Ayres, on a point of order?
Senator Ayres: The point of order is relevance, Mr President. It's not remotely relevant for the minister to explain why she'd prefer not to answer a question.
The PRESIDENT: If the minister is addressing the question and providing reasoning for her answer and I believe that relates to the terms of the question I don't believe I can rule that out as not being directly relevant. You've reminded the minister of the question but I can't instruct the minister how to answer a question. I call the minister to continue.
Senator REYNOLDS: Thank you very much, Mr President. As I have said a number of times in this chamber over the last two weeks, those opposite are asking me questions premised on the assertions of facts. This is neither the place nor the time for me to discuss or debate the accuracy of some of the assertions of those opposite. The time for me to do that is with the Australian Federal Police and also the other inquiries underway. I still believe I owe Brittany her agency and her privacy.
JobSeeker Payment
Senator SCARR (Queensland) (14:29): My question is to the Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business, Senator Cash. In light of today's announcement of the Morrison government's plan to permanently increase the JobSeeker rate, how will the government ensure that unemployed Australians remain engaged with the labour market and looking for jobs?
Senator CASH (Western Australia—Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business and Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:29): I thank Senator Carr for the question. As Senator Carr knows, Australia's economic recovery from COVID-19 is well—
The PRESIDENT: Order. Senator Scarr, a point of order?
Senator Scarr: Whilst I admire Senator Carr immensely, it is Senator Scarr. I am not sure who would be more insulted—
The PRESIDENT: Senator Cash, continue.
Senator CASH: Senator Scarr, it is my great Western Australian accent that I am so often reminded about in this place.
The PRESIDENT: Please continue, Senator Cash.
Senator CASH: At least one can laugh at oneself. Australia's economic recovery is well underway. In fact, the recent ABS jobs data shows that employment increased by over 29,000 jobs last month, including an increase of 59,000 full-time jobs. This, of course, is a direct result of the Morrison government's economic recovery plan, which has provided unprecedented levels of support to Australian households and businesses. As our economic recovery continues, it is important that we provide Australians who've lost their jobs or who've had their hours reduced with the support they need to get into fulfilling employment. That is why, today, we've made a number of announcements in relation to the strengthening of mutual obligation requirements. The Morrison government firmly believes that the best form of welfare is a job. That is why we will put in place the necessary measures to ensure that those who don't have a job at the moment are doing everything they can to become work ready or, alternatively, if they are offered suitable employment, are able to take up that suitable employment.
We've made a number of changes, including to the number of job searches that a person needs to undertake. We're also establishing an employer reporting line so that people who actively say no to suitable work are able to be followed up by job providers or, alternatively, the department. We're also allowing people to participate in short training courses—for example, a course on JobTrainer. It's all about ensuring that we have the right mechanisms in place so that those people who are on welfare are becoming as job ready as we can get them to move into work.
The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Cash. Senator Scarr, a supplementary question?
Senator SCARR (Queensland) (14:31): Could the minister update the Senate on why the recovery in the Australian labour market makes it an appropriate time to strengthen mutual obligation requirements for jobseekers?
Senator CASH (Western Australia—Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business and Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:32): Thank you, Senator Scarr. While the events of last year were unprecedented, they obviously required additional flexibility when it came to mutual obligation. The government worked with jobseekers. As you know, we lifted those mutual obligation requirements as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. But now we're seeing jobs returning to the economy—over 800,000 jobs have actually returned. About 93 per cent of the jobs lost during COVID-19 have returned to the economy. Hours worked have now recovered by 74.5 million hours since the peak of the pandemic in May. Of course, we've seen job ads reach higher levels than before the pandemic, with Seek, ANZ and the National Skills Commission continuing to show increases in recruitment activity. When you are of the belief that the best form of welfare is a job, everything you do needs to be focused on ensuring people become as job ready as possible.
The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Cash. Senator Scarr, a final supplementary question.
Senator SCARR (Queensland) (14:33): Following the changes announced today, why should Australians who are returning to the labour market have confidence about their ability to find a job?
Senator CASH (Western Australia—Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business and Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:33): As I said in answer to Senator Scarr's first question, Australia's economic recovery is well underway. We only need to look at the recent labour force figures for January 2021, with the ABS jobs data showing that employment increased by over 29,000 that month, including an increase of 59,000 full-time jobs. That is, as I said, a direct result of the Morrison government's economic recovery plan, which has, as we know, provided unprecedented levels of support to Australian households and Australian businesses. As I said, we've seen over 800,000 jobs—that's around 93 per cent of the jobs lost during COVID-19—return to the economy. We're also seeing consumer confidence, business confidence and jobs ads grow to levels higher than before COVID-19. The best form of welfare is a job, and we will do everything, as a government, to get people into jobs, because that's where they belong.
Employment
Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (13:54): My question is for the minister representing the Prime Minister, Minister Birmingham. I've actually got a favour to ask you, Minister. I've got a friend who's looking for a job. He's a lovely bloke; everyone agrees with that. You'd like him. Could you tell me whether there are any $400,000-a-year taxpayer funded jobs you're looking to fill with an ex-member of parliament?
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:34): I thank Senator Lambie for her question. The government, indeed, fills some jobs, and there have been some distinguished former members of parliament who have filled some jobs over a period of time—from all sides of politics at different times as well, I note. Of course, far more important than the jobs that the Australian government fills are the jobs that the private sector fills across Australia, creating sustainable opportunities for Australians and a growing economy. What we as a government were pleased to have achieved prior to the pandemic was a record level of employment across Australia. During our first six years in office we saw employment grow by 1.5 million additional jobs, thanks to strong growth across the private sector and strong growth in Australian businesses, which took on more Australians and created more opportunities. In doing so, what those Australians enjoyed was, of course, the opportunity of work, the opportunity to provide for their family, the opportunity to plan for the future. The benefit that provided—
The PRESIDENT: Senator Lambie on a point of order?
Senator Lambie: I like to be informed in here; that's wonderful. But I just wanted to know whether there are any $400,000-a-year taxpayer funded jobs that he's looking to fill that may involve being an ex-member of parliament: yes or no.
The PRESIDENT: I've allowed you to restate your question, Senator Lambie. I'm going to take the minister as being relevant, given the nature of the question, unless you object further and are demanding a very specific answer.
Senator BIRMINGHAM: So, having addressed those issues at the start of the answer, the point is that, through having achieved all of that extra jobs growth across the Australian economy, it created the situation where the welfare dependency among working-age Australians was at its lowest level ever. We had record numbers of taxpayers across Australia and we had achieved, indeed, a participation rate at its highest level. Crucially, women's workforce participation was at its highest level as well. They are the jobs our government is overwhelmingly focused on delivering for Australians, delivering as part of the—
The PRESIDENT: Senator Lambie on a point of order?
Senator Lambie: Is what you're talking about now taxpayer funded jobs, or are you just going on the loose, Minister?
The PRESIDENT: Order! Senator Birmingham to continue.
Senator BIRMINGHAM: I'm pleased to say the vast majority of the jobs our government has seen created under our watch are in the private sector. Businesses are growing across Australia, creating more opportunities for more Australians to get ahead, and that's our focus for the economic recovery too.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Lambie, a supplementary question?
Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (14:37): In the interests of full disclosure, because I'm all about full disclosure up here, there are a few things I should let you know. When he was a member of parliament, he lobbied the immigration minister to get the brother of a political donor an Australian visa to avoid jail time for criminal conspiracy, violent crime, drug importation and extortion. Should I get him to send in his resume, Minister?
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:38): Many people send their resumes, but it doesn't change the fact that our government is focused resolutely on job creation opportunities for all Australians. That was our focus prior to the pandemic. Through the pandemic our focus has been on saving and securing the jobs and the businesses of and the opportunities for Australians to keep them safe in a health context and secure in an economic context. Now, as we emerge from the different stages of recovery of the pandemic, we are focused on that job creation agenda again. Job creation is overwhelmingly occurring in the Australian private sector. Job creation is seeing that some 93 per cent of those Australians who lost their jobs or were reduced to zero hours around this time last year have now got their work back. Australians are actually back in employment thanks to the good management of an enormous global challenge that is being provided right across the country, for which Australia can hold its head high.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Lambie, a final supplementary question?
Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (14:39): Just one more thing, and I'm sure it's only small. My mate took a job as a lobbyist while he was also a member of parliament. He didn't disclose it, but apparently that's okay in here because we have no standards. Also, as a lobbyist and a member of parliament, he was lobbying his colleagues to oppose his own government's legislation because his client was paying him to do it. Do you think that'll be a problem, or should he still put his resume in, Minister?
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:39): I'll refrain from the point of order that hypothetical questions are out of order. The focus remains very clear for our government, as I've said, on continuing to build the economic recovery for Australia. If people want to be distracted by other issues, our government will not be distracted. We will continue to focus on delivering the vaccine rollout that Senator Colbeck has spoken of each and every day over the last couple of weeks. The crucial steps in economic recovery will be underpinned by that vaccine rollout, the most complicated logistical exercise undertaken in Australia's peacetime history, probably, according to many of the experts. We are getting on and doing that in cooperation with the states and territories, in cooperation with health authorities. We're getting on with continuing to support Australian businesses. All of this is about continuing to focus on the things that really matter, like keeping Australians safe and secure.
The PRESIDENT: The clock should have about eight or 10 seconds left. Senator Lambie, on a point of order?
Senator Lambie: With all due respect, Mr President, on relevance. Can he just answer the question? Let's get some standards in here for once.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Lambie, I'm not going to rule the minister not being directly relevant, due to the nature of the question. I call on him to continue if he wishes. No? I'll go to Senator Polley then.
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator POLLEY (Tasmania) (14:41): My question is to the Minister for Defence, Senator Reynolds. When asked yesterday about her meeting with the Assistant Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, she said, 'Everything that was done was with her knowledge and with her concurrence'. Ms Higgins has said, 'I had no idea she was meeting with the AFP about my sexual assault.' Will the minister now correct the record?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:41): I stand by what I said in the chamber yesterday. Just to be very clear, on 1 April I met with the AFP, Brittany and my then chief of staff. As I've said in this chamber previously, during the course of that meeting it became apparent to me that the matter was more serious than a security breach, of which I had been previously advised. That same day I organised for Brittany to meet with the AFP, something which I have been advised did occur. By way of follow-up and clarification, I met briefly with the Australian Federal Police on 4 April at their request. I commenced the meeting alone and I was then joined for a brief period by my chief of staff.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Polley, a supplementary question?
Senator POLLEY (Tasmania) (14:42): After misleading the Senate yesterday, the minister had to correct the record and confirm her chief of staff had attended her meeting with the AFP assistant commissioner. Why did the minister mislead the Senate by saying she had met with the assistant commissioner alone?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:43): Just to be totally clear, and I'll just say it again so there's no misunderstanding, I did meet with the Australian Federal Police twice. The first one was on 1 April with Brittany and my then chief of staff. As I've said, it's my understanding that Brittany then met with the AFP out of the office and not in my presence. By way of follow-up, at their request, I met briefly with the Australian Federal Police, with the assistant commissioner, on 4 April. I commenced the meeting alone, and then my chief of staff joined me at the very end of the meeting.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Polley, a final supplementary question?
Senator POLLEY (Tasmania) (14:43): The minister failed to disclose her meeting with the Assistant Commissioner of the AFP until the Prime Minister revealed that fact in House question time. She misled the Senate by saying she'd met with the assistant commissioner alone and misled the Senate by saying Ms Higgins was aware of the meeting. When will the minister be honest as to her conduct in response to the alleged rape of a staff member in her office?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:44): I've answered that same question twice. As I've said, for complete clarity, there were two meetings. My apologies if that was not clear yesterday, but I've been very clear. For this chamber's benefit, if you would like me to clarify that for a third time, I will happily do so. I met on 1 April with Brittany and my then chief of staff. As part of that meeting, I organised for Brittany, at her request and her agency, to meet separately with the Australian Federal Police. Then, on 4 April, by way of follow-up, at the request of the AFP, I met with the assistant commissioner alone, and then my chief of staff joined that meeting—to the best of my recollection, at the end of that meeting.
Modern Manufacturing Strategy
Senator McKENZIE (Victoria—Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) (14:45): My question is to the minister representing the Minister for Industry, Science and Technology, Senator Seselja. The Liberal-National government has committed $1.5 billion to the Modern Manufacturing Strategy to assist Australian manufacturers across six national priority areas to scale up, improve competitiveness and build more resilient supply chains. Food and beverage is included as a national manufacturing priority, supporting our world-leading agricultural industries, and that's fantastic news. Can the minister advise what the strategy provides for our high-quality sustainable fibre industries, including forestry, wool and cotton?
Senator SESELJA (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for International Development and the Pacific) (14:45): I thank Senator McKenzie for the question. The first pillar of our strategy is getting the economic conditions right for businesses in all manufacturing sectors to succeed. That's what we want to see happening. That includes every area of our agricultural sector, because we understand how vital our farmers, fishers and foresters are to our regions and to our nation.
When our manufacturing sector grows and we value-add here at home, it provides more opportunity for our agricultural sector. Getting the economic conditions right is the first pillar of our Modern Manufacturing Strategy, and that's what's happening across the board. For example, the extension of the instant asset write-off is seeing manufacturers invest in new equipment, upgrade production lines and bring work home to Australia. The budget also includes a record investment in skills, plans to make energy more affordable and reliable, support to open up trade markets and a fairer, simpler industrial relations framework. These are the building blocks that will assist every sector of manufacturing. I know the Minister for Industry, Science and Technology met with Wool Producers Australia just last week to discuss the contribution woolgrowers make to our economy and how our broader manufacturing plan will support them—for example, through improved animal health and stockfeed production.
The government's strategy is a commitment to play to our strengths. If we're going to turbocharge job creation and effect meaningful change in manufacturing, then we need to focus on investment in areas where we know we can get the best return. That's why we're focusing on our six national manufacturing priorities: resources technology and critical mineral processing; food and beverage; medical products; recycling and clean energy; defence; and space. Our strategy reflects the fact that we're serious about helping our manufacturers achieve the competitiveness, scale and resilience that will make our nation stronger, not just for the recovery from COVID but for the generations to come. (Time expired)
The PRESIDENT: Senator McKenzie, a supplementary question?
Senator McKENZIE (Victoria—Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) (14:48): Can the minister outline the opportunities provided by the Manufacturing Modernisation Fund for our food, fibre and beverage industries to plan for their future and improve their competitiveness and productivity?
Senator SESELJA (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for International Development and the Pacific) (14:48): Yes, I can. I thank Senator McKenzie for the question. The second round of our Manufacturing Modernisation Fund is targeted at small and medium-sized businesses in our priority areas, including food and beverage. These projects will have a particular focus on new technologies. This will make the businesses more competitive and productive, which, in turn, will create new jobs. There has been huge interest from businesses in our priority sectors, with over 500 applications received from businesses right across Australia. The senator and the Senate will be pleased to note that there have been a very healthy number from regional areas. These are now being assessed. The successful businesses will receive support of between $100,000 and $1 million. This is matched funding, where we provide $1 for every $3 that the business provides. This government is backing Aussie manufacturers that are prepared to back themselves, which is all part of our plan to create jobs and grow the economy right across the nation.
The PRESIDENT: Senator McKenzie, a final supplementary question?
Senator McKENZIE (Victoria—Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) (14:49): Can the minister also outline how the strategy will assist all manufacturing industries under each national priority to strengthen our sovereignty and supply chain resilience, particularly for food and fibre harvesting and processing?
Senator SESELJA (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for International Development and the Pacific) (14:49): COVID has demonstrated that we must increase the nation's resilience to supply chain disruption to protect our economy and security into the future. The Liberal-National government is working with industry to identify the goods and services most critical to Australians. That's why, as part of the Modern Manufacturing Strategy, we are investing over $107 million in the Supply Chain Resilience Initiative: to help Australia be better prepared for any future shocks. We are looking right across the supply chains, from medical products our doctors and nurses need to the chemicals required for packaging and for our farmers to grow their crops, or the equipment to harvest and process our food. From there we will look at a range of solutions, whether that is establishing or scaling up domestic manufacturing, ensuring the capacity to pivot to meet surge demand or working with other like-minded countries to make sure that Australia is more safe and more secure.
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator WATERS (Queensland—Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (14:50): My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Birmingham. I asked you yesterday whether Brittany Higgins's alleged rapist had ongoing access to this building to meet with ministers and ministerial and departmental staff. I'm still waiting on that reply. If he was issued with a lobbyist pass, a member of parliament would have had to have attested that he was of good character to grant him unaccompanied access to the building. Without a pass he would have needed to have been signed-in to the building by a passholder. Did any member of parliament or ministerial staff member authorise the alleged rapist access to the building after he left his role in Minister Reynolds' office, and, if so, who?
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:51): I thank the senator for the question. You did ask those questions yesterday. I have been seeking information in relation to those questions and some related ones that were asked yesterday. I apologise that I haven't yet provided the particulars to the chamber of those that you have asked, which I received just prior to question time. I am still securing answers on some of the other matters.
In terms of the particulars of the questions that you have asked, I have consulted with the President, and the Prime Minister with the Speaker, because access to the building is, as you would appreciate, Senator Waters, managed by the presiding officers, not by the government. In relation to the question of a sponsored pass or lobbyist pass, I am advised by the President that the individual did not have access to such a pass and, therefore, obviously nobody had sponsored or acknowledged the facts that you have identified.
In relation to overall access to the building, in terms of being signed in, the President has advised me that, as you would appreciate from signing people in yourself, they are manual, handwritten logs of people who are signed in. Obviously for pass issues there is an electronic record, but the singular visitation is a manual log that is kept across the building. It would, obviously, be a very resource intensive effort for DPS security to go back over those manual logs and try and ascertain the names of any individuals who had entered the building. Of course, there are also public areas of the building for which people are free to come and go in and for which no record is kept. I'm unable to say categorically that he never re-entered the building, but I can say categorically that he was not issued with a sponsored pass, nor did he gain sponsored access, in any knowledge, to the building subsequent to his termination.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Waters, a supplementary question?
Senator WATERS (Queensland—Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (14:53): Minister, what exactly has Mr Gaetjens been tasked with investigating? Is it the information available to, and the actions taken by, the Prime Minister and his office only, or is it the broader mishandling of Brittany Higgins's rape allegations?
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:53): The broader issues that are being addressed will be addressed by the independent multiparty review process that I have described in this place, for which I'm undertaking consultations with all parties, with staff from different parties and with other experts in the field to ensure that we establish a terms of reference and a review process in which everyone can have confidence. The work that Mr Gaetjens is doing is in specific relation to the handling of the particular incident.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Waters, a final supplementary question?
Senator WATERS (Queensland—Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (14:54): I asked yesterday whether Mr Gaetjens' report will be made public and didn't get a response. Can you confirm whether it will be made public and whether there's any truth to the suggestion that it will be released this week and is thus the ultimate tick-and-flick exercise?
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:54): I understand the Prime Minister has advised that he has not made decisions in relation to the public release of information there, which obviously may have implications for the police investigation that may ensue following the meetings that we understand to be occurring tomorrow afternoon.
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (14:55): My question is to the Minister for Defence and it relates to some answers given in question time today. In an earlier answer today, the minister indicated to the Senate for the first time that in fact she met with the AFP twice—first on 1 April and the second meeting on 4 April. In relation to the meeting of 1 April, the minister asserted twice in question time today that that was a meeting which she commenced alone with the AFP but then the meeting included both her chief of staff and Ms Higgins. Does the minister stand by that answer?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:55): What I will do is I will take that question on notice. I will check what I said yesterday and what I said today against my recollections and I will come back at the first opportunity to clarify.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Wong, a supplementary question?
Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (14:56): I'm advised that Ms Higgins says she never attended a meeting with the AFP with the minister. Can I ask, therefore, why the minister made that assertion on at least two occasions to the Senate today?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:56): As I said, I will go back and check what I said yesterday, check what I've said today and I will come back to the chamber at the first opportunity. I am recalling and making sure that I'm recalling, to the best of my recollections, about the circumstances two years ago. I will go back and check what I've said and I will get back to the chamber.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Wong, a final supplementary question?
Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (14:57): I give you the opportunity again; you gave this answer some 10 minutes ago. Do you stand by the answer you gave in question time today that you attended not one but two meetings with the AFP, the first of which included Ms Higgins?
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (14:57): As I have said, I will go back and I will check my records of my recollections and I will get back. Given the importance and seriousness of the question, I will get back and come back to the chamber at the first possible opportunity to answer that question.
Scientific Research
Senator BRAGG (New South Wales) (14:57): My question is to minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy, Senator Hume. Can the minister update the Senate on what the Morrison government is doing to increase Australian research capacity by leveraging super computing power?
Senator HUME (Victoria—Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy) (14:58): I thank Senator Bragg a lot for this question. In fact, I'm extraordinarily grateful for this question because only just this morning I had the pleasure of visiting the National Computational Infrastructure Facility at the ANU. I met somebody called Gadi—or something called Gadi. Gadi is the most powerful supercomputer in the Southern Hemisphere. It is in fact the 27th most powerful supercomputer in the world. The Morrison government is very proud to have supported this remarkable technology, with $70 million allocated in 2019 to get this supercomputer up and running, supporting jobs in the Australian research and technology industry. It's right here in Canberra on the ANU campus.
I met with Associate Director Alan Higgins, Professor Sean Smith and Vice-Chancellor Brian Schmidt, who told me it has already been put to work by a large community of researchers from the likes of the CSIRO, the Bureau of Meteorology, Geoscience Australia and, of course, the ANU itself. You may not know this but Gadi actually means 'to search for' in the language of the Ngunawal people and that's exactly what Gadi does. It allows researchers to process extraordinary amounts of data in search of answers to some of our most challenging questions. For example, it's been leveraged to build a complex genomic data set for studies into cancer, into diabetes, into lupus and into heart disease. In fact, it's given ANU astronomers a better understanding how stars form. A team of chemists have been incorporating the supercomputer into its search for a COVID-19 treatment. Both CSIRO and Geoscience Australia will use the supercomputer to improve their own systems aimed at predicting extreme weather patterns including fires, earthquakes, tsunami and cyclones.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Bragg, a supplementary question?
Senator BRAGG (New South Wales) (15:00): Can the minister outline what the government is doing to support world-leading research in complex data-intensive projects right here on Australian soil?
Senator HUME (Victoria—Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy) (15:00): It's hard to overstate the extraordinary utility of a facility like Gadi. It has 155,000 processor cores. It can transfer data at 200 gigabits per second within the supercomputer itself. I know there are a few people in this room that aren't tech heads, but, trust me, that is incredibly fast. 'How fast?' I hear you ask. A 4K film can be downloaded in well u under a second.
Honourable senators interjecting—
Senator HUME: I heard you ask, 'How fast'! In 2019-20, Gadi supported over 1,125 research projects, with over 6,000 users across Australia allocating 756 million hours of computing time. That is an extraordinary amount of number crunching to support world-leading and potentially life-changing research, right here in Australia.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Bragg, a final supplementary question?
Senator BRAGG (New South Wales) (15:01): Can the minister explain what the Gadi supercomputer is researching that will benefit Australians now and into the future?
Senator HUME (Victoria—Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy) (15:01): As Lucy Guest at the NCI told me today, 'Pick a field of science, and that's where you will find a benefit.' For example, the NCI's partnership with the Bureau of Meteorology enables increasingly accurate weather predictions, knowing where and how rain will fall and where frost will set in and enables our agricultural sector and our farmers to make far better choices, to optimise yield, to minimise cost and to minimise waste.
I understand that Senator Watt believes supercomputing is something that involves wearing your underpants on the outside and watching funny cat videos, but that's not what we're doing here. In fact, Gadi is helping build more accurate models of fire movement, helping to predict bushfire behaviour and save lives and save livelihoods. With researchers leveraging Gadi to help the model of the next-generation personalised genomic medicine, Australians and people around the world can look forward to improved treatments for rare diseases like cancers and more. (Time expired)
Senator Birmingham: Mr President, I thank Senator Hume for giving Senator Watt the fashion sense of former Senator Conroy, in her answer there, and I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper.
DOCUMENTS
Defence Procurement
Order for the Production of Documents
Senator PATRICK (South Australia) (15:03): In accordance with standing order 164, I'm seeking an explanation from the Minister for Defence as to why she has not responded to the Senate's order of 11 November 2020 to provide documents to the Senate economics committee.
Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia—Minister for Defence) (15:03): I thank Senator Patrick for raising this issue with me earlier. In relation to this, I can confirm that we have complied with that order. However, I did receive further correspondence from Senator Gallacher in response to my letter, in relation to access to these documents. I received that correspondence on 19 February, and I am in the process of responding to that.
Senator PATRICK: I move:
That the Senate take note of the minister's explanation.
Just so the chamber is very clear, the chamber has asked for documents to be returned to the Senate economics committee. That's very important, because rather than asking for them to come to the Senate table, where they are public, responsibly the committee has asked for these documents to be sent to the committee itself; thereby, they can be managed in terms of their confidentiality. Unfortunately, all that has been provided to the committee is a series of redacted documents that do not let the committee go to the fundamental task required of it by the Senate, to examine Australia's sovereign naval shipbuilding capability. So we end up with a problem.
I'll just lay out what the problem is. This is a really important issue, not just for the inquiry into naval shipbuilding but for the Senate more generally. The proposition that has been put forward by Defence in advancing a case for public interest immunity is that they have signed a contract with Naval Group and other providers—BAE, Luerssen and so forth—and that those contracts have confidentiality conditions. Because we have confidentiality conditions in these contracts, they are of the view that they cannot provide them to the Senate, on the basis that, if they do so, it may undermine the future provision of information.
Unfortunately, what the department hasn't told you is that they correctly, when they signed these contracts, included clauses related to confidentiality that included words like this—that they cannot disclose information except as otherwise required by law. Just because Defence enter into a contract that involves confidentiality—and I know that that's important; you need to have confidentiality in these projects so that Defence take care of information and don't hand it over to entities that have no business seeing it; they take care of it properly; they put it in safes. They also reciprocate: they require Naval Group to make sure they look after our information as well. That is proper. But you cannot have a clause in a contract oust the jurisdiction of the Senate in its oversight role, just as it would be preposterous if Defence were to claim that a court couldn't get access to documents, that a court couldn't subpoena documents, because there was something written in a statute.
The Senate's powers to obtain documents to carry out its oversight role come from section 49 of our Constitution, backed up in the Parliamentary Privileges Act. There can be no question that the Senate has power at law to obtain documents. It is not possible for the Department of Defence to sign a contract with a commercial party to oust that jurisdiction. It simply cannot happen. Unfortunately, that's the proposition that has been presented to the Senate. This time around, it's about a shipbuilding contract, but the next time around it could be something that other senators are inquiring into, and they may have a department turn around and say, 'We can't give it to the Senate; there's a confidentiality clause in the contract.' People can clearly appreciate that that would affect us in the execution of our role and our responsibilities, one of which is, of course, to review, examine, modify and pass legislation and the other, very importantly, is to scrutinise the executive.
Again, it's written into the contracts. If I look at the Department of Finance's advice in relation to confidentiality of contracts, they make it very clear that officials need to be mindful of things like FOI. I know; I am in the AAT in relation to this matter now. Again, if a contract says something is confidential, that is quite legitimate, but, to the extent that a statute, something that the parliament commands, grants a citizen a right to access, then the contract is void to the extent that it interferes with that statute right. Of course, that doesn't mean you just come in and ask for documents under FOI and they will be given to you. That's not the case, because the FOI Act provides certain protections in relation to confidentiality. But it doesn't rely on the contract. Right now, in the Senate Economics References Committee, we can't do our job looking into shipbuilding, and it's a really important job. I'll just look at one of the programs that we are examining: the submarine project. The history is that, back in 2009, it was identified in the Defence Capability Plan and the defence white paper that we needed to build 12 new submarines. There was a very rough estimate of budget. Between 2009 and 2015, a period that expanded across two governments—the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government and also the Abbott-Turnbull government—$214 million was allocated to the Department of Defence to examine the Future Submarine project. They were to look at it, work out what ought to be in it and what ought to be out of it, and, presumably, to build up some reasonable costs. They came to the conclusion in about 2015—and they gave evidence to a Senate estimates committee—that the project would cost $50 billion out turned. That would include acquisition and sustainment.
We then went through a CEP, a competitive evaluation process. Out of that process we selected Naval Group as the partner to build our future submarines, but in there, somehow, the cost of the submarine went from an estimated $50 billion out turned for sustainment and acquisition to $89 billion out turned. I am going to ask officials about this at the next estimates. How do you go from a proposition that something will cost $50 billion out turned to $89 billion out turned without anyone even raising a question? No-one even said, 'How did that happen across the CEP? How did we get it so wrong? We spent $214 million—that was allocated in the lead-up to the CEP to work out exactly what the landscape was. Unfortunately, there was this huge error. Now we see $39 thousand million increase in the price of the Future Submarine project. Defence will argue that it's not a blowout because it was approved by government. What they've said is: 'It's your fault.' Somehow something went up $39 thousand million and no-one bothered to raise the questions: 'Can that be right? Can we have a submarine fleet suddenly go up $39 thousand million?' That increase is $2.8 million per day for 38 years. That's how much that increase was. I would have thought someone would have said, 'Hey, what happened? How did we get such a big increase?' But, no, the government just signed off on that project. They were caught up in a pre-election frenzy and wanted to do good, but, in fact, it looks like they've done harm. Since that time, we know that the project has had problems. This is one of the things that the economics committee is examining: how much Australian industry involvement is taking place. How are we building our sovereign naval shipbuilding capability in relation to this particular contract?
Defence resisted an OPD, but under FOI I got access to the plans of Naval Group as they went forward and made their tender to the Australian government about what it was that they thought they could do with Australian industry. It included things like partnering with ASC, setting up programs in schools and setting up capability centres. It included all manner of things. This committee has started to examine exactly what was offered versus what was contracted. They're the exact documents we are looking to obtain. What did the companies that won the job offer to do here in Australia, and what has been done? What has been contracted? They're very important issues.
Very unusually, the minister stood up in question time today and, in answer to the first question, said, 'I'm very frustrated with Naval Group'—because we are not getting what we should get from that contract. We have a committee of the Senate looking into this, and the Department of Defence is refusing to hand over documents. To be fair to the minister, she has, as she alluded to, sought to work out a way to grant access to those documents. But this has been going on for almost a year. If the Senate is to do its job properly, it has to be properly informed and it has to be able to receive information in a timely fashion. Otherwise we can pack up and go home. Otherwise we can operate remotely and simply press a button on our office walls whenever there's a vote. If we can't do the oversight role properly, we ought not be here. It's a very serious issue that I'm talking about. It's not just about naval shipbuilding; it's about the Senate's capacity to do the job that it is required to do under the Australian Constitution. We were granted powers to do those jobs for very good reason. I said this at a Senate committee that was examining certain elements of the department's refusal to provide the Senate with information. I think we're very close to a privileges resolution. I think we're very, very close because I can't see how any one of us could watch a committee stand still for six months waiting for the executive to respond favourably to provide it with the information it needs to do its inquiry. If that's not fettering the ability of a committee to do its work then I don't know what is.
Minister Birmingham has weighed in on this issue. It's very important. One day, people on the government side of the chamber will be in opposition and they will be wanting to do their job properly. I said in a speech—it might have been in 2019—that the Senate has lost its mojo. It disheartens me to say that. I watched the House of Commons, in seeking to get access to documents from Facebook, arrest someone in a hotel, bring them back to the Commons and say to them: 'You can't leave. If you don't hand over the documents we're putting you in a cell'. That's mojo. We in this place, on a repetitive basis, ask for documents to be provided and simply ignore the executive when they fail to deliver.
I, for one, am not going to let that happen, because I take my role as a senator very, very seriously. We are put here by the people of our respective states to do a proper job—and that job involves keeping an eye on the executive, scrutinising the executive. I know scrutiny is to the Prime Minister as kryptonite is to Superman. I know he doesn't like it very much. But that is our job. We are empowered to do it and we should do it. We should not accept a claim by the executive that we cannot have access to information to do our job. We are tasked to do that and we should do it. We need the Department of Defence to comply in this particular instance, and the minister needs to direct them to do so.
Senator BIRMINGHAM (South Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (15:19): I rise only very briefly on this matter but I do wish to make a contribution to it. The scrutiny functions that the parliament undertakes—in particular, the scrutiny functions that this Senate, as the house of review, undertakes in this parliament—are of crucial importance and something that I hold in very high regard and of great import to the functioning of the parliament and of the government and, indeed, to our entire system of government. I acknowledge the important role that individual senators play in this place in driving levels of scrutiny over government decisions and particularly important policy decisions such as those that relate to the procurement of our future defence assets.
I do note that there are also a few things that are perhaps more sensitive in terms of their content than documents that relate to the type of assets our defence forces are procuring for the future. Those sorts of assets are obviously of high degrees of sensitivity and do need careful consideration in the approaches that are taken to their scrutiny. I have been pleased to try to work with Senator Patrick, since my appointment as Leader of the Government in the Senate, in relation to some of his concerns that he has expressed about access to some of the Defence procurement documents. I acknowledge that he is genuinely seeking to scrutinise some of the information within those documents.
I do think that a significant breakthrough was made, shortly prior to this fortnight of parliamentary sittings, when the Minister for Defence, following further work with her department, offered the members of the Senate economics committee access to those documents that had been previously redacted for a number of reasons. I think it is notable that a very significant breakthrough occurred. It was a very significant step by Defence to provide access to those tender and procurement related documents for significant defence assets in naval infrastructure, to do so in an unredacted format and to be available to be questioned in confidence about those documents. I do encourage members of the Senate economics committee to engage with Defence through the process that Defence has offered in that regard, to at least do so in good faith initially. If there are dissatisfactions following that engagement, then, by all means, bring those concerns back to the government. But Defence, I think, has made a very significant step in transparency and in engagement with this chamber, in particular with senators on the Senate economics committee. I would encourage them to take that up and to use the opportunity that has been provided.
Senator GALLACHER (South Australia) (15:22): I too rise to take note of the response of Senator Reynolds. I do endorse the comments made by Senator Birmingham. I think he has been a circuit breaker in what's been an extremely unusual and vexed inquiry. I've done a couple of inquiries since I've been here. As I languished on the backbench, I learnt all about Senate standing order procedures and inquiries, but I've never run into this level of intransigence. I honestly have no political perspective in the pursuit of this inquiry. To me, it looks straight up and down: scrutinise expenditure, plans and progress in an extremely important area of defence policy.
I had the opportunity of opening up a hearing quite recently, and I said to the secretary of Defence:
I will start for a few moments. I'm not looking at this from any particular perspective, other than that the Senate gave this committee a reference. You would be familiar with the terms of that reference. Amongst the terms of reference is the ongoing examination of contracts and scrutiny of expenditure. The department's performance, when we have requested information, has been nothing short of abysmal. You have redacted publicly available information and sent it to us. It's almost like you have a giant forefinger up to the operation of this committee. It has now been to the Senate to get orders. I accept that you have a case on your commercial confidentiality position and all the rest of it, but, in the ordinary course of this committee's activity, I, as the chair, personally feel—and I'm sure there are other members of the committee who feel the same way—that Defence has been absolutely obtuse, arrogant, dismissive and contemptuous of the work of a Senate committee duly given a reference by the Senate.
