2020-12-03 46 1 0 House of Reps 0 1

Thursday, 3 December 2020

The SPEAKER ( Hon. Tony Smith ) took the chair at 09:30, made an acknowledgement of country and read prayers.

 

PARLIAMENTARY REPRESENTATION 1 PARLIAMENTARY REPRESENTATION Members Sworn 1 09:31 The SPEAKER 00APG I have received a return to the writ which I issued on 26 October 2020 for the election of a member to serve for the electoral division of Groom, in the state of Queensland, to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of John Joseph McVeigh. By the endorsement on the writ, it is certified that Garth Russell Hamilton has been elected. Garth Russell Hamilton made and subscribed the oath of allegiance. The SPEAKER 00APG Congratulations! BILLS 1 BILLS National Emergency Declaration Bill 2020 1

National Emergency Declaration Bill 2020

First Reading 1 Second Reading 1 09:35 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The National Emergency Declaration Bill will implement recommendation 5.1 of the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements by establishing a legislative framework for declaring national emergencies. The Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements highlighted the limits of the Commonwealth's ability to coordinate a nationally consistent response to emergency events. The royal commission observed early on in its examination of national disasters that Australia is likely to experience more frequent and intense natural disasters, requiring jurisdictions to coordinate strategic decision-making and share resources. The COVID-19 pandemic has similarly tested Australia's existing disaster management arrangements. The experiences of the Black Summer bushfires and COVID-19 have left an indelible impression on Australians from all walks of life. This government has listened to stories of resilience, patience and courage in the face of disaster. Australians need clarity and decisive, coordinated action that will deliver them the support they need when a nationally significant emergency event occurs. The Australian community expects and deserves swift and unambiguous action. That is why this government is delivering a unified framework for the use of Commonwealth powers during major emergencies. This bill will unify these emergency powers by establishing a consolidated list which will provide greater visibility to decision-makers of the full range of powers available in a national emergency. With respect to the national emergency declaration framework, the bill will enable the Governor-General to declare a national emergency on the advice of the Prime Minister. The bill's framework will be applicable to emergencies that rise to the level of national significance, whether they be disasters caused by humans or natural disasters. In order to seek a declaration, the Prime Minister must be satisfied that the emergency event has caused or is causing or is likely to cause nationally significant harm, where 'nationally significant harm' is defined as harm that has a significant national impact because of its scale or consequences, and that is of a particular kind including, amongst other things, harm to the life of an individual or group of individuals. The framework will be able to be triggered in respect of emergencies occurring on land or sea (including in Australia's offshore area) or in Australian airspace, and emergencies that are limited to one jurisdiction or that span multiple jurisdictions. This 'all-hazards' approach acknowledges the complexity, scale and significance of the emergency events that Australia may face. The bill then will establish two pathways for the Prime Minister to request a national emergency declaration. The bill provides a power for the Prime Minister to request the declaration at the request of the relevant state or territory, or combination of states or territories. However, the bill also provides that the Prime Minister has the power to unilaterally request the declaration in limited circumstances. These circumstances are: because of the sudden and extraordinary nature of the emergency, it is not practicable to make a declaration at the request of the relevant state or territory the emergency has affected, is affecting or is likely to affect Commonwealth interests, or the Prime Minister is satisfied that it is appropriate in all of the circumstances to make the declaration without a prior request from one or more of the relevant states or territories. This alternative pathway ensures that the Commonwealth can take swift action if a state or territory is incapacitated or overwhelmed by the emergency events in question. This also ensures that affected states and territories can continue to focus their energy on operationalising their response and recovery efforts. The national emergency declaration will be time limited and may only be in force for a maximum of three months. The bill also enables the declaration to be made for a lesser period, which ensures that the period during which the declaration is in force is proportionate to the purpose for which the declaration is made. The maximum limit of three months in which a declaration can be in force ensures that there is a fixed point in time where the declaration must be evaluated to determine whether it's still required and appropriate. The bill acknowledges that some nationally significant emergencies and the harms that flow from such emergencies, for instance, the COVID-19 pandemic, may extend beyond three months. In recognition of this the bill provides a mechanism to enable the Governor-General to extend the duration of a national emergency declaration for a further period of up to three months, if the Prime Minister is satisfied that the initial circumstances that justified the making of the declaration continue to exist. The Governor-General may extend a national emergency declaration more than once. However, each extension must be for no more than three months. The bill will also enable the Governor-General to vary any other aspect of a national emergency declaration if the Prime Minister is satisfied that, in all the circumstances, it is appropriate to do so. This will ensure that the declaration can remain appropriate and adapted to the emergency event if the nature of that event has changed. For instance, it may be necessary to vary the national emergency declaration if the declaration was made in respect of a cyclone that then resulted in flooding and the flooding then resulted in a disease outbreak that required a different emergency response to the initial flood. Finally, the Governor-General may revoke the national emergency declaration if the Prime Minister is satisfied that, in all the circumstances, it is appropriate to do so. This is an important safeguard and reinforces the principle that a national emergency declaration should not be in force for longer than is necessary in the circumstances. The making of a national emergency declaration will send a strong, clear message to the Australian community and all levels of government, ensuring we can mobilise our collective resources towards the response and recovery effort effectively and efficiently. The declaration framework consolidates and streamlines existing Commonwealth emergency powers across the statute book. This will enable ministers and officials to have a complete picture of the powers that they can use to assist with the response and recovery effort. The making of a national emergency declaration will not automatically trigger the operation of these powers—rather, it will enliven the ability for ministers and officials to use an alternative streamlined test to respond to the declared emergency. These alternative tests are provided for in the National Emergency Declaration (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020. The bill includes safeguards to ensure that the framework remains effective and appropriate. Given the powers that may be enlivened through the declaration framework, the bill contains a requirement for the relevant minister to report on the exercise of powers and the performance of functions under national emergency laws. This will provide parliament and the Australian community with visibility of the operation of the framework. In addition, the bill contains a requirement for a review to be conducted into the operation of the framework after five years. This will provide an opportunity to assess the effectiveness of the framework and ensure that it is appropriate and adapted to Australia's future needs. The bill will also create two new emergency powers that will be available where the Governor-General has declared a national emergency. Power to waive red tape requirements The first is the power to waive red tape requirements. People in emergency situations obviously do not need red tape. When faced with a nationally significant emergency, people need support, not unnecessary paperwork, to help them get back on their feet. So the bill will introduce a power for ministers to suspend, vary or substitute red tape requirements in laws that they administer to ensure that Australians affected by a declared national emergency can get the support they need quickly. Once a national emergency declaration is made, this power will enable ministers to suspend, vary or substitute procedural requirements that may be a barrier to people in emergency affected areas accessing payments, benefits or services, such as requirements to produce particular kinds of identification or have their signature witnessed. Power to compel Commonwealth entities to report on certain information There is also a power to compel Commonwealth entities to report on certain information. It is paramount to any disaster response and recovery effort that the Australian government has an accurate understanding of the resources at its disposal. The bill therefore provides that where a national emergency declaration has been made, the Prime Minister may require Commonwealth agencies and departments to provide specified information direct to the Prime Minister for the purposes of preparing for, responding to or recovering from an emergency to which the national emergency declaration relates. This may include information on stockpiles of medical or other supplies held by or available to the Commonwealth entity, or assets or other resources held by or available to the Commonwealth entity, or options or recommendations relating to actions that may be taken by the Commonwealth. The purpose of this power is to ensure that the Commonwealth government can quickly gain an understanding of the resources at its disposal and what could be made available to assist in the response to or recovery from the emergency. It will also ensure that that the need for departments to be able to report on these matters immediately following the declaration of a national emergency is integrated into all national emergency planning and exercise processes. Conclusion By way of conclusion, this bill will recognise and enhance the role of the Commonwealth in preparing for, responding to and recovering from emergencies that cause or are likely to cause nationally significant harm. The bill will ensure that the Australian community is aware of the significance, gravity and nature of a declared emergency event and galvanise support across all levels of government towards the response and recovery effort. The bill will also provide greater visibility to decision-makers of the full range of powers available in a national emergency. This aspect of the bill will operate in conjunction with the National Emergency Declaration (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020, which will introduce alternative streamlined tests for the exercise of these powers while a national emergency declaration is in force. I commend this bill to the House Debate adjourned. National Emergency Declaration (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020 3

National Emergency Declaration (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020