It was a pretty strong opening line to a departmental secretary, but I don't resile from it, because the people who are resourcing the Senate committee, the good people of the secretariat, were becoming absolutely flabbergasted at the information that was given to us. The way it was presented to us was almost something that had never been seen before—and I have done a little bit of work with Defence.
I chaired the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee, and we went through some exceedingly contentious private issues and dealt with an enormous amount of stuff that may have needed to be visible in camera. It appears, though, that all of those sorts of protocols and procedures have been forgotten by Defence. In the Veterans' Affairs area we had a whole stack of in camera documents made available to senators. When I say 'senators', I don't mean just to voting senators, as they've tried to prescribe here. Over a period of time you'd sign in, you'd be able to access the information—you couldn't copy it or take it away but you could view it—form your opinion and come back and make your contribution. I well remember Senator Fawcett being exceedingly diligent in that area. Personally, I have only to read one tale of distress; I don't need to read a hundred. But there were other senators—Senator Lambie, Senator Fawcett—who went in camera and went through the whole lot. This is the really interesting thing: the end result was that we produced a report which had 26 recommendations, and the government accepted every one of them. The Department of Veterans' Affairs actually put money behind some of the initiatives that were suggested. So good work can come out of difficult areas. But not providing information to people is absolutely not conducive to a great outcome.
Senator Reynolds has left the chamber, and basically that's why I need to put on the record that she had written to me setting out a pathway forward, and that I had written back to her and she was responding to that. The problem with Senator Birmingham's and Senator Reynolds's responses basically is that this has twice been the subject of a Senate order for the production of documents. Senator Patrick is quite entitled to look for a Privileges outcome here. I foreshadowed that this type of activity could occur every sitting day until we got resolution. I foreshadowed it to the Department of Defence and clearly, obviously, as it was a public hearing, to the minister. What the minister sought to do was to say: 'Senators will be able to view the documents at a secure location in Canberra. This will be available to voting members of the committee only.' Clearly, that condition is a breach of the standing orders. All members of the Senate are participating members of all committees and therefore can go and participate in all inquiries. To say it's available to voting members only is wrong; it's against standing orders. That has been clearly pointed out. This request contravenes standing order 25(7)(c), which states:
Participating members may participate in hearings of evidence and deliberations of the committees, and have all the rights of members of committees, but may not vote on any questions before the committees.
So they can get all the information; they just can't vote on the outcome of it.
We're not quite as close as Senator Birmingham alleges, but I do say that he has intervened to good measure a couple of times. The nut of it all is this: I said to our committee secretary, 'Can you reach out to the Department of Defence and say: "We're not unique. This is a reference. You can see the terms of reference. These are requests. You know the standing orders. Can we get somewhere closer? Is there an area where we can start seeing a regular flow of information to allow the committee to do its work?"' You've got to allow the committee to do its work. If you need to argue commercial-in-confidence, you'll either win or lose that, and you're losing it. Senator Patrick has come to the committee and put on the table freedom-of-information outcomes which clearly say that Defence was wrong in hiding the stuff from the committee. There are no ifs and buts about it. Some of the freedom-of-information stuff that he's got actually state that they should be made available to the committee. So we've been passing the parcel in a very difficult area. I don't know whether this intransigence and reluctance to cooperate with the Senate committee is in the ministerial office or whether it's in Defence.
I fired a shot over Secretary Moriarty's bow and said: 'I reckon you're giving us a giant forefinger. Tell us why you're not, and improve your performance.' This doesn't stop in the references committee; all it does is transfer it to estimates, and then you'll have another whole heap of departmental officers working away on questions on notice and the like. Why can't we have what the Constitution says? There's a parliament and there's an executive, and this Senate gave us the job of scrutinising performance capability and money. Where's the big issue here? Every time they raise an issue, Senator Patrick trumps them with this: 'By the way, I got that under freedom of information, and it says it shouldn't have been classified in the first place.'
I won't take up any more of the Senate's time, but I think it's important that we allow our Senate committees to do what they do best: scrutinise expenditure. The Audit Office will come down eventually and say, 'God Almighty, what happened here?' but in the meantime we might be able to put someone on the pathway to good outcomes.
Question agreed to.
QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator POLLEY (Tasmania) (15:31): I move:
That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Defence (Senator Reynolds) to questions without notice asked by Senators Wong, Gallagher, Ayres and Polley today.
What we've seen in this chamber, day after day, is that the Minister for Defence is somebody who cannot remember, who doesn't understand the processes and who has done nothing to protect the privacy of Ms Higgins, yet she comes into this place and hides behind her words, saying that she wants Ms Higgins to be able to give her recollections herself and that she is trying to respect to Ms Higgins's privacy. Well, Ms Higgins's response to those statements that have been given in this place and elsewhere is: 'I don't think she has ever been concerned about my privacy. She wasn't concerned about my privacy when she met with the assistant commissioner of the Australian Federal Police behind my back.'
What has been so disappointing about this whole sordid affair involving Ms Higgins, who has made a very serious allegation of rape, in the office of the Minister for Defence, is that every time this minister comes into the chamber she refuses to give a full and frank account of what she did in terms of supporting Ms Higgins—referring the matter to the AFP, informing the Prime Minister of this country. We have seen nothing but failure on the part of this minister. In this chamber, during question time, the minister all but called Ms Higgins a liar. That's what she did. So the effect that this is having—
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Polley, please resume your seat. Senator Brockman, on a point of order?
Senator Brockman: Under 193(3), this is getting very, very close, if not over the line, to a direct imputation against a member of this place, and I would ask you to listen closely to what is being said.
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: I certainly will. As you pointed out, I think the senator came close but not quite all the way there, although I will be guided by the Clerk if he thinks otherwise. Yes, I think the senator has come close, Senator Brockman, and I'll continue to pay close attention. I would invite Senator Polley, if she thinks there is an imputation she wishes to withdraw, to take the opportunity to do so. But please continue.
Senator POLLEY: The minister, today in this chamber, said that Ms Higgins had her recollections and she has a right to tell that story. But I believe that Ms Higgins has a right to be heard, to be listened to, to be supported and to be respected. This is a terrible message that we're sending out to young women who work in this place and young men who work in this place. They cannot be assured that they're going to have the support of their minister, their senator or their member when something happens that is unacceptable, that is contrary to Australian law. Their boss won't first have their back and won't refer the issue to the Australian Federal Police straightaway. It is just extraordinary. The minister came in here and said, 'Yes, I did have a meeting with the Assistant Commissioner of the AFP'—only after the Prime Minister had already made that public in the other place. Today she said she had that meeting. Yesterday she couldn't tell us whether anyone else attended the meeting, but today she said: 'I did have a meeting. In fact, I had two meetings. On 1 April my chief of staff came and joined me.' She came back later and, to further questioning from Senator Wong, said: 'I don't know. I will have to take that on notice.'
This is a serious issue. I have no doubt that the minister has put herself under immense pressure in this situation. But she should have been fully briefed, fully prepared and known whether she had meetings with the assistant commissioner, whether her chief of staff was there and when Ms Higgins was there. But now she's got to go and check those facts. This does nothing to assure the Australian people or anyone else that listens to parliament. I know from the number of phone calls my colleagues and I are receiving in our offices that they have little faith in this minister. They have little faith that this has not been covered up. In fact, some would assert that the cover-up goes right to the top, to the Prime Minister, who remarkably says that he only found out on Monday that there was an alleged rape in the minister's office. Anyone who's been in this place for even a short period of time would know that t nothing goes on in this place without gossip and innuendo about what's been happening. So it's an absolutely extraordinary effort by this minister to cover up a real crime. (Time expired)
Senator ABETZ (Tasmania) (15:38): Sensitive issues like this deserve to be treated with respect. It's got to be considered that these matters are fraught with exceptional difficulty. Whilst I am sure Senator Polley has huge qualities as a senator and is multiskilled, I would suggest to her that it is highly inappropriate for her or, indeed, any other senator to come into this place and pretend to be so multiskilled that you can be the investigator, the prosecutor, the judge and the jury all in one matter, especially one as sensitive as this. In a former life, I defended people who were accused of heinous offences and I represented victims who were the subject of heinous offences. Indeed, one of the privileges I had before entering parliament was being a founding executive member and honorary legal adviser to a women's shelter, where issues of this nature often arose. You've got to be sensitive. You've got to treat people that come with their stories with respect. In Australia we also have, thankfully, the concept of innocent until proven guilty. You've got to treat these cases exceptionally carefully.
What I would invite all senators to do is to leave this matter to the independent body that has now been established, where the Minister for Finance is seeking to ensure that this matter is dealt with in a manner that takes it out of the political realm. Sure, some people think that you can get some tawdry political advantage by going on a personal demolition derby against the minister, but the minister herself has been consistent throughout this matter in her responses, seeking to protect the person making the allegations. That is an appropriate course of action, a proper course of action and an honourable course of action. Especially in circumstances when political opponents are seeking to apply a blowtorch to her, it might be very easy for her to say, 'Well, here it all is.' Instead, she has retained her dignity. She has retained the exact same approach that she has from day one. I think that is indicative of character, discernment and judgement. For the Labor Party to try to run this tawdry exercise against the minister on a personal basis really does, I think, the Labor Party a great disservice, and, one assumes, also the lady making the complaint a great disservice.
We are not here to determine what the facts of the circumstances of the case may be. On the face of it, I've got to say it looks pretty ugly, pretty horrific and clearly it is an exceptionally serious matter. So, should it be bounced around this chamber and in the other place, with people trying to make some political point-scoring exercise out of it? I think not. What we need is genuine sincerity, a careful treatment of this matter, to ensure that everybody's rights are protected. What is more, whilst the particular circumstances of this case are being fully investigated and determined—as to whether, for example, a prosecution should or should not take place—that should be independently considered first by the Federal Police and then the Director of Public Prosecutions. And, whilst that's occurring, let us all work together to ensure that anybody that has a complaint of this nature has a proper pathway to go forward to ensure that there is a clear mechanism. Surely that should have been part and parcel and the thrust of Senator Polley's and the Labor Party's contribution today, but sadly it was not. They were all cheap, tawdry and personal attacks against the minister. I, for one, the Prime Minister and the whole coalition look forward to seeing a pathway being developed for the protection of all the staff who work in this place.
Senator GALLACHER (South Australia) (15:43): I rise to take note of answers to questions, and in particular Senator Wong's question to Senator Reynolds. But, before I go to that matter, I'd just like to, in a sense, congratulate Senator Abetz on his contribution. But there was one great big glaring hole in all of that contribution. On the night that this happened, no-one rang the police. I will shake my head forever as to why a security guard, a ministerial adviser, a DPS staffer and Senator Reynolds never thought to ring the police about what was clearly a serious crime that had been committed in this parliament.
The business that I want to refer to at the moment is Senator Reynolds' nonanswer, once again falling on a track record of nonanswers, to the naval shipbuilding inquiry in the economics committee. She did it again today. When asked, 'Why have you not made a decision, which you said you'd make in 2019?' She referred to our term of government and her government's investment in shipbuilding, submarines and the like. Where is the difficulty with this minister coming to grips with a decision which she had foreshadowed? Why is there such an ongoing black cloud over South Australia as to where this is? Why are there 750 workers wondering whether or not they've got a job in an area where we should be looking at confirming their position, recruiting more boilermakers, recruiting more engineers and recruiting more shipbuilding workers? There appears to be a continual hiatus in that office, a continual procrastination, a continual lack of decision-making. If you were to look at the debacle that has played itself out in the parliament for the last week or so, there clearly doesn't appear to be any strong ministerial leadership or any strong capability within the office. It seems to meander along from one disaster to the next.
When we in the naval shipbuilding inquiry and the like try to seek information about what capability plans are available, what expenditure is happening, we get stonewalled. We literally get told 'commercial in confidence', 'can't see it', 'can't do it'. It's quite extraordinary. I well remember asking questions of David Johnston, the former Senator from Western Australia, who was the Minister for Defence, and he'd give you a response. You may not like the response. As a matter of fact, one famous day in this chamber he gave you a response that no-one would like. About South Australian workers, he said, 'I wouldn't trust ASC to build a canoe'. Shortly after that he changed his career direction and went on to bigger and better things than Minister for Defence. He was never short of expertise and intelligent answers, but this minister appears to be bereft of expertise in her office and refuses to answer almost everything. There is literally almost not a question which we can craft that this minister will not find a way of avoiding.
We on this side are not playing trumps here. Defence is not an overtly political area. Once decisions about where things are made, where things are produced or where money is spent are made, people like to just get on and examine progress. Dare I say this: a government will never fall in Australia because Defence has overspent; it's almost inclined to overspend on everything it does. It often has three or four projects of concern requiring the attention of the Treasurer, the finance minister and the defence minister to try and get them back on track. So we have a minister who just blatantly refuses to provide information to properly constituted committees of the Senate and then, in question time, won't provide answers she knows to questions.
Senator HUGHES (New South Wales) (15:48): This has been an incredibly difficult period for a lot of women, certainly for Ms Higgins, but there have been a lot of women, and I know across the aisle they would understand this, who have experienced abuse, assault, sexual harassment, rape. For a multitude of reasons, a lot of these women determine that they want to keep it private. It's not just one reason why they keep it private; it's for a whole lot of reasons. There are experiences that occur not just in Parliament House, not just through our own political parties but through a variety of experiences in different times of their lives. I find it absolutely and utterly shameful, this politicisation of Ms Higgins's experiences.
The lack of sympathy for her, of an understanding of her, the fact that it has been a number of years since this occurred and things change for people over time—a lot changes for lots of people at different times. Ms Higgins, at the time, decided not to pursue a police investigation that was offered to her. At one stage, Senator Reynolds was being criticised for not respecting her privacy but, as it unfolds, Senator Reynolds actually was respectful of her privacy by maintaining a very dignified silence and is continuing to do so around Ms Higgins' situation.
Now those opposite are somehow claiming that those wishes should have been disrespected, those wishes should have been ignored, that somehow they know best as to what was happening at that specific time and that Senator Reynolds should have just ignored the wishes of Ms Higgins—the wishes that Senator Reynolds respected, that she listened to. She supported Ms Higgins throughout this and offered, at every opportunity she could, her support to go with Ms Higgins, to support her both in a physical sense and in being present in whatever way that she wanted. This was followed up by Senator Cash also offering to go with her to make a police report. This is actual support. By trying to take down one woman whilst alleging to support another, you should be ashamed of yourselves, absolutely and utterly ashamed of yourselves.
I guess one of the things that also upsets me, and I think upsets and confounds a lot of people, is your willingness to attack Senator Reynolds, your willingness—like Senator Gallacher just did, absolutely outrageously claiming Senator Reynolds should have called the police on the night the incident occurred. If you want to be angry with the security guards for not doing it, sure; fair enough. But Senator Reynolds didn't know about it on the night that it occurred. In fact, she didn't learn about it for a couple of days, when she was told about a security breach, is my understanding, not about an incident that occurred. You can't rewrite history because it suits your disgraceful narrative.
During the last election campaign, another woman made some allegations and a lot on the other side of the chamber were pretty quick to dismiss those, pretty quick to diminish that woman, pretty quick to race to the defence of their then leader. I hope you've all had a good hard look at yourselves, with this faux outrage and this absolutely pathetic effort in what you're trying to do to Minister Reynolds. I hope you are reaching out to Ms Sheriff and offering support to her—absolutely abhorrent behaviour, trying to tear down one woman with a rewriting of history—she who did absolutely everything by the book, as required. The minister in charge of defence industry, the minister who was told of a security breach, not of an incident, and now we're rewriting history to suit an absolutely disgraceful agenda.
But I am wondering at what time the Labor Party or anyone else in this chamber might find a little outrage for the alleged perpetrator—perhaps even Ms Wilkinson, who left it to the 29th minute of that interview to even mention him. Perhaps, at some stage, you might realise that there was someone else that inflicted this alleged attack on Ms Higgins. Yet we have silence, a total silence of anger or empathy or any feelings towards the alleged perpetrator in what he allegedly contributed to Ms Higgins— (Time expired)
Senator McCARTHY (Northern Territory—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (15:53): What's missing here is leadership. What's missing here is the inability of a minister to provide a time line of duty of care, of responsibility, of questions by senators to the Senate. What's missing here is the inability of a minister to talk straight, to talk honestly, consistently. Every minister in this cabinet has a responsibility to this parliament. So when they are questioned, whether in the Senate or in the House, they have a responsibility to respond to the questions.
There is no disagreement around the need to have absolute empathy, sincere concern, for a young woman whose story has been shown right across this country. We're not fighting over who feels more disgusted about what occurred here. What we demand to know in this Senate is what duty of care and responsibility those in power, who are responsible for others, have to their staff? That is a question we will continue to ask. That is a question we must ask. Not to do so would be an abrogation of our responsibility. Right now, the ones who are abrogating that responsibility are the minister and the Prime Minister, because these questions must be asked and they must be answered. We have hundreds of staffers and workers in this building, and the rest of the country wants to know that we are able to reach to the highest of levels, above all political persuasions, to make this place a safe place.
When the minister comes in here with one response to a question by a senator and then changes that response in responding to another question by another senator, we deserve the right to pursue this minister to hear the truth. What is your truth-telling here, Minister? Do the right thing. Speak your truth. All we hear is hidden messages, ducking and weaving. You are a leader in this government. You are supposed to be a leader in this Senate. You have a responsibility and a duty of care, not only to those around you but to our country, as the Minister for Defence. Minister, if you cannot speak straight and honestly in the Senate, where you must be held accountable, then how can any Australian expect you to do that out there? How can our defence forces expect you to do that out there? When we ask you questions about the AFP, about your role in your meetings with them, you need to be clear. In one response today you said one thing about the AFP; 10 minutes later, you couldn't remember what you'd said about the AFP. It is our duty as senators in this Senate to ask these questions.
There is no challenge as to who feels more disgusted and angered by the events of this past fortnight and, in fact, the past couple of years; only Ms Higgins holds that. But we, as senators, have to pursue what we believe is the right thing to do, and that is to understand the honesty and the truth-telling that is yet to come from you.
Question agreed to.
JobSeeker Payment
Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (15:58): I move:
That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Families and Social Services (Senator Ruston) to a question without notice asked by Senator Siewert today relating to the JobSeeker payment.
This is an outrageous act by the government—$25 a week! What century are they living in? I'll tell you: the last century. The Prime Minister admitted it when he referred back to the days of John Howard in talking about this increase. The minister could not answer my question as to whether she could survive on $44 a day. That's because she couldn't and she knows it. It is outrageous! This government knows you can't live on $44 a day. They knew you couldn't live on $40 a day, which is why they introduced the coronavirus supplement during the pandemic. The Prime Minister has broken the hearts of every jobseeker across this country, because they have been deliberately condemned to live in poverty, which is outrageous in a country as wealthy as Australia. He has a duty to support jobseekers, and what he's done is condemn them to poverty.
Question agreed to.
REGULATIONS AND DETERMINATIONS
Federal Court and Federal Circuit Court Amendment (Fees) Regulations 2020
Disallowance
Senator GRIFF (South Australia) (16:00): I move:
That the Federal Court and Federal Circuit Court Amendment (Fees) Regulations 2020, made under the Federal Circuit Court of Australia Act 1999 and Federal Court of Australia Act 1976, be disallowed [F2020L01416].
Last day to resolve the motion or the instrument will be deemed to have been disallowed.
This disallowance is to right a wrong where, yet again, this government is doing whatever it takes to make it hard for refugees and migrants. How else can this be explained when this regulation imposes a five-fold increase in Federal Circuit Court fees for migration litigants, taking the fee from $690 to $3,330? If this regulation stands, this is what migration litigants will have to pay in order to challenge a decision made by the minister for immigration, the Immigration Assessment Authority and the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. That cost will increase this July and every July thereafter. Even those who have demonstrated severe financial difficulty will still be required to pay half the new fee, or $1,665. For a refugee on a bridging visa or a migrant in Australia who may well be earning the minimum wage, assuming they even have work rights, the new fee is the equivalent of over a month's pay. This fee hike doesn't just affect refugees and protection visa applicants. About half of the court's migration caseload deals with student visas and skilled work visa refusals and cancellations as well as applications relating to partner visas, business visa applications, and visitor and other short-stay visas.
The government argues that the Federal Circuit Court's migration case load has almost doubled in recent years and higher fees will enable more investment in judges and other resources. Let's just work through that rationale. The government says that fees are necessary to provide the courts with additional resourcing. This only makes sense if you think that a court should be operating on a cost recovery basis. Cost recovery is entirely appropriate for some areas of policy, but justice is not one of them. Justice is a public good. It is also worth recognising that family law cases, not migration cases, make up the majority of the Federal Circuit Court's case load. In fact, there were 13 times the number of family law applications in the Federal Circuit Court last financial year than migration applications. It is worth noting that a similar attempt to increase fees for family law litigants was disallowed in 2015. This is no different. If the courts are overworked, and I absolutely believe they are, the solution is not to increase application fees but for the government to provide adequate resourcing.
The next government justification is that the fee hike will simply bring these fees into line with other courts. The Law Council of Australia and others have shown this claim to be totally false. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal charges no fees for some cases and less than $1,000 for others, certainly not $3,330. It charges no application fees for a number of immigration matters, including applications to review protection visa decisions. So why should the government take a different stance for applications to the FCC? There is no justification for the Federal Circuit Court charging such distorted fees for migration cases. My motion will disallow these regulations because they are unnecessary and absolutely unfair.
In December, the Senate agreed to an order for the production of documents seeking the rationale for the fee hike. These OPD documents showed a little more of the real story. They showed that the regulations were rushed, with the AAT and the Federal Court provided a copy of the draft amendments barely a week before the budget, and they were only given one day to respond—one day. The documents also portray the ideology and bias behind the funding increase.
One of the documents focuses exclusively on protection visas and the need to reel in the number of review applications. Protection visas have been targeted, even though they represent under half of the migration cases dealt with by the FCC. When the government talks about better resourcing and making case loads more manageable, what it is really hoping is that the fee hike will push migration law applicants away, out of the system. The real improvement in case loads will come from refugees and temporary migrants not needing to pursue their cases. People should be free to lodge an application when they believe they have a case. The cost of making the initial application should not be the deciding factor.
We know the fee hike is expected to raise just $14 million to offset the $35.7 million the government set aside in the budget for additional family law judges and registrars. But it appears from the documents that the government wants these fees to also help cover existing registrars that are funded through appropriations for a program it has not even legislated, which is the controversial parenting management hearings measure announced in the 2017-18 budget, which will now no longer proceed. Having decided to scrap the unpopular measure, the government has decided to squeeze migration litigants for the extra cash. It's a cheap game of smoke and mirrors, and vulnerable litigants are the ones who will pay the price.
Our legal system is based on the premise that every person has the right to justice. Justice should be accessible for all. It should be affordable for all. Justice should be about fair and equal treatment for all. This regulation undermines the very principles of justice and well and truly deserves to be thrown out. Migrants should not be treated as cash cows and a political weapon. If you share my concerns, I ask that you support this disallowance and send a clear signal to government that it's time to stop demonising, persecuting, isolating and punishing refugees and migrants.
Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Industry Development) (16:07): On behalf of the government, I would like to indicate that the government will not be supporting the disallowance of these matters. I will just put on record, on behalf of the government, that, as part of the 2020-21 budget, the government is providing $36 million for additional FCC resourcing, including three additional general division judges, along with an additional family law judge and five additional family law judicial registrars. This will allow the court to resolve more matters every year, including an estimated 1,000 additional migration cases, which responds to the increase in FCC migration filings, from 3,544 in the year 2014-15 to 6,555 in 2019-20. This resourcing will be offset by an increase to the migration application fee, to which this regulation gives effect, with all revenue reinvested in the court. Currently, the FCC fee for migration matters is significantly lower than that of the AAT fee, and the new rate is set halfway between the AAT and Federal Court fee. Applicants will continue to have access to the court through the full fee exemption and new partial fee exemption mechanisms.
Senator WATT (Queensland) (16:09): The Federal Court and Federal Circuit Court Amendment (Fees) Regulations 2020 would increase the application fee for migration litigants in the Federal Circuit Court from $690 to $3,330. Beyond a very vague explanatory statement issued by the Attorney-General, the dramatic increase to the application fee for migration litigants has not been explained or justified. In the Attorney-General's statement, the increase is justified in the following terms:
The amended fees only apply to migration litigants, and bring the Federal Circuit Court application fees in line with the Federal Circuit Court's placement in Australia's court hierarchy, relative to the application fees for the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and the application fees for the Federal Court of Australia.
The Regulations specify the Federal Circuit Court application fee for migration litigants is increased from $690 to $3,330, bringing the Federal Circuit Court application fees in line with the Federal Circuit Court's placement in Australia's court hierarchy.
The comparison is then made by the Attorney-General to the application fees for the AAT, which are currently $1,826, and for the Federal Court of Australia, which are currently $4,840. This statement from the Attorney-General is a nonsense. For starters, it suggests the Administrative Appeals Tribunal is a court and so forms part of Australia's court hierarchy. The Attorney-General, the first law officer of the Commonwealth, appears to think that the Administrative Appeals Tribunal is a court. The clue is in the title, Attorney-General. It's called the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, not the Administrative Appeals Court. The same Attorney-General who thinks he knows better than the entire family law sector when it comes to restructuring the Family Court and the Federal Circuit Court apparently doesn't even know the difference between a law court and a merits review tribunal. Or maybe he does know the difference, and his explanatory statement in relation to these regulations cannot be attributed to ignorance but can instead be attributed to malevolence, because the upshot of these regulations is that it will cost some of the most vulnerable people in Australia more than twice as much to make an application to the Federal Circuit Court as it costs companies like Amazon, Microsoft or Facebook. That's because this fee increase will apply only to migration litigants.
So who are these migration litigants? In 2019-20 there were 6,555 migration matters filed in the Federal Circuit Court. Forty-nine per cent of those matters related to judicial review of protection visa decisions. As the Federal Circuit Court notes in its 2019-20 annual report:
A protection visa is the means by which Australia recognises and protects foreign nationals in Australia claiming to fear certain kinds of harm in their countries of origin.
When a foreign national who is seeking Australia's protection has his or her visa application refused, that person will often seek review in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. That's the merits review tribunal that the Liberals, and the current Attorney-General in particular, have stacked with over 70 former Liberal Party politicians, failed Liberal candidates, Liberal donors and former Liberal staffers. The application fee for the Migration and Refugee Division of the AAT is $1,826, so you have to pay a lot of money, as an asylum seeker, to have your matter heard by a mate of the minister who made the decision you're complaining about. If a member of the AAT, including any one of those 70 former Liberal party politicians, failed Liberal candidates, Liberal donors and former Liberal staffers, decides to uphold the government's decision to refuse an application for a protection visa, the affected individual can then apply to the Federal Circuit Court to review the legality of the tribunal's decision—or at least the individual can theoretically apply, because how many people who are asylum seekers and are seeking Australia's protection will be able to afford the application fee if these regulations are not disallowed and the fee goes up by almost 400 per cent, to $3,330?
These regulations are an attack on access to justice. These regulations are designed to make it harder for people to challenge the legality of decisions made by ministers so that it is easier for ministers to make unlawful decisions with impunity. We all have an interest in ensuring that ministers and departments are acting within the law, and the only way we can ensure that ministers and departments are acting within the law is to ensure that, both in theory and in practice, they are subject to the law. These regulations are taking us on a very dangerous path towards a user-pays justice system, where the only people who have access to justice are those who have the money to pay for it. That certainly seems to be the Morrison government's view of the justice system. When the Assistant Minister to the Attorney-General stood up in this place and defended these fee increases last week, she said:
… there is a fiscal responsibility in the way that we operate that court—
the Federal Circuit Court—
and that means that the fees associated with, for instance, filings for migration cases will be applied to cover costs associated with dealing with migration cases, such as the costs associated with those judges.
What the Assistant Minister to the Attorney-General is describing there is a user-pays justice system, and her comments, and the Morrison government's attitude to the legal system, should concern all Australians. While courts do charge fees, the Commonwealth has traditionally funded the Federal Circuit Court and Family Court out of consolidated revenue, with a view to enabling individuals, regardless of their financial circumstances, to access justice and vindicate their rights. That is as it should be, because courts are a public good.
In relation to these regulations, the Law Council said:
The rule of law and human rights of all people are core tenet of our modern democracy and having access to justice, is an important part of protecting those rights.
… … …
Justice is not a commodity and our justice system should not be reduced to a user pays model
One fundamentally important and publically beneficial role that courts pay is upholding the rule of law and ensuring that governments act within the rule of law. To take a recent example: vulnerable Australians who suffered under the robodebt debacle know a bit about the role courts can play in holding a particularly reckless and especially arrogant government to account. It was the Federal Court that held that the robodebt scheme, which was designed and boasted about by the current Prime Minister and Attorney-General, was illegal. Let us never forget that, under that illegal scheme, this callous and malicious government demanded tens of thousands of Australians pay debts they didn't owe. When people didn't or couldn't, this government called in the debt collectors. That scheme would still be in full swing today, if it were not for the Federal Court and if it were not for the fact that one of the individuals who was targeted by the government under the Prime Minister's—
The PRESIDENT: Order! Senator Henderson?
Senator Henderson: My point of order is that I would ask the senator to return to the nature of the motion.
The PRESIDENT: Respectfully, we have traditionally applied a wide range of relevance when speaking to motions in the Senate. I haven't detected anything out of order. Senator Watt.
Senator WATT: Unfortunately, Senator Henderson's point of order just demonstrates that, if there was any doubt, this government doesn't understand the rule of law. The exact same issues are happening in relation to these regulations as occurred in relation to robodebt. It's about Australians, whether they be Australian asylum seekers, whether they be people receiving payments from the federal government that were incorrectly and illegally sought to be returned under robodebt or whether they be wealthier people in our community, like—through you, Mr President—you and me, Senator Henderson, that have the ability to go to the courts. The government, in increasing the fees through this regulation, is simply denying access to justice for more Australians. Thank you, Senator Henderson, for inviting me to make my speech even longer than it was going to be. This is a government that hates scrutiny, detests accountability and thumbs its nose at fundamental democratic principles and institutions, including access to justice. Labor has always fought for access to justice. This dramatic, unjustified and unjustifiable increase to filing fees in the Federal Circuit Court is inconsistent with that principle. Labor calls for them to be disallowed.
Senator HENDERSON (Victoria) (16:17): I have to say that I am disappointed with the disallowance motion that has been brought forward by Senator Griff today, principally because Senator Griff has not explained this particular regulation in full. I want to refer senators to the fact that the proposed regulation that Senator Griff is seeking to disallow allows the registrar or an authorised officer to determine that an individual may pay the reduced fee as specified. Senator Griff did reference that, but he did not reference—and nor did Senator Watt—the fact that it is also open to applicants to seek an exemption from paying the fee—that is, a full waiver of the fee. I'll read out the relevant provision of the regulation:
… if, in the opinion of the Registrar or the authorised officer at that time, the payment of the reduced fee would also cause financial hardship to the individual—the individual is exempt from paying both the full fee and the reduced fee.
Opposition senators interjecting—
Senator HENDERSON: I can hear the heckling from the other side of the chamber, but it is a very serious omission. It is a very important point to make, because it goes to the very point of access to justice. I'll also reference another provision of the regulation:
In considering whether payment of a fee would cause financial hardship to an individual, the Registrar or authorised officer must consider the individual's income, day-to-day living expenses, liabilities and assets.
It is open to any applicant to make an application for a full waiver of the fee.
Senator Watt made some outrageous and abhorrent suggestions in relation to breaches of the rule of law and human rights; what absolute rubbish from Senator Watt. I want to refer him and other senators to the finding of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights in relation to these regulations and the bipartisan position that was taken in assessing the human rights implications of this regulation. I want to read onto the record from Human rights scrutiny report: report 1 of 2021 for all senators' benefit. The committee, including Labor members of the committee, noted:
… the Attorney-General's advice that the funds generated by the increased application fee for migration matters will be used to offset the cost of increasing the capacity of the Federal Circuit Court in both migration and family law matters, including enabling the court to finalise an estimated additional 1,000 migration matters each year. In addition, the committee notes that court personnel will have the discretion to consider an applicant's full unique personal circumstances (including their liquid assets, income, and any other relevant factors) in determining whether they will be in financial hardship if required to pay the application fee. The committee also notes that some classes of applicants (such as minors and people in detention) are exempt from payment of the application fee based on their status. The committee considers, therefore, that there are sufficient safeguards such that these amendments may not result in a limitation on the right of access to justice in practice.
I chair the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights and that was the bipartisan position of all members of that committee. As I say, I am very disappointed that Senators Griff and Watt have not referenced the very important point that I've made: a full exemption is available and it's determined independently by the registrar or an authorised officer, who would be able to look at all of the circumstances of that applicant's financial situation. That's a really important point when we are talking about access to justice.
The other really important point to make, and why I'm asking that senators do not seek to disallow this regulation, is that all of the revenue from this measure is being reinvested in the court. The revenue is supporting $35.7 million over the forward estimates in additional funding for the Federal Circuit Court to assist with the timely resolution of both migration and family law matters. This additional resourcing will provide the Federal Circuit Court with three additional general federal law judges, a very significant investment, accompanied by two additional registrars and other support staff to support the migration workload of the court. It will also support one additional family law judge accompanied by five additional registrars and other support staff to support the family law workload of the court. It will also help to increase base funding to support the court's current and ongoing operations. The number of migration matters filed in the Federal Circuit Court has grown substantially, from 3,544 in 2014-15 to some 6½ thousand in 2019-20, so these resources are incredibly important in terms of addressing that workload. While the Federal Circuit Court continues to increase the number of migration matters that it finalises each year, it has been unable to finalise as many matters as there are filings, so these resources are desperately needed and incredibly important.
The increase to the Federal Circuit Court migration fee will bring the Federal Circuit Court into line with the Federal Circuit Court's placement in Australia's court hierarchy, so I think the criticism that Senator Watt made in that respect is really quite pathetic. The fee for migration applicants to the AAT is 2½ times higher than the Federal Circuit Court fee for migration litigants. The Federal Circuit Court fee is lower, Senator Watt, than the AAT's fee of $1,826, so it is a proportionate and reasonable increase. As I say, bearing in mind that those who are the most disadvantaged, who have significant financial hardship, are able to make an application for this fee to be completely waived. Of the 25,809 migration lodgements in the Migration and Refugee Division of the AAT, there were some 930 applications for a fee reduction, and 490 fee reductions were in fact granted. It is important to note that, in 2014, the Productivity Commission also noted that court fees in Australia are relatively low and recommended increasing the level of cost recovery in most courts.
It's important to recognise that the government has put in place measures to ensure that this change will not prevent access to justice for migration litigants. I also think it's very important to note—and I do particularly take issue with Senator Watt's characterisation of the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia bill which was passed by the Senate last week—that this is incredibly important legislation to provide greater justice, to provide one point of entry, to provide more resources to the unified court and to end the days when we have two courts dealing with Family Court matters. I strongly say to senators today: please do not support this disallowance motion, for the reasons that I've put forward and for the reasons that have been put forward by Senator Duniam on behalf of the government.
Senator McKIM (Tasmania—Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (16:26): I thank Senator Griff for tabling this disallowance, which will be supported by the Australian Greens. What the government is proposing to do, and what this motion seeks to disallow, is to massively increase filing fees for people who wish to litigate migration matters in the Federal Circuit Court. When I say 'massive', I mean an increase of over 400 per cent. Actually, it is an increase of nearly 500 per cent, so maybe 'exorbitant' would be a better description than 'massive' to describe an increase, in one case, from $690—the current fee—to $3,300—the proposed fee. The Greens hold dear the concept of access to justice, and access to justice should not be determined by the depth of somebody's pockets nor the thickness of their bankroll. Far too many people are already priced out of Australia's justice system, and the regulations which this motion seeks to disallow would just make things worse. It will decrease access to justice for some of the people in our country who need access to justice most—people seeking asylum, refugees and holders of temporary visas.
These matters are high stakes; they are potentially life-changing matters. We have a politicised Department of Home Affairs making decisions that are massively impactful on peoples' lives in order to please its political masters. There are countless examples of Home Affairs decisions being made on things like applications for asylum that are overturned in the courts. It happens ultra-regularly in this country, yet this government wants to make it more expensive for people to seek justice—500 per cent more expensive. Remember, many of these people are people who the government has banned from having work rights in our country and people from whom the government has cut off income support. Basically, the government said, 'You can't work, and we're not going to pay to keep you alive,' so the burden goes to those fantastic organisations around the country who support people seeking asylum and refugees in Australia. These people often have limited English language skills. They're unfamiliar with our judicial system and with our culture. This is a neoliberal user-pays move by the government. The proposal to lift fees is unjust, it is bad law, it has a racist underpinning and it should be disallowed. I thank Senator Griff for bringing this motion to the chamber, which will be supported by the Australian Greens.
The PRESIDENT: The time for the debate has expired. The question is that the disallowance motion moved by Senator Griff be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [16:30]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
NOTICES
Presentation
Senator Ruston to move on the next day of sitting:
That, in accordance with section 45-20 of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission Act 2012, the Senate approves the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission Amendment (2021 Measures No. 1) Regulations 2021 made under subsection 45-10(1) of the Act on 18 February 2021.
Senator Fierravanti-Wells to move 15 sitting days after today:
That the Law Enforcement Integrity Commissioner Amendment (Law Enforcement Agencies) Regulations 2020, made under the Law Enforcement Integrity Commissioner Act 2006, be disallowed [F2020L01506].
Senator Rice to move on the next day of sitting:
That the following matter be referred to the Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport References Committee for inquiry and report by 2 August 2021:
The need to reduce carbon pollution from the transport sector, with particular reference to:
(a) the need to urgently transition to a net zero economy by 2035 to address the climate crisis, including through emissions reductions in the transport sector;
(b) the urgent need for government policies to support a rapid transition to electric vehicles, including through consumer incentives, government procurement and other policies;
(c) opportunities for the manufacturing of electric vehicle and electric vehicle components in Australia;
(d) the need for federal resourcing and planning to support walking and cycling;
(e) reducing emissions from shipping and aviation;
(f) the need for a broader transport transition plan, to coordinate and support workers, communities and companies in the transition to a net zero economy; and
(g) any other related matters deemed relevant by the committee.
Senator Kitching to move on the next day of sitting:
That—
(a) the Senate notes that:
(i) for years the Government publicly referred to the Future Frigates as a $35 billion acquisition, until the release on 1 July 2020 of the 2020 Force Structure Plan which contained a revised costing of $45.6 billion,
(ii) the Department of Finance has revealed that since 2018 the Government knew that the out-turned acquisition cost of the Future Frigates had increased to $44.3 billion, and
(iii) the Department of Defence has revealed that commercial considerations subsided in December 2018, and thus nothing precluded the public release of updated acquisitions costs;
(b) the Senate further notes that, despite the facts outlined in paragraph (a), the Government continued to incorrectly refer to the Future Frigates as a $35 billion acquisition, and this included:
(i) the then Minister for Defence and then Minister for Finance in a joint media release on 14 December 2018,
(ii) the then Minister for Defence and now Minister for Defence in a joint Budget media release on 2 April 2019, and
(iii) the Minister for Defence and Minister for Defence Industry in a joint media release on 31 March 2020;
(c) there be laid on the table by the Minister for Defence and Minister for Finance, by no later than 9.30 am on Thursday, 4 March 2021, documents and correspondence relating to the preparation and finalisation of materials for use by the Departments of Defence and Finance and the Ministers for Defence and Finance between 1 December 2018 and 1 July 2020 that included reference to the Future Frigates as a $35 billion program;
(d) documents to be produced under paragraph (c) include, but are not limited to:
(i) documents and correspondence relating to the preparation and finalisation of the media releases referred to in paragraph (b),
(ii) documents that may relate to the production of other media releases, speeches and other documents prepared to support public statements and media engagements by the Ministers for Defence and Finance and officials of the Departments of Defence and Finance, and
(iii) drafts of documents and any comments from Ministers or their staff on drafts of those documents; and
(e) if the Senate is not sitting when the documents are ready for presentation, the documents are to be presented to the President under standing order 166.
Senator Roberts to move on the next day of sitting:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) Australians own vast reserves of offshore natural gas and the Australian Government manages these vast reserves on behalf of the people of Australia,
(ii) every other country in the world receives higher payments for its gas than Australia,
(iii) the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission recently found that Australia is the only large gas producer in the world where the domestic price of gas is higher than the price of exported gas,
(iv) the Western Australian domestic gas reserve policy has been avoided at every opportunity by foreign gas companies,
(v) the Government's inquiry into petroleum resource rent tax legislation in 2017 made 12 recommendations of which none have been implemented, and
(vi) the Government's gas-led recovery strategy is a fiction until the government reforms the gas laws; and
(b) calls on the Government to implement the Callaghan Report recommendations.
Senator Rice to move on the next day of sitting:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) Australia's native forests are under threat - more than 12.6 million hectares were burnt and over 3 billion animals killed during the 2019-20 summer - and logging has restarted in and near forests burnt in the fires,
(ii) campaigners around the country are protesting to protect Australia's native forests, including:
(A) in the Wentworth Hills in Tasmania's Central Highlands,
(B) in the Tarkine, protecting Australia's largest temperate rainforest,
(C) on the Errinundra Plateau in East Gippsland,
(D) in Olney Forest, New South Wales, and
(E) in Western Australia's South West forests,
(iii) legal challenges have shown that regional forest agreements (RFA) are unsustainable, with the win for the Friends of Leadbeater's Possum in Victoria, and the Bob Brown Foundation's legal case showing that RFAs do not have to protect threatened wildlife, and
(iv) the Samuel review noted that 'environmental considerations under the RFA Act are weaker than those imposed elsewhere...and do not align with the assessment of significant impacts on MNES required by the EPBC Act …', and that 'Commonwealth oversight of environmental protections under RFAs is insufficient…'; and
(b) calls on the Government to end native forest logging, and provide a just transition for forestry workers including in the plantation timber industry.
Senators Davey, McKenzie, Canavan, McDonald, McMahon, Molan and Rennick to move on the next day of sitting:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) companies including SunRice and Manildra originated in regional Australia and are now global companies, and
(ii) the importance of food and fibre manufacturing in regional Australia for providing employment; and
(b) commends the Modern Manufacturing Initiative as a first step to reinvigorating manufacturing in Australia.
Senator Birmingham to move on the next day of sitting:
That the order of the Senate of 23 March 2020, relating to extensions of time for the presentation of reports from standing, select and joint committees cease to have effect on and from 25 February 2021.
Senators Canavan, McMahon, McDonald, Fierravanti-Wells, Abetz, Dean Smith, Stoker, Antic, Hume, Scarr, Rennick, Henderson, McGrath, Ryan, Duniam, Seselja, Chandler, Van, Paterson, McKenzie, O'Sullivan, Molan, Kitching, Polley, Hanson, Roberts, O'Neill, Farrell and Ciccone to move on the next day of sitting:
That the Senate—
(a) recognises that:
(i) in October 2020 Australia celebrated 200 years of Catholic education,
(ii) the celebration honours Fr John Therry who founded the first Catholic school in Hunter Street, Parramatta,
(iii) Catholic education plays an integral role in our education system, having educated over 750,000 students over 200 years,
(iv) 40% of Catholic schools are located in regional, rural, and remote communities, and
(v) one in five schoolchildren attends a Catholic school; and
(b) congratulates Catholic education for its:
(i) continued contribution to Australia's education system, and
(ii) continued commitment to the faith-based education of Australians in the past, present, and future.
Senator Siewert to move on the next day of sitting:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that the Government is making a deliberate choice to keep people on the JobSeeker Payment living in poverty by keeping the payment below the poverty line; and
(b) calls on the Government to immediately revise its announcement and urgently increase Jobseeker Payment to be above the poverty line.
Senator Payne to move on the next day of sitting:
That the following bill be introduced: A Bill for an Act to amend the Work Health and Safety Act 2011, and for related purposes. Work Health and Safety Amendment (Norfolk Island) Bill 2021.
Senator Gallagher to move on the next day of sitting:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) on 16 February 2021 the Prime Minister announced the Deputy Secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Ms Stephanie Foster, would conduct a review of support available for staff engaged under the Members of Parliament (Staff) Act 1984, and
(ii) on 17 February 2021 the Prime Minister announced the Secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Mr Philip Gaetjens, would examine conduct by the Prime Minister's office following an alleged sexual assault at Parliament House in March 2019; and
(b) orders that there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Prime Minister, by no later than 9.30 am on 25 February 2021, documents containing the terms of reference for the reviews being conducted by Ms Foster and Mr Gaetjens.
NOTICES
Withdrawal
Senator FIERRAVANTI-WELLS (New South Wales) (16:36): Pursuant to notice given yesterday, I withdraw business of the Senate notice of motion No. 2, standing in my name for today, proposing the disallowance of the ASIC Corporations (Litigation Funding Schemes) Instrument 2020/787.
BUSINESS
Leave of Absence
Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Opposition Whip in the Senate) (16:37): I move:
That leave of absence be granted to Senator McAllister for today, for personal reasons.
Question agreed to.
NOTICES
Postponement
The Clerk: Postponement notifications have been lodged in respect of the following:
General business notice of motion no. 1025 standing in the name of Senator Antic for today, proposing the establishment of a select committee on big tech influence in Australia, postponed till 24 February 2021.
COMMITTEES
Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee
Reference
Senator KIM CARR (Victoria) (16:38): I move:
That the following matter be referred to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee for inquiry and report by 10 August 2021:
The efficacy, fairness, timeliness and costs of the processing and granting of visa classes which provide for or allow for family and partner reunions, with particular reference to:
(a) limitations on eligibility to apply for relevant visas;
(b) waiting times for processing and integrity checking of applications for relevant visas;
(c) waiting times for the granting of relevant visa;
(d) cost of applying for relevant visas;
(e) commitments required for the granting of relevant visas;
(f) government policy settings regarding relevant visas and the role of family reunion in the Migration Program;
(g) eligibility for and access to family reunion for people wh9 have sought protection in Australia;
(h) the suitability and consistency of government policy settings for relevant visas with Australia's international obligations;
(i) the budgetary and governmental impacts of relevant visas, including on state, territory and local governments; and
(j) any other matters deemed relevant by the committee.
Question agreed to.
MOTIONS
Workplace Relations: Food Delivery Industry
Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Opposition Whip in the Senate) (16:38): At the request of Senators Bilyk, Sheldon, Gallacher and Sterle, I ask that general business notice of motion No. 1020 be taken as formal.
The PRESIDENT: Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?
An honourable senator: Yes.
The PRESIDENT: There is an objection.
Mental Health Services
Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Opposition Whip in the Senate) (16:39): At the request of Senator Polley, I ask that general business notice of motion No. 1021 be taken as formal.
The PRESIDENT: Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?
An honourable senator: Yes.
The PRESIDENT: There is an objection.
Health Care: Fertility
Senator GRIFF (South Australia) (16:39): I move:
That the Senate—
(a) notes the launch of the YourIVFSuccess.com.au website last week which, for the first time, provides consumers with information about the success rates of each fertility clinic in Australia;
(b) further notes the strong consumer support for the website:
(i) 26,000 unique visitors from Monday, 17 February to Friday, 19 February 2021, with excellent engagement on the site, and
(ii) approximately half of visitors explored the clinic success rates and half used the website's personal 'IVF success estimator';
(c) recognises the Federal Government's role in delivering this important transparency tool for Australian health consumers;
(d) notes that transparency and public reporting of hospital performance and clinician outcomes allows patients to make an informed choice and is also important to improving patient outcomes;
(e) further notes that, in August 2018, the former Council of Australian Governments' Health Council communique stated 'ministers agreed to commit to create a data and reporting environment that increases patient choice through greater public disclosure of hospital and clinician performance and information'; and
(f) urges the Federal Government to resume and prioritise this work with state and territory health counterparts, and with the medical colleges, to ensure consistency of national data and to allow for transparency and reporting across all surgical specialities.
Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Industry Development) (16:39): I seek leave to make a short statement.
The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.
Senator DUNIAM: The government is committed to improving transparency for patients in clinical and financial consent. The 2020-25 National Health Reform Agreement, which took effect from 1 July 2020, includes a commitment to national actions that will further improve the transparency of health performance. It will establish Commonwealth-state patient-level primary and community healthcare datasets; develop and implement a consistent approach to the collection and use of patient reported measures; build national-level evidence and improve care across the health system; and develop and implement enhanced performance reporting across the whole care pathway, including health outcomes and the interface between health and other sectors such as the disability and aged-care sectors.
Question agreed to.
Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation Committee
Senator FIERRAVANTI-WELLS (New South Wales) (16:40): I, and also on behalf of Senator Carr, move:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) an essential function of the Senate is to scrutinise the law-making power that the Parliament has delegated to the executive and to hold the executive to account in this regard,
(ii) since 1932 the Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation has operated in a bipartisan and consensual manner to support the Senate in this role by assessing all disallowable delegated legislation against its longstanding scrutiny principles, which were most recently endorsed by the Senate in November 2019, and
(iii) to effectively fulfil its mandate the committee relies on the constructive and timely engagement of ministers and agencies on the technical scrutiny concerns raised by the committee;
(b) calls on all ministers and agencies to:
(i) respond to the committee's requests for information in relation to its technical scrutiny concerns within the timeframes set by the committee, and
(ii) implement undertakings made to the committee in a timely manner; and
(c) calls on all shadow ministers to actively consider comments made by the committee in relation to delegated legislation made in their portfolios.
Question agreed to.
Job-ready Graduates Package
Senator STEELE-JOHN (Western Australia) (16:41): I ask that general business notice of motion No. 1023 be taken as a formal motion.
The PRESIDENT: Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?
An honourable senator: Yes.
The PRESIDENT: There is an objection.
Senator STEELE-JOHN: Pursuant to contingent notice, I move:
That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the motion being moved immediately and determined without amendment or debate.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that the motion moved by Senator Steele-John to suspend standing orders to allow this motion to be attended to be agreed to.
Question agreed to.
Senator STEELE-JOHN: I, and also on behalf of Senator Faruqi, move:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) 2021 is the first year of university study under the Morrison Government's fee hikes and funding cuts,
(ii) the Job-ready Graduates Package more than doubled fees for new students in some of the most popular university courses and slashed Commonwealth contributions to teaching and learning,
(iii) according to Universities Australia, at least 17,300 jobs were lost in the university sector in 2020, and universities lost an estimated $1.8 billion in revenue compared to 2019, and
(iv) early enrolment data from tertiary admissions centres indicates tens of thousands of commencing students will be saddled with more than double the debt they would have accrued without the Morrison Government's fee hikes;
(b) calls on the Morrison Government to fully fund higher education, significantly boost research funding and make university fee-free for all; and
(c) calls on universities' senior management to reject further austerity and do everything in their power to preserve university jobs.
Senator PRATT (Western Australia) (16:41): I seek leave to make a short statement.
The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.
Senator PRATT: Labor wants every Australian to be able to get a great, affordable education no matter where they live or their background. The government's Job-ready Graduates Package will make it harder and more expensive for thousands of students to go to uni. When Labor was last in government we uncapped university places and introduced demand-driven funding so that every Australian who worked hard and got good grades could go to uni. Labor calls on the government to make university affordable for every student. However, we won't be supporting this motion because there are better, more targeted ways to make sure tertiary education is in reach for all Australians.
Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Industry Development) (16:42): I seek leave to make a short statement.
The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.
Senator DUNIAM: Our Job-ready Graduates Package is creating up to 30,000 additional university places in 2021, up to 100,000 places by 2030 and bringing down the cost of degrees in key areas. The cost of agriculture and maths degrees is down 59 per cent and the cost of nursing and teaching degrees is down 42 per cent. Our intent was to encourage more students into courses where there was the best chance of getting a job. Pleasingly this is now happening, with applications for courses such as agriculture up 60 per cent and applications for courses in health up 15.5 per cent. Our universities are in a strong financial position, declaring a $2.3 billion surplus in 2019. Universities Australia's own figures show an operating loss of less than five per cent in 2020, with Monash University, for example, recently declaring a surplus of $259 million.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that motion No. 1023 be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [16:44]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Environment: Beetaloo Basin
Senator WATERS (Queensland—Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (16:47): I, and also on behalf of Senator Thorpe, move:
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) approximately 90% of regional water demand in the Northern Territory is supplied by groundwater,
(ii) First Nations communities and farmers remain strongly opposed to fracking in the Beetaloo Basin due to risks of groundwater contamination,
(iii) the Independent Scientific Inquiry into Hydraulic Fracturing of Onshore Unconventional Reservoirs in the Northern Territory recommended a review of risks to groundwater supplies,
(iv) the Gas Industry Social and Environmental Research Alliance, funded by the gas industry and the Federal Government, subsequently commissioned a review of the McArthur region, including the Beetaloo Basin, and
(v) the review, conducted by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation and Charles Darwin University, found stygofauna, Parisia unguis, throughout groundwater in the study area, confirming the interconnected groundwater system extends at least 300 kilometres; and
(b) calls on the Government to:
(i) withdraw funding for the Beetaloo Strategic Basin Plan, and
(ii) abandon its plans for a gas-led recovery, and instead support the farmers and Traditional Owners who do not want their water supplies threatened, their cultural heritage compromised, and the climate sacrificed by the Beetaloo fracking project.
Senator McMAHON (Northern Territory) (16:47): I seek leave to make a short statement.
The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.
Senator McMAHON: As part of the gas fired recovery, the government provided $13.7 million to extend the CSIRO's Gas Industry Social and Environmental Research Alliance, including in the NT. Stygofauna are small animals found in groundwater systems. GISERA's research confirms the presence of the same species at widely separated sites across the Cambrian Limestone Aquifer in the NT. There is nothing to suggest that unconventional gas development will impact on these animals, with industry having world's best practice technologies above that recommended by the independent scientific inquiry into hydraulic fracturing. The gas industry is vital for the economic development of the NT. The Greens will seize on every opportunity to spread misinformation and fear.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that general business notice of motion No. 1024 be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [16:49]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
JobKeeper Payment: Arts and Entertainment Industry
Senator HANSON-YOUNG (South Australia) (16:52): I move:
That the Senate—
(a) notes:
(i) it has almost been one year since COVID-19 physical distancing rules effectively shut down the arts and entertainment industry overnight,
(ii) hundreds of thousands of workers in the arts and entertainment industry have been impacted, as well as those in industries which rely on a thriving arts sector, like accommodation, hospitality and tourism,
(iii) the industry is still in crisis, with international and domestic border restrictions and social distancing rules impacting its ability to operate at full capacity and many people remain out of work, and
(iv) the arts and entertainment sector contributes about $15 billion annually to the Australian economy; and
(b) calls on the Morrison Government to:
(i) extend JobKeeper beyond 28 March 2021; and
(ii) provide an industry-specific recovery package for the arts and entertainment industry of the quantum actually required to save jobs and a generation of arts and entertainment workers.
Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Industry Development) (16:52): I seek leave to make a short statement.
The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.
Senator DUNIAM: The JobKeeper package was announced as a temporary measure intended to end in March 2021. The government's $250 million Creative Economy JobMaker Package will continue rolling out through the $75 million RISE fund. We've announced $60 million of successful batch 1 recipients and we'll start seeing the projects commence from this month. The outcome of the second batch of RISE applicants is expected to be announced in late March 2021. Over the next year government supported productions, festivals and concerts will fill our stages and our theatres.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that general business notice of motion No. 1022 be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [16:57]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Workplace Relations: Food Delivery Industry
Mental Health Services
Senator PRATT (Western Australia) (17:00): I seek leave to move motions 1020 and 1021 together, and that they be determined without amendment or debate.
Leave not granted.
Senator PRATT: I move:
That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent general business notice of motion nos 1020 and 1021 being moved together immediately and determined without amendment or debate.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that the motion to suspend standing orders moved by Senator Pratt be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [17:01]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Senator PRATT (Western Australia) (17:08): At the request of Senators, Bilyk, Sheldon, Gallacher and Sterle, I move general business notices of motion Nos 1020 and 1021 together:
GENERAL BUSINESS NOTICE OF MOTION NO. 1020
That the Senate—
(a) recognises that most food delivery riders are classified as contractors rather than employees, which denies them access to the following entitlements:
(i) award wages,
(ii) superannuation,
(iii) job security,
(iv) the right to bargain collectively for better wages and conditions,
(v) a voice on issues regarding workplace safety, and
(vi) workers' compensation if they are killed or injured at work;
(b) notes that five food delivery riders were killed on Australia's roads last year within a three-month period and conveys its condolences to their families;
(c) agrees that gig economy workers, such as food delivery riders, need access to minimum standards which give them better protection from exploitation and dangerous working conditions; and
(d) calls on the Australian Government to adopt a policy of extending the powers of the Fair Work Commission to include 'employee-like' forms of work as outlined in Labor's Secure Australian Jobs Plan.
GENERAL BUSINESS NOTICE OF MOTION NO. 1021
That the Senate—
(a) notes that:
(i) according to the Productivity Commission's inquiry into mental health, mental illness costs the economy up to $220 billion each year,
(ii) the report found that on average people attend 4.5 of the 10 Medicare-rebated sessions they are entitled to each year, but a vast majority of people attend one or two sessions,
(iii) as revealed at the last round of Senate Estimates, Mr Morrison received this report on 30 June 2020 – it wasn't until the October Budget that he acted upon this and doubled the Medicare rebated psychology sessions,
(iv) despite being a welcomed increase, the report identified a missing middle gap encountered by hundreds of thousands of Australians who cannot afford the expensive co-payments and are faced with waiting times of up to several months,
(v) these gaps in the system mean that too many people are not caught before they reach crisis point,
(vi) rather than implement the recommendations of the Productivity Commission's final report, the Government has established a House Select Committee on Mental Health and Suicide Prevention to review its findings instead; and
(b) urges the Government to improve access to mental health services as a priority and to not wait any longer because Australians are suffering.
Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Industry Development) (17:08): by leave—I table statements from the government relating to general business notices of motion Nos 1020 and 1021.
Senator ROBERTS (Queensland) (17:08): by leave—I table a short statement on general business notice of motion No. 1020.
Senator FARUQI (New South Wales) (17:08): by leave—I table a statement on general business notice of motion No. 1020.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that general business notices of motion Nos 1020 and 1021 be agreed to.
Question agreed to.
MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE
Job Security
The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator McGrath ) ( 17:10 ): I inform the Senate that, at 8.30 am today, 26 proposals were received in accordance with standing order 75. The question of which proposal would be submitted to the Senate was determined by lot. As a result, I inform the Senate that the following letter has been received from Senator Walsh:
Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:
The Morrison Government's failure to address failing wage growth, growing insecurity of work and increasing incidents of wage theft.
Is the proposal supported?
More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—
The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today's debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.
Senator O'NEILL (New South Wales) (17:10): First of all, I congratulate Senator Jess Walsh for advancing this matter of public importance, because it is indeed a great matter of importance to people right across this country that this government in its third term, having worn through three prime ministers, has presided over a period in Australian economic history that is absolutely characterised by wage stagnation, by growing job insecurity, and what we've come to accept in our parlance is the description of a practice of too many businesses that was, until recent times, called underpayment.
On the watch of this government, the scale of underpayment has been so extensive that it's now known as wage theft in the Australian community. So I sincerely congratulate Senator Walsh for bringing this matter forward, because Australians are feeling this pain. They are feeling it intimately every time they try to balance their budget and every time they try to get ahead, with people in insecure work reporting to Senate committees that they have no chance of getting a loan for a car, let alone a house, when their work is constantly described as 'insecure'.
This government is presiding over a period of separation between hardworking Australians who want to work or who want to work more hours and just can't and a government that's looking after people whose wealth is rising by the day as the Australian stock exchange market rises. This was part of the evidence that we received from Per Capita in the inquiry that is currently underway that deals with critical matters in industrial relations. This is what Per Capita said in their opening statement:
Despite a strong recovery in asset prices and a falling headline unemployment rate towards the end of 2020, the reality is that Australia's …
economic recovery from the impact of COVID-19—
threatens to take the shape of a 'K' rather than a 'V': that is, some people will do very well, having retained their jobs and saved money during the lock-downs last year, while others will fall deeper into insecurity and poverty.
That's what this government is presiding over: a period of time when there is a profound decline in the capacity of Australians to have secure employment and share in the economic benefit of Australia as a very wealthy nation.
I have to say that I was profoundly impacted by the evidence that we received at our hearing just last Friday. A wonderful AIN working in aged care talked about the struggle of trying to make ends meet, of not being able to spend anything in the local business economy but having to go to big suppliers of foods. She couldn't support her small businesses because she needs to buy materials in bulk or buy no-brand or home-brand goods, the very cheapest—all of the time—because her work is so reduced and so insecure.
She also spoke about the ramifications of this job insecurity, in terms of her capacity to do her work ethically. She is a carer, a carer by nature and a carer in her paid work, and her care for the elderly in aged care is critical to their health and wellbeing. She described a situation where her work is now so precarious—based on arguments that no doubt you'll hear from the others on the other side that allow efficiency for some businesses. That's what it is described as: efficiency measures; flexibility measures. Every time someone from the LNP says, 'We need to give businesses flexibility. Workers love flexibility,' it belies the reality of what they're delivering. Genuine flexibility in the workplace, with small businesses, absolutely happens. There are great small business employers. But there are also some pretty dodgy ones out there. What this government has presided over and is attempting to introduce in its IR bill is more of an attack on job security. We need job security and flexibility. We can't trade one off against the other. Flexibility can't always be loaded up as an advantage to the powerful and used as a tool of abuse of those who are in insecure work, yet that's what we're seeing.
The matter we're discussing today is a matter of public importance because good businesses that need money to move around in their local economy—good business owners who employ their staff; who know the names of their staff; who know the families of their staff; who genuinely provide flexible, great, secure work—know that their businesses are hanging on a precipice come the end of March with the withdrawal of JobKeeper. There will be more insecurity, stagnation in wages and, for the worst types of employers, such a sense of entitlement to take and make profit for themselves that they take the wages of the people they dare to call their employees. They should be more truthful. When you steal someone's wages and they work for you for nothing, or work for you for too little or work for wages that are illegal, that is a form of servitude. It's a form of modern day slavery. If the government gets its way we will have worse conditions for Australians. The government's economic agenda reveals their total unwillingness to get wages growing for Australians, their desire to cut working conditions for Australians and their refusal to legislate to protect Australians from increasing instances of wage theft.
Wages in Australia have stagnated under this government. Corporate profits have continued to grow. Average Australian workers, and that's most of us, are not getting ahead. They're feeling the pressure, they're feeling the pain, they're expressing concern, and it's manifesting itself in the data around mental health or, better put, mental ill-health—anxiety, worry, concern that they can't see a pathway forward to look after themselves and their family under this Liberal-National government. Inequality in Australia has grown ever larger, and it has come as a result of the design of this government.
On the new monstrous IR bill, which I think is aptly called 'WorkChoices 2.0', we've been taking evidence about what that will do. Let me be clear: it's a massive bill, called an omnibus bill. It has loads and loads and loads of schedules in it and proposals for change from this government. Buried deep down in the bottom are a couple of half-decent ideas, but even they are not legislatively drawn in a way that will improve the lot of Australian workers. I did not hear any evidence that has given me any sense of hope during the three hearings that we have been allowed to have, because the government only allowed three hearings—and, Deputy President, you would know the pace at which those hearings have had to advance, with half-hour slots and with people coming forward wanting to give testimony but not allowed to speak, because it is so contained by the government.
Not one of those hearings, not one bit of evidence that we've heard, gives me any hope that there will be wage growth under this government. In fact, this bill, if passed, looks like it will put downward pressure on wages. One of the key issues that prevents wage theft is proper legislation that acts as a disincentive for people to steal wages from the people with whom they've entered into a relationship as an employer with an employee. We've seen wage theft at a remarkable scale across this country. Very, very sadly, this government, if it passes this legislation, will reduce the protections that are currently in place for Queensland and Victorian workers. This is a matter of importance to the nation, and the truth should be told.
Senator ABETZ (Tasmania) (17:20): Usually, in matters of public importance, I'm able to compliment the ALP at least for rhetoric, if not on facts. But I must say, on this occasion, I can't even compliment the Labor Party on their rhetoric and, clearly, if the honourable senator opposite thinks that her contribution just then will assist her in her preselection battle with her deputy leader in this place, I'm not sure it's going to cut the mustard. Let's have a look at what this motion actually says, and there are three parts to it. First is the Morrison government's failure—let's be correct, alleged failure—to address falling wage growth. First of all, who determines the wages in this country? It is the Labor Party's beloved Fair Work Commission. It is the one that sets the minimum wages in this country and so, if there is a failure in relation to wages and wages growth, it is in the system that the Labor Party itself set up in the first place. This is the Labor Party's creation, so what they're basically saying, if they were being honest with the Australian people, is that that which they set up has been an abject failure for the workers of Australia.
But let's be clear: good, sound economic management allows for wages growth whilst inflation is kept at bay, and that is exactly what the Howard government was able to achieve in its period of office. There was real wages growth, but for that you need good, sound economic management over a lengthy period of time. It would be fair to say that, after the ambush of the economy by Labor after the Howard government was defeated, it took some time to try to get the economy back on track. We were achieving that when COVID-19 hit. The government's alleged failure in addressing falling wages is what the Labor Party is trying to suggest to the Australian people, who are smarter than that; they won't accept that sort of empty rhetoric. They know that there are circumstances which mitigate against the Fair Work Commission increasing wages because there has to be that balance between wages and jobs and job creation.
The second part of the motion talks about the government's alleged failure in relation to job security. Let's be clear: there was a huge spike in unemployment for one reason—we all know it, COVID-19—so let's not try to get cheap political points on the back of a national pandemic. The unemployment rate, thankfully, is coming down. It is coming down steadily and, what is more, with permanent jobs, with full-time jobs. That surely should be celebrated. But, no, the exact figures to back up that which Labor is asserting in this motion were not presented by the Labor Party in moving this motion. Why? It is because there aren't those sorts of figures to support the assertion. Indeed, so desperate were the Australian Labor Party in this debate that they had to rely on Per Capita as somehow providing some credibility to this motion.
The third limb of the motion talks about increasing incidence of wage theft. Excuse me, where was the evidence for that assertion? It was completely and utterly absent in the presentation that was made to us. But let's be very clear: I recall saying that underpayment, if deliberate, is wages theft, and that is why we, as a government, have said on numerous occasions that we have zero tolerance when it comes to wage theft. If a business can't run without underpaying workers, it should not be in business.
Senator O'Neill in her contribution referred us to dodgy businesses that would seek to underpay. Well, I wonder what dodgy businesses might spring to mind? Senator Small, who in cooperation with the trade union and a trade union leader, who now sits in the other place, who used to be in charge of the Australian Workers Union, underpaid mushroom workers, cleaners, builders? We will see what happens from the Registered Organisations Commission investigation in relation to the union itself, but talk about dodgy. I would have thought that would be one area that the Australian Labor Party would not seek to traverse.
The reason why the Labor Party refused to present figures to us was that, if figures were to be presented, they would be telling us that the Fair Work Ombudsman is taking strong action on behalf of workers. In 2019-20, exactly $123 million was recovered, a record amount of money for underpaid workers, which is more than five times the money recovered by the agency during Labor's last full year in office because we, as a government, resourced the Fair Work Ombudsman to be able to pursue this matter and get wage justice for the workers of Australia.
This momentum is continuing. In the first six months of 2020-21, the Fair Work Ombudsman recovered almost $81 million for almost 31,000 employees, filed 37 litigations and entered into 12 enforceable undertakings. These are the facts. These are indicators that we as a coalition government are concerned to ensure that a worker who is entitled to appropriate wages receives those appropriate wages—none of this funny money dealing that Mr Shorten from the other place engaged in whilst he was secretary of the Australian Workers Union. If the majority of the Australian workforce were actually to believe the mantra of the Labor Party, one suspects we would not be in office on this side, but they take a balanced and sensible approach, recognising there is an independent arbiter for our wages in this country—namely, the Fair Work Commission—and it does its job. Sometimes workers get more than bosses want and sometimes workers get less than the workers want. That is the role of an umpire—to try to make a decision which is fair and reasonable in all the circumstances. We all know, if wages are set too high, it will cost jobs and therefore that important balance is required and that is something which the Fair Work Commission seeks to do to the very best of its ability and that is why we have so many people gainfully employed and being able to sustain themselves in work.
But the Australian Labor Party, in their submission before us, there is not a single alternative what Labor would do other than to oppose the bill that is currently before us. What does that bill seek to do? For the first time ever, it seeks to deal with the issue of—you guessed it—wages theft, to actually criminalise it.
In the years of Labor, under Messrs Hawke and Keating and then under Rudd-Gillard-Rudd, did the Labor Party ever see it necessary to ensure that it could be criminalised in a manner that would dissuade bosses from doing so?
No. They didn't do anything. Who is it being left up to to get a fair and balanced workplace? Yet again, the coalition.
The Australian people have voted previously, and I can reassure them that this is a government committed to fair, balanced workplace relations that ensure that they have the dignity, the self-esteem and the mental and physical health benefits of employment. They're the things that we want to see. We on this side see employment as not only an economic good but an overwhelming social good as well. That is why you have to have that sensible balance, and we on this side are very comfortable in looking after both the worker and the employer. Without an employer, there'd be no employees. We need the balance, and that is what we as a government are providing.
Senator FARUQI (New South Wales) (17:30): I thank Senator Walsh for bringing this matter of public importance to the Senate. Over the last 40 years, Australia has gone from being one of the most egalitarian countries in the Western capitalist world to one of the most severely unequal—one dominated by business interests. Key to the growth of inequality and precariousness in Australia has been decades of neoliberal industrial relations policy designed to smash the power of organised labour and reorientate workplace organisations in favour of maximising gain for employers and giving them more flexibility to hire and fire workers.