First Reading 3 Second Reading 3 09:44 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The National Emergency Declaration (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020 will consolidate and streamline enumerated emergency powers across the statute books of the Commonwealth to enable ministers and officials to act decisively in respect of a declared national emergency. The bill will operate in conjunction with the National Emergency Declaration Bill 2020 (NED Bill), which enables the Governor-General, on the advice of the Prime Minister, to declare a national emergency. It will also implement recommendation 5.1 of the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements by complementing the legislative framework for declaring national emergencies enacted by the NED Bill. Consequential amendments The consequential amendments bill complements the national emergency declaration framework by amending the legislation listed in its schedule, to add alternative tests for the exercise of powers that can support the response and recovery effort where a national emergency has been declared. It achieves this objective in three key ways. First, where the powers currently contain an 'emergency' test, the bill removes the legal requirement for each decision-maker to separately consider whether there is an 'emergency' in circumstances where a national emergency has been declared. Second, in the case of powers that are often exercised in an emergency, but that do not currently contain an emergency test, the bill enables decision-makers to exercise each power if they are satisfied that it is necessary to respond to, or support the recovery from, the declared national emergency. Third, where the tests for those emergency powers contain elements that overlap with the test for making a national emergency declaration, the bill creates an alternative simplified test where a national emergency has been declared that does not contain the overlapping elements. Together, these amendments ensure that ministers and officials can act quickly once a national emergency declaration is made. The amendments integrate the making of a national emergency declaration into each power's respective frameworks. These are necessary amendments to bring together the disparate powers across the statute book, and, most importantly, ensure ministers and officials have a comprehensive picture of the powers at their disposal that can be employed to ensure an efficient and effective response and recovery effort. This framework does not duplicate existing powers, or displace the availability of the powers outside of a national emergency. It is not the intention that these alternative tests preclude decision-makers from relying on pre-existing tests for the exercise of a power during a national emergency if it would be more convenient or appropriate to do so. Rather, these amendments do not alter which minister or official is responsible for exercising each power. The intent of the amendments is to assist ministers and officials to make critical decisions in the most timely way possible where a national emergency declaration has been made. Conclusion The consequential amendments bill makes important amendments to support a clear and comprehensive legislative framework for the exercise of the Commonwealth's national emergency powers. I commend the bill to the House Debate adjourned. Regulatory Powers (Standardisation Reform) Bill 2020 4

Regulatory Powers (Standardisation Reform) Bill 2020

First Reading 4 Second Reading 4 09:49 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Regulatory Powers (Standardisation Reform) Bill 2020 represents the second coordinated tranche of amendments to Commonwealth acts to trigger the operation of the Regulatory Powers (Standard Provisions) Act 2014. By way of background, the regulatory powers act provides for a standard suite of provisions in relation to monitoring and investigation powers, as well as provisions regulating the use of civil penalties, infringement notices, enforceable undertakings and injunctions. That act commenced on 1 October 2014, but only has effect where Commonwealth acts are drafted or amended to trigger the standard provisions. By standardising regulatory powers across the Commonwealth, the act is intended to: significantly reduce the length of legislation governing each regulatory regime provide greater clarity and consistency for agencies that need to exercise powers with respect to multiple regulatory regimes make it easier for businesses that are subject to multiple regimes to understand and comply with the law, and facilitate the development of a common body of law. The regulatory powers act also ensures that Commonwealth regulatory powers are sufficiently certain and predictable, while being flexible, to ensure that agencies with specialised functions can operate effectively. The standard provisions of the regulatory powers act represent best practice in relation to regulatory powers of general application. The first standardisation reform act, the Regulatory Powers (Standardisation Reform) Act 2017, amended 15 Commonwealth acts to repeal existing provisions providing for regulatory regimes and instead apply the standard provisions of the regulatory powers act. Since then a number of acts have also independently triggered the regulatory powers act's standard provisions. This bill amends six acts to trigger the standard provisions of the regulatory powers act. Amendments to the Education Services for Overseas Students Act 2000, the Fisheries Management Act 1991and the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Act 2011 will move existing bespoke regulatory regimes to the standard provisions to align with best practice regulatory powers. Amendments to the Defence Force Discipline Act 1982, the Tobacco Advertising Prohibition Act 1992 and the Tobacco Plain Packaging Act 2011 will trigger the regulatory powers act to expand their regulatory powers and provide a more robust compliance and graduated enforcement scheme. Amendments to provide these acts with standard regulatory powers will support the acts' overarching policy objectives, including the reduction of smoking rates, the management of fisheries resources and the integrity of educational services. Alignment with the regulatory powers act also provides an opportunity to consider whether existing regulatory powers or functions are still relevant and appropriate. Accordingly, the bill will either repeal or narrow existing regulatory provisions that do not have equivalent provisions in the regulatory powers act on the basis that those existing provisions are no longer required or required in their current form. In addition, limited modifications to the standard provisions will be made to some of the acts to tailor the standard provisions to the regulatory context of each act. A mendments to the regulatory powers act The bill will also make minor amendments to the regulatory powers act to ensure that the regulatory requirements and underlying penalty and offence provisions of acts that trigger the regulatory powers act can be effectively enforced. Those amendments would: enable the use of monitoring powers in relation to matters, rather than only in relation to a provision, or information given in compliance with a provision update the description of offence provisions, and the description of provisions relating to infringement notices which might apply to contravention of both a civil penalty and criminal offence provision to ensure consistency throughout the regulatory powers act and respond to recent drafting practices By way of conclusion, implementing the regulatory powers act supports the government's regulatory reform agenda, as that act intends to simplify and streamline Commonwealth regulatory powers across the statute book which currently vary in breadth and detail, resulting in inconsistency or unnecessary duplication across regimes. Standardisation provides regulatory agencies with the opportunity to use more uniform powers, and increase legal certainty for businesses and individuals who are subject to those powers. The use of the standard provisions ensures that the government exercises regulatory powers responsibly and with accountability so that the rights of individuals and businesses remain protected. I commend the bill to the House. Debate adjourned. Australian Immunisation Register Amendment (Reporting) Bill 2020 5