It's not so much that the Morrison government are trying and failing to address stagnant wages, the dominance of insecure work and the scourge of wage theft; they simply choose not to address them. They have no intention of winding back the systems that, to the benefit of corporations and billionaires, entrench poverty, inequality and precariousness for workers. In fact, they're doing the opposite. There are 1.2 million people who are locked out of work. Then there are others on JobKeeper who are locked into poverty.
This government's core constituency is their big donors and big business, and things are going well for them. Before the pandemic, wage growth was stagnant. Jobs were increasingly insecure, and wage theft was at epidemic levels. Since COVID reared its head, things have gotten even worse. The labour share of national income has fallen below 50 per cent for the first time since 1959, and corporate profits have soared. Wage growth has fallen to record lows, and wages have declined in real terms. As lockdowns have ended and businesses have begun to reopen, the proportion of insecure jobs has exploded. This government has shown no interest in genuinely tackling wage theft. The most important and effective wage theft deterrents, such as making sure that wage thieves know they may be caught out and increasing the powers and resourcing of regulators to investigate claims and enforce the law, don't seem to be on the agenda at all.
Forty years of marketisation, deregulation, privatisation, government outsourcing and good old-fashioned union-busting has created an economy designed to funnel wealth upwards and leave workers with the scraps. Suppressed wage growth, the expansion of insecure work and perniciously increasing wage theft are symptoms of a business orientated system working precisely for the big end of town. Until this government either undergo a fundamental shift in their political orientation or are kicked out, nothing will change. They need to be given the boot.
Senator CHISHOLM (Queensland) (17:33): I, too, thank Senator Walsh for putting forward this MPI. I think it goes to the fundamental failure of this government and it sums up their terrible record over seven years. That record is of failure to address wage growth. It is of failure to address the growing insecurity of work. It is of failure to deal with the increasing incidence of wage theft. Indeed, after seven years of this LNP government, their record is a sad record. I want to consider that record in detail because, when we look at the record of this government over the last seven years, there is a lot of detail to understand when it comes to these issues.
When it comes to wages growth, according to the OECD—and I know Western Australian Liberal senators have a lot of faith in the OECD at the moment—real wages in Australia have declined by 0.7 per cent since the Liberal-National coalition were elected in 2013. That's their record after seven years in government. In 2019—so before the pandemic hit—Australia ranked third last out of 35 countries for wages growth. So even in the year before the pandemic hit the record of this government was a terrible one. It has been a miserable seven years for Australian workers and their families, in particular for those looking to get ahead and build a better future for themselves.
Sadly, the government's record on insecure work is no better. Even pre the pandemic we were seeing insecure work skyrocket. In the travels I do, in particular through regional Queensland, I come across so many people who have been impacted by the use of labour hire in their industry. It is absolutely rampant at the moment. I talk to people who are working side by side doing the same work, but one of those workers is earning 30 to 40 per cent less than their permanent counterpart next door. We exposed some of this during the Senate hearings into the bill put forward by the government. Ultimately, the use of labour hire, as I've observed it through regional Queensland, is actually being used to drive down the wages and conditions of all workers. That's the ultimate game of those who want to bring it in: they want to drive down the wages and conditions of all workers.
When it comes to wage theft, we have a federal government that has done nothing for seven years. Senator Abetz tried to say they have zero tolerance. What he fails to talk about is what they've done for the seven years they've been in power. He highlighted some of the recoveries they've made. Instead of trying to recover money, why don't you try to stop wage theft? That's actually the power of the government. You have the ability to do things to stop this from happening. They say nothing on that because they have no record they can point to after seven years. That is despite so many examples that have come before us, such as 7-Eleven and the outrageous attack on the workers in the employ of that company.
Now, when Australians want to look forward to emerging from the pandemic in a stronger position, when they want something to be optimistic about in the future, the government offer up more of the same. Their IR changes will undermine the pay and conditions of workers. They do little to address the rampant use of labour hire that is prevalent in so many parts of Australia but particularly, I know through my experience, in regional Queensland. They do nothing to create secure jobs with decent pay. What could be more important for Australian families at the moment, as they rebuild after being impacted by a pandemic, than to have a secure job with decent pay? They want something they can plan for the future on, yet this government continues to offer insecure work, not changes that are going to lead to better pay for those Australians. It is consigning more Australians to more years of the same, with more casualisation and insecure work.
The government's proposals on wage theft are weak. Compared to what some of the state Labor governments have been doing to outlaw wage theft, the government have been slow to move, despite all the evidence that has been presented, and, when they do move, it is still weak. They are a government with a shocking record when it comes to wage growth, insecure work and wage theft. After seven years they are offering no solutions to these problems. The best they can do is more of the same. There's no doubt that the Australian people are looking for an alternative. They deserve so much better on these issues than what their federal government has put up so far.
Senator SMALL (Western Australia) (17:38): I'm here on behalf of a government that has taken proactive and decisive measures to help Australians. We're focused on helping the economy grow jobs. Having delivered 1½ million new jobs prior to the onset of the pandemic, we see that, under our responsible economic management, 93 per cent of those jobs are already back. We've sought to boost wages for Australians through tax cuts delivered to one million businesses in Australia and 11 million hardworking Australians, who are already seeing more money in their pockets as a result of the initiatives this government has led. We've sought to enhance productivity through measures like the loss carry back and the instant asset write-off. But we aren't done yet, because we've got before this chamber a suite of sensible, measured and incremental reforms that seek to provide people with certainty and enable casual workers to convert to full-time employment.
We've sought to articulate the work that the government is doing with respect to wage theft and enhancing the protections that vulnerable Australians would be protected by. Instead, rather than those reforms already putting more money into the pockets of Australians, and rather than those additional protections already being in place, we are being held back by the Labor Party, who sit opposite. Our approach to this has been informed by extensive collaboration with both industry employers and unions, but instead we've seen the Labor Party seeks to turn workplaces into political battlegrounds whilst the Leader of the Opposition is focused only on his tenuous grasp on his job rather than the jobs of those out in the community.
The government have already demonstrated that we're willing to work with this chamber and work with the crossbench, by removing the section 189 amendment. We've done this because we see five key areas of reform that will assist Australians. But, by attempting to block this, Labor is actually standing between Australians and wage growth, Australians and wage-theft protection and Australians and increased job security through a more prosperous economy. Labor's industrial policies were overwhelmingly rejected at the last election under the then leader Bill Shorten, and we're simply seeing this recycled now by the current Leader of the Opposition. Labor's proposed industry laws reveal who really calls the shots on that side of the chamber. The only job they seem focused on is that of the Leader of the Opposition.
The government have made it clear that we have zero tolerance for employees being underpaid and make no exception for any employer who seeks to exploit vulnerable Australians. The government have committed to decisive action, with $160 million to the Fair Work Ombudsman, as Senator Abetz clearly articulated, and an up to tenfold increase in the penalties for employers. The only thing stopping a tenfold increase in the penalties for employers that do the wrong thing is those opposite. Undertaking reforms to enforce our current compliance and enforcement regime with the current act is also part of this contemplated reform.
But Labor clearly doesn't believe that those workers who are underpaid need and deserve better wage protection. They've seen them as a necessary sacrifice, throwing them under the bus by blocking this bill. They made this blatantly obvious in the past as well when they advocated to scrap the Australian Building and Construction Commission. They've also carefully ignored the fact that the ABCC has already returned millions of dollars to employees since it was reintroduced by the coalition government in 2016.
The Fair Work Ombudsman continues to take decisive action on behalf of workers despite the unprecedented effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, and $123 million has been redelivered into the pockets of workers—five times more money than that same agency was able to recover under the previous Labor government. The Fair Work Ombudsman has delivered 952 compliance notices, a 250 per cent increase on the number of compliance notices issued in 2018-19; filed more than double the number of court cases against employers who have done the wrong thing; secured 163 per cent more court ordered penalties; issued 603 infringement notices; and, finally, secured $56.8 billion in back payments for workers.
We are not done yet, but we are being held back by the intransigence of those opposite, who clearly, from their track record of opposing the ABCC and indeed the Registered Organisations Commission, oppose not only the rule of law but also shredding the absolute iron grip that the union movement has over labour relations from their perspective. What proposals have we heard from those opposite in this chamber tonight that would seek to improve worker entitlements and protections? We've heard nothing. In fact, all we've heard from those opposite is a proposal to take $153 a week from the pockets of casual workers across this country, a tax on businesses and nothing else.
In opposing these changes, the Labor Party have further signalled that they do not have any intention to streamline wage recovery. We've seen them with reports suggesting that underpaid employees are merely collateral damage to a broader approach that seeks to emphasise that the Leader of the Opposition holds his job. They've also stood between workers in Australia and a quicker enterprise agreement approval process, when we know that enterprise agreements in this country deliver up to 40 per cent more than award wages into the pockets of Australians. And the Labor Party still oppose that. If that's not wage growth, I don't know what is.
Let's talk a little around flexibility, which those opposite say is a terrible, terrible premise. The reforms that this government has proposed would allow 30 per cent of the part-time employees in the retail sector and 40 per cent of part-time employees in the accommodation and food services sector to work more hours but with the protections of being permanent employees and with the leave entitlements associated. But, no, the Labor Party would rather that those hours go to workers under more flexible arrangements such as casual employment. So it's the Labor Party that stands between part-time permanent employees being able to work more hours with more protection and, indeed, entrenching casual employment at the heart of the Australian economy.
As something that's very close to my heart as the Western Australian representative, we've also sought to create job opportunities with project certainty for mega projects on greenfield sites, allowing up to eight-year agreements to be struck. No; the Labor Party stand between more investment dollars generating more jobs for Western Australians and Australians more broadly, whereas this government is about getting more jobs for more Australians.
Stronger conversion rights for casuals is central to the reforms that this government has offered before this chamber, but Labor are saying that they would rather have more casuals remain, even if they would prefer permanent employment. The mechanisms that this bill articulates provide a clear and consistent pathway for any casual worker having served the requisite time period to convert that employment to permanent employment. It is a right that this bill confers. So what holds that back? Opposition from the Labor Party. So, it seems to me that the only side that is proposing to cut wages, to cut job security and to cost jobs in the Australian economy is in fact the Labor Party.
In true Labor fashion, their solution to all problems is simply to raise taxes, and we saw this going into the last election, with $387 billion worth of new taxes proposed. We've seen it recently, with this $20 billion hit to business, or a pay cut for casual workers of $153 a week. So, if we're serious in this place about putting more money into the pockets of Australian workers, if we're serious about affording Australians the improved job security that comes with a healthy economy, if we're serious about tackling wage theft and getting wage underpayments into the pockets of Australians in a more efficient and streamlined process, then honourable senators in this place will get behind these important reforms and get the job done. That's what the people of Australia sent us here to do.
Senator ROBERTS (Queensland) (17:48): This motion is one of the least self-aware that I've seen out of the Labor Party. As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I note that the median wage has not increased in real terms over the last 30 years, after adjusting for dramatic increases in the cost of housing, health care and education, yet Australia's gross domestic product per capita has increased over that period from $13,600 to $65,400 in real terms, as have all my figures today. Gross domestic product is up by a factor of five, and the wages of everyday Australians have not increased. Where's the money gone? Average wages for Australians at the upper end of the scale have seen an increase of 50 per cent, and at the very top end the increase is over 100 per cent. A graph of our median and average wages over time is untroubled by changes in government. Liberal, National, Labor or Greens—it makes no difference; workers just keep going backwards.
Wages as a share of GDP have fallen from $116 billion to $96 billion over 30 years. The share of our gross domestic product being paid to Australian workers is at an all-time low, yet corporate profits have grown from $20 billion to six times that amount, $120 billion. Globalist economics has crushed the wages of everyday Australians and deposited the spoils from an expanding economy into the pockets of the big end of town in salaries, bonuses and dividends. Globalist free trade agreements have seen more than one million high-paid, skilled manufacturing and heavy industry jobs moved overseas. Labor is a big fan of globalism, voting in favour of every one of those free trade agreements. Recently the Senate voted for a UN funding bill to direct money into funding economic development in countries with which we have a free trade agreement. This facilitates increases in their productive capacity to take yet more Australian jobs. One Nation was the only party to oppose the funding bill. The Labor Party voted in favour of losing yet more jobs overseas.
COVID restrictions have had a role to play as well. The government's COVID restrictions have moved consumer spending away from small businesses who employ everyday Australians to corporate retailers who pay the minimum wage. Online growth has gone to Amazon, owned by the world's richest man, Jeff Bezos. Social media are calling the COVID restrictions on businesses 'a war on capitalism'; they are no such thing. In corporate Australia, the biggest crony capitalists have record sales and profits and have paid higher dividends and bonuses. As a result of government coronavirus restrictions and measures, the world's 400 richest people have increased their wealth by $1 trillion. Much of this new wealth is money that was once spent in local communities—in hardware stores, community supermarkets, butchers and grocers. It was money that held up real wages paid by local businesses to their loyal staff. Now those businesses have been forced to close or to sack workers.
So the real outcome from coronavirus measures has been the largest transference of wealth from small businesses to foreign owned or controlled corporations in Australian history. We expect this sort of thing from the globalist Liberal Party and their sellout sidekicks the Nationals, yet this has been brought to you by Labor in Queensland, Labor in Western Australia and Labor in Victoria. Almost every government measure during the COVID period has been waved through the Senate by the Labor Party, working in conjunction with the Liberals and Nationals. Labor don't get to complain now; they should have seen this coming. The only thing that was not in this profligate spending was a permanent increase in JobSeeker. The constant pressure from One Nation in this place directly with the government across many years has today had a result. One Nation will continue to stand up for everyday Australians.
The destruction of wages and entitlements of Australian workers has many other causes. At the heart of the problem is supply and demand for workers. At the same time Australia is sending jobs overseas, we are importing workers. Over the last 30 years, Australia has added 10 million new Australians. While many of them do not go into the productive economy, the bottom line is simple: we are importing workers for jobs that have already been exported to lower cost destinations, especially China. There are more workers than jobs, and that can only have the effect of reducing wages. Labor defend Australia's high immigration rate and suggest One Nation are racists for wanting a reduction in the rate of arrivals. The use of the word 'racist' means they have no argument to counter us. All One Nation are doing is standing up for everyday Australians who will never get a decent pay rise as long as the government keeps bringing in more new arrivals than there are jobs. The Rudd Labor government and the Gillard-Rudd Labor-Greens government increased permanent migration from 160,000 in 2007 to 205,000 in 2013. Labor cannot pretend to care about workers when it was Labor that initiated the largest spike in arrivals in the last 30 years.
The other issue around stagnation in real wages is foreign temporary workers. The Senate inquiry into temporary work visas found temporary migrant workers experienced widespread wage theft and gross violations of Australian minimum work standards. These included the failure to pay minimum wages, long work hours and a lack of health and safety training, leading to workplace injuries. Temporary work visa holders are being exploited to drive down wages and conditions. Bill Shorten, as minister, set the record for temporary work visas in this country, a record that Labor still holds. I don't hear Labor complaining about this. This may be because their beloved free trade agreements facilitate foreign workers. The Indonesian free trade agreement section 12.9 removes labour market testing and allows additional contract workers across 400 skilled occupations. It allows for 4,000 temporary working holiday-maker visas per year, and these workers are highly exploited because they'll be deported if they lose their jobs. Wage theft is not entirely restricted to vulnerable foreign workers, although it does account for most of the cases.
The problem of falling real wages, job insecurity and wage theft, which Senator Walsh mentions in this motion, results from Labor Party policies. One Nation is accused of wanting to wind the clock back. Well, on this issue we do want to wind the clock back, back to when workers got a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. We need to start putting Australia and Australians first, back to when workers settled here, became Australian citizens and contributed to the future of our marvellous country. (Time expired)
Senator SHELDON (New South Wales) (17:55): It used to be said in life there are only two constants: death and taxes. But, under the Morrison government, Australian workers must deal with three constraints and three constants: falling wages, insecure work and wage theft. These three crises of the Australian labour market are not just holding Australian workers back but holding the Australian economy back. Wage growth has reached its slowest pace since the Depression in the 1930s. In the most recent September quarter, wages grew as little as 0.1 per cent. Things have become so desperate that the governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia, Philip Lowe, has been calling it a crisis in wage growth, calling on workers to start demanding wage rises from their employers. Even before the pandemic, the pace of insecure work in Australia had been rising, and since COVID-19 the pace of insecure work has accelerated rapidly. For example, 60 per cent of all new wage jobs created since May last year were casual jobs. This is the biggest increase in casual employment in Australia's history. Three-quarters of all new jobs were part-time in nature, and insecure work, such as our own accounts contracts and gig work, dominated the growth in jobs considered self-employed. Then we come to wage theft. PwC estimates that $1.35 billion in wages are stolen or unpaid every year, and Industry Super Australia estimates that as much as $6 billion in superannuation is not paid, affecting one in three Australian workers.
Under the inaction of the Morrison government, Australian workers must deal with insecure work, with falling wages and with wage theft. Behind these facts and figures are human stories and real workers that have been affected, workers like Diego. Since coming from Brazil three years ago, Diego has been working for the food delivery company Deliveroo. He was often paid below the minimum wage, working almost every day of the week delivering food to people's doorsteps to support his wife and 11-month-old daughter. Diego has become the face of the heartless way these companies try to employ their workers. In the midst of the global pandemic, at a time of unprecedented increase in demand for food delivery, Deliveroo sacked Diego with practically no warning at all because he was 10 minutes late with an order. In the midst of a pandemic, with a wife and daughter to support, Diego was interviewed on the ABC. He spoke of his sacking:
It was frustrating, as I've been with them for years and they just didn't care what I had to say.
I mentioned all of my personal problems, my loss of income, my wife and 11-month-old daughter, who I need to take care of ... but they just don't care.
Backed by his union, the Transport Workers Union, Diego has taken Deliveroo to the court over his unfair dismissal. His challenge is a major test case for the gig economy in Australia, not one this government is funding. They fund cases against casual workers that get rights in the mining industry, they back big labour hire companies and they back big miners. Of course they intervene in those cases, but they don't intervene in the cases for real people that are really struggling and that deserve to have rights in this economy. I eagerly await the case, but I certainly won't be holding my breath waiting for the government to act.
Workers in food delivery need outcomes now. A recent survey of riders and drivers by the TWU and the Delivery Riders Alliance revealed the distressing nature of the industry. There is an average hourly rate of little more than $10 an hour. Almost two-thirds felt that they had been unfairly treated by a company, without a chance to defend themselves. More than one-third had been injured on the job, with almost 80 per cent of those injured receiving no support of any kind from their company. We know this is dangerous work. We know that we've had five people killed in a matter of only a few months. All of them leave behind friends and family—loved ones who deserve better than to lose their father, their brother, their son or their friend to an industry that pays critically low rates of pay and incentivises people to drive and ride dangerously just to be able to put food on the table.
We've been having this debate about what should happen with the media and what sort of arrangements we should have. Some were calling it the Murdoch tax. Others are calling out how this government is prepared to take up this case for Murdoch, against Facebook, the gig economy and tech companies, but they're not prepared to take cases up for hardworking people in this country, who are literally dying at the hands of these companies. They're being ripped off by these companies. Rather than just handing money over to firms in the hope that they will keep journalism going, and taking on the big tech companies—people have been pounding their chests about this in the last few days—how about you pound your chest for Dede Fredy, Xiaojun Chen, Chow Khai Shien, Bijoy Paul and Ik Wong, all of whom died because they did not have the protection against those same monoliths and the same types of corporation that you failed to take into account.
Hearing Minister Porter in the House yesterday, and seeing the responses to questions asked about Deliveroo, we're saying to give these workers minimum wage and rights to collectively bargain, but those things are just too complicated. This Attorney-General, who has responsibility for workplace relations, says someone getting paid half the minimum wage is too complicated for him and the government to work out—that says it all. It's not too complicated. It's just that they've simply taken the side of these big monoliths and made a decision. Their card is always going to be in my pocket. It's quite clear that, when these companies are supported in this sort of lack of action to protect workers, people pay the price.
These companies are literally killing people in the food delivery industry. These companies are literally maiming people in the food delivery industry. There has been report after report about what occurs when you incentivise payments for companies and for workers in the way that these companies are. When you do not give them a minimum wage, an appropriate wage, to be able to sustain their families, they drive like hell and they put themselves at risk, because it's a choice between doing that or not eating. It's a choice between doing that or not providing for your daughter or your partner or your family.
We clearly need a government that turns around and says that all workers are important; that the economy is important, so that people have the capacity to spend; and that business doing the right thing is more important than business doing the wrong thing. There are companies that operate in competition with the gig economy. They operate and pay decent wages. They actually have enterprise bargaining agreements. It might be surprising to some on the other side that the enterprise bargaining agreements with unions are at better rates of pay and have better conditions. Their people have more of a voice and there is more consultation in the negotiations for agreements. It's inconvenient for those on the opposite side to actually recognise that, because that has been the strength of enterprise bargaining agreements. The weakness is the fact that the laws being proposed by this government do not allow proper negotiation to take place, which will further exacerbate the imbalance in bargaining right through the middle of a pandemic.
If you want any more starker example of where this country is getting it wrong and where this government has got it so wrong, it is when we say to gig workers that they don't count, when we say to their loved ones that they don't count, when we say to those who have lost family members that they don't count and when we say that you can be paid less than minimum wage—that it's too complicated to fix. In my previous life I dealt with a lot of employers, and I tell you what: they don't think that it doesn't count. They think it does count for something, and you should think that way, too.
Senator CANAVAN (Queensland—Deputy Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) (18:05): I want to start by recognising the merit in Senator Sheldon bringing these complaints to the chamber and the need for them to be properly investigated. If people are mistreated by large companies, or by small companies, they deserve justice. I note that there has been significant change in employment markets or, I suppose, work arrangements, with the rise of companies like Deliveroo and Uber, and it's probably not unusual, therefore, that our laws might be lagging behind some of those developments. We should look at those things, and that's why we have an inquiry on at the moment to investigate them.
I'm not sure that Senator Sheldon has the solutions just yet. I know he was only able to make a brief contribution, but I'm not sure I necessarily heard solutions. It's one thing to say it's simple and that it's not as complicated as the minister says. But I have been speaking with a few Uber drivers—they're the main ones I interact with; we don't have Deliveroo in Rockhampton, so I don't get that. Some of them really do like the flexibility they get, so I'm not so sure they want to go to a regulated, centralised, unionised environment just yet. Through the inquiry, I will very much make sure that the workers are front and centre of what this parliament should do.
The matter of public importance before us here today is quite an achievement by the Labor Party. I believe they put forward an MPI containing about 19 words. They criticise the Morrison government for failing wage growth, for lack of action on wage theft and for increasing the amount of insecure work. It's quite an achievement—in just 20-odd words, the Labor Party have been able to squeeze in three misleading statements, and sometimes flat-out wrong statements.
In the case of failing wage growth, that is just not true. Wages have not been falling. In fact, over the time of the coalition government, when you take out the effects of inflation, real wages have gone up by 0.7 per cent a year, slightly above the 20-year average of 0.6 per cent a year. Nominal wages have gone up even more, but that's not a fair comparison. So there is definitely not a fall in wages. Of course, we would like wages to be growing higher and better than they have been. As a nation, we do have an issue with productivity growth. That is something that must be focused on, which is why we want to lower taxes, which has been opposed by the Labor Party; why we are providing more tax incentives for capital accumulation through the instant asset write-off changes—they have been very successful; and why we are reforming the overall industrial relations scheme.
This MPI also accuses the coalition government of not acting on wage theft. I'm trying to spend a minute on each of the Labor Party's three misleading statements. I don't have time to go through all of the action that the Commonwealth government has taken, but I believe we have put aside $160 million towards increasing the compliance of people engaging in wage theft. We are going to create a new criminal offence for the dishonest and systematic underpayment of one or more employees, carrying a maximum penalty of four years. We will also be increasing civil penalties and prohibiting employers from advertising jobs with pay rates below the minimum wage. We have seen some shocking examples of underpayments, effectively wage theft, in recent times and, in response to those, the Commonwealth government has taken, and will continue to take, action.
Finally, on the idea that insecure work is increasing, I think Senator Sheldon was quoting that last year somewhere around 60 per cent of the jobs were part time. It may be news to Senator Sheldon that we're in a global pandemic. There was a global pandemic going on and it makes sense, in a time of that global uncertainty, that perhaps there were going to be a lot of companies, a lot of businesses, not offering full-time jobs because, obviously, when you offer a full-time job you're making a commitment over a number of years and you would want to have a fairly certain economic environment to make such a commitment. It's not at all unusual that, in times of global uncertainty the likes of which we haven't seen for a hundred years at least, in terms of the health issue of the pandemic, there would be an increase in the proportion of jobs going to part time. But, in good news, recent employment data, which I don't Senator Sheldon concentrated on, shows 60,000 full-time jobs were created in the last month. That is a massive number and it gives us hope for the future.
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Thank you, Senator Canavan. The time for this discussion has expired.
DOCUMENTS
Consideration
The following documents were considered:
Motion to take note of documents nos 1 and 2 moved by Senator Siewert. Consideration to resume on Thursday.
Motion to take note of documents nos 3 to 5 moved by Senator McCarthy. Consideration to resume on Thursday.
COMMITTEES
Public Works Committee
Report
Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Deputy Government Whip in the Senate) (18:12): On behalf of the Chair of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works, I present the committee's first report of 2021, concerning the Australian War Memorial development project.
Senator STEELE-JOHN (Western Australia) (18:12): I move:
That the Senate take note of the report.
I seek leave to continue my remarks later.
Leave granted; debate adjourned.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Joint Committee
Government Response to Report
Senator COLBECK (Tasmania—Minister for Sport and Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) (18:12): I present the government's response to final report of the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme on its inquiry into NDIS planning. I seek leave to have the document incorporated in Hansard.
Leave granted.
The document read as follows—
Australian Government response to the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) Final Report:
Inquiry into NDIS Planning
February 2021
Introduction
The Australian Government welcomes the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme 's (the Committee's) final report on the Inquiry into National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) Planning (the Report).
The Report contains 42 recommendations to improve the participant experience with the NDIS and support the National Disability Insurance Agency (NOIA) to deliver a transparent, consistent and equitable approach to planning.
The recommendations cover a number of areas including:
The experience, expertise and qualifications of planners;
The value of informal supports and the role of families, carers and health practitioners in the planning process;
The interface between the NDIS and other service systems;
The planning experience in particular communities of need, such as those in rural and remote communities, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and those from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse backgrounds;
The timeliness and transparency of the internal review process; and
The availability of advocacy support and access to legal services for people seeking external review of NOIA decision-making.
The Government is committed to improving participant experiences with the NDIS and is on track to deliver improvements to the NDIS that make it fairer, simpler and work better for participants, their families and carers. These reforms will help deliver on the promise of the NDIS - to provide people with permanent and significant disability true choice and control over a flexible support package to pursue their goals. They also deliver on the final elements of the Productivity Commission's original design for the NDIS, as well as recommendations of other reviews and inquiries, particularly the 2019 independent review of the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013 by David Tune AO PSM (Tune Review).
The NOIA has recently concluded a national public consultation process on the design of these reforms and will continue to engage with the disability sector, the broader community, and key organisations to ensure people are informed and can provide ongoing input into the design of these reforms, which will begin to roll out from mid-2021.
The Government supports, or supports-in-principle, 26 of the recommendations made in the Committee's report. Given the ongoing reforms to the planning process being progressed by the NOIA, the Government notes the Committee's remaining 16 recommendations and provides information on the key initiatives underway and planned to address them.
Inquiry into NDIS Planning
Recommendations made by the Committee
1. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency provide fully costed, detailed draft plans to participants and their nominees at least one week prior to their meeting with an official with the authority to approve the plan.
Supported in principle
The Government recognises the importance of providing participants with access to information about their plans prior to their planning meeting. Having a draft plan in advance is an important mechanism to ensure decision-making processes are transparent and for keeping the participant at the centre of the planning process, enabling the participant to consider how they might best use their plan funding to meet their goals and aspirations.
The NDIA is reviewing feedback from the national consultation on a new approach to planning, which will be underpinned by the introduction of independent assessments later in 2021. Under the proposed new approach to planning, all participants will receive a costed, draft plan prior to their planning meeting with an NDIA delegate. The NDIA delegate will have authority to approve the overall plan budget, enabling the plan budget to be quickly considered and approved - removing an administrative step in the process that might otherwise delay the funding of appropriate supports. The draft plan will be provided to participants with sufficient time for them to consider how they could use their plan prior to a planning meeting.
The feedback received during the consultation process will help inform the development of the new approach to planning and the policy, legislative and operational design for the use of independent assessments. Timeframes for certain NDIA administrative processes, such as approving a plan, will be legislated in the Participant Service Guarantee later in 2021.
2. The committee recommends that the Australian Government implement Recommendation 3 of the Review of the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013 (the Tune Review).
Supported in principle
The Government agrees with the intent of Mr Tune's recommendations in relation to ensuring participants are supported to navigate the NDIS. The Government and NDIA have committed resources to improve the participant pathway.
For example, from mid-2021, free independent assessments will be a key input used for NDIS access decisions for disability support or early intervention. From late 2021, independent assessments will also be a key input informing the value of a participant's plan budget, allowing planning conversations to focus on supporting participants to make the best use of their funding to meet their needs and pursue their goals and aspirations.
By making independent assessments free, the Government is removing the financial burden of gathering evidence of functional capacity needed to access the NDIS, and ensuring participants have the right assessments to inform access, planning and review decisions. This will ensure all participants, or potential participants, are provided equal opportunity in the NDIS.
In addition:
the NDIA is currently reviewing the Local Area Coordination (LAC) framework to ensure the Partners in the Community provide effective outreach and referrals.
$20 million has been committed to expand the NDIS Community Connectors Program to assist hard to reach communities to navigate the NDIS and assist them in access, planning and plan implementation.
Under the Department of Social Services, more than $75 million will be made available in 2020-21 and 2021-22 through two new grant opportunities under the Information, Linkages and Capacity Building (ILC) program and $64.9 million in ILC grants was announced on 1 September 2020.
The Government will monitor the effectiveness of these reforms before considering whether further investment is needed.
3. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency provide caregivers, where they are involved in the planning process, with written information about the types of supports that the National Disability Insurance Scheme can fund to sustain caring arrangements.
Supported
The NDIA has an important role to assist families and carers of people with disability to identify, and in tum engage with or strengthen supports that assist them to maintain their caring roles. The supports they provide their loved one with disability is critical for the facilitation of outcomes of economic and social independence and the pursuit of goals and aspirations.
The Government recognises carers of persons with disabilities should be given access to information about the types of supports available to sustain caring arrangements. The NDIS website already provides written information for carers about the types of NDIS supports available to sustain informal supports, as well as links to external websites such as Carers Australia and the Carer Gateway, where carers can access detailed information about the NDIS planning process. In addition, Partners in the Community can provide information about respite and other supports to sustain informal supports to participants, their representatives and carers throughout the planning process. Partners in the Community can also support participants and caregivers to link with mainstream services, such as the Carer Gateway.
The NDIA will consider the effectiveness of these products in promoting information on supports available to carers, and take into account the implementation of the new planning approach, before considering whether further administrative processes are necessary.
4. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop, publish and implement a strategy to better support people providing informal supports to participants, particularly caregivers and immediate family members.
Noted
The Government recognises the importance of supporting families and carers, and aims to ensure that carers of all Australians, irrespective of whether they care for people who are NDIS participants, are supported to access the assistance they require to fulfil this important caring role.
The Government has also recently invested more than $700 million over five years for carer support services through the introduction of Carer Gateway. The new network of Carer Gateway service providers commenced on 6 April 2020, and places greater emphasis on early intervention and prevention, helping carers access supports and navigate relevant and local services through federal, state and local government and non-government providers, such as My Aged Care and the NDIS.
5. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency assign specialised planners to participants who are hospitalised to assist with a smooth transition from hospital to home that enables the participant to access the supports that they need.
Supported
The Government is committed to supporting NDIS participants to transition from hospital as soon as practicable with the necessary supports in place. By the end of December 2020 the NOIA had deployed 24 Health Liaison Officers (HLOs) nationally to improve outcomes for participants and potential participants in health settings, including hospitals. HLOs share their understanding of the NDIS with targeted health services to ensure prospective and existing NDIS participants are supported in their interactions with NOIA and maximise their NDIS outcomes. HLOs also work closely with existing health services to ensure the NDIS access process is clear and understood, in order to support timely hospital discharge. In addition, the NOIA provides dedicated planners for those participants whose support needs are complex and require specialist planning expertise.
During the COVID-19 pandemic the NOIA implemented a streamlined approach to hospital discharges where a participant required access to Specialist Disability Accommodation (SDA) if they were eligible. The NOIA has retained this streamlined approach. Under the new approach, HLOs work closely with participants and the SDA sector to match participants with appropriate accommodation vacancies, if eligible, and expedite the planning process, including by identifying opportunities to rent or hire assistive technology from state and territory equipment schemes to reduce wait times.
6. The committee recommends that the Commonwealth, states and territories, through the appropriate inter-governmental forum, consider the appropriate division of responsibility for the funding of supports for participants in the criminal justice system.
Noted
The Government is committed to ensuring the Applied Principles and Tables of Support (the Applied Principles, or APTOS) are applied consistently across the NDIS service system. As agreed by all governments, the APTOS set out the agreed division of service roles and responsibilities between the NDIS and other service systems, including criminal justice systems.
Building on the APTOS, the Commonwealth, in agreement with states and territories, has implemented the following improvements to clarify the justice/NDIS interface:
Recruited 14 Justice Liaison Officers (JLOs) to assist justice personnel in custodial settings understand the NDIS pathway. JLOs also provide guidance to ensure potential and existing NDIS participants who are approaching release have appropriate NDIS supports in place when they transition back to the community;
Undertaken awareness raising activities of NDIS and justice systems roles and responsibilities ;
Developed a national process map with the intention of providing greater transparency regarding NDIS timeframes and justice agency touch points to improve planning and implementation of supports;
Introduced an Information Sharing Protocol in December 2019 to assist with the delivery of protected information, both with and without the consent of the person to whom the information relates, where to do so is in the public interest ;
Developed formal data sharing agreements;
Rolled out an NDIA strategy to strengthen relationships between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander justice settings; and
Commenced improving data on justice settings through linkages of Commonwealth and state data in the National Disability Data Asset.
The Commonwealth, states, and territories continue to work together on the remaining actions in progress.
For the avoidance of doubt, all governments have agreed that states and territory criminal justice systems continue to be responsible for meeting the needs of people with disability while they are in detention and for reasonable adjustment in such settings. Supports, above reasonable adjustments made by the criminal justice systems, may be funded by the NDIS and accessed by the participant during their incarceration.
7. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop, publish and implement a strategy for engaging with participants in custody to ensure that these participants:
a. are not unfairly disadvantaged in planning, and
b. are assigned to planners who have the expertise to work with them.
Noted
The NDIA has committed resources to overcome the challenges custodial settings present for supporting people with disability to navigate the NDIS, while appreciating the clear state and territory responsibility for criminal justice settings as set out in the APTOS. This includes the introduction of JLOs in all jurisdictions, undertaking awareness raising activities, and better promotion of standard practices and information sharing in the criminal justice space.
In addition, the NDIA is developing an external resource, Our Guideline - Justice System. This guideline will explain how the NDIA supports participants in the justice system, and include guidance on both applying to become an NDIS participant or remaining as an NDIS participant. It will have information about the typical supports participants can expect from the NDIS while in the justice system and how planning will occur if they are leaving a custodial setting. This guideline is due for publishing before 30 June 2021.
The Government has also commissioned independent research to examine the most effective methods and processes for identifying and assessing disability among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander prisoners in all jurisdictions. The final report is expected to be provided to Government in mid-2021, and will provide valuable understanding of this cohort and how to effectively support them in the custodial setting and reintegrate into the community.
8. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency publicly report on its progress in implementing the strategy outlined in Recommendation 7.
Noted
The Government recognises the importance of timely and accurate data collection on participants in the justice system. Improved interface and data sharing between NDIS and state and territory justice systems are being negotiated and defined, in line with Commonwealth, state and territory disability ministers' agreed timeframes. Once improved data collection is available, the NDIA will determine what data (quantitative and qualitative) to include in its comprehensive Quarterly Reports to disability ministers.
9. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency provide further training for planners about how participants can access services outside the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Supported
The Government recognises the importance of ensuring NDIS participants can access mainstream and community supports. The introduction of independent assessments from 2021 will enable Partners in the Community to shift from being involved in planning discussions to focus on advising people with disability and their families and carers on available mainstream and community supports and assisting them to connect with these services. This coordination and facilitation role was originally proposed by the Productivity Commission in its 2011 Disability Care and Support Inquiry Report.
In anticipation of this shift in approach, the NDIA is delivering a new starter capability and development program to the Partners in the Community, which includes a topic on innovative integration of informal, community & mainstream supports to support participants to realise their goals. The NDIA will work closely with its Partners in the Community throughout the rollout of the new approach to planning to ensure they have the required skills and capabilities.
10. The committee recommends that the Australian Government ensure that the resourcing for the National Disability Insurance Agency and its Partners in the Community is sufficient to enable planners to collaborate effectively with different service systems throughout the planning process.
Supported
In the 2020-21 Budget, the Government announced it will support expenditure of an additional
$709.5 million over three years to the NDIA for work to improve flexibility, consistency and certainty for NDIS participants in response to the Tune Review and to support continued efforts to improve the participant experience.
This funding will also ensure recent improvements to reduce NDIS wait times are maintained and the NDIA and the Partners in the Community are appropriately staffed to ensure positive experiences for every person with disability.
The Government has and will continue to monitor and adjust resources to meet the needs of the NDIS and the people it supports.
11. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency require planners to provide, in planning meetings, personalised material that outlines how the participant could access supports that the National Disability Insurance Scheme will not fund on the basis that the support is available in another service system.
Supported
The Government supports participants being provided with personalised information about how they can most effectively use their plan funding to meet their needs and help pursue their goals and aspirations. This includes identifying how to access mainstream and community supports provided outside the NDIS.
Coordination of NDIS supports with mainstream services is currently undertaken by NDIA staff, Partners in the Community, Early Childhood Partners or NDIS-funded support coordinators, who work with participants to ensure the supports in their plans, including mainstream supports, are meeting their needs. The introduction of independent assessments and plan flexibility from 2021 will refocus the Partner in the Community role towards plan implementation, including connection and coordination with mainstream services. To support plan implementation in the future, the NDIA will improve its materials to help participants know how to best use NDIS funds, and to access mainstream services and supports not covered by the NDIS. This shift is in line with the original Productivity Commission design of the NDIS.
12. The committee recommends that the Australian Government amend the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013 to clarify that where the CEO of the National Disability Insurance Agency (or their delegate) considers that a support would be more appropriately funded or provided through another system of service delivery or support services, the CEO must be satisfied that this support is in fact available to the participant and that they are likely to be eligible and able to access it.
Noted
The NDIS is intended to complement, not replace, all the services and supports available to people with disability provided elsewhere in government or community. As outlined in the National Disability Strategy, ensuring inclusion of people in their community and enabling them to access the supports they need to realise their full potential is a shared responsibility of all governments, non-government organisations, business and the wider community.
The complementary responsibilities of other service systems was reinforced in the Tune Review, which recommended legislative amendment to clarify that the NDIS is not the vehicle for funding all the supports a person with disability may need. The Government supports this recommendation of the Tune Review and will bring forward legislative amendment to confirm that the NDIS is not the default provider when other systems do not meet their responsibilities to provide supports for people.
Noted
On 28 August 2020, the NDIA released its new Participant Service Charter and Participant Service Improvement Plan, which sets out how the NDIA and its Partners in the Community will deliver participant service excellence and 51 tangible initiatives the NDIA will make to deliver a better experience.
As set out in these documents, the NDIA has committed to giving participants clear reasons for decision-making, using consistent terms and definitions, to the maximum extent possible in the language and mode of communication with which the person with disability is most comfortable.
The NDIA is also in the process of releasing more plain English resources and clearer guidelines and procedures, including revised Operational Guidelines, to help participants better understand NDIA policies and processes, including how it decided a support is most appropriately provided by another system of service delivery.
14. The committee recommends that the Australian Government ensure that funding amounts for supports available under the National Disability Insurance Scheme are consistent with funding amounts under other Commonwealth schemes.
Supported in principle
The Government acknowledges that current funding mechanisms, and resulting pricing regulations, differ across programs such as aged care, disability, veterans care and other supports. This variation is expected as there are important differences in the policy objectives and settings of these programs. Participants and client cohorts that have different needs, different regulatory arrangements and service models are in place and there are different market systems and settings. Any comparison of prices between Commonwealth-funded schemes needs to take into account this broader range of factors and settings.
Price setting in the NDIS is based on a detailed analysis of market conditions and the costs of delivering supports. Specified prices are developed in consultation with the sector and are grounded in an annual financial benchmarking survey in which all providers are able to participate. Regular consultations are also held with other funding schemes.
The Government is committed to the continued development and refinement of the approach to regulation of the NDIS market, including price regulation. The objective of any further refinements will be to ensure the market operates as efficiently and effectively as possible in the delivery of innovative and high quality supports that enable participant independence, participation and inclusion.
15. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency investigate ways in which each participant's plan could be shared, with the participant's consent, with their general practitioner.
Supported in principle
The NDIA is undertaking a body of work to improve the online participant experience. This will include better interactions with the NDIA, such as a case management capability in the participant portal, which will enable participants to follow the progression of their requests throughout the planning process. The NDIA is also considering other improvements, and will consider Participant Plan sharing with others, including health practitioners, as part of this work. The NDIA will continue to consult with participants and stakeholders to inform and test future improvements.
16. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency publish clear and detailed information about its Technical Advisory Branch and expert teams on the Nati onal Disability Insurance Scheme website.
Noted
The NDIA Technical Advisory Branch and associated teams have a broad team of internal subject matter experts with specialist clinical and technical expertise in various disability and health related fields that may consult with NDIA planners, Partners in the Community and delegates , when they are unsure about particular support types or what supports might be appropriate for a participant. These advisors may also assist a delegate to consult with allied health providers to better understand a participant's support needs and to gain information as required to ensure informed decisions can be made.
These teams are internal enabling teams only, providing individual advice and practice guidance to assist NDIA planners, Partners in the Community and delegates to make informed and appropriate decisions regarding supports for participants. Staff in these teams are not decision making delegates and do not have any participant facing functions and their details are therefore not published on the website.
17. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop, publish and implement templates for allied health experts to assist them when drafting reports and recommendations for particular supports to be included in participants' plans.
Supported
The Government supports the provision of templates to assist allied health experts to draft reports and recommendations for participants. The NDIA publishes templates for a range of reports and assessments, including assistive technology assessments, on the NDIS website. These templates are available for allied health and other experts to download. The NDIA also provides guidance for providers on writing progress reports, and specific guidance for EC providers on how to complete the Early Childhood provider report form.
Templates and guidance on Early Childhood reports and progress reports are currently available at: www.ndis.gov.a u/providers/working-provider/connecting-participants/reporting-andparticipant-plan-reviews. Assistive technology templates are also available at www.ndis.gov.au/providers/housing-and-Iiving-supports-and-services/providing-assistivetechnology.
As part of the proposed new approach to planning, the NDIA is currently considering how to best support allied health professionals and other experts to provide information where it is required. The NDIA will incorporate feedback received through sector consultation into the development of resources and materials for allied health professionals and other persons supporting people with disability to navigate the NDIS.
18. The committee recommends that the Australian Government amend the National Disability Insurance Scheme (Supports for Participants) Rules 2013 to require the CEO of the National Disability Insurance Agency ( or their delegate) to take into account any expert advice developed specifically for a participant when deciding whether a support would, or would likely, be effective and beneficial for that participant.
Noted
From late-2021, the outcomes of independent assessments will be a key input into deciding the value of a plan budget. This will mean that the current approach to creating a participant's plan budget will change, with the amount of funding in a participants plan informed by their functional capacity as determined through an independent assessment, not a listing of individual reasonable and necessary supports. The participant's plan budget will also reflect any relevant environmental factors, including informal supports available to the participant and other contextual factors such as locality and circumstance . This will ensure a consistent approach to providing funding for people with similar levels of functional capacity and in similar circumstances, with the participant supported to then use that funding flexibly to meet their needs.
The emphasis on flexibility and personalised budgeting follows participant feedback that they find their current plans confusing and difficult to understand, and are frustrated by inconsistent decision-making and being unable to buy a particular support if it is not listed in their plan.
This approach will also take into account the expert advice offered by a participant's treating professionals, recognising that that important relationship between professional and participant will not change.
19. The committee recommends that where a participant's plan does not reflect expert advice developed specifically for that participant, the National Disability Insurance Agency be required to provide written reasons for this decision at least one week before any joint planning meeting (and also in an alternative format where appropriate).
Noted
The NDIA already considers expert advice when determining whether a support is reasonable and necessary, however the CEO must be satisfied that all the criteria in Section 34(1) of the NDIS Act are met.
Section 34(1) of the NDIS Act covers the criteria used by the NDIA for what supports are considered "reasonable and necessary" for the NDIS to cover. For a support considered reasonable and necessary under section 34, a support or service:
must be related to a participant's disability;
must not include day-to-day living costs not related to your disability support needs, such as groceries;
should represent value for money;
must be likely to be effective and work for the participant; and
should take into account support given to you by other government services, your family, carers, networks and the community.
Under the proposed new approach to planning, reasonable and necessary budgets will be developed based upon independent assessments of functional capacity, rather than support by support. Participants will see a draft plan prior to their planning meeting which will include draft budgets.
20. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency publish information about the training it provides to planners, Local Area Coordinators and Early Childhood Early Intervention partners on the National Disability Insurance Scheme website in an easily accessible location.
Supported
The NDIA already provides information about training provided to its staff and Partners in the Community in the Corporate Plan and Annual Reports, published on the NDIS website and available here: https://www.ndis.gov.au/about-us/publications
21. The committee recommends that when conducting recruitment processes for planners, the National Disability Insurance Agency give greater preference to candidates with experience or qualifications in allied health or disability-related areas.
Supported in principle
The NDIA is committed to attracting talented, knowledgeable and experienced staff as well as to providing ongoing investment in building capability and training delivery. This commitment and strategies to deliver on this vision are set out in the NDIA Strategy 2020, which is available on the NDIS website.
The NDIA's approach to workforce management includes the identification and forecasting of skills mix changes to support evolving operational processes and ensure the NDIA has the right capability and resource capacity to deliver the NDIS. The NDIA recruits planners based upon the APS employment principles, taking into account all the qualities of a job applicant to determine their suitability for the role.
The NDIA also considers formal qualifications in allied health or disability and lived experience of disability to be highly desirable in planner recruits. Some planners, such as those within the Early Childhood Early Intervention (ECEI) stream, are required to have allied health qualifications, such as Psychology and Occupational Therapy.
22. The committee recommends that the Australian Government ensure that the National Disability Insurance Agency is sufficiently resourced to meet future planning needs.
Supported
The Government is committed to finalising the rollout of a fully funded NDIS and setting it up for future success.
During 2019-20 the Government announced an increase to the NDIA's average staffing level to support implementation of participant pathway reforms and increase the number of positions able to exercise delegations under NDIS legislation. Over 2019-20, the NDIA's total Australian Public Service (APS) workforce grew from 3,495 to 4,396; a net increase of 901 headcount.
The National Delivery APS workforce was the priority area for the workforce growth and increased by 707 (2,654 to 3,361); predominately in Planning, Access, and Unscheduled Review functions.
This increase in NDIA workforce capability has supported significant improvements to the NDIS participant experience, with reduced wait times and backlogs for access and planning decisions.
The Government has and will continue to monitor and adjust resources to meet the needs of the NDIS and the people it supports.
23. The committee recommends that the Australian Government conduct an inquiry into the workload and changing responsibilities of the National Disability Insurance Agency's Partners in the Community.
Noted
The Government notes that, during the trial and transition phases of the NDIS, there was an understandable focus on ensuring participants had appropriate plans as they moved from state and territory programs into the NDIS. As a result, Partners in the Community and EC Partners were asked to undertake dual roles of planning and coordination for the majority of the NDIS eligible population. The Tune Review noted that there were indications from participants, carers and families that this focus on planning has been at the expense of the original coordination role proposed for Partners in the Community.
The introduction of independent assessments from 2021 will enable Partners in the Community to return to their originally conceived roles by advising people with disability and their families and carers on the available mainstream and community supports and assisting them to connect with these services. This refocus of responsibilities is in line with the original Productivity Commission design of the NDIS.
24. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency improve its wait times for children, particularly the time taken to produce a plan following an access decision and to approve assistive technology
Supported
On 26 June 2019 the Government announced several measures to resolve delays for children under the age of seven accessing EC:EI supports through the NDIS. Since then, wait times for children have significantly improved. For example in the September 2020 quarter, first plans for participants aged 0-6 were approved, on average, in 34 days. This compares to 129 days in the June 2019 quarter.
The NOIA continues to work closely with its EC Partners to implement a range of ongoing initiatives and improvements to ensure that children continue accessing ECEI supports, including assistive technology where reasonable and necessary, in a timely manner.
25.The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop, publish and implement templates or guidelines to ensure that plans for children and young people take into account key developmental stages and life transition points.
Supported
The NDIA is working to reset its approach to Early Childhood Early Intervention (the ECEI Reset) to be progressively rolled out across 2021 and 2022, informed by the NDIA's consultation on supporting young children and their families early, to reach their full potential.
Amongst the identified areas for improvement the ECEI Reset will ensure plans support children through key developmental stages and life transition points including beyond early childhood, such as young people graduating from school, through the creation of a dedicated ECEI planner workforce. These dedicated planners will ensure children and families receive expert advice and support. The NDIA will incorporate feedback received through sector consultation on the ECEI Reset into the development of resources and materials for NDIA planners and EC Partners. ·
26. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency:
a. increase its family violence training for planners in how to identify family violence and what appropriate referral services exist;
b. ask participants before their planning meetings if they have a preference for a planner with a particular gender;
c. create a team of specialised planners within the Complex Support Needs pathway who are specially trained in how to plan for participants experiencing family violence; and
d. ensure that planners and Local Area Coordinators are able to refer participants who they suspect are experiencing family violence to this pathway.
Noted
The NDIA upholds the Commonwealth, state and territory governments' shared responsibility for effectively responding to family violence and child abuse. As such all new starters in the NDIA complete a mandatory suite of eLearning which includes a module on Family and Gender Based Violence Prevention. Given that the training is mandatory for all those coming into contact with participants, a team of specialised planners in this regard is not judged necessary.
If a participant self identifies as someone experiencing family violence, the Partner in the Community or planner will support them to the correct external pathway, for example Police and/or emergency services. Participants are also able to request a different planner should they not be comfortable for whatever reason including if they have a preference for a planner with a particular gender.
27.The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency finalise its review into its Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Engagement Strategy and update the strategy to address the issues outlined in this report for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander participants.
Supported
The Government supported Recommendation 10 of the Tune Review to improve outreach and engagement with cohorts of people with disability, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
In line with Recommendation 10 of the Tune Review, the NDIA has reviewed the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Engagement Strategy, and will release an update in early 2021, detailing progress against the Strategy and priority actions to further drive the implementation of the Strategy over the next two years. This strategy will be refreshed in 2022-23, following consultation with key stakeholders.
28. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency review its Cultural and Linguistic Diversity Strategy and update it to address the issues outlined in this report.
Supported
The Government supported Recommendation 10 of the Tune Review to improve outreach and engagement with cohorts of people with disability, including people with disability who are culturally and linguistically diverse.
The Government has also provided an additional $20 million to support the rollout of the NDIS National Community Connectors Program, which is focused on supporting hard to reach communities to engage with the NDIS.
In line with Recommendation 10 of the Tune Review, the NDIA has reviewed the Cultural and Linguistic Diversity Strategy, and will release an update in early 2021, detailing progress against the Strategy and priority actions to further drive the implementation of the Strategy over the next two years. This strategy will be refreshed in 2022-23, following consultation with key stakeholders.
29.The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency publish information about the Complex Supports Needs pathway, including about who is eligible, and how the National Disability Insurance Agency defines the term 'complex support needs'.
Supported in principle
The NDIA developed the Complex Supports Needs (CSN) Pathway in November 2018 to provide specialised support for people with disability who experience personal and situational factors that are beyond the scope of the typical NDIS Pathway.
The NOIA is currently reviewing the CSN Pathway. Following the outcome of the review, the NOIA will consider including more detailed information on the Complex Support Needs pathway on its website. This is in line with the NOIA 's commitment to transparency under the NDIS Participant Service Charter to ensure information provided to participants, their families and support networks, including content on the NDIS website, is easy to access and understandable.
30. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop and implement a mechanism to encourage planners to develop specialisation in particular types of disability or particular groups of participants.
Noted
For consistent high quality service provision, the NOIA supports planners and others involved in the planning process being well versed in a broad range of disability types rather than specialising in particular types of disability or particular groups of participants.
For those participants who require specialist planning expertise the NDIA already has a range of specialised internal planning supports, including ECEI as well support from the Technical Advisory Branch. Further specialisation of planners in disability types is not judged necessary beyond the current expertise available to planners.
31. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency review its Rural and Remote Strategy 2016- 19 and, as part of this process, examine practical solutions to the issues outlined in this report regarding planning for participants in rural and remote areas.
Supported in principle
The Government recognises there are challenges for participants in rural and remote areas. The NOIA will release a position paper in 2021, articulating the NDIA's approach to service delivery in remote Australia.
The NOIA has implemented the NDIS Community Connectors Program which provides improved support for Australians with disability in rural and urban locations. The program focusses on four specific population groups:
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities;
Culturally and Linguistically Diverse communities;
people experiencing psychosocial disabilities; and
ageing parents or carers of people with disability.
Community Connectors are trusted local community members who enable better linkages between people, communities and services. People with disability, their families and carers rely on the responsiveness of Community Connectors to access information and supports required to engage, access and benefit from the NDIS including planning activity.
32. The committee recommends that the Australian Government provide the National Disability Insurance Agency with sufficient resources to ensure that its Administrative Appeals Tribunal Applications and Decisions Division can reduce the amount of time it takes to resolve AAT appeals.
Supported in principle
As part of forthcoming legislative amendments to give effect to the recommendations of the Tune Review, the Government has committed to improving the NDIA's administration of reviews to deliver a better experience for participants. This includes through legislating timeframes for internal reviews to be completed, in the form of the NDIS Participant Service Guarantee, and removing unnecessary prescription around the process for giving effect to changes to a plan.
Since the NDIA 's Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) early resolution model commenced in December 2018 there has been a significant reduction in timeframes to resolution of AAT planning applications, from an average of 200 days pre-December 2018, to I05 days for July-September 2020.
This data indicates a significant and continuing reduction in average resolution timeframes during a period in which the AAT caseload increased threefold (which is commensurate with the growth in the Scheme). Resolution timeframes remain low relative to other AAT Divisions and reflect the Agency's focus on improving the participant experience.
Resolution timeframes are impacted by a range of factors including increasing complexity of cases before the Tribunal, increasing volumes of new cases, challenges obtaining necessary information to assist the Tribunal during the COVID-19 pandemic and moving to online case conferences, conciliations and other AAT proceedings.
The Government has and will continue to monitor and adjust NDIA resources to meet the needs of the people the NDIS supports.
33. The committee recommends that the Australian Government review the amount of funding that it provides to advocacy organisations through the NDIS Appeals program and ensure that these organisations are sufficiently funded to support participants throughout the Administrative Appeals Tribunal process.
Noted
The Department of Social Services funds the NDIS Appeals program for participants to use when appealing to the AAT, with 42 advocacy organisations and eight Legal Aid Commissions being funded.
The NDIS Appeals program provides participants with:
access to a skilled disability advocate who acts as a support person; and/or
access to funding for legal services, if there is a wider community benefit and/or disadvantage that would substantially benefit from legal representation.
In 2020-21, funding for NDIS Appeals program is $10.67 million. The Department is continuing to monitor demand for NDIS Appeals advocacy support and legal assistance. This includes understanding the impact of reforms such as the NDIA Early Resolution Team, the Participant Service Charter and Participant Service Improvement Plan on the demand for NDIS Appeals program. This will inform advice on appropriate future funding levels.
34. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop and publish de-identified summaries of key themes arising from settlement outcomes in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
Noted
The AAT generally publishes decisions in relation to the NDIS in accordance with its publication of decisions policy (Publication of Decisions Policy | Administrative Appeals Tribunal (aat.gov.au). AAT settlements are not precedent-setting and all cases are considered on their individual merits.
35.The committee recommends that t he Australian Government ensure that the-National Disability Insurance Agency is sufficiently resourced to carry out the functions outlined in Recommendation 34.
Noted
The Government is committed to appropriately resourcing the NDIA so the agency can undertake all its legislated functions.
36. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency ensure that it always communicates with participants and their nominees in accessible formats, and in accordance with any participant requests.
Supported
The NDIA already undertakes to correspond with participants and their nominated representatives via their preferred means of communication, including for plans and planning related documentation, alerts and reminders. In addition, the NDIA produces communications material for a participant audience in a variety of accessible formats, where appropriate.
The NDIS Participant Service Charter and Participant Service Improvement Plan, sets out how the NDIA and its Partners in the Community will deliver participant service excellence. Under the Participant Service Improvement Plan, 12 initiatives will improve the way the NDIA communicates with participants and how participants are able to access information. These initiatives include the use of plain English reasons for decisions in letters to participants, further public guidance and procedures to support consistent decision-making, and the removal of jargon by using consistent terms and definitions.
The Participant Service Charter commits the NDIA to providing participant service excellence that is transparent, responsive, respectful, empowering and connected. These five engagement principles and Participant Service Guarantee were key recommendations made in the Tune Review.
37.The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency ensure that it provides participants and the people they bring with them to joint planning meetings with sufficient time to articulate their needs in those meetings.
Supported
The NDIA is reviewing feedback from recent consultation on the proposed new approach to planning. Under the proposed new approach, the NDIA or Partner in the Community will contact participants prior to their plan's expiry to determine if they require a full plan review, light touch review, or a plan rollover, based on their circumstances, their goals and how their plan has been working. The NDIA will also conduct check-ins with participants to support the implementation of their NDIS plans in pursuit of a participant's goals.
The NDIA anticipates for many participants, plans will be ongoing and participants will not be required to attend as many planning meetings if their circumstances are unlikely to change. In cases where a full plan review is required, sufficient time will be built into the independent assessment and the planning meeting process, so that participants and the people they bring with them will have time to articulate their needs. Participants will receive a draft plan and be able to discuss this with a delegate prior to the plan being approved.
38. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop and publish a clear diagram on the NDIS website of the planning process.
Supported
Information about the current planning process is published on the NDIA's website. This information includes understanding supports within an NDIS plan, how to prepare for a planning meeting, using an NDIS plan and reviewing an NDIS plan.
From late 2021, independent assessments will be used as a key input to inform an NDIS plan budget as part of the new approach to planning.
The NDIA has engaged widely with participants, their families and carers, peak bodies,· disability organisations, peer and family networks to help develop and test how independent assessments and the new approach to planning will work. This included the release of a consultation paper on the new planning approach for personalised budgets and plan flexibility, also available in Easy Read formats. The NOIA is reviewing feedback received from this consultation to inform the final approach to planning, including how the information will continue to be released to participants, child representatives and carers.
The NDIA will also continue to ensure information released is consistent with its commitment under the Participant Service Charter and Participant Service Improvement Plan to release information that is easy to understand and in accessible formats. This includes publishing further guidance and procedures about the new approach to planning when finalised.
39. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop a more detailed checklist of documents participants can provide before their planning meeting as evidence for the supports they request. This checklist should be published on the NDIS website and be referred to by planners in planning meetings.
Noted
Three participant booklets are available on the NDIS website and in hard copy to support people with disability and participants to engage with the NDIS. The booklets help people with disability, participants, their families, carers and the wider community to learn more about the NDIS, prepare for a planning meeting and to implement their plan.
In addition to the booklets, participants can access assistance from planners, support coordinators and LACs. The NDIS website also includes a range of information to assist participants to prepare for the planning and planning review process including a detailed section outlining the types of evidence and requirements on providing evidence of disability: www.ndis.gov.au/applying-access-ndis/how-apply/information-support-yourrequest/providing-evidence-your-disabiliy
The NDIA frequently updates the website content to ensure it accurately reflects current operational guidelines, policy and practices.
From late 2021, under the proposed new approach to planning, participants' plans will be developed based upon independent evidence of their functional capacity, reducing the need for separate extensive documentation and assessments prior to each planning meeting. To the extent specific documentation is still required for the provision of fixed supports, such as complex assistive technology, NDIA planners, LACs and support coordinators will work with participants and their providers to ensure they understand what evidence is required.
40.The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency contact new participants and their nominees at least three weeks before their first planning meeting to ensure that they understand what the meeting will involve and how they need to prepare for it.
Supported in principle
The Government recognises the importance of early engagement with participants and their representatives, to support them to prepare for the planning process. Usually, staff members from Partners in the Community or NDIA Business Support Officers contact participants or their representatives prior to their first planning meeting to explain the planning process and what documentation may be required.
While this would usually happen three weeks prior to the first planning meeting date, sometimes that isn't the preferred option of the participant due to their particular circumstances, and the planning meeting may occur within three weeks of initial contact. The Participant Service Guarantee, expected to be legislated in 2021, sets out timeframes for NDIA processes.
41.The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency develop and implement detailed guidance for planners and delegates about how to engage with participants appropriately during planning meetings and the involvement of third parties including advocates, parents, carers and family members.
Supported
The NDIA provides extensive training and guidance to planners, delegates and Partner in the Community staff about how to engage appropriately with participants and their support networks. All NDIA staff undertake contemporary Disability Rights and Disability Awareness training. Planners and Partners in the Community also attend the New Starter Program, an in-depth training program that develops active listening skills, to ensure participant facing staff can appropriately engage with participants and their nominees and understand their lived experience and the impact of their disability. This formal training references and is supplemented by additional materials and external resources about different disabilities and the impacts of these on participants' lives.
The NDIA has also commenced development of new learning products for staff that will focus on communication, conversation skills, and the importance of ensuring the most appropriate advocates and informal supporters are engaged throughout the planning process. Specific modules are being developed that target components of planning and communication capability. A new Continuous Improvement Connect framework will also contain an element of planner and Partners in the Community soft skill development.
42. The committee recommends that the National Disability Insurance Agency co-design new metrics for measuring participant satisfaction with people with disability and advocacy organisations.
Supported
The Governments supports the development of participation satisfaction metrics in conjunction with key stakeholders . Since 2018, the NDIA has conducted a participant satisfaction survey to measure participant satisfaction across each stage of the planning pathway.
The Government supported Recommendation 24 of the Tune Review, which recommended the development of a new independent participant satisfaction survey. The NOIA is working with the Independent Advisory Council to build on the current survey to develop a more comprehensive picture of participant satisfaction. This includes working with people with disability and advocacy organisations and the results will be included in quarterly reports to disability ministers.
Senator CAROL BROWN (Tasmania) (18:12): I move:
That the Senate take note of the document.
I rise to take note of the government's response to the final report of the Joint Standing Committee on the NDIS on its inquiry into NDIS planning. When our committee released its our final report we made 42 recommendations, all of which were aimed at improving the planning process from the participants' perspective. The committee conducted this inquiry in response to years of advocacy from participants, carers, supporters, advocates and groups in the sector who were calling for reform. Of those recommendations, the government has chosen to support, or support in principle, 26 recommendations and to note the remaining 16 recommendations. During this inquiry the committee received 157 submissions and conducted 14 public hearings.
As every NDIS participant knows, NDIS planning, along with access, is the primary point at which participants interact with the scheme, so it goes without saying that a good planning process can change life for the better. It's pleasing to note the government's recognition of the importance of providing participants with information about their plans prior to their planning meeting. During the inquiry, the committee received extensive evidence about the many inconsistencies in the planning process and plan funding. Some plans did not include funded supports because in the view of the planner or agency the participants had access to informal support. 'Informal support' essentially means carers supporting the participant. That was essentially what the NDIS were falling back on, that a participant was going to be assisted by members of their family. The committee also heard of discrepancies in funding and support between siblings with the same disability type.
It is heartening that the government acknowledges the important role the NDIA has in assisting families and carers of people with disability in the planning process. This is an issue that has been ongoing for a very, very long time. However, the committee's recommendation that caregivers be provided with written information about the types of support that the NDIS can fund remains very, very important. Participants and their advocates have long advocated for specialist planners for participants who are hospitalised to assist with a smooth transition. The government supported this recommendation, and that is welcome. These transitions and other similar experiences can create uncertainty and gaps in support for people with disability. It is essential that various levels of governments and their agencies work together to support some of our most vulnerable citizens. The appointment of 24 health liaison officers nationally is a good first step towards achieving this.
Many participants in the NDIS have complex needs and need to access the complex supports needs pathway. The committee recommended that the NDIA publish more information about this pathway, including information on who is eligible and how the NDIA defines the term 'complex support needs'.
I note that the NDIA is currently undertaking a review of the pathway but would remind government and the agency that the more information provided to participants, supporters and advocates, the better. Clear advice and information are essential to the planning process succeeding. Throughout the inquiry this was one of the central messages that we received around information and clear advice. It's very clear that that advice that participants and their families are receiving is not clear and not consistent, so work towards ensuring that it is clear and consistent is welcomed.
Another key element is ensuring that there is trust in decision-making of the agency in the resourcing and transparency of the appeals process. The need for many of these appeals arises because participants never meet with the NDIA delegate who makes the decision on their plan. For too long the NDIA was slow to respond to appeals lodged with the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. Recent improvements are welcome, but the priority of resourcing this task must be maintained. Leaving NDIS participants living with the uncertainty is not good enough and must be addressed by the agency.
During our inquiry we also heard about the impact that planning errors had on participants. Initial plans and reviews have often been undertaken by a planner without any knowledge of the participant's disability, and this is an ongoing issue. The stories of planners relying on search engines while conducting meetings with participants are legend. In responding to many of the recommendations in this review the government notes recent announcements or reviews. But as we all know an announcement does not mean that the issue has been resolved. Announcements do not provide us with hope and provide us with an acknowledgement that the government has recognised the need to address the issue.
One of the announcements that the government is relying on in its response to this report is their recent commitment to the introduction of independent assessments. The government's determination to now rely on these assessments has already caused a great deal of alarm and concern in the disability community. This supposed reform was announced without adequate consultation and consideration of the needs of NDIS participants. That is why the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme is already conducting a separate inquiry into independent assessments.
There are roughly 440,000 people with disability on the NDIS. The rollout of independent assessments is a radical plan. You can't help but wonder if the soul aim of this radical plan is cost cutting. They all have to prove that they have a disability and they've been assessed as being eligible to participate in the scheme. What the government is now proposing is that these 440,000 participants effectively have to requalify for the scheme. The shadow minister for the NDIS has said that people with disability are effectively being asked to reaudition with a complete stranger for the same money they're already getting—not with the medical specialists that they've been used to over the years or have already received medical reports from, but with a panel of medical people they need to select from. We know that they've already had to convince a range of medical and allied health professionals, and NDIS officials, that they're eligible for the NDIS.
The rollout of independent assessments is a radical plan. I can tell you right now that advocates and participants are wondering whether this is not just a way of cost cutting, cutting people's plans. The reality is that this reform is based on shaky evidence and doesn't necessarily promise a fix for the problems with consistency and fairness in planning as outlined in this report. The government says that there's a new approach for planning which will be underpinned by the introduction of independent assessments later in 2021. Advocates and participants are, at best, very unsure about how this process is going to work. At worst, they believe that this is a way to cut their support. But it also adds stress to the planning process. It is stressful. You can imagine, if you had to go through it, how stressful it would be to talk to somebody and, at the moment, perhaps talk to somebody that doesn't even understand anything about your disability or the supports that you need. Here we have the government introducing independent assessments and lauding that as some sort of reform that's going to fix the issue around having fully costed, detailed draft plans. That's not going to happen, because they don't talk to participants or advocates or family members. (Time expired)
I seek leave to continue my remarks later.
Leave granted; debate adjourned.
Public Works Committee
Report
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That the Senate take note of the report.
Senator THORPE (Victoria) (18:23): I rise to speak on the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works first report of 2021 on the Australian War Memorial Development Project. My great-great-grandfather fought and died for this country. He was awarded a military medal in World War I. He was never to return; he's still buried overseas. Not only was he oppressed in his own country; he then went to fight for the same country that oppressed him and sent him and our family onto a mission reserve, where we couldn't speak our language, we weren't free to roam, we weren't allowed to work—and the list goes on.
The Australian War Memorial is a shrine, a museum and an archive whose main purpose is to commemorate the sacrifice of those who have died in a war as well as creating an understanding of this country's wartime experience. This memorial is being given half a billion dollars for refurbishment, and this report recommends that it go ahead. I note that this proposal has been slammed as wasteful by others, particularly as it would involve the demolition of Anzac Hall. I will let others speak to what the proposal to redevelop the memorial includes, but I'm here to talk about what it doesn't include. It does not include anything of significance about the Frontier Wars. The Medical Association for the Prevention of War made a submission to this committee's inquiry where they said:
A proposed huge redevelopment of the AWM which continues to pay marginal attention to the Frontier Wars, the conflicts that have had a profound and lasting impact on the descendants of this land's original inhabitants, simply magnifies the deep stain of colonial dispossession on our national story.
'The Frontier Wars' refers to the conflicts between our people and the colonial settlers during the British invasion of this continent, beginning not long after the landing of the First Fleet in 1788, with the latest clashes happening as late as 1934. It is estimated that at least 40,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men, women, boys, girls and babies were killed. They were murdered. The very foundation of this country was paid for by our blood. Thousands of schoolchildren visit the War Memorial every year. There are also thousands of overseas visitors who go to the War Memorial to learn about our history as a country, and each and every single one of them will leave the memorial none the wiser about what happened here. The Hawkesbury, Bathurst and Nepean wars are not explored. The wars on the Liverpool Plains are not commemorated. The Tasmanian Black War is not explained. None of the massacres are properly listed or commemorated.