Australian Immunisation Register Amendment (Reporting) Bill 2020

First Reading 5 Second Reading 5 09:55 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders I move: That this bill be now read a second time. In particular, the Australian government is a strong supporter of immunisation in that it is a safe and effective way to prevent the spread of many diseases in the community that can cause hospitalisation, serious ongoing health issues or, tragically, as we well know at this time above all others, the loss of life. This Australian Immunisation Register Amendment (Reporting) Bill 2020 supports and builds upon the longstanding action of successive governments to ensure that Australians have access to safe and effective vaccines and that we maintain world-leading immunisation rates. Currently not all vaccination providers make a record in the Australian Immunisation Register (the AIR) when a vaccine is administered which means that the individual or a health professional may not have access to vaccination history which could be vital information in an emergency, when undertaking medical treatment and in managing health and wellbeing. The effect of the amendments in this bill is to make it mandatory for all vaccination providers to report vaccines given, including any COVID-19 vaccine, to the AIR whilst maintaining the fundamental Australian position of voluntary vaccination of and in itself. These changes will ensure that every Australian can access their vaccine history through this safe and secure register. While the government strongly supports immunisation, it is not mandatory, vaccination will remain voluntary and individuals will retain the fundamental choice not to vaccinate. The amendments in the bill will support Australians' health and wellbeing by improving reporting to the AIR to better inform vaccine projections, purchasing, delivery and program performance, and analyses of vaccine effectiveness and safety, which will be particularly important for the COVID-19 vaccines. The world is facing an immense, once-in-a-generation challenge from the COVID-19 pandemic, as this House well knows. Over 64 million cases of the virus have been formally notified and, sadly, over 1.4 million deaths so far globally have been recorded. Inevitably, the real numbers are significantly higher. In Australia, while there has been loss and tragedy we have been mercifully spared much of the anguish faced by the rest of the world. We have had minimal cases in recent weeks and many days of zero cases. Agonisingly by comparison the rest of the world saw over 575,000 cases in the last 24 hours and almost 12,000 lives lost. These results came about because of a deep national partnership based on our COVID-19 pandemic plan, which we began in January and released in February and which we have lived and helped deliver in partnership with the Australian states and territories and people ever since. But precisely because of these global figures Australia will not be fully safe until the world is safe. That's why our next step is to ensure the provision of free COVID-19 vaccines, on a voluntary basis, available to the entire Australian population. Against that background, the Australian Immunisation Register Act 2015 governs the AIR as a whole-of-life, national immunisation register which records vaccines given to all people in Australia. This includes vaccines given under the National Immunisation Program (the NIP), through school based programs and privately, such as for seasonal influenza or travel. AIR data is used: to monitor the effectiveness of vaccines and vaccination programs, including adverse events; to identify any parts of Australia at risk during disease outbreaks; to inform immunisation policy and research; as proof of vaccination for entry to child care and school, and for employment purposes; to monitor vaccination coverage across Australia; and to demonstrate eligibility for family tax benefit and childcare subsidy payments. The Australian government is committed to providing all Australians with access to free, safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines as soon as available. A safe and effective vaccine, available globally, will dramatically improve health outcomes and societal wellbeing and facilitate economic recovery. As a nation, we welcome the news from the United Kingdom of the first emergency approval of the Pfizer vaccine. The lessons learned in the UK will be of deep value not just to Australia but to the world as a whole. And, as I say, Australia, will not be fully safe until the world is safe. The Australian government has therefore acted decisively to secure production and supply agreements to ensure early access to over 134 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine to Australians in 2021-21 and 2021-22 through an investment of $3.3 billion. That is also strengthened by the additional 25½ million units which will be available under the COVAX international facility. Should these vaccines prove to be successful—and the latest advice from the regulator is positive—and safe and meet the Therapeutic Goods Administration's (TGA) stringent assessment requirements and approval processes, Australians will have access to: 33.8 million doses of the University of Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, available from early 2021; 51 million doses of the University of Queensland/CSL vaccine, available from mid-2021; 40 million doses of the Novavax protein subunit vaccine, available from the first half of 2021, with the option to purchase an additional 10 million doses in 2022; and 10 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech mRNA vaccine, available in the first half of 2021, on which we've received this positive news in the last 24 hours. It is important, therefore, to note that all four vaccine candidates are likely to require two doses per person on the best available advice from the medical experts. In addition to the significant investment in COVID-19 vaccines, the Australian government invests over $400 million each year though the NIP to protect Australians against 17 vaccine preventable diseases. The NIP provides free vaccines to eligible people, including children, adolescents, the elderly, pregnant women and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people against conditions such as pneumococcal, meningococcal, measles, mumps, rubella, pertussis, shingles, human papillomavirus (HPV) and influenza amongst others. These changes, therefore, will ensure that every Australian can access their vaccine history through the Australian Immunisation Register. The need for the Australian Immunisation Register Amendment (Reporting) Bill 2020 arose from the need to provide Australians with information about their immunisation history, to support the rollout of a COVID-19 vaccine and the ongoing administration of the NIP. The effect of the amendments in the bill is to make it mandatory for all vaccination providers to report vaccines given, including any COVID-19 vaccine, to the AIR. The details of the reporting obligations, including who is obliged to report and what information is to be reported in what time frames, will be prescribed in the Australian Immunisation Register rules to be made under this bill. Combined with the reporting of influenza and NIP vaccines, this will inform the public health response to COVID-19 and other potential vaccine preventable diseases outbreaks. Currently, vaccination providers are encouraged to report all vaccines administered to the AIR; however, as reporting is voluntary, not all vaccines administered are reported. Australia continues to have a high level of vaccination reporting and AIR data that is entered is sufficiently reliable for the administration of childhood immunisations due to a number of policy and program settings which do encourage reporting. For example Australia's immunisation coverage rates for children continue to be at a record high, compared to the rest of the world. As at September 2020, 94.90 per cent of all Australian children aged five years and 97.03 per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children aged five years were fully vaccinated. These are record numbers which have increased during the course of the pandemic, a tribute to the Australian public and our public health professionals and systems around the country. However, reporting of adolescent and other adult vaccines is lower and less reliable. For example, the reporting of vaccinations against herpes zoster and pneumococcal for older Australians is around 40 per cent and reporting for seasonal influenza is around 50 per cent. There is currently no statutory mechanism by which the government can require vaccination providers to report all vaccines administered. Without such a mechanism on which to rely, the government will be unable to enforce the mandatory reporting of COVID-19 vaccines administered, once a vaccine becomes available for clinical use. Mandatory reporting to the AIR will therefore enable the monitoring of immunisation coverage and administration, which is key to ensuring vaccination course completion—a critical element—as well as assisting with any adverse event reporting. While the government strongly supports immunisation—fundamentally believes in immunisation—and will run a strong campaign to encourage COVID-19 vaccination and general vaccinations, it is not mandatory and individuals may choose not to vaccinate. I do want to thank the member for McMahon and the opposition for their strong, clear, unequivocal bipartisan support. This is an article of faith both in terms of the National Immunisation Program and shared approaches to vaccination which are abiding through different governments of different persuasions and their support has been critical and faultless. That's a personal thanks from me to my shadow minister counterpart. The AIR provides Australians with an immunisation history statement (IHS) which displays all immunisations that an individual has had that are recorded on the AIR. The IHS, or immunisation history statement, can be viewed and printed via Medicare Online, myGov or the Express Plus Medicare mobile app. Vaccination providers can print an IHS on behalf of their patient. Immunisation information on My Health Record is updated via a daily feed from AIR data. The IHS can be used by individuals to prove their immunisation status for child care, school, employment or travel purposes, particularly as there are cases around the world where different types of vaccinations are required for different countries. The AIR provides an ICT platform incorporating themes of accessibility and usability capable of integrating with the My Health Record system and the Department of Health's Enterprise Data Warehouse, with the ability to be expanded to support further vaccination initiatives in the future. The AIR operates with clinical information systems to enable healthcare providers to provide data to the register easily and receive information back easily to better inform clinical decision-making. Public consultation seeking stakeholder, and the broader public's, views on the proposed legislative amendment has occurred through an extensive process of engagement. It is pleasing—and I'm delighted to inform the House this—to note that key stakeholders, including health peak bodies, such as the AMA and the RACGP, are supportive of the proposed changes. The majority of individuals who responded that they did not agree with the proposed legislation amendment provided views regarding mandatory vaccination as opposed to mandatory reporting of vaccinations. Therefore it is fundamentally important to reiterate again that, while the government strongly, deeply profoundly supports immunisation—indeed this is the view overwhelmingly of this parliament on all sides—it is not mandatory, vaccination will remain voluntary and individuals will retain the fundamental ability to choose not to vaccinate. State and territory jurisdictions also support these legislative changes as this supports strategies they have, or are intending to introduce, to achieve increased reporting to the AIR. The government is serious about ensuring the AIR maintains a complete and reliable national dataset. Compliance activities will occur for those vaccination providers who do not comply with the new arrangements. It is conceivable that the vaccination providers who have failed to report a single vaccination event and are otherwise compliant with legislation are likely to have experienced isolated issues—or could've experienced. In such circumstances education and support will be provided in the first instance. For those vaccination providers not reporting any vaccines to the AIR and who do not undertake behavioural change even after education and support is provided, more serious compliance action, such as a civil penalty, could be considered. The Department of Health is working closely with Services Australia and the Australian Digital Health Agency on a range of system enhancements to ensure vaccination providers are able to easily meet their obligations under the new arrangements. The feedback from the consultation process has informed the development of the bill, particularly in regards to compliance measures and the plans for additional provider information and support. The government is keenly aware that the AIR holds sensitive information. Existing provisions in the AIR Act state how the AIR can collect, store, use and disclose personal information, and the persons who are able to access the AIR to achieve the purposes of the register. Privacy is fundamental. The types of information to be collected under the reporting obligation are the same as those currently collected on a voluntary basis under the AIR Act. The amendments will expressly authorise or require the collection, use and disclosure of information that will also meet obligations under the Australian Privacy Principles in schedule 1 to the Privacy Act 1988. There are existing provisions under the AIR Act that provide individuals with control over how their personal information is used. These provisions allow individuals to opt out from receiving correspondence from the AIR and/or having their information shared with third parties. The existing limitations for purposes for which the information can be disclosed are a reasonable and proportionate use of individuals' personal information. Individual privacy is maintained and championed, and not diminished in any way by this bill. The new reporting requirements commence on the day after royal assent. The intention is that the amendments will be in place for mandatory reporting to commence for influenza vaccinations and any COVID-19 vaccine (should one or more safe and effective vaccines meet all necessary regulatory requirements for supply in the Australian market) from 1 March 2021. I would emphasise to the House that the latest advice I have from the Therapeutic Goods Administration is that we are on track for a decision in relation to the first of the COVID-19 vaccines before the end of January, and we are on track for delivery, subject to those approvals being positive, commencing in March 2021. This is an important milestone for saving lives and protecting lives in Australia. From 1 July 2021 vaccination providers will be required to report all National Immunisation Program vaccinations to the AIR. The bill will serve to benefit the health of Australians through more complete reporting of vaccinations. Over time, it will help increase vaccination coverage rates and the effectiveness of vaccination programs, and support the health system by informing policy for the NIP and service delivery at the local level. I particularly want to thank for their work, from my office, Kylie Wright, Sam Develin, Stacey Edmanson and Joanne Tester, and, from the department, Secretary Professor Brendan Murphy, Chief Medical Officer Professor Paul Kelly, and the head of the Therapeutic Goods Administration, Professor John Skerritt. I want to thank all of those health professionals who have contributed. I have mentioned, and again reiterate, my thanks to the opposition. Ultimately, vaccinations save lives and protect lives. This bill is about saving lives and protecting lives, and I commend it to the House in the strongest possible way. Debate adjourned. Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Bill 2020 9

Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Bill 2020

First Reading 9 Second Reading 9 10:12 Mr DUTTON 00AKI Dickson I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Bill 2020 will enhance the powers of Commonwealth law enforcement agencies to help combat serious crimes perpetrated using anonymising technologies and the dark web. As technology has changed, so too has the tradecraft of criminals. Multiple layers of technologies that conceal the identities, IP addresses, jurisdictions, locations and activities of criminals are increasingly hampering investigations into serious crimes. This includes child sexual abuse, terrorism and the trafficking of firearms and illicit drugs. Online anonymity, combined with less-traceable cryptocurrencies, allows criminals to trade in the most abhorrent online marketplaces with perceived impunity. But these activities are not going unchecked. The recently established Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation (ACCCE), working alongside the Australian Federal Police and partner agencies, is targeting the depraved and hidden world of online child sexual abuse, including the pay-per-view and live streaming crime types. The AFP and ACCCE work closely with state and territory and international partners to dismantle networks of child sex offenders. In the past 12 months, the ACCCE has intercepted and examined more than 250,000 child abuse material files. Of these, 44 referrals were made to ACCCE's victim identification team, making up more than 4,000 images and 2,200 videos. As a result of AFP investigations between 1 July 2018 and 30 September 2020, there have been 302 arrests with 2,334 charges laid and, most importantly, 229 children removed from harm. That includes 113 domestically and 116 internationally. I commend in the strongest possible terms the men and women of the Australian Federal Police, ACCCE and partner law enforcement agencies and all of the staff within the department who provide support to the work of these officers on their collective outstanding work to date and the lives they have saved. Unfortunately, though, the threat continues to grow. The ACCCE has identified a 163 per cent increase in child abuse material downloaded on the dark web in just three months between April and June this year compared to the same period last year. As a government, we are determined to provide our agencies with all reasonable powers necessary to protect the lives of children and to protect the Australian public from criminals acting anonymously online to perpetrate other serious crimes. This bill will allow the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) to shine a light into the darkest recesses of the online world and hold those hiding there to account. Specifically, it provides the AFP and ACIC with three new powers. First, the bill provides a new power to collect intelligence through access to online networks. This power will allow investigators to identify offenders and the scope of their offending online, including on the dark web. Second, the bill will allow agencies to disrupt criminal activity where they see it occurring online. This will allow authorities to limit ongoing criminal activity and protect individuals from further victimisation. Finally, the bill will allow agencies to take control of a person's online account for the purpose of gathering evidence to expose online criminality. The AFP and ACIC's existing computer access warrants are not designed to address the new threats perpetrated by the increased use of anonymising technologies by large networks of criminals operating in the online environment. These powers are limited to evidence gathering for particular investigations. The proposed network activity warrant will provide the AFP and ACIC with a new intelligence collection power that will enable them to build a picture of how criminal networks are operating online and inform future investigations. Network activity warrants will allow officers to access networks being used by criminal gangs whose members are suspected of being involved in serious online offences. This warrant will be available where the members' identities are unknown to authorities, allowing the suspects' online identifying information to be collected as the first step in an investigation. Consistent with existing powers in the Surveillance Devices Act, a network activity warrant may be issued by an eligible judge or nominated AAT member. A judge or an appropriate AAT member will need to be satisfied there are reasonable grounds to suspect a group is a criminal network and access to the group's computers will substantially assist in collecting intelligence relating to the group's activities. The intelligence must be relevant to the prevention, detection or frustration of an offence with a maximum penalty of at least three years imprisonment. As this is an intelligence collection power, any information collected using these warrants will not be admissible in criminal proceedings. This ensures the data will only be used to enhance agencies' intelligence picture and inform further investigations. Criminal offences will apply to any unlawful disclosure of information collected using a network activity warrant, and additional safeguards will protect legitimate users from interference with their devices. The Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) will ensure rigorous oversight over this power. This is appropriate given this power is limited to the collection of intelligence rather than evidence. IGIS oversight will ensure these warrants are closely scrutinised and agencies act with legality, propriety and in line with human rights obligations. A data disruption warrant will allow the AFP and ACIC to remotely modify data held in computers to frustrate the commission of relevant offences. For example, investigators who become aware of child abuse images being shared online will be able to modify or delete that material to prevent its further spread. This will halt the further victimisation of children in the images while police work to bring their abusers to justice. A judge or AAT member will need to be satisfied there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that a criminal offence is being committed, and disruption is necessary and proportionate to the seriousness of the offence. These powers will be accompanied by robust safeguards to ensure they are exercised with due care and consideration for the property of third parties. Data disruption warrants are limited to interference with data and cannot be used to damage physical property or confiscate funds. Oversight of the disruption activities will be conducted by the Commonwealth Ombudsman. This is consistent with the general oversight arrangements for the activities of these agencies under similar computer access powers. Currently, law enforcement cannot use information obtained under an investigatory power to facilitate an account takeover. The account takeover power will allow officers to take over online accounts and gather evidence about a person's online criminality and their associates' activity. This power will allow law enforcement to uncover identities of individuals operating online and identify potential victims. Through the new account takeover warrant, AFP and ACIC will be authorised to take control of a person's online account to gather evidence leading to prosecutions of a serious offence. Officers will also be able to gather evidence about the activity of a person's associates. For example, current powers enable an AFP officer to obtain a password to a forum account that can be accessed through a device if the device is suspected to be used to distribute child abuse material. This does not allow taking full control of their online account. The account takeover power will enable an officer to obtain exclusive control of the online account and prevent the person's continued access to a forum and the further dissemination of child abuse material. A magistrate will need to be satisfied there are reasonable grounds for suspicion an account takeover is necessary for the purpose of gathering evidence for a serious offence. The nature and extent of the suspected criminal activity must justify the account takeover. An account takeover warrant is limited to activities necessary to take control of an online account. When issuing a warrant, the magistrate must consider the existence of alternative means of obtaining the evidence sought and the extent to which the privacy of any person is likely to be affected. Law enforcement officers are required to restore access to the holder of the target account upon expiry of the warrant, if the account is lawful, such as a social media or internet banking account. The Commonwealth Ombudsman will provide oversight of the AFP and ACIC's use of the account takeover powers. This is consistent with the general oversight arrangements for the activities of these agencies. The Ombudsman is required to inspect agencies' records and report to the Minister for Home Affairs every six months. This report must be tabled in parliament. Respective agencies will also be required to provide statistics relating to the use of data disruption warrants, network activity warrants and account takeover warrants in annual reports to the minister. For data disruption warrants and network activity warrants, this information will be included in the Surveillance Devices Act annual report, and for account takeover warrants, this information will be included in the Crimes Act annual report. The minister is required to table the reports in parliament. These key new powers are critical in enabling law enforcement to tackle the fundamental shift in how serious criminality is occurring online. Without enhancing the AFP and ACIC's powers, we leave them with outdated ways of attacking an area of criminality that is only increasing in prevalence. This bill demonstrates the government's commitment to equipping the AFP and ACIC with modern powers that ensure serious criminality targeting Australians is identified and disrupted as resolutely in the online space as it is in the physical world. In conclusion, I want to commend the work of the officers in particular who have been involved in the department in compiling the work associated with this bill. I'm supported by a fantastic group of professional individuals within the Department of Home Affairs and within the agencies within the Home Affairs portfolio. But in particular today I wish to recognise Andrew Warnes and Jessica Bock for their work and the work of their team, for their professionalism, and for the way they have worked tirelessly to bring this bill to fruition. Our country will be a safer place when this bill passes and is implemented and utilised by the AFP and the ACIC. The officers of the home affairs department, including Andrew, Jessica and their team, should be incredibly proud of the work that they have put together to enable this bill to be presented here to the parliament. I commend the bill. Debate adjourned. National Collecting Institutions Legislation Amendment Bill 2020 11 First Reading 11 Second Reading 11 10:25 Mr FLETCHER ( L6B