How can the War Memorial tell the story of this country without starting from the very beginning? How can we live in peace and expect peace when we can't even tell the truth? Many of the people watching or listening to this debate today are not aware of the brutality of colonisation and the wars fought right here on these shores. At the dawn service on Invasion Day, 26 January, we commemorated the Convincing Ground massacre, a massacre of approximately 200 Gunditjmara people, my people, who were brutally massacred by British whalers. The Convincing Ground is probably the first recorded massacre site in Victoria—one of, sadly, hundreds. The site of the massacre was in Portland Bay in western Victoria. The dispute arose over a beached whale. Our people asserted their right to the whale as traditional food, as we have done for thousands of years on our country, except British whalers wanted the whale for themselves, so they opened fire on our people, killing all but two of us. The Convincing Ground massacre was part of the wider Eumeralla Wars between British colonisers and Gunditjmara people. Up to 6,500 Gunditjmara people were killed in the Eumeralla wars. That's over 10 times the number of Australian lives that were tragically lost in the American war in Vietnam. Where's our memorial? What, don't we matter? Really? Where in this redevelopment are our people honoured, our sacrifices talked about and our history shared, which is your history too?
I feel sorry for every visitor to the memorial, because they will leave there none the wiser as to the truth of what happened. This government continues to perpetrate the lie. Let's be honest, this country's very foundation was based on a lie: terra nullius. It's not like this issue didn't come up at the committee inquiry. It's just that, so many people in this place, from the Prime Minister all the way down, would rather see us as a monument and not for who we are—a proud people who are still here, a people who were killed in a bloody conflict, right here under our feet.
This is no more evident than when any visitor who wants to learn about our history just walks into the memorial courtyard. In that beautiful courtyard, they will see 26 sandstone gargoyles: a kookaburra, a wombat, an emu, a frog, a carpet snake, and a gargoyle of an Aboriginal man and an Aboriginal woman. Really? The War Memorial of this place is happy to have gargoyles for our people in the memorial courtyard, with dirty rainwater pouring out of our mouths. But they will not commemorate and tell the truth about the frontier wars in the galleries inside.
These gargoyles were part of the original building in 1941, and they're still there. Despite spending half a billion dollars on redeveloping the memorial, the gargoyles will stay. I can't believe I'm saying this! Don't you get it? Don't you understand? We are the world's oldest living culture. We're not just from this country; we are of this country. The way the memorial treats us is indicative of how you view us. The Aboriginal gargoyles are products of the frontier wars. They are the only representation visitors will see of the wars that happened here and of a violent history of colonisation and of stolen lands, lives, children and identities.
The War Memorial is happy to have us silent, set in stone, in our place, but will not recognise how many of us died here at the end of a British gun or bayonet. A Senate committee in 2015 heard that the gargoyles would be refurbished and that the project would cost $1.6 million. Those gargoyles are still there. The government spent $1.6 million redoing them. It's shameful that I have to come here to the Senate to tell everyone that we are not monuments, that our culture is not set in stone, but we are here and we ain't going anywhere, and it's time to tell the truth in this country. I seek leave to continue my remarks later.
Leave granted; debate adjourned.
COMMITTEES
Consideration
The following committee reports and government responses were considered:
Public Works—Joint Statutory Committee—1st report of 2021—Referral made in April 2020, dated February 2021.
National Disability Insurance Scheme—Joint Standing Committee—Final report—NDIS planning—Government response, dated February 2021.
QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: ADDITIONAL ANSWERS
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator SESELJA (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for International Development and the Pacific) (18:34): I table a response to a question taken on notice asked by Senator Wong on 17 February 2021. I seek leave to have the answer incorporated in Hansard.
Leave granted.
The answer read as follows—
Dear Mr President,
On Wednesday 17 February 2021, Senator Wong wrote to Senate the Hon Simon Birmingham, Leader of the Government in the Senate, seeking a response from me in respect of a number of questions I took on notice.
I responded to those questions in my statement to the Chamber at the commencement of Questions Without Notice on Thursday 18 February 2021.
I trust this addresses Senator Wong's concerns.
Yours sincerely
Linda Reynolds
Employment
Senator SESELJA (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for International Development and the Pacific) (18:34): I table a response to a question taken on notice asked by Senator Gallacher on 22 February 2021 relating to the JobMaker hiring credit scheme. I seek leave to have the answer incorporated in Hansard.
Leave granted.
The answer read as follows—
Dear Mr President
I write with regard to a question I took on notice from Senator Gallacher during Question Time, Monday 22 February 2021, on the matter of the JobMaker Hiring Credit Scheme.
I can advise that eligible employers can access the JobMaker Hiring Credit for each eligible additional employee they hire between 7 October 2020 and 6 October 2021. From 6 December 2020, employers were able to register with the ATO for the Hiring Credit.
Once registered, employers can claim payments from the ATO in arrears from 1 February 2021.
The claim period for first quarter (7 October 2020 to 6 January 2021) only opened at the start of this month and employers have until 30 April 2021 to lodge a claim. At this early stage, accurate data on the number of claims and the value of payments is not available. Accurate data will be available in due course.
I have copied this letter to the Prime Minister, the Treasurer and Senator Gallacher. Yours sincerely
Simon Birmingham
Minister for Finance
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator SESELJA (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for International Development and the Pacific) (18:34): I table a response to a question taken on notice asked by Senator Wong today relating to the meetings with the AFP. I seek leave to have the answer incorporated in Hansard.
Leave granted.
The answer read as follows—
Dear Mr President
Today in Question Time, I took questions on notice from Senator Wong concerning statements I had made in regards to meetings with the Australian Federal Police (AFP).
In response to those questions, I write to you to advise the following, and correct some of my previous statements:
- On 1 April 2019 I met with my then Chief of Staff and Brittany Higgins, following which I organised for Brittany to meet with the AFP - a meeting that I believe occurred later that day.
- I did not meet with the AFP on l April 2019.
- I confirm that on 4 April 2019 I met with the AFP. 1commenced the meeting alone, and I was then joined for a brief period by my then chief-of-staff. Ms Higgins was not present at that meeting.
l trust this addresses Senator Wong's concerns.
Yours sincerely
Linda Reynolds
COMMITTEES
Australia's Family Law System Joint Select Committee
Reporting Date
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT (18:35): The President has received a message from the House of Representatives agreeing to the Senate resolution extending the time for the Joint Select Committee on Australia's Family Law System to report.
BILLS
Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
to which the following amendment was moved:
At the end of the motion, add: ", but the Senate:
(a) notes that:
(i) Australia has one of the most concentrated media markets in the world,
(ii) since the Government's changes to media law in 2017, there have been alarming contractions and warning signs of
market failure in Australia's media landscape, and
(iii) the Bill was introduced 18 months after the ACCC delivered the Final Report of the Digital Platforms Inquiry in
June 2019 and does not address all of the ACCC's recommendations to support public interest journalism; and
(b) calls on the Government to:
(i) do more to support public interest journalism in Australia as a matter of urgency,
(ii) deliver a support and transition package to assist news media publishers unduly negatively impacted as a
consequence of this Bill, and
(iii) make appropriate provision to ensure the viability of AAP newswire as a matter of priority".
Senator McLACHLAN (South Australia) (18:35): I rise to continue my remarks on the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021. Before I had to give way to question time, I was reflecting that this bill hasn't come to us, as I was suggesting, fully formed from the head of Zeus but after almost three years of public consultation following extensive analysis by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the ACCC. What gives me comfort about the extent of the market intervention is, particularly, the paragraph as expressed by the minister responsible for the bill in the other place:
The Code creates a framework for parties to reach commercial agreements so that news media businesses are fairly remunerated for the content they generate—
which the digital platforms benefit from. That's the essence, or the driver, for the creation of this bill and, in essence, is the guiding light for the extent to which the government is seeking to intervene in the market. Intervention always carries some risk of unintended consequences, and that is why a review has been implemented.
I think I finished my comments with a quote from Clive James, and I'll say it again, 'The last stage of fitting the product to the market is fitting the market to the product.' It's very much an apt description, although I don't think he was saying it in this context of the large-scale tech companies. We have been here before: monopolistic practices have been around since ancient Rome, and, indeed, things like salt were traded under imperial mandates. The benefit of the monopoly is that infrastructure is built extremely fast at a low cost. The problem is that eventually you kill off innovation because there is no competition, and some historians suggest that it was effectively the fall of ancient Rome and the Reformation that brought to the European economy both competition and innovation.
Similarly, in the United States, particularly before and then after the American revolution, there were a number of large corporations that had to be granted exclusive contracts because there was a need for large-scale public works. So the benefit of the monopolies they created was that infrastructure was created at a reasonable pace, but of course, eventually, they had a large-scale debate across the country on whether they would break up the monopolies. This debate continues to this day, because we have before us a debate around the world about whether you regulate large tech, you intervene in the market or, in fact, you have a more extreme intervention with the breaking up of those companies—and I don't intend to express a view on that today; it's outside the scope of the bill. But we are joined by an international community of legislators who are grappling with the problem.
We are, rightly, endeavouring to keep the pricing of journalism appropriate in our economy from organisations that have global reach and to some extent have developed an attitude of being too big to care. They provide extremely valuable services, as we've seen with the decision of Facebook, which I understand has been reversed, which has prevented Australians from seeking information regarding essential services. But we need to reflect that they set the rules and they determine how their infrastructure is being used, and I think that we need to start to think about the internet and these large platforms as infrastructure.
We spend much of the time in this place discussing banks and their interaction with ordinary members of the community. A similar attitude needs to be taken by this parliament about the services that are provided—who sets the rules—not only in how they are accessed but how the infrastructure is being used. This has been alluded to by many other speakers in this debate—the potential threat to not only new business creation but also to democracy at large.
Philosophically, I often reflect that large tech tends to compete for a whole market, to effectively be the market, as opposed to competing within the market. Our legislative view of big tech needs to take into account that we cannot allow that sort of practice to drive ongoing behaviours where winners take all. We are elected here to care for and to show compassion for our community and to make sure they are looked after. The executives of large tech are not elected to care.
I would hope that the hope of every senator in this chamber would be that big tech would exercise social responsibility. Obviously that is still in question and, thus, we need to act. I would like to think this is the last market intervention, but I doubt it. We are on a road of continuous review and reform and we will often be guided by what happens overseas. I'm very interested in the French model, which has taken the approach of copyright. I'm hopeful, maybe aspirational, that this parliament will not avert its gaze from the operations of these platforms in the future. We all know how much the community relies on social media for communication—bushfires come to mind. Our youth were brought up on it, not like my generation, who had to learn it as we went through. I suppose the essence of this debate is very much about social licence. How much social licence are we expecting from these companies? How much social licence do they wish to take on board? And, where they fall short, to what extent are we going to have to intervene? They have incredible power and it does cause me great concern.
I come back to the surety I have in the one-year review, the rigour of the ACCC's analysis and also in our own internal parliamentary processes. I would like to think that, in a year's time, we can celebrate no further regulation. But the next big issue facing us, as has been alluded to by other members, is not only the amount of the tax they pay but also the privacy of the individual user. The individual should be free to interact with these organisations in an open and transparent way and not be an unwitting provider of corporate surveillance, which drives their profits. On that note, I commend the bill to the chamber.
Senator DAVEY (New South Wales—Nationals Whip in the Senate) (18:43): I also rise to commend the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 to the Senate. I just want to talk very briefly about some parts of the bill that have not necessarily garnished as much focus as other parts. I mean, we have heard a lot about the Facebook news ban and the fact that people couldn't find information, not only from the Bureau of Meteorology and a number of other sites that one would argue are not news sites but also from the sites that were wiped in the unilateral move by Facebook in its attempt to have us reject this bill. I am very pleased that we have not flinched and we have not stood down from our resolve to actually implement regulations. Essentially, that's what it comes down to: at the end of the day, this is not about big tech paying big media; this is about big tech paying news media organisations so they can pay their journalists. It is only fair that people are paid for their work. These news sites are populated by articles written by journalists: individuals who deserve a salary and due recognition for the work that they do.
We've heard that Google has entered into agreements with some of the larger media organisations, such as News Corp and Guardian. I commend Google for taking that proactive approach before the regulation has been brought in. Very importantly, this bill also addresses smaller news media organisations, enabling them to be remunerated for their content. This code provides for digital platforms to publish what will be known as 'standard offers' on their websites. A small independent news organisation that's registered through the Australian Communications and Media Authority can then seek to participate in that standard offer, which will save a fortune in both time and money by them not having to go through the negotiation, mediation and, potentially, arbitration, of negotiating an individual agreement with the big tech companies. Some of these smaller organisations are also members of larger groups. You might have several newspapers operating in semi-independent structures that belong to a single group, like the McPherson Media Group, based out of Shepparton in regional Victoria, which is also the owner of several semi-independent newspapers under that banner. They can come together and collectively negotiate their own agreement under this code, which is a really important aspect of the code. There is also Country Press Australia, an organisation which brings together 81 members and 160 regional newspapers. They represent the rights of those regional, rural newspapers that service small communities like mine and that provide a foundation for those communities. Under this code, Country Press Australia, on behalf of all their members, can negotiate an agreement with the big tech firms that can apply to all of their members. That is a really important factor that I don't think has had enough attention in today's debate.
This is not just about big business. As I said at the outset, it is about journalists getting remuneration through this code but it's also about communities being able to access their choice of news through these digital platforms. For these reasons I commend this bill to the chamber.
Senator HUME (Victoria—Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy) (18:48): Firstly I would like to thank those senators that have contributed to this debate. This bill, the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021, establishes a world-first mandatory code to address the bargaining power imbalance that exists between digital platforms and Australian news media businesses.
Consumers are now obtaining more and more news online while, at the same time, digital platforms are thriving with their advertising revenues growing in leaps and bounds. In these circumstances it is unacceptable that digital platforms continue to earn revenue from news content created by Australian news media businesses without fairly remunerating them. The ACCC found that this situation arises because of an imbalance of bargaining power between digital platforms and local news businesses. The code addresses this problem in a fair and flexible way. It is a key part of the government's strategy to ensure that Australians continue to enjoy the benefits of digital technology while at the same time protecting key elements of Australian society, such as a strong, sustainable and independent Australian news media. The code will be reviewed by Treasury one year after its operation, to ensure that it is delivering on its outcomes and that the outcomes are consistent with the government's policy intent.
I thank the Senate Economics Legislation Committee for its consideration of this bill and welcome the finding that it will help safeguard public interest journalism in Australia. I note the additional comments from Labor senators and, in particular, their view that the government's work on the code has improved the responsiveness of digital platforms to the news media businesses.
I also want to address the additional comments from the Australian Greens in the Senate economics committee report and the additional recommendations that they put forward. The government does not support the Greens' recommendations. The Morrison government is a strong supporter of public interest news and, in June 2020, announced that 107 regional publishers and broadcasters would receive a share of $50 million in funding as part of the Public Interest News Gathering program, the PING. Of the 107 eligible applicants, 92 are regional publishers, 13 are regional radio broadcasters and five are regional television broadcasters, the majority of which operate as small to medium businesses. I can further advise the Senate—and this goes directly to Senator Pratt's amendment to the second reading motion, which the government will also be opposing—that in September 2020 the minister for communications announced that $5 million of funding would be provided to AAP Newswire to enable them to continue to offer their services to more than 250 regional mastheads that are serving local communities.
Senator McKim's amendment goes to the collection of data. I note that, on 12 December 2019, the Attorney-General announced that the government would conduct a review of the Privacy Act 1988 to ensure that privacy settings empower consumers, protect their data and best serve the Australian economy. The review was announced as part of the government's response to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's Digital Platforms Inquiry. The issues raised by Senator McKim should be addressed in the context of that review rather than this legislation.
Similarly, the Senate is currently conducting an inquiry into the concentration of news media in Australia—the subject of Senator Waters's amendment. The government does not support the contention in Senator Waters's amendment, and those issues should be addressed in the committee context rather than in the context of this bill's second reading debate.
With regard to Senator Hanson-Young's amendment to the motion on the ABC, the government does not support that amendment, and I note that the ABC has more funding certainty than any other media company in Australia, and that is because taxpayers provide the ABC with over $1 billion in funding every year. I also note that the government has been very clear that any proceeds that the ABC receives from Google or from Facebook under the news media bargaining code are not going to be debited from, or lead to a reduction in, the funding that the government is otherwise providing to the ABC. I commend this bill to the Senate.
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: There are a number of second reading amendments. We will start with the amendment standing in the name of Senator Pratt.
The PRESIDENT: The question is that the second reading amendment moved by Senator Pratt be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [18:59]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Senator HANSON-YOUNG (South Australia) (19:01): I move:
At the end of the motion, add: ", but the Senate:
(a) notes that on 8 December 2020, Minister for Communications, the Honourable Paul Fletcher MP, stated that the 'commitment from the ABC is about funding they receive under the Code, should they receive remuneration under the Code, that that would go to regional journalism…there's no intention on our part to in some way offset that'; and
(b) calls on the Government to guarantee that revenue collected by the ABC through deals done under the Code will not be offset by any reduction in government funding".
The PRESIDENT: The question is that the second reading amendment moved by Senator Hanson-Young be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [19:03]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Senator WATERS (Queensland—Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (19:05): I move the Greens amendment on sheet 1213:
At the end of the motion, add: ", but the Senate:
(a) notes that:
(i) billionaire Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation controls much of the Australian media,
(ii) billionaire Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook controls much of Australia's online activity, and
(iii) both big corporations pay little to no tax in Australia; and
(b) is of the opinion that implementing a media code is not the best way of addressing the growing power of the billionaires and the big corporations; and
(c) calls on the Government to deal with the growing concentration of media and online ownership by implementing new tax measures, funding public interest journalism and increasing media divers
The PRESIDENT: The question is the second reading amendment on sheet 1213, moved by Senator Waters, be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [19:07]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Senator McKIM (Tasmania—Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (19:11): I move:
At the end of the motion, add: ", but the Senate is of the opinion that:
(a) Australians should have more control over how companies collect data about them online, who has access to that data, and how, and for what purposes, that data is used;
(b) concerns over privacy, and the use of personal data for commercial gain, can no longer be ignored by the Government; and
(c) the Government must implement, as a matter of priority, protections equivalent to the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation".
The PRESIDENT: The question is that the second reading amendment moved by Senator McKim be agreed to.
The Senate divided. [19:15]
(The President—Senator Ryan)
Senator HUME (Victoria—Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy) (19:19): I table a supplementary explanatory memorandum relating to the government amendments to be moved to this bill.
ADJOURNMENT
The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Brockman ) (19:20): It being 7.20 pm, I propose the question:
That the Senate do now adjourn.
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Senator BRAGG (New South Wales) (19:20): I rise tonight to speak about the ABC. Again, I put on the public record that I am a big supporter of the ABC. I think it does an outstanding job, for the most part, and it's very important that the ABC maintain its very high standards. Of course, the ABC, like the BBC, its brother or sister organisation in the UK, has had some issues with impartiality over the course of the years. One of the good things that the BBC has done under its director-general, Tim Davie, is put in place an edict so that BBC employees are forced to maintain impartiality in their dealings. It's very important to maintain confidence in public broadcasting. Tim Davie has said, 'Impartiality is the foundation on which we deliver insightful, exciting and groundbreaking stories. These guidelines are intended to help us continue to deliver this and build audience trust.'
Now, I raised these very good guidelines with Mr David Anderson, the managing director of the ABC, on multiple occasions at estimates last year, and the ABC has now followed suit. It has put out a code of conduct which deals with the personal use of social media. I think this is very, very welcome. This, of course, follows some unfortunate tweets last year by ABC staff, in which they referred to ideological bastardry and hoped people were feeling smug, which I think was very unfortunate. The ABC, under Mr Anderson, has now said that the guidelines for personal use of social media will be dealt with in accordance with relevant ABC employment agreements and may lead to disciplinary action, including possible termination of employment, if they are contravened. One of the key standards—there are four—is to not mix the professional and the personal in ways that are likely to bring the ABC into disrepute. This is good stuff by the ABC and David Anderson. They are incremental but very important changes which will ensure the integrity and impartiality of our public broadcaster.
This has been a week in which we can reflect on the great value of the ABC. When Facebook, in the dispute which I believe we are about to win with the big tech publishers, decided to switch off news, Australians could access news through the ABC, The Guardian, news.com.au and Sky News, but they always knew in their hearts that they could get ABC news on their apps and on their websites, because we spend $1 billion of taxpayers' funds each year to ensure that good news is available to all Australians. I think it has been a very important week for us to reflect upon the value of the ABC.
Now, I am concerned that the ABC is in business with people it should not be in business with. It has emerged from estimates and from my correspondence with Mr Anderson that the ABC is in business with an organisation called the New Daily, which is owned by a bunch of lobbyists who are owned by the Industry SuperFunds people. This, I think, is a grave error by the ABC because, in getting into business with a hyperpartisan lobbyist, it is putting at risk its veneer of independence, which I think it is on the cusp of crossing a new Rubicon on. I think that these statements from David Anderson are very welcome because they show the organisation's commitment to impartiality. How can you be impartial if you're doing deals with the super fund lobbyists, whose only mission in life is to distort the public record in relation to this huge experiment of superannuation? These are the most cashed-up lobbyists on earth. Who could imagine an organisation that is so rich it can run its own newspaper, the New Daily, and have an agreement with the national broadcaster? I think it's important that the ABC terminate this agreement. I'm going to write to David Anderson and ask him to terminate that agreement and, if it's not terminated, I will seek to introduce legislation to terminate all future agreements.
North Queensland: Insurance
Senator GREEN (Queensland) (19:25): I rise tonight to speak on a very important economic issue impacting North Queensland, particularly Far North Queensland. I have spoken on many occasions about the North Queensland insurance crisis in this place, because the cost of insurance in North Queensland continues to go up and this government continues to do nothing to fix it. The Morrison government has already failed to deliver on its promise to drive down the cost of insurance premiums and improve the availability for residents in northern Australia. The Assistant Treasurer said that this was an issue of such importance that the government was going to respond to the ACCC's findings before the ACCC handed down its final report. This did not happen. For the last seven years, members of this government, including the member for Leichhardt, the member for Dawson and now the member for Herbert, have promised to fix this crisis, yet they have failed to implement one single recommendation from the ACCC reports. We know that they've been describing this as a crisis for a long time, even as far back as 2015, yet nothing has been done. The government is not taking mitigation funding seriously, one of the big recommendations from the report, one of the things that insurers say will bring down prices in northern Australia. Out of $4 billion announced in the government's Emergency Response Fund, not one single dollar has been spent. Currently only three per cent of natural disaster funding is being spent on mitigation.
The members in Far North Queensland and North Queensland, particularly the member for Dawson—but now the member of Herbert has jumped on this as well—have spent a lot of time holding forums and talkfests, talking about what they are going to do to fix this problem. Yet, since the ACCC handed down its first interim report on 18 December 2018, of the 15 recommendations from that report, not one has been implemented. Of the 28 recommendations from the second interim report, released a year later, on 20 December 2019, not one single recommendation has been implemented. Most recently, on 20 January 2021, the ACCC handed down its final report, after three years of investigating this incredibly important issue. Not a single one of those recommendations has been implemented by this government.
In fact, the local members in Far North Queensland and North Queensland have decided that they don't like the ACCC report because it's not giving them the answers that they want. They've decided that the recommendations of the ACCC report, after all that hard work and cost to produce them, aren't something they are interested in implementing. They are out there talking about a reinsurance pool, but we know the ACCC recommended strongly against this course of action. The ACCC said it probably wouldn't work and, if it were implemented, it would cost a lot of money. That's not what the member for Herbert or the member for Dawson are out there telling people; they are saying this is going to be the magic bullet: 'Forget about the ACCC recommendations, all 38 of them; we don't need to implement those. What we need to do is find another solution to talk to you about that takes the blame off us, that takes the impetus off us to do something about this.'
The ACCC made recommendations around consumer behaviour, around mitigation, around banning broker commissions, around introducing a comparison website and around regulatory changes, and not one single recommendation has been implemented by this government. The government haven't even said if they are planning on implementing these recommendations. People in Far North Queensland and North Queensland are getting pretty sick and tired of hearing members of this government say that this is a huge problem, that this is a crisis, that it needs to be fixed but we don't have the answers to fix it. Roll up your sleeves, do the hard work, listen to the recommendations that have been handed down and find some solutions, because our economic recovery in North Queensland depends on getting this right. This isn't mudslinging from the opposition; this is just asking those opposite to do your job. Do your job and fix the insurance crisis now.
Employment
Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (19:30): I rise this evening to speak on mutual obligations and employment providers. Today the government announced, as part of that dreadful announcement on the JobSeeker payment, a reporting line so employers can dob in people to the government if people are in an employment program and, in the government's words, 'refuse to take a job'. But we hear absolute crickets from the government on the employment programs and providers that are being paid a lot of money to find these magical jobs when we have 1.5 million people on JobSeeker and youth allowance and 175,000 jobs available. Those figures just don't match. This is all part of the sick obsession of this government, with their picking on and blaming people for the fact that they can't find a job. In the light of those figures, it's hardly surprising. And that's during a pandemic and a recession.
For many years my office has been contacted by people who have been bullied, harassed, ignored or treated very poorly by their employment service providers. I asked people in the community how they are going with their providers, so I could share some of these accounts with the Senate. To date—and I only asked over the weekend—I've had 700 responses, so I'll only be able to share a handful with you now. I'm quoting the messages that I got. One said: 'My absolute low point was when I was turned down for a job washing dishes because the employer believed I was overqualified.'
Another said: 'I was diagnosed with a degenerative muscular disease and need ongoing physio. Due to the loss of muscle tone, I have to drag my right leg upstairs and often can't climb them at all. My job network provider thought it would be a really great idea to enrol me in a forklift course. The problem is that there are steep narrow steps to get on the forklift. Imagine my embarrassment when I couldn't climb on the forklift, with everyone in the class watching. I was then told I couldn't complete the course. In response, my JSP accused me of not trying hard enough and threatened to have my payment suspended.'
Another said: 'Pre-COVID I was told by my employment consultant that I wasn't trying hard enough to find work. They made me come in every day, under his supervision, to look for work as my "methods obviously aren't working". I am in my 50s, with a partial capacity to work. I really didn't anticipate his attitude or approach. I do not feel supported at all. I am legally blind and also have a chronic health condition that is so life-threatening that I have a medical alarm at home.'
Another person: 'One time, I had to change my meeting time to earlier in the day to accommodate a job interview. I contacted my JSP and was told it was all okay. Half an hour after the job interview finished I received a message saying I'd missed my JSP meeting and would have my payment temporarily suspended. I've been in a payment for just under a year. In that time my provider has spoken to me only twice. I was actively trying to get assistance from them, even when there was no mutual obligation, but they were nowhere to be found. I've applied for more than 70 jobs this year, in 2021, with absolutely no support whatsoever, not from writing applications, finding jobs to apply for or interviews. My job provider repeatedly ignored my emails and never called me back. The only time they contacted me was when they wanted copies of my payslips when I started working. I found out later that they wanted my payslips because they got bonuses for getting me a job. So I refused to send them. I missed an appointment over the phone that fell outside the time I was told to expect the call. In the time it took for me to call back, less than five minutes, they had already put my payment on hold. I couldn't get through to my consultant to figure out what had happened.'
And there's this one: 'My son has been suicidal for a few years and was finally well enough to return to university studies, last semester, doing one unit. He recently got a call from his JSP informing him that as he is no longer suicidal he needs to either get a job or study full time.' I should have issued a trigger warning when I read that out.
These are the lived experiences of people trying to get appointments and help from their job service provider. They're the very people—and I've got 700 of these; I'm sure I will have more soon—to whom the government are saying, 'It's okay, you can ring a job in a JobSeeker line.' It's appalling. (Time expired)
Freemasons Centre for Male Health and Wellbeing
Senator McLACHLAN (South Australia) (19:35): There is something exciting taking place in South Australia. It's another initiative that cements my state as the leader in medical research. It'll be of interest to my friends in the Northern Territory. The Freemasons Centre for Male Health and Wellbeing is a research alliance involving the masonic charities, the University of Adelaide and SAHMRI in South Australia.
The South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, SAHMRI, is South Australia's first independent health and medical research institute and home to more than 700 medical researchers. On Monday 8 February, I attended the official launch of this alliance, which was gracefully conducted by His Excellency the Hon. Hugh Van Lay, the Governor of South Australia. The centre has two divisions. There is one in South Australia and the other in the Northern Territory. The centre is the evolution of the Freemasons Foundation Centre for Men's Health, which was established in 2007, and is maintained through a $7.2 million partnership between the Freemasons Foundation and the University of Adelaide. Going forward, the centre will continue to be supported by the Masonic Charities, the new charitable arm of Freemasons South Australia and the Northern Territory, capably chaired by Mr John Behenna.
The organisation has committed to donating a minimum of $1.8 million over three years to the centre. They are funds that will be matched collectively by the research alliance partners. The centre brings together a multidisciplinary team of clinicians and researchers, undertaking research, delivering programs and preventing and treating conditions that continue to contribute to ill health and premature death in males. The conditions include prostate cancer and preconception health, as well as other particular conditions affecting men, such as obesity, diabetes, depression and sexual health.
The three partners are seeking to work together to tackle the biggest health challenges in society today. The entities have a natural alignment of values, which come together in the centre's mission statement. In summary, the mission statement says, 'Through benevolence, leadership and partnership, the centre will enable and undertake outstanding male health and wellbeing research.' This includes generating significant new knowledge, embracing innovation, advancing health and wellbeing education and seeking to have an enduring impact on individuals, families and communities.
Two speeches delivered at the opening particularly resonated with me. The chairman of the board, Dr Neil Jensen, spoke of the importance of the benevolence to Freemasons. He said that Freemasons are taught to be ever alert to the needs of others and to promote happiness. He saw the centre as an iteration of the desire for a better tomorrow. He said, 'Through the work of the centre see our great masonic family providing tangible help for our fellow citizens—men, women and children.' Professor Gary Wittert of the centre acknowledged the now 13-year history of the centre and the major investment of the University of Adelaide and the Freemasons South Australia and the Northern Territory, through the Freemasons Foundation and now Masonic Charities. He emphasised their incredible support and commitment that has led to the success and growth of the centre from originally a handful of researchers to now more than 50 researchers. All of the speeches embraced the theme of the importance in life of seeking knowledge to better the lives of others.
Along with my Northern Territory friends, I am proud that Australia's only multidisciplinary male health research centre calls South Australia and the Northern Territory home. I congratulate all those who have brought the Freemasons Centre for Male Health and Wellbeing to life.
International Women's Day
Senator WALSH (Victoria) (19:39): For over a century, International Women's Day has been an opportunity for women to take stock, re-energise and organise. This year's theme is 'Achieving an equal future in a COVID-19 world'. On 8 March we will acknowledge the immense contribution Australian women have made during the pandemic. Women have shouldered an enormous burden during COVID-19, as frontline workers, as parents and as carers. Women in caring professions have put their health and safety on the line for others, and too many of these women are in low-paid and insecure jobs—cleaners and aged-care, childcare, health and community services workers, to name just a few. We know that during the pandemic women have disproportionately taken on additional caring responsibilities at home, including homeschooling. But, even though we all spent much more time at home, women were still five times more likely to take on primary caring roles during the pandemic.
We also know that during last year women bore the brunt of the economic downturn. Women lost jobs at a greater rate than men, and women lost more hours of work than men. International Women's Day marks more than just one day each year. It actually represents an international movement that, every day of every year, continues to demand equality for women. In the Labor Party, we know that greater equality is not inevitable. We know that it must be fought for, and Labor will always fight for the women of Australia. We will always fight for good, secure jobs for the women of Australia, for equal pay, for the respect women deserve but still don't have—to be listened to and to be heard.
What do the women of Australia see when they look to the leader of this country? They see a person who is sending a message to every girl and every woman that they just don't matter. Prime Minister Morrison is not standing up for the women in his own party. He is not standing up for the women who work in this parliament. The women of Australia know that they can't count on him to stand up for them. As Senator Wong said in this chamber this week, Mr Morrison is arguably the most powerful person in the land. He sets standards that form cultural expectations. His actions and inactions shape the culture. So what does it say when the standards he sets in legislation currently before the House would hurt Australian women by cutting their wages and making their jobs less secure?
We are 12 months into this pandemic and into the economic crisis that it created, and the Prime Minister has offered absolutely nothing for the working women of Australia in the recovery. The Prime Minister has instead used the pandemic as cover to give businesses more power to cut the pay of Australian workers. He's abandoned women who are essential workers to wallow in insecure and casual work and he's robbed women of a comfortable retirement by making them raid their own superannuation savings to get by. The Prime Minister is making things worse for hardworking Australian women. He has set too many Australian women on the path to poverty and he won't stand up for the women of this country.
Queensland: Local Government
Senator ROBERTS (Queensland) (19:43): As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I wish to further discuss the corruption that continues in Queensland local government. This corruption is ripping off hundreds of millions of dollars of Commonwealth and state taxpayers' money. These moneys are being redirected, not spent on their intended purposes, not spent at all or corruptly provided to persons in exchange for overvalued materials and services. Emergency Management Australia, EMA, administers the National Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements, the NDRRA, and the Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements, the DRFA, funding on behalf of the Australian government. Seventy-five per cent of the funds are from the Australian government, and the remainder is reimbursed by the Queensland state government. The Queensland Reconstruction Authority, QRA, and Emergency Management Queensland, EMQ, coordinate disaster funding in Queensland. Queensland councils received $5.4 billion in NDRRA funds from 2011 to 2019. This may be a billion-dollar scandal.
Recent royal commissions into aged care, institutional abuse and banking practices only came about after much opposition. Look how much evidence surfaced when people were able to come forward to tell their stories. This inquiry is urgently needed. The councils and the Local Government Association of Queensland facilitate a system where contractors make huge profits from road-building by fraudulently claiming payments and stripping 40 to 60 per cent out of NDRRA funding as private profits. These practices are widespread across Queensland. At the heart of this local government corruption has been the Local Government Association of Queensland, the LGAQ, a private company that has a special relationship with the Queensland government and is not obliged to go to tender when contracting with councils.
This lack of transparency breeds corruption. What makes the LGAQ unique is the special statutory provisions that make the LGAQ virtually unaccountable for their actions. Under rule 234 of the Local Government Regulation 2012 a council is exempt from calling contracts to tender or calling quotes if the contract is entered into under an LGA arrangement. Can you imagine that? This includes a contract made with the LGAQ. Every contract the LGAQ enters involves a substantial fee being paid to the LGAQ. I will say that again. Every contract the LGAQ enters involves a substantial fee being paid to the LGAQ. It is classic cartel arrangement prohibited in any other state except Queensland, where it is legalised by rule 234.
Some of this information has been disclosed in the Queensland state parliament and directly to the CCC, which inexplicably declined to investigate. Many complaints to the CCC about a council are sent back to the council to investigate itself; actual CCC investigation is rare. A research paper prepared by Professor Timothy Prenzler into the complaints sent to the CCC found that less than two per cent of complaints were investigated and the other 98 per cent largely disappeared. Why?
After I alerted the Senate that I wished to put a motion to support a Senate select committee inquiry into this corruption, the LGAQ sent representatives to Canberra to try to stop the inquiry. Some mayors contacted the office of the local government minister, Mr Coulton, objecting to the inquiry. What are they afraid of? What do these mayors all have to hide? What do they think an inquiry will reveal? Is this an admission of guilt? A council with nothing to hide would welcome an opportunity to show how well it uses public money. Yet, when the motion was put to the vote, the government, Labor and the Greens voted against this anticorruption motion.
This was quite stunning. The government wishes to introduce an integrity bill, yet voted against an anti-integrity motion. The Greens believe the lies that complaints brought to the CCC had been investigated and found to be without substance. This is false. Key witnesses were never contacted, let alone questioned. Key locations were never inspected or visited. How could the Greens say this constituted an investigation? Crossbench senators Jacqui Lambie and Rex Patrick know I'm right and supported my motion. I thank these senators for their integrity. The mechanics of the corrupt practices are known and have been brought to the attention of the authorities. I call on the Senate to do the right thing. I will continue exposing this corruption and continue to seek a Senate select committee to protect taxpayers' money and to restore integrity.
Regional Australia: Tourism
Senator DAVEY (New South Wales—Nationals Whip in the Senate) (19:48): Today is another sad day for regional tourism. Regional tourism operators are really hoping that they can start to recover some of the money and business lost last year through the pandemic and as a result of border closures and restricted travel for well over 12 months. Today they woke to read that Rex Airlines is cutting some of its regional routes. They say they are doing this due to predatory behaviour by Qantas. However, the routes they are cutting are routes that only Rex services. It is a very sad day.
I understand that regional aviation is an expensive business to be in, and I also understand that businesses need to, at the very least, break even. At the same time, Qantas has announced that it will develop some new routes into regional areas, including, for example, Adelaide to Mount Gambier, Griffith to Sydney, and Melbourne to Merimbula. However, these are routes that are already serviced, whereas the routes that Rex cut in order to compete against Qantas on these new routes are routes that aren't serviced by anyone else. For example, the Bathurst to Sydney and Cooma to Sydney routes were only serviced by Rex. The community of Cooma had advocated for years to get an airline service back to their community so that people could travel to Sydney for business, for medical appointments or for recreation. We are now going to see that service closed down again. It must be heartbreaking for the community of Cooma. They're also cutting the Adelaide to King Island route; there is no easy alternative to get from Adelaide to King Island.
I can understand that the regional communities that depended upon these aviation routes must be feeling absolutely devastated, particularly the small businesses and tourism operators that had relied on people being able to get to their communities easily and efficiently and people living in these communities who relied on these airlines to get to things like medical appointments. Importantly, this move has longer-term impacts on the communities in rural and regional Australia. We know competition is a mechanism that helps drive efficiencies and potentially cut prices, but, where competition leads to a business undermining its own sustainability, it's not healthy competition at all. Competition that is a race to the bottom is a race that is lost to all.
I just want to let these regional communities know that I stand with them. I will be advocating on their behalf to all airlines to have a look at these regional routes and to reassess. Instead of looking at paths where they see an easy, competitive mechanism, maybe they could look for where the gaps are and at how to get people into regional Australia to help revive our regions, help their business and help other regional businesses across Australia.
Aged Care
Senator SHELDON (New South Wales) (19:52): On Friday this week the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety will hand down its final report. After more than two years, dozens of hearings, 20 research papers and millions of words of evidence, the royal commission will provide an authoritative perspective on aged care in Australia, as well as guidance on the path forward. Before then, however, the royal commission's verdict on this government's performance in this space has been unambiguous. They have let older Australians down—our parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, uncles, sisters, brothers and, of course, our community. The royal commission's interim report, released in 2019, explained the government's approach to aged care right in the title: Neglect. This damning report card was delivered before the COVID-19 pandemic hit and before 678 residents of aged-care facilities had died. It laid bare for all to see what the underfunding of staff and the neglect of patient needs and infection protocols meant.
As the duty senator for the Central Western New South Wales seat of Calare, I'm compelled to bring the heartbreaking example of Lithgow Aged Care Ltd to the attention of this this chamber. Like many regional centres, Lithgow's local aged-care centres have been struggling with inadequate funding to maintain care. Lithgow Aged Care received its first official sanction from the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission in 2019. On 15 February this year, the centre was audited by the commission and received a notice that the centre's accreditation would be revoked within eight weeks. That would, of course, require the centre to close. If the centre closes, 75 frail and vulnerable residents will be forcibly relocated further away from their families.
There are simply no beds in town, so the Department of Health has attempted to find places for them as far away as Western Sydney, which is a great inconvenience for those in the community and, of course, for those patients and residents. While there are repeal avenues available to the Senate, without a decisive intervention from the federal government 15 April will be the day that more than 120 staff will be made redundant and all the residents will be made homeless. Lithgow already struggles with chronic unemployment, so over 120 staff will find it difficult to find work. Meanwhile, the income from these jobs will be ripped out of the local economy.
Aged care is the responsibility of the federal government, and for eight years the coalition has slashed funding and further enabled the plunder of this vital public institution by 'rich listers', who become multimillionaires and billionaires on the backs of vulnerable people and underpaid care workers, often on the government dime. Since Scott Morrison was Treasurer and then Prime Minister, $1.7 billion has been ripped out of the aged-care budget. Even the government's own former aged-care minister delivered a scathing assessment of what the Liberal Party has done to aged care in this country and the revolving door of ministers who have failed older Australians.
The people of Lithgow in New South Wales can now speak to what their underfunding and neglect looks like. When the centre's board ran into difficulties running the centre, it was abandoned by this government. On his Facebook page the member for Calare, Andrew Gee, has a range of posts announcing funding for this centre, but, like the rest of the government, he is there for the photo-op and gone for the follow-up.
The ABC reported a story of Bill Burns, a local whose mother died three weeks prior to the meeting. He said the standard of care delivered at the home amounted to 'broken promises'. Another resident, Bronwyn Thompson, said she had observed 'systematic failures' at the home. Her father is a resident there, while her mother died there last year. Ms Thompson said, 'The staff are great but there's just not enough of them.'
If this centre is to close in April, I'm extremely concerned about the impact this will have on residents and staff in the local community. I'm calling upon the government to come up with a plan to provide continuity of care to these residents in the centre they are currently in.
Tasmania: Tarkine Region
Senator McKIM (Tasmania—Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate) (19:57): A couple of weeks ago, I went out into the southern part of the Tarkine, home for tens of thousands of years to the Tarkiner people. When I was out there I caught up with some great folk who are bravely defending some of the most magnificent forests on our planet. These forests are in a landscape that is a rich tapestry of Aboriginal cultural history, they are some of the most carbon-dense forests on the planet and they are home to some of the most beautiful and unique creatures on the planet. And of course the reason that these folk are out in these forests to receive visitors, such as me—and who are still out in those forests today, I might add—is because the logging industry of Tasmania, cheered on by the neo-Liberals in this place from the Liberal and National parties and the Australian Labor Party, have devastated that landscape, and I do mean devastated that landscape. Remember, they're not doing it for money, because every tree that's cut down actually costs the Tasmanian taxpayer money. There is no economic case to underpin native forest logging in Tasmania.
I particularly want to thank Viola, who I met for the first time nearly 50 metres up a giant Eucalyptus obliqua, a tree, and Viola was camped on a platform 50 metres up that tree. I somehow managed to haul myself, with nothing more than a few ropes and some prussik knots, nearly 50 metres up that tree. I lost a bit of bark, as we say in Tasmania—a little bit of skin—off the fingers on the way up and down. But if those people weren't out there, believe me, that beautiful, magnificent standing giant of our forests would have lost a lot more than bark; it would have lost its very existence. So I want to pay tribute to and thank every single person who's stood up to defend those forests, the creatures in them, the carbon in them and the Aboriginal cultural heritage that surrounds them, particularly, the people—including former senator Bob Brown—who have been arrested over the latter part of last year, and as recently as Monday this week, while putting their bodies on the line to defend those places. They are true heroes. Logging those forests is a crime against nature and a crime against our climate.
It reminds me of what's going on inside the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage area, where right now the Liberal government of Tasmania, under Premier Peter Gutwein, is actually privatising our World Heritage area. He's flogging it off for a pittance to tourism developers who gain exclusive rights. That means that we can't go to a place like Halls Island in Lake Malbena anymore, which is inside the Walls of Jerusalem National Park, inside the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage area—a place we have all agreed to protect on behalf of all of humanity because of its wilderness values and its cultural values. We're not allowed into our own World Heritage area. It is verboten for us to go to Halls Island because it has been hived off for a pittance to a tourism developer driven by greed and profit. Ordinary Australians are now forbidden from setting foot on Halls Island after having had that island open for any of us to go to since Europeans arrived here in this country—I mean, seriously.
I used to work as a wilderness guide. I did many seasons of wilderness guiding in Tasmania. I know two things. We need to protect wilderness for its own sake. That wilderness was there long before humanity ever set foot on this planet and it will be there long after we're gone, as long as we look after it. That's the first thing I know. And the second thing is this: for those in this place, and it is most of you, who can't see the value in anything unless you can attach a dollar sign and a job to it—I used to be a wilderness guide, as I said, and people used to come out in the wilderness with me and they would pay good dollars. They'd employ lots of people. They pay for a wilderness experience; they don't pay for mechanised noise like the helicopters that will service Halls Island.
Tasmania: COVID-19
Senator CHANDLER (Tasmania) (20:02): The economic consequences of the coronavirus pandemic could not have come at a less convenient time for Tasmania. In recent years my home state had turned an economic corner and was powering ahead, after years of budget mismanagement and economic turmoil under the previous state Labor-Greens government. Business confidence was up, retail trade was booming, cranes dominated the Hobart skyline, and Tasmania's reputation as a first-class visitor destination for interstate and international tourists alike was second to none. Tasmanians were feeling confident about the future. An increase in the number of jobs in the state meant Tasmanians were reconsidering their need to move to the mainland for work, reversing a sad historical trend.
Then the pandemic hit, bringing to a halt all of our positive momentum and slamming the brakes on the progress we had made over the last few years. I was worried that we would see a return to the bad old days where Tasmanians were leaving the state in droves, the unemployment rate was at an all-time high and business confidence was almost non-existent.
In the weeks following the initial fallout from the virus and over the course of 2020, the Morrison coalition government introduced unprecedented levels of support for individuals, families and businesses to weather the worst of the economic downturn. Budget initiatives in the form of tax cuts have helped ease cost-of-living pressures by putting more money back into the pockets of Australians.
Retail figures show that Tasmanians have been spending this money locally, taking up the call to support local business by buying Tasmanian produce and manufactured goods. Tasmanians have taken it upon themselves to spread the economic love across our state, responding to the call to holiday at home. We've relished the opportunity to get out and explore our own backyard, rediscovering places we haven't visited for an extended period or stopping off at locations we inevitably put off to travel further afield. Every cup of coffee, every petrol stop, every meal purchased and every overnight accommodation booked supports local businesses and jobs.
As a government, we have been focusing on investing in job-creating projects to further enhance Tasmania's economic recovery. A $150 million commitment to duplicate the Sorell and Midway Point causeways will improve the safety and travel time along this busy transport corridor. An investment in Tasmania's iconic tourism drawcards, including Freycinet National Park and the celebrated Overland Track, will ensure these sites can continue to welcome visitors for years to come. This kind of targeted investment is exactly the type of stimulus the economy needs right now, creating better public and community infrastructure and, most importantly, creating local jobs. While we still have a way to go, the seeds of our economic revival have begun to sprout and will only grow stronger over the course of this year.
The release of the Tasmanian Treasury's revised estimates report for the 2020-21 financial year has confirmed the island state is on the mend, and our economy is starting to recover from the crisis. Strong uptake of the Commonwealth and Tasmanian HomeBuilder grant program saw dwelling approvals skyrocket in December last year, with the number of dwelling approvals at more than 95 per cent above the same period in the previous year, creating increased activity in the building and construction sector and supporting jobs around the state.
The ABS labour force statistics released last week further confirm Tasmania's positive economic trajectory, with employment on par with pre-pandemic levels. Our unemployment rate is now the lowest of all the Australian states, at 5.9 per cent, having fallen a further per cent just in January. This is fantastic news for the island state, which, before the spread of COVID-19, was smashing economic records under the leadership of former Tasmanian Premier Will Hodgman and current Premier Peter Gutwein, with the support of a federal coalition government. This doesn't happen by accident.
As a government, we will be continuing our efforts to support job creation and create economic prosperity across Australia and throughout regional communities, particularly in Tasmania. The vaccination program is the next crucial step along our path to economic recovery, and the rollout, which commenced this week, has the economic forecast for 2021 looking more positive. My strong hope and the ambition I share with Tasmanians is that we can get our state back on track and continue on our journey towards economic prosperity as soon as possible. I'm confident we can build upon this success to come out of this crisis stronger than ever.
Western Australian State Election
Senator STEELE-JOHN (Western Australia) (20:07): All people, all human beings, everywhere in the world, should have access to the essentials we need to live a good life. All precious places and all plants and animals, everywhere in the world, should be protected and preserved. Over the last year, in our part of the world, people in our community have been struggling with the twin crises of COVID-19 and the continuing crisis of climate change. Many people who were struggling before COVID-19 hit are doing it even harder now. People have lost work and are staring down the barrel of losing the roof over their heads when rental moratoriums end in mere weeks.
The sense of uncertainty in the community and the sense of worry about the future is palpable in Western Australia, as it is across the entire country. This worry is exacerbated when people look to the very spaces where the solution should be being crafted—their parliaments at the state and federal levels—and yet what they see is sanctioned corruption. They see millions of dollars being funnelled from massive fossil fuel corporations like Chevron and Woodside—funnelling it into one door of the parliament and getting their legislation pumped out of the other.
In the state of Western Australia, what this means for us is that at a moment when we are faced with the opportunity to rebuild after COVID-19 in a way that addresses the climate crisis, in a way that delivers high-quality, free health care, education and affordable housing for everyone, we are instead opening up the Kimberley to fracking, we are instead selling off public housing and we are instead dodging action on climate change—throwing up smokescreens.
Mark McGowan's Labor government has been terrible when it comes to climate change. We are the only state without a renewable energy target. The state government has signed off on projects with emissions intensity four times greater than the Adani Carmichael mine—four times more polluting—at a moment in our history when we know we need to halve our emissions of carbon dioxide across the decade or face utter disaster.
It is these absences of action that are the wellspring of a deep frustration in the community when it comes to the major parties, because we look at them and we see the reality: whether you're blue or whether you're red, you're taking the same money from the same corporations and giving them the same outcomes, when it is not what the community wants. We as a community in Western Australia and across the country want to see action on climate change. We want to see every person have a roof over their head, a place to call home. We want to see education for all, high-quality and free, from cradle to grave. This is what we want. This is our demand to those who would seek to form a government in our name. On 13 March we as a community have an opportunity to vote, and I hope that we send many more Greens back to the parliament.
Members of Parliament
Senator ANTIC (South Australia) (20:12): I rise tonight to speak regarding a growing issue in Australian politics, being the increasing entrenchment of the political class in parliaments across the nation. This is a problem which has plagued the political landscape in the United States. As we speak, recently appointed US President Joe Biden is returning Washington to the political class by appointing a wave of long-time Democratic functionaries, political staffers and lobbyists to key positions in his administration. After all, what could be more diverse than a 78-year-old white bloke who has spent 47 years as a career politician?
Politics in the United States is being returned to the swamp, and Australia needs to be careful not to repeat those mistakes by bricking in a political elite of our own. The political class in this country, in the past 20 years, has been growing. Where did it come from? There has long been a view that the Australian Labor Party and, to an extent, the Australian Greens are too one-dimensional because they enter the workforce through a trade union or a political office and gain entry to parliament by organising numbers at a branch level. That is so much so that in 2017 former Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke warned that career politicians without enough life experience were letting the public down. Mr Hawke was quoted as saying:
My advice consistently to every young person who comes and asks me about [entering politics] is to make a life first.
But in 2021 a rising political class is no longer an issue solely for the Labor Party, as a culture of political elitism is affecting parties at all levels. Even former Liberal Party Prime Minister John Howard recently lamented the creep of political elites when he said:
We have too many people who enter Parliament now, particularly at state level, who have had no experience in life other than politics … If you're on my side, they skip the trade union and they go to the politicians … We have too many now and I think it's part of the problem we face.
Parliament is responsible for making and updating laws, for representing the people and for holding the government to account for its policies and actions. Parliament needs a range of views from the farthest reaches of our community. A life prior to politics, before parliament, is so important. Forget quotas and forget diversity based on gender, race, sexual orientation; we need to bring people into parliament from outside the political bubble to avoid stale thinking and cronyism. Beginning a career in a political or ministerial office means that, from a young age, a person surrounds themselves with politicians, lobbyists and other political staffers. It builds an expectation that the next step is a parliamentary career, and it builds a culture of entitlement. Such a limited professional experience perpetuates the culture of cronyism in politics and leaves people vulnerable to limited career prospects post parliament. The problem is universal. The problem with modern-day politics is the political class itself. Post politics, many ex-politicians become lobbyists, further perpetuating the culture of political entitlement.
Federally, the Liberal Party is lucky enough to have a broad range of experience in its ranks, with many ex-service people, doctors, small-business people and professionals. But politics needs people who have had careers and who have come to parliament prepared to speak their minds without fear or favour, to represent the interests of their constituencies and not watch the backs of their political allies or friends from other offices 10 years ago. There are many people who would like to consider a parliamentary career, but many who cannot crack the culture of political elitism. We should be pursuing those who might otherwise run in the opposite direction from public life. That doesn't come from political elites bricking in their own positions and padding out their post-politics lobbying careers by ensuring their allies gain preselection. We must make sure that we clear the way for everyday people to serve this country—good people who've served their country outside of a parliamentary bubble. That's real diversity. The political class cannot be allowed to dominate the field. Our country deserves better.
Members of Parliament: Staff
Senator FARUQI (New South Wales) (20:16): On 8 March, millions of people across the world will be marking International Women's Day. We will look back and reflect on how far we've come on gender equity. The sobering fact is that we will not see gender parity in our lifetime or our children's lifetime. On current tracking, it will take four to five generations to close the global gender gap. As a woman and as a feminist, that is unpalatable for me. We have fought very hard and we have won battles, many battles. But, when I think of what happens right here in my own workplace, reality hits me in the face. We haven't come very far at all. This week and last week I have been ashamed to work here. I have felt my skin crawl with disgust every time I have walked in here. I know that that is nothing compared to what the survivors of sexual assault must have been feeling. I am sorry that the Australian parliament is hurting and harming women.
Brittany Higgins has said that she was sexually assaulted right here in this building. These are allegations of an abhorrent crime committed against a young woman in a place that is charged with the responsibility of keeping our whole society safe. She has said she felt pressured not to proceed with a formal complaint, for fear of losing her job. Despite the silencing, Brittany Higgins has shown incredible courage by telling her story and bringing what has been done to her out of the shadows and into the light. Challenging the powerful and the privileged is never an easy task. It's even more difficult for survivors. She should not have had to do this. She should've been listened to and believed at the very start. She should've been safe in the first place.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison, under whose watch this horrific alleged crime was committed in one of his minister's offices, claims he knew nothing of it till last week. Frankly, this is hard to believe, given what we know now about how it was dealt with at the time. If he didn't know, then he presides over a culture of cover-ups. This is a culture of 'don't ask, don't tell' that he has cultivated. He is the highest authority in this country, and he must take responsibility.
The culture of Parliament House is broken. There is no doubt about that. But let's not sidestep the failures right at the very top of the broken culture: the failure of the Prime Minister and his ministers to support Brittany Higgins, who is still looking for justice two and a half years on, failure by ignoring and deflecting issues of bullying and harassment when they've been raised.
I often wonder if there is a single woman on this planet who has not experienced unwanted sexual advance, be it verbal or physical; subtle or blatant; young or old; white, brown or black; executive, teacher, student, political staffer, journalist or waitress; famous or completely anonymous. As women, no matter who we are, we are targets. Sexism and sexual abuse in the workplace comes in many shapes, from meetings where women are silenced, to uninvited touch and explicitly predatory behaviour and violent sexual crimes. It is part and parcel of the patriarchal order in dominant masculinity we all live with. Women get so used to sexual harassment that they feel they have to accept it or brush it off. There can be no starker example of that than what we have seen here in the last few days: obfuscation, deflection, victim blaming, everything but taking responsibility for actions. That's the oppression of patriarchy, right on display here.
It takes immense courage to speak your truth in a world where the perpetrators have the power and influence, and Brittany Higgins has shown that courage. This is the strength of women and the camaraderie between them that will eventually bring down the patriarchy that runs deep in parliament and our society. We will force you to listen, act—
The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator McLachlan ): Senator Scarr.
Fall of Singapore: 79th Anniversary
Senator SCARR (Queensland) (20:21): I rise today to speak about an event I attended on 14 February 2021, which was the commemoration of the 79th anniversary of the fall of Singapore during the Second World War. The commemoration was held at the Brisbane Shrine of Remembrance and was hosted by the 2/10th Field Regiment Association.
I'd like to thank the organisers of the event—in particular, the association and its committee, led by Ms Libby Parkinson, OAM, who has organised the annual service for the past 17 years. I'd like to especially thank Mrs Wendy Drysdale, OAM, who is known very well to my friend Senator James McGrath, who's here. He delivered a speech at the event this year that was very noble and moving. Mrs Wendy Drysdale has been in hospital. She's not well, and she helped organise this commemoration from her hospital bed. I think that's such a wonderful example of service to the community that we can all deeply respect. I can also acknowledge that it is a bit of a family affair. Mrs Wendy Drysdale's husband, Mr Jeff Drysdale, also assists as does their daughter Mrs Lizzie Drysdale-Gardiner and her husband, Mr Jason Gardiner.
I'd also like to thank Sergeant Major Brian Moore, who assisted with the catafalque party. I'd like to acknowledge the Hon. Jane Prentice—some people here would know her quite well—who served constituents in the seat of Ryan with great distinction for many years and who was also in attendance. I often say that those members who keep attending community events and giving to the community should be acknowledged. It's a sign that they served in this place with the right intent: to help the community. I'd also acknowledge Councillor Angela Owen, of the Salvation Army band, who was in attendance, the police, the QAS and everyone else.
The 2/10th lost something like a third of its contingent during the course of imprisonment under the Japanese. There's one story in particular that I'd like to share, which, after I first attended this event, I've carried with me always. That is the story of Dr Dominic Picone. Dr Picone had been a registrar at the Mater Hospital in Brisbane. He'd also practised as a GP at Cooroy. He was one of the three Australian medical officers who remained with the 2,400 Australian and British POWs at Sandakan. Mr Acting Deputy President, you would have heard—everyone here would have heard—of the Sandakan death marches. Dr Picone and 14 other POWs were executed by the Japanese on 27 August 1945. The war ended on 15 August 1945. Dr Picone and the 14 other POWs were executed by their captors 12 days after the end of the war so they could not give witness to the atrocities they had seen. I'd like to end this contribution this evening with the dedication that appears on the plaque honouring the 2/10th Field Regiment at the Australian War Memorial:
One great benefit to those of us who have survived is the tremendous feeling of comradeship or mateship that exists between us and our families. On our banner of honour, preceding the names of our comrades who were lost in battle, are the words: 'To live on in the hearts of those we leave behind is not to die.'
Gippsland: Logging
Senator THORPE (Victoria) (20:26): I rise to draw this place's attention to one of the most beautiful places in the world—
An honourable senator: Queensland.
Senator THORPE: the land of the Gunnai people, which is in East Gippsland, thanks, Senator. My people, the Gunnai people, are the traditional owners of what is now called Gippsland. It is told that the first Gunnai came down from the north-west mountains with a canoe on their head. We are the people of the mountains, of the seas and of the forests. Our people are not from country; we are of country. This is why it pains me that the ancient forests on Gunnai country in East Gippsland are under threat from clear-fell logging. To our people, these are not just forests. The forest, from the roots of the trees to the tips of their leaves, is our mother.
Today I want to thank the land defenders who have held off the desecration of country for almost four weeks up on the Errinundra Plateau. Our friends and allies are putting their bodies on the line, as we have for the last 200 years, to stop the planned logging of one of the last unburnt areas of forest on country. This country is a refuge for our wildlife, including our sacred totems and creator spirits. They need this land to survive. The Victorian state government's own environmental department said this was an important habitat and that logging is a dangerous threat to our state's endangered animals, yet the Victorian state government agency VicForests do what they want—no consent, just go in and clear the land.
But there are good people who know this and are calling it out. Yesterday these land defenders also came to the state government's doorstep. They set up a tree sit in the Treasury Gardens as a peaceful protest, speaking up for the Errinundra forest because the forest can't speak. I'm thankful for everyone who acts in solidarity with our people, who also is caring for country and who joins us to say, 'Enough!' when the bulldozers move in. The traditional country of our people must not be desecrated. There is no consent. The climate science is clear that we must leave carbon stores intact. The ecological science is clear that we need to halt the extinction crisis. Yet the desecration of country, because of logging, still happens.
Now the pockets of forests left untouched by the fire are being logged and destroyed. How much more do you want to take? This destructive colonialism is killing us. It's killing everybody. And it's killing our planet's life support systems. Those trees—the clean water, the oxygen they produce—are what keep us all alive. Can you imagine what kind of country we would have if you just listened to us, if you just took a moment and heard what we have been saying? Can you imagine what kind of country we could have if you relied on our traditional knowledge, our science? We have been caring for country for thousands and thousands of generations. We know what we're talking about.
How can the Andrews government be negotiating a treaty in Victoria while we're still logging it? It's not just the Victorian Labor government with blood on its hands; this government is part of the problem too. The regional forest agreements that allow logging are signed by the Premier of Victoria and the Prime Minister. The Victorian Labor government and this federal government have together announced a major event review of the bushfires. There is no doubt we need a review, but the logging must stop. And this major event review must be led by traditional owners. We need assurance that First Nations' voices will be heard in this process. We need to make the transition out of native forest logging now—not in 10 years, now!
Jeitz, Ms Denise
Senator CANAVAN (Queensland—Deputy Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) (20:31): I rise this evening to pay tribute to a lady, Denise Jeitz, who passed away earlier this year after a long battle with cancer. I'd like to recognise Denise not just because she was a good friend of mine but because, while most people in this chamber wouldn't have known Denise, I think all of us would know someone like Denise in our political parties. It is people like Denise that make all of this possible and, for me, and I know for many others, make it all worth it.
Denise never sought the accolades and never sought office within our political party—the Liberal-National Party, and before that the National Party—but she was a tireless supporter behind the scenes. Without people like Denise, a lot of people wouldn't even be here. I count myself in that category. Without people like Denise, there wouldn't be lamingtons and jam scrolls and cups of tea at all our functions, and, without people like Denise, you wouldn't have as much fun, that's for sure! This game can be quite tawdry and dirty from time to time.
It was a great loss for our party and especially for Denise's family. She passed away this year at just 69 years of age. She led a remarkable life. She grew up in the small country town of Bell, and she visited Canberra, moving and shaking with prime ministers and ministers and members of parliament.
As I said, I probably wouldn't be here without Denise. When I was first thinking of pursuing a political career, someone gave me some advice, saying: 'Look, the most important people you need to convince are women. Don't worry about the blokes, convince the women. If you get a bloke to vote for you, you've got one vote. But, if you convince a female to vote for you, you'll probably get 10 others, because they talk to people, when men tend not to.' I think it was with this advice in mind that I, very early on, called Denise, who I'd got to know a little bit but not that well at that stage, and asked her for her advice on what I should do. I was pretty chuffed as she was the first person to say she'd vote for me in the preselection, and that gave me, as a young, somewhat ambitious potential political candidate, a degree of confidence. My bubble was deflated a little bit a few weeks later when I found out that Denise wasn't actually on our LNP state council and couldn't vote for me anyway! But I had already embarked on that journey, and I thank Denise for it.
For Denise, despite her strong and long involvement in politics, family was at the centre of her life. At just the age of 17, she lost her mother. As the oldest child, she effectively became a surrogate mum for her younger sisters. She went on to have three lovely children, Lucinda, Cameron and Julia, and it was lovely to join Lucinda at the service in Dalby just a few weeks ago. It was a lovely celebration of Denise's life.
Denise saw a fair amount of tragedy. Her son, Cameron, succumbed to blindness at a very young age and eventually died in 2010, and she lost her husband in 2011. I knew her over that period and, as I said, despite all that sadness she was a guiding light for so many in our party. She was always there to help her local community. She was in politics for the right reasons. She secured funding for local community clubs, like the Jandowae Tennis Club, and for the Jandowae Timbertown Festival. People like Denise are the heart and soul of this country. They create communities and maintain friendships and, as I said, they really make this career worth fighting for.
I know that most of you would not have known Denise, but I hope that, in our political parties and movements, we can all remember and cherish the people like Denise who touch our lives, because, as we know, life can be too short. It definitely was for Denise. Vale Denise Jeitz.
Assange, Mr Julian
Senator WHISH-WILSON (Tasmania) (20:36): Speaking in the Australian Senate chamber tonight, I'd like to make a heartfelt appeal to the US President, Joe Biden, and the new US Attorney General, Merrick Garland. Firstly, Attorney General, congratulations on your recent appointment. My appeal to you is to prioritise, review and walk away from your appeal seeking the extradition of Australian award-winning journalist and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. While I understand the US Department of Justice recently decided to appeal the UK court's decision not to extradite Julian Assange, I also understand it would have been very out of the ordinary for an acting attorney general waiting for a new attorney general in a new administration to stop any high-profile case before it started. I also understand that the US prosecutor in the Assange extradition case recently said there was division within the Department of Justice on proceeding with this appeal. I hope this is a decision you will be reviewing and contemplating shortly.
Gentlemen, after Judge Vanessa Baraitser, on 5 January this year, accepted all the substantive arguments of your prosecution for the extradition of Julian Assange, legally and politically speaking you now hold the high ground. You won your moral victory. By rejecting extradition on mental health grounds, the judge also made it clear that Julian Assange is a broken man and that extraditing him would be tantamount to murder. You can now stop this extradition appeal with the stroke of a pen. I and many others are asking: why would someone so powerful continue to pursue a sick, broken man? It looks very personal and very political. The full resources of one of the world's great nation states is intent on the destruction of one man. That is hardly fair, now, is it? My fellow Australian citizens across all political colours may be many things but we all have an innate sense of fairness.
Pursuing Assange will be seen as overreach. The chorus of voices from around the globe is echoing this. If you proceed with this appeal, you risk undermining your legal judgement and your high ground, certainly in the court of public opinion. If Mr Assange dies in prison, you also risk a significant backlash, not to mention martyring him. If you succeed in any appeal and he faces trial in the USA, you risk the actual trial being on the real and existential threats to press freedom, the First Amendment and much, much more, rather than on the alleged espionage activities of Assange and WikiLeaks. If you drop this extradition treaty now, your sword, or the prospect of another extradition, or worse, will hang over Julian Assange for the rest of his life. You get to have your cake and eat it, politically speaking, if you walk away now. You have made your point.
Gentlemen, both our parliamentary systems are based on the ancient republic of Rome. One thing the Romans knew too well was that, the more powerful you became, the more you needed to be challenged and held to account. Who is there in this day and age to hold the powerful to account? A greatly diminished free press, perhaps, which your extradition threatens to its core? Whistleblowers, who you throw in jail? Your deeply divided partisan political system? I think not.
If it's not just the destruction of Julian Assange that you seek, but also what he represents, then I ask you to consider this: politics today feels like it is full of lies and liars—so many lies, layers upon layers of them. Call it a post-truth world or whatever, but we both know it is eating away at our members of parliament and institutions of democracy. And you would know this better than anyone. The man whose administration you replaced had been caught out lying over 30,000 times during his presidency.
Without a value on truth and truth-telling, there is only one path left to tread. And it gets more dark and more dangerous from here. Again, you should know this better than anyone after the desecration of your own capital. All because of lies. Lying with no consequences and no accountability. What is there left if we demonstrate we don't value the truth? Especially from our leaders. Lies are the cancer on our polity. You might truly believe that what was published by WikiLeaks on the Iraq War was stolen by a whistleblower, Chelsea Manning, and, to quote Mike Pompeo, published by a hostile actor, Julian Assange, and WikiLeaks. But I ask you to please put politics and personality aside and ask yourself: how is it morally hostile to publish war crimes and other criminality, exposing lies and deceit, so that citizens know the truth? I'm sure that, like me, on honest reflection you were both angered and deeply saddened by some of the terrible things that were made public in these disclosures—things that needed to change.
I would ask you to reflect on the fact that everything published, the documents over which you are extraditing Assange, were 100 per cent factual and clearly in the public interest. No lies here—this is beyond dispute. These disclosures may well make you uncomfortable, and the manner in which they were made public may make you angry, but surely citizens have a right to know what is done, the decisions that are made in their names and in their countries' names, with their taxpayer dollars, especially when this involves invading another country and the aggression and tragic loss of life involved in a war. I remind you that reliable and credible estimates have put the civilian death toll of the Iraq War at over a million people.
You see, it was a lie and a terrible deceit that led us to war in Iraq in the first place. Your country and mine. A manufactured deception by some of the most powerful people and organisations on this planet. Perhaps the most egregious, dangerous lie of our time. And it appears they have all got away with it. By going after my fellow countryman Julian Assange, you are going after the truth-teller of this terrible war, this dark chapter in our collective history. By doing so, you are reminding people of this lie. They will not forget this. It is not acceptable to send any messages that crimes can be covered up, and truth-tellers prosecuted and persecuted, in the name of secrecy and national security.
I invite you to reflect on how this looks and how this extradition appeal process will simply continue to erode trust in our political leadership, in our democracy, in our institutions and, importantly, in our nation's deep and abiding friendship—but, most importantly, in eroding the value of truth and truth-telling. I trust you are honest men and you value the truth and the importance of protecting press freedoms, especially at this juncture in history. Once more, I invite you to reflect on what is really at stake here and choose the truth. It's not too late, and history will judge you well for this intervention. Thank you.
Pell, Cardinal George, AC
Senator FIERRAVANTI-WELLS (New South Wales) (20:45): I have previously suggested the time has come for a royal commission into the relationship between the Victorian Labor government and Victoria Police. With spectacular timing, yesterday Premier Andrews initiated a royal commission into Crown casino, saying it was about 'making sure that those who hold a casino licence in Victoria uphold the highest standards of probity and integrity—and that they're accountable for their actions.' Perhaps that was the reason, or was it, as journalist Damon Johnston suggested, that Andrews was beginning to look exposed and so made the classic 'If you're going to go late, you've got to go big' political move? One can only assume that Victoria Police, who govern the application of the laws in Victoria, would be held to an equal or higher standard than casino operators. If Crown casino events are sufficient to justify a royal commission then the events of the Pell case would, to borrow a gaming phrase, present a 'royal flush'.