Bradfield — ) ( ): I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The National Collecting Institutions Legislation Amendment Bill provides for a range of measures that reflect the government's ongoing commitment of support for the six national collecting institutions within my portfolio: the Australian National Maritime Museum, the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia, the National Gallery of Australia, the National Library of Australia, the National Museum of Australia and the National Portrait Gallery of Australia. The bill includes two schedules. Schedule 1 includes measures that will allow these institutions to invest philanthropic donations more broadly than is currently permitted under the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013. Doing this will allow them to seek higher returns on funds associated with such donations and encourage greater philanthropic giving for the long-term benefit of those institutions, their collections and the delivery of their programs and services in the national interest. Schedule 2 of the bill makes minor amendments to improve consistency between the six enabling acts and reduce inefficiency in a range of administrative matters. Investment of philanthropic funds (schedule 1) Currently, the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 restricts the ability of corporate Commonwealth entities, including the six national collecting institutions in my portfolio, to invest any cash reserves not immediately required for the purposes of the entity, in low-interest bearing options such as bank accounts or securities guaranteed by the Commonwealth. The measures in the bill will provide a mechanism for these institutions to invest funds associated with philanthropic donations in higher yielding asset classes in order to achieve greater financial returns. To do so their accountable authorities (that is, their governing boards and councils) must first formulate investment policies identifying their investment and risk management strategies, and benchmarks for assessing investment performance. Investment policies will also be required to be made publicly accessible on their websites for transparency purposes. The bill does not change the current investment restrictions imposed by the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 for those funds received from the government, or from revenue generated by the commercial and retail activities of the institutions as part of their business. The government considers that the provisions in the bill provide a sensible balance to enable greater financial freedom to invest those funds received by donation (which present a lower risk), while retaining restrictions on revenues from business operations that have a clear connection to appropriated funds and the ability for institutions to deliver their mandated functions. Over many years our national collecting institutions have successfully attracted philanthropic giving through fundraising foundations, endowments and bequests. This private giving is a valuable means of support for these institutions which helps them develop and deliver additional exhibitions and educational programs, enhance their facilities and purchase particular items of cultural heritage and national significance for their collections. There is strong ongoing competition for philanthropy across many sectors. These measures respond to feedback from the national collecting institutions that restrictions to investing beyond low-interest bank accounts was proving to be a deterrent to philanthropic giving and preventing them from realising the full financial potential of the philanthropic support that they receive. These institutions are fortunate to attract significant philanthropic interest; however, individuals who are often making extremely generous donations are understandably making choices to direct their donations where they will have the greatest impact. The government expects this amendment will contribute to the financial sustainability of the national collecting institutions by enabling them to optimise the returns on the investment of privately donated revenue and to encourage greater philanthropic support into the future. Other administrative amendments (schedule 2) The bill also provides an opportunity to make administrative amendments to the enabling acts of the six national collecting institutions, which reflect differing drafting approaches over the period 1960 to 2013 and are hence inconsistent with each other. Some of these acts also contain provisions that are no longer necessary in light of the commencement of other legislation of broader application. There are gains to be made through the simplification and standardisation of certain administrative requirements, contributing to improved efficiency and productivity in government operations. The amendments proposed by the bill include removing planning and reporting provisions that are additional to what is required by the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013, introducing more consistent provisions related to entering into contracts and financial transactions, among others. For example, the bill repeals a number of requirements included variously in three of the acts in relation to corporate plans. These include a provision for the minister to give directions regarding the content of the plan, as well as particular requirements around timing, approval and tabling before parliament. The bill also repeals requirements for one agency, related to the preparation, approval and tabling of an operational plan. These planning and reporting provisions exceed the requirements under the PGPA Act that apply to corporate Commonwealth entities and place an additional administrative burden on the affected agencies. The bill also seeks to standardise the provisions related to entering into contracts including the financial thresholds below which ministerial approval is not required. This means both the way the provisions are described and, in some cases, the actual financial values related to the thresholds. The proposed amendments will list six common categories of arrangement which will have corresponding threshold values listed in regulations. The six types are the acquisition and the disposal of collection material; the acquisition and disposal of property, right and privilege; building construction; and entering into a lease of land. It is proposed that the regulations of each of the acts will be remade, where necessary, to include a common threshold of $2 million below which ministerial approval would not be required prior to entering a contract. For three of the agencies this would represent an increase. It is anticipated that this will streamline approvals, and that specifying thresholds in the regulations, rather than the acts, will provide flexibility to update threshold amounts over time. An exception to the $2 million threshold will be for the National Gallery of Australia, which currently has a $10 million threshold for acquiring works of art. It is anticipated that the remade regulations will retain this amount and introduce a corresponding $10 million threshold for disposals of works of art. The bill also seeks to introduce exemptions to the requirement to seek ministerial approval in relation to contracts for the day-to-day operations of the agencies. This will mean agencies will no longer be required to seek the minister's approval prior to entering into an arrangement for services such as utilities, cleaning, security, general maintenance and replacement of capital assets. The institutions enter such contracts only after testing the market and considering what provides best value and it is sensible that they be permitted to directly manage their own operational affairs in this way. An exemption from ministerial approval for all transactions associated with investments is also proposed by the bill. This recognises that governing bodies will be responsible for investment activities under their policies and that the requirement for ministerial approval would be contrary to the intention of the newly introduced investment provisions. A number of amendments are also proposed with regards to governing bodies. Currently some acts include a ceiling of nine years service by individual members of their board or council. The minister will be able to make short-term acting appointments, and an acting period will be counted in the nine years service. The bill aims to apply this across the acts for consistency, recognising that it provides an appropriate balance of retaining experience and renewing the skills and expertise of the membership. The bill also seeks to repeal a requirement that the Governor-General terminate the appointment of a senator or member of parliament elected to sit on the National Library of Australia Council if their term as a senator or member of parliament ends. This means that such an appointment would automatically end and not require a letter of resignation or advice to the Governor-General. This reflects the arrangements already in place for parliamentary representatives elected to the National Archives of Australia Advisory Council. The bill removes requirements that the Australian National Maritime Museum furnish the minister with an annual operational plan, and a copy of its minutes after each council meeting, and that the National Gallery of Australia be restricted to storing its collection within the Australian Capital Territory. These provisions are considered unnecessary to retain. The bill provides that the minister may delegate specific powers to the secretary or relevant senior executive staff of the department. These powers expressly exclude the ability of a delegate to make a ministerial direction, to appoint an acting board or council member, to approve the entering of an agreement for the purchase of land. This new provision would enable the minister, where he or she wishes, to delegate across the acts the powers to appoint an acting agency head or to approve entering into contracts above specified thresholds. Such appointments or approvals are sometimes required at short notice. Providing such a delegation will support greater efficiency. Some of the acts already include this provision and are supporting current delegations of this nature. The bill will extend this provision in relation to each of the national collecting institutions and agencies. The bill also provides that the minister may make a ministerial direction for each of the national collecting institutions, which removes an inconsistency in that the minister at present is unable to make a ministerial direction for two of the six institutions. The measures that the bill proposes will offer the national collecting institutions an opportunity to enhance their financial sustainability through the investment of donated funding. The measures will also remove anachronistic requirements and replace them with clearer administrative provisions. These measures aim to provide long-term benefits to those institutions and their audiences. I commend the bill. Debate adjourned. Telecommunications Amendment (Infrastructure in New Developments) Bill 2020 14