A royal commission would be about much more than Cardinal Pell. It would be about whether the people of Victoria can have confidence in the probity and integrity of their police force. Even prior to the Pell investigation, charges, trial and unjust imprisonment, there was an indication that some within the highest ranks of Victoria Police were not willing to tell inconvenient truths that didn't match up to the prevailing narrative pushed by certain media outlets. Detective Sergeant Carson, of Ballarat police, produced two reports, in September 2011 and February 2012, into suicides in Victoria that were linked to childhood sexual assault by clergy members. The Carson reports claimed that there was 'an inordinate number of suicides' that appeared 'to be a consequence of sexual offending'. They claimed that 43 suicide deaths had occurred as a result of clerical sexual abuse and called for an inquiry which, the reports said, would likely uncover many more deaths as a consequence of clergy sexual abuse of which the Catholic Church would no doubt be aware but had chosen to remain silent.
The call for an inquiry was successful and Carson's reports had the desired effect, but only after those reports were provided to sympathetic media. On 13 April 2012, The Age published an article quoting the leaked reports at length. Four days later, the Victorian parliamentary Inquiry into the Handling of Child Abuse by Religious and Other Non-Government Organisations was announced. The claims of 43 suicides also gained the attention of the Victorian coroner, who was urged to reopen the investigations into these deaths based on the Carson reports. The coroner referred the matter back to Victoria Police, whose sexual crimes squad investigated the veracity of the claims made in the reports. This investigation became known as Operation Plangere. Itwas tasked with seeking to substantiate the scope of the issues outlined in the Carson reports, including the identification of the persons mentioned, their living status and, if they were deceased, the cause and any associated factors contributing to their death.
Despite being handed down on 1 November 2012, less than two weeks after the commencement of the Victorian parliamentary inquiry, the Operation Plangerereport was not made public until May 2015, long after the parliamentary inquiry had completed its work and delivered its findings. The Plangereinvestigation completely decimated the claims made in the Carson reports. It said that there were 'significant limitations to the data supplied by Detective Sergeant Carson', including matters such as full names, birth dates, addresses and information about the alleged offenders or offences. The missing information could not be verified in most cases because no source was provided for the claim that a suicide death had occurred. There were no dates provided for the reports being made, how the person reporting the death made contact or who they made contact with.
When the Plangereteam sought more detail from Carson, it found that he could not provide any further information or records to substantiate the claims in his reports. Plangere found that it could only positively identify 25 persons of the 43 persons alleged to have committed suicide as a 'direct result of alleged instances of childhood sexual assault by clergy members'. Of those 25 that were capable of being positively identified, only 16 had been categorised as having committed suicide and only four were the victims of childhood sexual assault. Of those four, only one case had identified childhood sexual assault by a member of the clergy as a contributing factor in the motivations of the person for their suicide. Despite the findings essentially destroying the narrative of an epidemic of suicides as a result of clergy sexual abuse and despite their relevance to the parliamentary inquiry, the Plangerereport would remain confidential for another 2½ years.
It is important to pause at this point and be absolutely clear: all suicide deaths are a tragedy, and even one death or one attempted suicide because of clerical sexual abuse is inexcusable. But justice requires that the truth be told. Regrettably, the truth of this report was not told to the parliamentary inquiry.
When then Deputy Commissioner Ashton appeared before the inquiry, he was asked about the alleged suicides. He was asked whether he had 'seen an increase in suicides as a consequence of the abuse' and whether he had the data to support it. His response was:
I need to tread a little carefully on the suicide issue. Earlier this year we received a report from one of our detectives regarding work that was being pulled together on the issue of suicides as a result of clergy abuse. We have seen suicides as a result of clergy abuse. In relation to the material that was provided to us in a compiled format early this year, we met with the coroner and discussed the issues around those particular alleged suicides. I think there were 43 in number that were talked about at the broad level that needed to be looked at. The coroner asked us to do a review of those individual cases to determine whether she should reopen any of those matters. We have now concluded that research, and we will be in a position very shortly—maybe in the next week or two—to go back to see the coroner and give her the results of that work. So I am just a bit reluctant in open forum to provide you with those details.
While Ashton was not perhaps in a position to detail the findings to the inquiry, he would nonetheless have been in a position to know that the claim of the 43 suicides had no data behind it. It was totally disingenuous of him to repeat that figure and place it on the parliamentary record when it was false and it was clear that it would be revised down to a single death. This allowed a narrative of an extremely high rate of clergy abuse to play out nationally through the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, because that was well underway. In many corners this narrative is still prevalent, demonstrating just how damaging those allegations based on unverified information were.
What was the motivation of Victoria Police in keeping the information secret for so long? Why did Ashton wait until July 2013 to tell the Victorian parliament that the claim was 'overstated' and 'lacking in evidentiary basis'? Why did Ashton also not provide a correction to the media outlets who had received and reported on the overstated claims? Why didn't the Plangerereport? It was completed more than 12 months before the inquiry handed down its final report, so there was ample opportunity to correct the record, but this wasn't done.
Ashton continued to feature heavily in the Pell saga. As Chief Commissioner from 2015 to 2020, it was Ashton who oversaw the public appeal by Victoria Police's Sano taskforce for victims at St Patrick's Cathedral to step forward. He was the one who approved his then deputy and now successor, Shane Patton, to travel to Rome to interview Pell. It was Ashton who was in the top job when they decided to lay charges against Pell. At every stage, Ashton was in a position of influence.
In her book, Louise Milligan notes that the Operation Plangerereport 'unwittingly undermined the force's new commissioner'—that is, Graham Ashton—'and the police case against Pell.' It might be inferred that the dogged pursuit of charges against Pell, even in light of the mountain of contradicting evidence, was an attempt to save face, but without a proper inquiry the Victorian public will never know.
In some ways, the story of the Carson reports and the grossly overstated number of suicides is a small matter in a much larger story of abuse and cover-up in institutions, police leaking information to media and keeping contradictory reports secret and allowing media outlets like Fairfax and the ABC to create a narrative that saw an innocent man imprisoned for more than a year.
Looking at the matters pertaining to the Crown Casino, which have only yesterday seen a royal commission launched in the state of Victoria, the Pell case provides even further reason for a royal commission into Victoria Police: to restore confidence and to ask deep questions about government manipulation of people's lives for the sake of the political process. To be continued.
Nelson, Mr Tjakamarra
Nipper, Mrs Kunmanara, AO
Senator McCARTHY (Northern Territory—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (20:55): I rise to pay tribute to leader, teacher, wise man and Warlpiri warrior, Mr Tjakamarra Nelson. A gentleman who led the way walking in two worlds, Tjakamarra was a land rights champion from the early days. Born on Mount Doreen Station, Mr Nelson was six years old when his family was moved to Yuendumu, a welfare ration depot, around 1946. He was the fifth of nine siblings and his father had four wives. Even though he only attended the community's school until grade 5, he benefitted from additional tuition by Baptist missionary Tom Fleming. 'I was lucky', he recalled in the Central Land Council's oral history collection Every hill got a story:
The whitefella missionary used to teach me after hours … to give me extra education. That's where I managed to pick up my command of English.
Tjakamarra considered himself blessed to have received a two-way education, with regular breaks from settlement life. He'd go to church every Sunday and, 'practice our culture every night if possible'.
After a mechanics apprenticeship, Tjakamarra attended teachers' college in Darwin and returned to the Yuendumu school to teach, becoming one of the first Aboriginal teachers in Central Australia. After five years teaching, he joined the Department of Aboriginal Affairs to support the outstation movement as an assistant community adviser. During early Central Land Council meetings, he worked as a Warlpiri interpreter and went on to represent the Central Land Council as an active member, nationally and also internationally.
He was a champion of Aboriginal-led economic development, serving on the advisory committee of the Aboriginal Benefit Account and as a director of Yuendumu's Yapa-Kurlangu Ngurrara Aboriginal Corporation. Tjakamarra was a passionate supporter of the Yuendumu football club, the Mighty Magpies, serving as president for many years. He was a strong advocate against the Northern Territory intervention and he spoke publicly many times about the impacts of this destructive legislation on his community and his family. I'd like to share some of his words that were reported in the media in 2016:
The Intervention came in when we were getting into self-government—I'm talking about Yuendumu. We were controlled, the workforce here, it all worked out. Then new laws came in. Me, personally, that broke my heart. It chopped the wings off the dreams I had of improving the living conditions of the people here. Ten years later, (it's) still hurting. I am anyway, definitely. We could have been miles in front by now. (Intervention money should have spent on) roads going out the to the homelands, drilling rigs, good supplies of water.
Tjakamarra left us still advocating for better roads, better housing and better education in the bush.
He was a lifelong advocate for truth-telling, with one of his last public appearances as MC at the 90th anniversary of the Coniston Massacre commemoration in 2018. He was still working for his people and his community despite ill health until his passing. I had the personal pleasure of working beside him for many, many years in my time as member for Arnhem and as the Minister for Statehood in the Northern Territory, where Mr Nelson would advise me quietly and confidently—ground me at times—about the direction to empower First Nations people and to empower the Northern Territory people to become the seventh state in the Australian Federation.
Following the last CLC elections in 2019, he told the many new, young delegates why he was not yet ready to retire then. He said:
We are still very strong and still battling with the government and others who are damaging our country. I'm talking about the mining companies. That's why I joined the land council.
To the senators here, to his family and to all the families in Central Australia, I wish to express that my thoughts are with Mr Nelson's wife, Lynette, his children and families, and my sincere condolences to all of you on this sadness, but also to remember the incredible legacy he leaves not only to you, his family, but indeed to all the people of the Northern Territory.
I would like to pay tribute to Kunmanara Nipper, a Anangu elder who recently left us and one of the principal figures in the history and development of Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. Mrs Nipper was born in the Western Desert. It's estimated that she was born in the late 1920s, making her well into her 90s when she passed away. A senior Anangu woman, Mrs Nipper played a key role in the campaign for land rights and the handing back of Uluru to traditional owners in the 1980s. She helped establish the joint management arrangements for Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park and was a tireless board member for many years. Mrs Nipper was involved in almost every aspect of park work at Uluru, from manual labour to establishing three park businesses and the cultural centre, through to negotiations with federal and Northern Territory ministers.
Mrs Nipper was a formidable tracker. Her skills were particularly highlighted with her tracking of the infamous dingo in the Azaria Chamberlain case in the 1980s. Her contribution to her people and the development of Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park was recognised in 2006 with an Order of Australia medal.
My sincere condolences go out to Mrs Nipper's family and many friends, supporters and admirers, not just in Central Australia, but right across the Northern Territory and, indeed, Australia. I say thank you for the legacy and work of Mrs Nipper and all she did for her people.
Forestry
Senator PATRICK (South Australia) (21:02): I rise tonight to speak about Australian timber. Proper plans require careful consideration of the variables, setting measurable outcomes, meaningful participation from stakeholders and commitment to implementation. Plantation timber and forestry is a long game. There's a saying: it takes nine months to have a baby. Well, it takes 25 years to grow a tree to the point at which it can be harvested and processed. So in the timber industry knee-jerk reactions can't change anything, catchy slogans can't change things and even lots of money can't change things. Growth of a properly managed and sustained timber industry brings a whole range of benefits to Australia. The timber industry is manufacturing. It's an industry where Australia adds value taking raw products through each of the processing stages. Trees are good for the environment, with carbon sequestration, and provision of transpiration and shelter.
In 2018 there were about 70,000 Australians directly employed in the industry. The sector generates $23 billion of economic activity. Growth of the Australian forestry sector is not new. It has been a policy objective of successive Australian governments for some time. Go back to 1992 where we had the National Forestry Policy Statement. In 1997 we had Plantations for Australia: the 2020 Vision. Of course, 2020 has passed. In March 2020, at estimates, the government was asked about the final assessment of this program. The answer was: 'A report is being prepared and should be available by the end of the year.' We haven't seen that.
In 2018, there was another program: Growing A Better Australia—A Billion Trees for Jobs and Growth. A key theme of the 2018 plan was that, over the next decade, a billion new trees were to be planted in forestry plantations. If you do the sums over 12 years to 2030, that's about 83 million trees per annum. On top of that, we need to add about 70 million trees per annum to replace the trees harvested from the plantations. The program was intended to boost the Australian economy and drive jobs and growth. Announced in 2018, there was $20 million over four years out to 2021-22. Nominally, we're about 65 per cent of the way through that period of funding, but there's no evidence of increased planting.
In March 2020, when asked how many trees had been planted under the program to date and where the new trees had been planted, the department responded with: 'The 2019-20 bushfires have had significant impacts on plantation forests in some regions. In these areas, it's likely that plantation owners will be investing in plantation re-establishment initially. The full detailed assessment, analysis and planning by the individual companies is still underway.' That's Sir Humphrey Appleby speaking, if I've ever heard it—basically covering up the fact that 'I don't think anything has been done.' I'll be asking questions at next month's estimates to see what's happening.
Of course, I understand the bushfires did have an impact. In terms of commercial plantations affected by the fires, about 130,000 hectares were impacted. In South Australia, there were 15,275 hectares of forestry lost, with an economic cost in excess of $140 million. Just understand that when we're planting trees we're trying to get about 83 million new trees a year, plus 70 million to replace what's being harvested, but we also have to deal with the fact we lost a lot of trees in the fires. I've recently been told that some plantation owners are not replanting, because they can't secure access to water. That'll be a further hit to the industry and those who work in it, with a flow-on effect to the market, with the reduction of products. There's a huge disconnect; there's a disconnect between announcements and delivery, and we have to think very carefully about this. In terms of shortages, the previously alluded to forecast shortages are, for a variety of reasons, being felt by our population, with potentially worse to come.
We all recall HomeBuilder. I'm not going to be critical of the program. Stimulation of the building sector is a good concept. People need houses, building trades need work, it's good for training, and it puts more money into the economy. However, what if this drives us into a shortage of materials? Are we setting ourselves up to fail? In June 2020, the forecast was that residential construction would decline, expected to be about 37 per cent lower than the previous forecast, despite the fact that there were more than 3,100 homes destroyed in the bushfires. The ABS issued a media release on 3 February this year, which said:
Private sector house approvals rose for the sixth consecutive month in December …
… … …
Dwelling approvals rose across all states, in seasonally adjusted terms. Tasmania led the way, rising 66.5 per cent, followed by Queensland (24.0 per cent), South Australia (16.7 per cent), Victoria (8.6 per cent), Western Australia (7.8 per cent) and New South Wales (1.8 per cent).
In December 2020, dwelling approvals were up 10.9 per cent. Private sector houses had increased by 15.8 per cent—a record high. So we've got lots and lots of demand but access to timber is down. Timber merchants can't get timber. Builders can't get the timbers. Carpenters can't get timber. Domestic sawmills are running at capacity. Australia is a net importer of timber and there's been an impact on those supplies. We're being outbid by our colleagues, our friends, in the United States. So we're now in a situation where we're pushing businesses who can't source timber, who have work but simply can't get the product necessary to do the job, into operating and, ultimately, into financial stress.
We've got this fragility in our supply chain, so we need action. In the first instance, the government needs to extend the period to commence construction for the HomeBuilder program. This would provide some immediate relief, and I note the Senate passed a motion to that order last week. But this is clearly going to be an issue for the longer term. We'll have to look at mechanisms to better utilise our timber with alternate building constructions such as double brick, product variances, use of laminated or structural timbers. What can we do to advance timber recycling? Let's stimulate investment in the timber industry.
Of further concern is the government's plan for manufacturing that repeatedly overlooks the timber industry. Australians, individuals and businesses are fed up with studies and the launch of plans or strategies. They want to see a plan that's implemented with measurable milestones which actually work towards realistic goals. Lip service and slogans but no meaningful actioning of plans is not a good way forward.
Human Rights
Senator RICE (Victoria—Deputy Australian Greens Whip) (21:12): I rise tonight to speak out about human rights violations. The Greens believe that universal human rights are fundamental and that they must be respected in all countries and for all people. That includes criticising our own government here in Australia when we believe that we should be doing more to protect human rights and there is certainly more that we can be doing. I want to particularly mention the universal periodic review, which is the UN Human Rights Council human rights review process that occurs every five years. Australia has recently appeared before the UPR working group.
I want to mention particularly the issue that was highlighted by a coalition of non-government organisations in their report that was submitted as part of the UPR process. They said:
The growing Black Lives and Aboriginal Lives Matter movements have drawn fresh attention to the long struggle of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to address systemic racism, police brutality, and deaths in custody.
A crucial issue here is the longstanding community-led campaign to raise the age of legal responsibility. More than two dozen countries, through the UPR process, have pressured Australia to raise the age of legal responsibility. The current minimum age of legal responsibility across the country is only 10. Ten-year-olds are children. In 2019 the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child recommended the age should be increased to at least 14, and Australia has repeatedly failed to act on this issue. This low age of legal responsibility particularly hurts First Nations children. While First Nations young people make up only six per cent of young people aged between 10 and 17, they make up approximately 57 per cent of those in youth detention. This is not because they commit more crime but because they are over-targeted, over-policed and punished more harshly and more often than their non-First Nations counterparts.
So, as well as human rights in Australia, we call for action by governments all around the world to protect human rights wherever attacks on human rights occur. Sadly, I want to start in India, where the government is increasingly undermining human rights. In its 2020 report, Freedom House said:
The Indian government has taken its Hindu nationalist agenda to a new level with a succession of policies that abrogate the rights of different segments of its Muslim population, threatening the democratic future of a country long seen as a potential bulwark of freedom in Asia and the world.
Concerningly, these steps by the Indian government will have implications and do have implications for the sustainability of democracy. Freedom House said:
… the BJP has distanced itself from the country's founding commitment to pluralism and individual rights, without which democracy cannot long survive.
Sadly, we've seen that shift towards nationalism and a willingness to undermine human rights play out in multiple areas. We're particularly concerned that Amnesty International India was forced to close its offices. I have spoken previously about our concerns for the farmers protesting for their rights and the need to protect them from corporations exploiting small farmers. We affirm our solidarity with those farmers and their right to protest. I also want to particularly mention the case of Disha Ravi, a young activist who was recently detained, which reflects a worrying pattern of attacking environmental activists. I'm calling for the Indian government to ensure that she has the full protection of the law and is not persecuted simply because the government is sensitive about her environmental activism.
In another concerning instance of human rights being undermined, I want to particularly mention a new report by Amnesty International titled Old ghosts in new garb: Sri Lanka's return to fear. As the executive summary of that report states:
The Sri Lankan government has launched a renewed crackdown on dissent. Civil society organizations and human rights defenders are under renewed attack by the Government and face numerous challenges to operate freely and safely. In only a year after a new government came into power in 2019, the authorities have escalated this into a full assault on dissent where a climate of fear and censorship has quickly expanded around the country, targeting key voices critical of the government and human rights defenders.
That concern for the ability of human rights defenders to dissent, to protest and to speak up matches what I've heard from community groups here in Australia.
Tonight I want to particularly thank the range of community organisations and their representatives who took the time to meet with me in Melbourne recently and share their profound concerns about what's been happening in Sri Lanka. They particularly raised concerns about forced cremations of COVID-19 victims. Despite a recent announcement by Sri Lanka's Prime Minister that the forced cremation policy would no longer apply, the government appears to have backtracked. As Human Rights Watch noted:
But despite the pledge, the government has continued to forcibly cremate Muslims and is backtracking by claiming the policy can only be changed following deliberations by an expert committee.
I also want to mention a particular issue that the community groups raised with me about the destruction of a monument to Tamils killed in the conflict. I'm concerned about the destruction of this monument and the threat to erase the memory of those who have died. I want to particularly mention some of the words that were shared with me in my meeting last week, as they're incredibly powerful. They said: 'This wasn't just a monument built with stones, cement and sand. It was a painstakingly crafted structure, depicting skulls and lifeless bodies with hands reaching out to heavens for the protection from the rain of artillery shells. The monument bore no names or numbers. Built 10 years after the end of the war, the sculptor's sole purpose was to convey the indescribable agony inflicted on the people by the tyranny of war. It was an artwork with a message for both the victors and the vanquished.' I say to those community groups, who are very concerned about Sri Lanka: we see you and we hear you, and we call upon the Sri Lankan government to reverse these policies and to protect the human rights of all of its citizens. And we urge our Australian government, particularly Minister Payne, to raise this issue with our Sri Lankan counterparts at both ambassadorial and ministerial level.
I now want to highlight the human rights situation in Pakistan—in particular the disappearance of Idris Khattak, a human rights defender and a former consultant with Amnesty International. He worked extensively on forced disappearances, which makes what has happened to him even more concerning. He was taken in November 2019. It has only been very recently that the authorities have confirmed that he's in their custody. He must receive a fair process and not be held indefinitely under their official secrets act. His family have only recently had access to him and he's at risk of COVID-19 in the prison.
In particular, I want to share the words of his brave daughter, Talia Khattak:
My father, Idris Khattak, a devoted human rights defender and the most selfless man I know, was forcibly disappeared on 13 November 2019.
… … …
My father is not a case file. He is a human being who cannot be wiped away like an inconvenient streak of dirt. He is a person … and he deserves the protection of the law.
We call upon the government of Pakistan to address this issue. They should immediately release Idris Khattak unless there is sufficient credible evidence that he has committed an internationally recognised offence. In the meantime, they should ensure that he's remanded by a civilian, not a military, court and granted a fair trial quickly. Finally, we urge the government of Pakistan to sign the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance because, despite public commitments in 2019, that has not yet occurred. It would be a welcome step.
I also want to thank the Kurdish community groups that I met with recently. We're particularly concerned about the arrest of Kurdish mayors in Turkey. I would like to note here the comments from Human Rights Watch that the Erdogan government refuses to distinguish between the PKK and the democratically elected Peoples' Democratic Party, which won 11.7 per cent of the national vote in the 2018 parliamentary elections and was elected in 65 local municipalities in the 2019 local elections. Former party co-chairs Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag have been in detention since November 2016. Turkey has refused to comply with the 2020 European Court of Human Rights ruling that Demirtas should be released immediately. We call upon the Turkish government to protect human rights and ensure due process for all its citizens and for those whom it has imprisoned and to not use criminal prosecutions for political purposes.
JobSeeker Payment
Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (21:21): I know better than to expect a good outcome from this government. I'd settle for good enough. But there's good, there's good enough and, apparently, there's 25 bucks a week, so I guess that's good enough. I've seen all the outrage from people saying that $25 a week is a slap in the face for people who need help. I've got to say I get where that's coming from. Really, people have been calling out for so long for a pretty basic bit of help. The bit of help they get is not really enough. It isn't enough to put food in kids' bellies and get their parents into a decent suit, and it's certainly not enough to get them out to a job interview. If you go to a doctor and the doctor says, 'Take four tablets a day or you'll die,' it's better than nothing to take one tablet a day. We're lifting a payment that left people in desperate poverty to a level where people are still going to be living in desperate poverty. I can't applaud that—I just can't. As a matter of fact, I find it extremely heartless.
This is what gets to me the most: the government has come out today and said it's time for people on JobSeeker to go and find some work. Good on you! People are going to have to go out and do 15 job applications a fortnight through April and then up to 20 in July. I know a lot of people won't like that part, but I reckon the government's right: people should be getting out there and getting some work now that things are picking up a little. But whatever the government says about wanting people to get into work, they're not actually going to support them to do it. That's because the income tests are coming back in April too, and anyone who works two shifts a fortnight will lose half the money they make on their second day of work. They will lose more than half of what they make on the third day. That is not very encouraging. It's not exactly a carrot at the end of the stick. It looks like we're going backwards—back to where we were before COVID.
It baffles me that Liberal and National Party politicians come into this chamber every day and tell us that the best form of welfare is to get a job while they're slapping a great big tax on anyone who actually manages to land one, let alone makes the effort to work extra hours. You're basically just going to take the money back from them. I just don't get it. I'm missing the whole encouragement thing here. Sorry, I'm just not getting the whole carrot. You're out there, high and mighty, telling people to pull their finger out, and you're punishing them while they're actually doing it. How does that make any sense? How is that fair? How is that Australian? It's no wonder people are outraged. What we've seen today is just completely and utterly outrageous. But the sad fact of the matter is that this place will let them get away with it.
I'm not going to stand in the way of poor people getting more money—all of 50 bucks a fortnight, 25 bucks a week, not even a cup of coffee each day for seven days; yes, that would be right. If the government were going to offer unemployed people so much as a bus ticket, I'd wave it through, not because it's all that they need, but because there's much more that they need and any start is better than not starting. So let me make a prediction because I know what's going to happen here: we'll get 30 speeches attacking the government for being stingy, then we'll get 30 speeches praising the government for being generous and then the senators will all vote to agree with each other to give these poor people an extra 50 bucks a fortnight. That's how it will work, because Labor won't have the guts to stand up and say: 'No way. We're not going to accept 50 bucks. We just won't, because it's not enough.' They'll say: 'Bugger this. Damned if we do, damned if we don't. We'll just give them 50 bucks, that's it and we'll walk off.' That's how it's going to happen.
The fact that we don't have the option is pretty damning, to be honest, and things are so bad, anything is better than this. Every time I speak with the government about ways to help people on JobSeeker, I'm told it's too expensive. 'Don't worry about the results, but it's too expensive.' Then I come back with ways to help people on JobSeeker that are less expensive and I'm told: 'Guess what? It's too difficult to administer.' The top people in the Public Service are paid more than enough money to get the job done. Then I come back with ways to help people on JobSeeker that are less expensive and easy to administer and then I'm told the politics are too difficult. Jeez, I can't win here and I'm starting to think they just don't want to help people on JobSeeker. As a matter of fact, they just don't want to help the most vulnerable.
Spending $9 billion helping people who are in need is a massive deal, and I understand that, but you can't point to the fact that you're spending $9 billion on this as evidence of how generous you actually are. We've seen the big tax cuts you'll give in 2024-25—trust me. I just don't take you that seriously anymore. That's how JobSeeker is, you're going to throw $9 billion at a problem and still people will be unable to pay their bills. That's not something to brag about. You can't brag about that. You can draw attention to the fact you're spending $9 billion on this problem, by all means, but you can't expect to get praised for it. If you're bragging about how it's going to cost $9 billion to fix a problem you created, someone has to explain to you what bragging means, because it's not bragging rights. The fact that it isn't enough is all that you should need to know about how much we've let things slide. The government is out there saying, 'This is the biggest increase in 30 years.' That's because there hasn't been an increase in 30 years. You could tell people on JobSeeker you're giving them an extra 40c for a phone call, and you'd still be able to call it the biggest increase in 30 years.
As much as we'd all like this to be higher, it's also fair to say that it could still be lower. You've got to be grateful for that, I guess. Maybe we're all like punch-drunk boxers that have been fighting for so long we keep swinging even after the bells have rung. I'll be honest: $9 billion is better than no billion, $44 a day is better than $40 a day but living on $44 a day is still really awful. You ask anybody on JobSeeker whether they'd like us to vote for an extra $25 a week, and they'd ask us if we had two heads because, of course, they want that. Just because they need more doesn't mean they don't need this. Starting somewhere is much better than not starting, apparently. But I'm treating this like a starting position, not a final position. We're not going to get what we need if we wait for the government to hand it over. That's not how we do things. I'll talk to the government about how we can make this situation better. When they tell me it's impossible, as they usually do, because it's all too hard or it just doesn't suit their agenda, I'll tell them that's what you've been saying about raising the rate for the last 30 years. Today is proof that it's actually not impossible. It's just hard work and, the last I checked, that's what we're elected to do.
Earlier today Minister Birmingham was good enough to answer questions about a friend who is looking for a job. I'm delighted to help my friend find a $400,000-a-year taxpayer funded job. I'm all about creating jobs for people who need a hand to find work. It's hard out there for ex-government members of parliament, so I was delighted to hear Minister Birmingham tell the Senate that my mate should send in his resume. I was delighted to hear he'll be in the mix for the next plum job that's up for grabs. Why wouldn't he be? He's got all the qualifications you need. Let's be honest, he used to be a Liberal member of parliament. Surely that gives you all the qualifications you need for $400,000 plum job. Sure, when he was a Liberal member of parliament he was censured by his own government for working as a lobbyist while he was working as a member of parliament.
What's a little conflict of interest between friends? There's nothing wrong with that up here, surely. It's standard procedure. Sure, he was being paid by the taxpayer to represent them; sure, he was being paid by his lobbying clients to represent them; and, sure, he was working against government policy to help his clients, but that's all good. That's what a good lobbyist does, apparently. There's nothing we can do to stop him doing that, because he's not a member of parliament. Plus, it is not technically a breach of the Lobbying Code of Conduct to be a member of parliament while you're also a lobbyist, because, let's be honest, the Lobbying Code of Conduct isn't worth the paper it's written on. If anything, he's overqualified—God bless him. It would be hard not to be.
What would you have to do to disqualify yourself for a plum gig up here these days? The only qualifications you seem to need is a blue tie and the title of 'former member of parliament'. You can take a job as a lobbyist while you're working as a member of parliament and, if you don't disclose it, all you have to do is apologise. So I'll get him to chuck his resume in, shall I? Even if there are no jobs going publically, it doesn't mean there isn't one going privately, does it? That's how it works up here: jobs for mates.
When the right ex-member of parliament comes along, you don't need a selection criteria, because that doesn't suit you or them. You don't even need to advertise the role. You find a way to pay them six figures, because that's what matters, isn't it? It's not about the country; it's about looking after your mates first. That's what seems to be the practice these days up here in parliament. It's all about mates. It's not about who's best for the job. It's not about who should have the job. It's not about who's the most qualified to have the job. So long as they're a mate first, that's the first criteria. That's how it works. There are no rules or standards. It's: 'G'day mate. You're my mate. That's wonderful. Let's go. You can have your 400,000 bucks a year. Thanks for coming.'
COVID-19: Tourism
Senator WATT (Queensland) (21:31): I rise tonight to speak about one of the major issues facing my home state of Queensland—that is, preserving jobs as we recover from COVID-19. I especially want to talk about the threat to Queensland jobs in an industry that my state is known around the world for—that is, tourism. We are well-known, right around the world, for our incredible tourism icons, ranging from the Great Barrier Reef to Fraser Island to the rainforests to the outback and to many more beaches and many more other attractions as well.
The tourism industry supplies tens of thousands of jobs, right around Queensland, literally from the tip of Cape York right down to Coolangatta and all the way out west. Right now, tourism businesses and tourism workers are really hurting as a result of COVID-19 and the restrictions on people's travel, especially from international destinations.
I have met with tourism businesses and tourism workers from Cairns to the Gold Coast and everywhere in between. They've told me how hard they have found the last 12 months and how fearful they are about the conditions that lie ahead. Of course, these problems are magnified by the fact that international borders remain closed, indefinitely. None of us know when international travel will resume to Queensland or to anywhere else in Australia. For those parts of my home state which are particularly dependent on international tourists, there is a very grim future ahead.
What is an even more imminent threat is the government's impending removal of JobKeeper in only a few weeks time. The only thing that has been keeping tourism businesses and tourism jobs afloat in Queensland over the last few months is the government's JobKeeper payment. That's a payment which, it's worth remembering, is something that the federal opposition encouraged the government to do in the first instance.
We've been very supportive of the government paying JobKeeper to tourism and other businesses as an important means of keeping jobs afloat, both in the tourism industry and in other industries again. But the reality is that conditions are still very tough, particularly in the tourism industry in many parts of Queensland. Removing JobKeeper will literally ring the death knell for many tourism businesses and tourism jobs right around our state. If you listen to the government, including in question time today, everything is fine and everything is going to be fine when JobKeeper is cut off at the end of March, because the industries across the country and the economy generally are on the rebound. Every time we hear a government member say that, it demonstrates how spectacularly out of touch the government is with the real world that exists in many parts of Queensland now, particularly those parts of Queensland that rely on the tourism industry. Only a couple of weeks ago I was in Cairns with Senator Nita Green and the shadow Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, meeting with tourism businesses and tourism workers. You could literally tell the fear that these people had. They had put all of their life-savings into running a business and employing people. They had been running these businesses for decades and were now faced with imminent closure because of the government's stubbornness and refusal to extend JobKeeper where it is desperately needed.
We keep being assured by government ministers that things are on the improve and everything is going to be fine. They keep hinting at some kind of package they are going to have for the tourism industry and say that, in the meantime, everyone should be patient and put up with things as they currently stand. Again, this shows how incredibly out-of-touch the government is with what is actually happening in the real world in the Queensland tourism industry right now. We are already seeing big and small tourism businesses around Queensland laying off workers because they have no certainty about what this government is going to do once JobKeeper is finished. This isn't a matter of businesses just sitting tight, waiting until they get an announcement from the government about their future, and keeping people on. The reality is that businesses are making hard decisions right now to lay off dozens and in some cases hundreds of staff, people who have worked in the tourism industry for a very long time, who we will want working in the tourism industry when we can eventually have international tourists coming back to our country.
It is deeply unfortunate that the government just seems to think everything is going to be fine, they don't need to rush, they will get there in their own time and, in the meantime, businesses should just keep on chugging on, even though they have no revenue coming in. The reason these businesses have been able to stay afloat is that the government has been propping them up with the JobKeeper payment. The minute that is removed, in the absence of an influx of tourists, who aren't actually able to get to this country, these businesses will go to the wall and we will see even more job losses right around Queensland in this incredibly important industry.
It's not just me saying this. I noticed a report in The Sunday Mail in Queensland on the weekend headed 'How 10,000 tourism firms could go broke'. It said that recent research predicted that up to a quarter of Queensland's 40,000 tourism business could go broke as a result of the devastating impact of the coronavirus and the looming end on 28 March of the JobKeeper supplement which has helped to keep many businesses afloat. On the Gold Cost, Aquaduck Safaris has been a tourism institution for decades but the general manager, Sarah Colgate, says it is under threat. Ms Colgate says: 'It will mean job losses, especially through the winter months. The tourism industry will lose professional long-term employees.' Red Cat Adventures owner Julie Telford said the award-winning Whitsunday business would be set back years if staff were lost over the end of the subsidy. She said: 'It feels as though we are standing on the edge of a cliff not knowing if we will be pushed over it or pulled back from the brink.' In Cairns, arguably the region hardest hit by the tourism downturn, Capita Group Managing Director Peter Woodward said 96 per cent of the 187 employees of his business were receiving JobKeeper payments. He said: 'We fear that no replacement of the government funding, whether through an extension of JobKeeper or a specific tourism support package, will result in a significant reduction of our skilled workforce.' These are people on the front line who are running businesses and employing people. They are telling us that the government's decision to remove JobKeeper will mean job losses in Queensland.
It cannot be clearer to the government that we are facing a catastrophe in the Queensland tourism industry which could potentially cost tens of thousands of jobs and see thousands of business go broke. That will have a devastating impact on regional economies right around Queensland. Unfortunately, the government seem to think they can just sit back, get there in their own time and, in the meantime, these businesses should just chug along and put up with it. That is not good enough.
We need to see some urgency from this government. We need to know what they are going to be doing to make sure our tourism businesses don't fall over and we don't see tens of thousands of tourism workers lose their incomes. That would be devastating for the workers and their families. It would be devastating for regional economies where tourism is such an important industry. If we see thousands of tourism workers put out of work, that is going to mean less money in people's pockets, less money going through local shops, and we will see the spiral continue. It is absolutely critical that we hear from the government immediately about what their plan is, particularly for the tourism industry, once we see JobKeeper cut out at the end of March. The clock is ticking. We need an answer now.
Senate adjourned at 21:39