Telecommunications Amendment (Infrastructure in New Developments) Bill 2020

First Reading 14 Second Reading 14 10:37 Mr FLETCHER L6B Bradfield I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Telecommunications Amendment (Infrastructure in New Developments) Bill 2020 will improve access to telecommunications in new developments. Access to telecommunications underpins much of today's economic and social activity. The importance of broadband connectivity has been highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic, with hundreds of thousands of people staying at home, often continuing their work and study online. When people move into new homes, or occupy new business premises, they expect ready access to telecommunications. Given that the majority of internet traffic is carried on fixed-line networks, people moving into new homes or business premises expect that the developers of those premises will have arranged for this infrastructure to be provided. Since 2011, the Telecommunications Act has required developers that are constitutional corporations to install what are called fibre-ready facilities—this is essentially pits and pipes which house telecommunications cabling. The requirement is that these fibre-ready facilities be installed in proximity to lots or new buildings before the developer sells or leases them. Unincorporated developers have not been subject to such a requirement. Since 2011, the majority of developers, both incorporated and unincorporated, have done the right thing and installed fibre-ready facilities. However, there has been a small but persistent failure by some unincorporated developers to install fibre-ready facilities. My department estimates that up to 3,000 premises each year are being sold or leased without pit and pipe facilities as a result. The impact on those affected, that's to say moving into new residential or business premises, can be significant and includes restricted access to telecommunications, reduced social and economic participation, retrofitting costs and sheer inconvenience. The cost to a developer of installing pit and pipe during construction is estimated at $600 to $800. By contrast, the cost to a new homebuyer of retrofitting pit and pipe is estimated at $2,100 and can be greater if extensive civil works are required. For example, in 2017 the buyers of three new homes in a development in Balga, in Western Australia, were presented with a bill of over $10,000 for retrofitting pit and pipe. The bill I am introducing today addresses this issue. It extends the arrangements that currently apply to incorporated developers to unincorporated developers. It also makes some minor related changes. It clarifies that the facilities to be installed must be functional. A functional facility must be technically capable of being used in connection with an optical fibre line. This would mean, for example, that if a pit or a pipe is filled with concrete or earth and, hence, is not functional it would need to be replaced or remediated by the developer. The bill provides a transitional exemption for projects that are already underway. Existing exemptions under the Telecommunications Act 1997 will continue and will apply to both incorporated developers and unincorporated developers. For example, there is an exemption where premises are being built outside NBN Co's fixed-line footprint and it is unlikely fixed-line networks will be provided. The arrangements in the bill are subject to civil penalty provisions. The Australian Communications and Media Authority, as the industry regulator, will be able to enforce the provisions. The amendments I'm bringing forward mean that people who occupy new premises can have greater confidence that appropriate pit and pipe facilities have been installed, in turn, giving them ready access to modern communications regardless of whether the developer is incorporated or unincorporated. I commend the bill. Debated adjourned. Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020 15

Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020

First Reading 15 Second Reading 15 10:43 Ms LEY 00AMN Farrer I move: That this bill be now read a second time. On behalf of the Morrison government, I am pleased to introduce the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020 to the House. This bill is at the centre of a package of legislation that will deliver groundbreaking improvements to the way that environmental risks from industrial chemicals are managed in this country. It delivers on reforms agreed by environment ministers from all Australian jurisdictions to drive consistency and higher standards for environmental protection across the nation, and I thank my state and territory colleagues for their cooperation and support in this process. These are commonsense reforms. They've been designed in cooperation with the states and territories and in consultation with industry and the public. They will deliver streamlined, transparent, efficient and predictable regulation. This bill is another example of the Morrison government's commitment to leading national action to protect Australia's environment, strengthen our economy and support our communities. Currently, there are more than 40,000 industrial chemicals able to be used in Australia. Many of these chemicals underpin aspects of modern life. They are used in household items, including cosmetics, paints, cleaning products, plastics and packaging materials, as well as in manufacturing, mining and fuel production. Most do not pose significant risks to people or the environment. However, it is clear that some, if not managed properly, can cause serious harm. It's also been clear that current regulatory arrangements for managing these risks are lacking Regulations for managing environmental risks from industrial chemicals differ across Australia's jurisdictions. This creates two problems: it contributes to complexity and uncertainty for business; and it fails to deliver consistently high environmental protection. The bill will address these problems and fills an important regulatory gap. It establishes a new national standard for environmental risk management of industrial chemicals, which will: streamline the regulation of use, storage and disposal of chemicals, improve consumer confidence in the safety of chemicals, drive consistency across jurisdictions, and better safeguard Australia's land, air, waterways, and its people, by reducing the impacts of chemicals on the environment. The bill will establish a legislative framework that allows industrial chemicals, or particular uses of an industrial chemical, to be listed in categories (known as schedules) according to their level of concern to the environment. It also provides for management measures to be prescribed to address those risks. Chemicals which pose greater risks to people and our environment will have stronger, tighter controls and management requirements. These scheduling decisions will be made available on a public register. States, territories and the Commonwealth will then implement the new standards within their own regulatory frameworks. Environment protection agencies in each jurisdiction currently look after the on-the-ground regulation of industrial chemicals. These reforms do not change that. What they do is establish a single standard—a single source of truth, in the public register—for managing the environmental risks from industrial chemicals in Australia. This streamlined approach gives greater certainty to Australian industry, manufacturers, retailers and end users. It delivers clear advice on the potential impact these chemicals could have on the environment and how to manage these substances. It will also provide assurance that our regulatory approach to environmental protection for industrial chemicals meets global standards, ensuring that Australia is on at least equal footing with many of our international trading partners. The Commonwealth is leading these reforms through the introduction of this bill. In addition, in the recent budget, the government announced funding to support implementation of these scheduling decisions in areas under Commonwealth control. This will ensure the new standards are met by activities in Commonwealth areas and at Australia's borders. This bill is part of once-in-a-generation regulatory improvements to protect the health of Australians and provide greater protection of the environment than ever before. It follows the introduction of the Industrial Chemicals Act 2019, which better targets chemicals of concern for assessment of their risk to human health and the environment. The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill takes this transformation even further. It delivers stronger protections for Australia's environment than ever before. Australians are right to expect that chemicals should be used in a way that will not damage the environment, regardless of whereabouts in the country they are. It makes sense for Australians to expect that chemicals are consistently regulated and managed to protect our land, air, and waterways. Businesses and industry need and expect clear parameters in which to operate. And it is incumbent upon governments to make sure there are efficient and appropriate controls to protect people and our environment, now and into the future. This legislation will deliver on these expectations. It will allow industry to make better-informed choices and give the Australian people greater confidence that the products they use have consistent environmental controls in place. These reforms will help protect Australia's communities from harmful industrial chemicals and reflects the deep commitment the Morrison government has to protecting, preserving and enhancing our environment. I commend the bill to the House. Debate adjourned. Industrial Chemicals Legislation Amendment Bill 2020 16

Industrial Chemicals Legislation Amendment Bill 2020

First Reading 16 Second Reading 16 10:49 Ms LEY 00AMN Farrer I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Industrial Chemicals Legislation Amendment Bill 2020 is a companion bill to the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020 (the principal bill). It would also make other minor amendments to the Industrial Chemicals Act 2019. The ICEMR Bill would establish a national framework to manage the ongoing use, handling and disposal of industrial chemicals, in order to reduce impacts on the environment and limit people's exposure to industrial chemicals. This bill makes a number of consequential amendments to the Industrial Chemicals Act 2019to ensure that the scheduling charge can be collected, in conjunction with the registration charge already collected under the framework of that act. Registered introducers of industrial chemicals will be liable to pay the registration charge under the IC Act and the scheduling charge under the principal bill (once enacted) at the same time. This is intended to reduce administrative burden on business. The bill also makes minor consequential amendments to the Industrial Chemicals Act 2019 to clarify how scheduling charge payments should be managed once received. Finally, the bill makes minor amendments to the delegations' powers in the Industrial Chemicals Act 2019to correct an error in the drafting of that act. Debate adjourned. Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (General) Bill 2020 17

Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (General) Bill 2020

First Reading 17 Second Reading 17 10:51 Ms LEY 00AMN Farrer I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020 (the principal bill) will establish a national framework for the consistent management of risks to the environment from industrial chemicals. The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (General) Bill 2020 (the general charges bill) is one of three bills that establish cost recovery mechanisms to recover the costs of effective administration of the scheme established under the principal bill. The general charges bill would provide a framework for applying cost recovery charges, in so far as the charge is neither a duty of customs nor a duty of excise. It will do so by allowing relevant charges to be prescribed by regulations. The general charges bill does not itself set the amount of the charges and will not impose any financial impacts. The charges will be set in regulations. The Morrison government will undertake a comprehensive consultation process with affected businesses, in developing a cost recovery implementation statement, before imposing any charges. Any charges will be developed in accordance with the Australian Government Charging Framework, which provides that the amount charged will not be more than the likely cost of delivering the activity. This package of bills will ensure that transparent and fair cost recovery mechanisms are in place for administering the industrial chemicals risk management framework established by the principal bill. Debate adjourned. Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Customs) Bill 2020 17

Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Customs) Bill 2020

First Reading 17 Second Reading 17 10:53 Ms LEY 00AMN Farrer I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Customs) Bill 2020 is the second of three bills being introduced to provide a framework for the Commonwealth to recover costs for administering the measures in the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020 (the principal bill). The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Customs) Bill 2020 will impose charges only when they are considered a duty of customs. The key provisions of the bill mirror those in the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (General) Bill 2020 and have the same operative function and effect. The amounts recovered by the charges, and the persons liable or exempt from paying them, will be set in regulations made under this bill. Debate adjourned. Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Excise) Bill 2020 17

Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Excise) Bill 2020

First Reading 17 Second Reading 17 10:55 Ms LEY 00AMN Farrer I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Excise) Bill 2020 is the final bill being introduced to provide a framework for the Commonwealth to recover costs for administering the measures in the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Bill 2020 (the principal bill). The Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (Excise) Bill 2020 will impose charges only when they are considered a duty of excise. The key provisions of the bill mirror those in the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Charge (General) Bill 2020 and have the same operative function and effect. The bill does not itself set the amount of the charges and will not impose any financial impacts. The amounts recovered by charges, and the persons liable or exempt from paying them, will be set in regulations made under this bill. Debate adjourned. Customs Tariff Amendment (Incorporation of Proposals and Other Measures) Bill 2020 18

Customs Tariff Amendment (Incorporation of Proposals and Other Measures) Bill 2020

First Reading 18 Second Reading 18 10:57 Mr WOOD E0F La Trobe I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Customs Tariff Amendment (Incorporation of Proposals and Other Measures) Bill 2020 makes important amendments to the Customs Tariff Act 1995 that will strengthen Australia's customs practice. The bill will incorporate the customs tariff proposals that provided concessional rates of customs duty for goods required to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. The bill will also make a series of changes to further enhance the operation of the Customs Tariff Act and realign certain aspects of that act with international practice. Customs Tariff Proposal (No. 1) 2020 and Customs Tariff Proposal (No. 2) 2020 were tabled in parliament in May and August this year. The proposals created temporary concessional items in schedule 4 of the Customs Tariff Act that provide a free rate of customs duty for medical supplies, such us face masks, soaps and eyewear, urgently required to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Initially, the concessional item covered a six-month period from 1 February to 31 July 2020. A review determined that the concession helped facilitate the import of crucial medical and hygiene goods and had been enthusiastically received by business and the public. As such, the government extended the concession for a further five months until 31 December this year. The bill confirms the application of those temporary concessions. This bill also makes a series of Customs Tariff Act changes that implement six measures designed to improve the functionality of the act and bring it back into line with international practice. The first of these measures introduces new tariff subheadings for 'formulated caffeinated beverages', 'formulated supplementary foods' and 'formulated supplementary sports foods'. The new subheadings for these goods reference the definitions provided in the Australian New Zealand Food Standards Code. These subheadings will allow the identification and monitoring of the products as they cross the Australian border as part of the Imported Food Inspection Scheme. This will help ensure that these goods meet Australian standards and are safe for consumption by the public. Measures 2, 3 and 4 realign the Customs Tariff Act with international tariff classification practices. The Customs Tariff Act incorporates the World Customs Organization's Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, commonly referred to as the harmonized system. The harmonized system is used by 183 countries and covers 98 per cent of global trade. The harmonized system provides means for identifying a good as it moves from one country to another, ensuring that what Australia calls a 'tomato' is the same as what every other user of the harmonized system also calls a 'tomato'. The fundamental principle of the harmonized system is that all tradeable goods have one, and only one, classification. The structure of harmonized system headings, section and chapter notes and interpretive rules that have been incorporated into the Customs Tariff Act determine a good's classification. The World Customs Organization periodically issues binding rulings on the classification of goods, where the classification is uncertain or disputed, and all countries, including Australia, are obliged to make every effort to adopt these rulings. Measure 2 will introduce an additional note into the Customs Tariff Act stating that wheeled garbage bins, commonly referred to as 'wheelie bins', are not unmotorised vehicles of chapter 87 of the Customs Tariff Act. This new additional note will restore the classification of wheelie bins to a classification that is consistent with international practice after a decision of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal held that wheelie bins be classified as unmotorised vehicles. Measure 3 introduces a series of additional notes that clarify the difference between vitamin products and other supplements which are medicaments with proven therapeutic and prophylactic benefits, and those intended to supplement a person's diet. This division is required by the harmonized system. The distinction between these two classes of goods will be made through reference to schedules 2, 3, 4 and 8 of the Poisons Standard which refer to pharmacy medicine, pharmacist-only medicine, prescription-only medicine and controlled drug respectively. The medicines listed in the schedules of the Poisons Standard are the product of an objective and well-established process undertaken by experts in this field. These amendments are required because domestic tribunal and court decisions have caused Australia's classification to become misaligned with international practice. Measure 4 introduces a series of additional notes that clarify the distinction between goods which should be classified as specialised parts of another good and goods that should be classified as pieces of metal of various shapes. For example, one of the amendments will clarify the distinction between certain metal pipes and parts of steel structures. Again, these amendments are required because domestic tribunal and court decisions have caused Australia's classifications to become misaligned with international practice. Measure 5 removes the $12,000 special customs duty on used and second-hand motor vehicles applied under the Peru-Australia Free Trade Agreement and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. Both of these agreements were negotiated using versions of the Customs Tariff Act which predated the removal of the $12,000 special customs duty. The terms of both agreements required they be implemented as negotiated, meaning the $12,000 special customs duty had to be included in the enabling legislation. This measure unilaterally removes the $12,000 special customs duty applied to Peruvian and Trans-Pacific Partnership originating goods, bringing them in line with the rest of the Customs Tariff Act. Lastly, measure 6 makes a number of technical amendments, which remove redundant provisions from schedules 5 to 12, covering Australia's numerous free trade agreements. These redundant provisions are phasing rates that have been fully implemented and are no longer required in the text of the act. I commend the bill to the chamber. Debate adjourned. Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill 2020, Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020 19

Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill 2020

Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020

Second Reading 19 11:04 Dr CHALMERS 37998 Rankin Australia has long relied on foreign investment as an important source of capital to grow our economy, grow jobs and support our economic development. It can bring important benefits, including access to new technologies and management practices. But there can also be risks. We've seen a growing focus on national security risks associated with sensitive sectors and critical infrastructure assets in particular. Australia welcomes foreign investment, but we need to ensure it is in our national interest. This means having a fit-for-purpose, well-resourced foreign investment regime and robust arrangements to monitor and enforce compliance with this regime. It also requires foreign investment policies to be applied as clearly and consistently as possible, with appropriate and proportionate fees and penalties to provide investor certainty and maintain investor confidence in Australia. The Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill 2020 and the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020 will help enact substantial changes to Australia's foreign investment regime. The stated purpose of the changes is to ensure Australia's foreign investment framework keeps pace with emerging risks and global developments. In particular, the changes will allow the Treasurer to screen direct investments made after 1 January next year on national security grounds. While the government has reduced the monetary screening thresholds to zero dollars for the duration of the current crisis, these arrangements are only intended to be temporary. In more normal times, private foreign investors generally only need to notify the FIRB of a substantial interest in a business that's valued at over $275 million. This means that some small but sensitive proposals may not always be captured or receive sufficient scrutiny. The bills that are before the House today include the following changes that are intended to come into effect on 1 January. Firstly, they introduce a new national security test, which requires a notification and screening of proposed investments in a national security business and national security land. The bills give the Treasurer the ability to call in certain investments on national security grounds and, as a last resort, the ability to impose conditions or force divestment to address national security risks. They strengthen the Treasurer and the tax commissioner's enforcement powers through increased penalties and a new set of monitoring and investigative powers. They expand the information-sharing arrangements to assist with the Treasurer and the commissioner's compliance activities and address national security risks. They make a range of changes to help improve the integrity of the framework and close potential gaps in the screening regime. They establish a new register of foreign owned assets to record all foreign interests acquired in Australian land, water entitlements and contractual water rights, and business acquisitions that require foreign investment approval. They introduce new fees for new actions established under all of these reforms. As I said at the outset, foreign investment has always been important to us—important for jobs, technology, trade and the broader Australian economy. But we do need to ensure that that foreign investment is in the national interest and that the foreign investment regime keeps pace with emerging developments and risks, including those risks associated with our national security. Labor's priority is to ensure these changes strike the right balance between welcoming that foreign investment, addressing emerging national security risks and ensuring foreign investments are in the national interest overall. While we support the broad intent of the bill, we do have some concerns about some of the details and how some of the changes will work in practice. These concerns were highlighted as part of the Senate inquiry which has recently concluded. These concerns are why I move the second reading amendment circulated in my name, which says 'whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes the concerns and uncertainty around the implementation of this bill and the coalition government's broader failures on foreign investment'. I also indicate to the House that we intend to move a substantive amendment in the Senate to ensure that we can assess these changes once they're up and running, to make sure we strike the right balance. On the changes that will be implemented with our support on 1 January, we need to have a look at those fairly soon after the implementation to make sure that our objectives are being satisfied and that we're going about this the right way, so that if we are not we have the opportunity to fix some of these arrangements. There is a lot of uncertainty, as I'm sure all sides of the parliament will acknowledge, in the business community about the operation of these arrangements. We need to give the people, the parliament and the government of the day the opportunity to have a good look at these laws in operation and make sure they're operating as they want them to. In terms of our concerns with these bills, we have four. Firstly, the parliament's being asked to support bills which delegate much of the detail to regulations that haven't even been finalised yet. This makes it very difficult for investors in particular to understand how the bills will work in practice. For example, a number of industry and investor groups have raised concerns directly with us—and I assume with the government too—about the lack of clarity around the definition of 'national security business' and 'national security land'. Some business and industry groups are also concerned about the level of fees being imposed for certain transactions, with the exact fee levels to be set by regulations that are, again, still yet to be finalised. These uncertainties are particularly concerning given the substantial new powers and penalties that will be introduced through these bills. In our view the government should respond to these concerns raised in relation to the draft regulations and finalise the regulations as soon as possible. The second concern is that the bills seek to introduce some substantial and complex changes to our investment regime at a time of heightened economic uncertainty. This legislation does have implications for a range of crucially important Australian industries, including resources, agriculture and many others. We can't afford for these changes to deter foreign investment and risk jobs as we recover from the worst economic conditions in almost a century. This makes it even more important for the government to issue clearer guidance and undertake investor outreach before the commencement of these changes, to make sure that their operation is well understood. Our third concern is that it's important for the government to have sufficient resources to process applications in a timely way and to properly monitor and enforce compliance. The bills bolster information sharing and enforcement tools, but for that to be effective we need the government to be proactive in monitoring and enforcing compliance, including breaches of conditions. It was disturbing, to be frank, to hear recent evidence that there were only two staff overseeing compliance activities last year. While this has since increased, we have concerns about whether enough is still being done. As the Productivity Commission said in June: While the Australian Government has recently announced that Treasury's compliance and enforcement powers will be expanded, it remains to be seen how these will work in practice. Our final major concern is that we want greater transparency around how the foreign investment regime is working and the impact of these changes. There is no review mechanism to assess the impact of the new policy, which is a major omission, in my view, given the nature of the changes and the uncertainty around how they will work in practice. If the government hasn't got it right, we need the capacity to improve or fix the policy based on a clear assessment of how it's working. That's why I foreshadowed the amendment we are likely to move in the Senate to that effect. While the rationale of the bills is sensible, like everything with this government, we need to be focused on the implementation and the follow-up. It's not the announcement that matters but the follow-up, the implementation—how these bills will work in practice. Many of what sound like sensible changes at face value have come too late, and some of them—not that the government will concede this—have come in response to some of the government's own failures on foreign investment over the last few years. We need look no further than the government's failure to properly scrutinise the Port of Darwin lease to Landbridge in 2015. Because the government has left these changes so late, they are doing this as we recover from the worst recession in a century. That's not a great time to be creating more uncertainty. By far the government's biggest failure when it comes to foreign investment has been their failure to monitor and enforce compliance. We have the announcement about conditions struck or expectations of one approval or another, and, unfortunately, we discover time and time again that there are very few occasions where those conditions have been followed up to ensure that they're happening. There has been a failure there. There has been a gap in the way the government has gone about it. It's partly about resourcing, but it's partly about commitment. They didn't even have adequate IT systems until this year's budget to analyse application data; it was still being done manually right up until the budget. That's why there have been some disappointing failures to monitor conditions, in particular. My colleague in the other place Senator O'Neill has done a good job of highlighting the failures on Alinta, for example. In 2017, the then Treasurer and current Prime Minister signed off on a deal for the purchase of Alinta Energy by Chow Tai Fook Enterprises. This year it was revealed that Alinta was not compliant with the data security conditions imposed by the Prime Minister and had been in breach of conditions for some time. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer failed to protect the privacy of over one million Australians, by failing to enforce their own foreign investment conditions. Those are the specific issues about foreign investment, but, on investment more broadly, we have a serious problem in this country that's been neglected for too long. It has consequences for jobs, wages and living standards. We've had problems with business investment for some years, not just as a consequence of COVID-19 this year. Yesterday's national accounts showed yet another fall in business investment. The government was quick to blame this on COVID and pretend that our problems with business investment had just suddenly arrived with coronavirus. But the truth is that business investment over the life of this government, which is now in its eighth year, is actually down 30 per cent by one measure. And what is, I think, more devastating for the government's recent argument is that 80 per cent of the decline in business investment over the life of this government happened before COVID-19. So we've had an issue with business investment for some time. It's partly a story about energy policy uncertainty, it's partly a story about failure to support key sectors, like manufacturing, and it's partly a story about not doing enough to encourage investment in research and innovation and in commercialisation to turn our good ideas into good jobs here in this country. These accumulated failures of long standing, when it comes to business investment, make it even more important that we get the foreign investment part of this story right. We don't want to exacerbate a problem that we have in this country already with business investment. We want the economy to be stronger, more inclusive and more sustainable than it was before COVID-19. I know the member for Cooper shares those objectives and speaks and acts on those objectives frequently. We want a big part of this story to be about kickstarting and broadening investment in this country, so we can get those secure and well-paid jobs that people are crying out for into our economy. We want small business to thrive and not just survive. We want more businesses to start up and scale up. We want more investment in research and innovation and in commercialisation to turn those ideas into jobs. We want to help business take a longer-term view that supports jobs and investment and helps create a dynamic future economy. We want less focus on spraying around profits on things like executive bonuses. We want super funds to play a bigger role in the recovery, rather than being attacked and undermined at every turn by this government. And we want foreign investment that supports and complements these goals, that allows us to better adopt and diffuse new technologies, strengthen and broaden our trade and create well-paying jobs in cities, suburbs and regions. That's why we're prepared to be constructive when it comes to these bills. We genuinely want to make sure that our colleagues and counterparts on the other side of the House do get the balance right between welcoming that foreign investment and ensuring that it's in the national interest and good for jobs. But being constructive doesn't mean being silent. It means pointing out the facts about the failures of the past and doing what we can to ensure that the government does a better job in terms of foreign investment, business investment more broadly, and managing an economy so that it can be better after COVID than it was before. The DEPUTY SPEAKER DZP The member referred to his amendment in his contribution. Just to clarify, could you formally move the amendment that you've put forward? Dr CHALMERS 37998 I move: That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: "whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes the concerns and uncertainty around the implementation of this bill and the Coalition Government's broader failures on foreign investment." The DEPUTY SPEAKER DZP Is the amendment seconded? Ms Kearney LTU Yes. I second that. The DEPUTY SPEAKER DZP I thank the member. The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Rankin has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. If it suits the House, I will take the question in the form that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question. 11:20 Mr SHARMA 274506 Wentworth The Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill 2020 and the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020 represent the most significant reforms to the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act 1975 since that legislation was introduced. These bills will ensure that our foreign investment framework remains fit for purpose and keeps pace with emerging risks. The changes mirror similar changes underway in comparable countries around the world. I'm a supporter of foreign investment. Since settlement, Australia has always been a net capital importer. It's foreign investment that has allowed us, with a small population base, to develop the resources of this vast continent, to build First World infrastructure and to create the modern and prosperous economy and society from which we all benefit today. A small domestic population, which Australia has, could never alone deliver us the savings needed to fund our development. It's foreign investment—access to foreign capital—that has allowed us to do this. It has allowed to us fully harness the talents and ingenuity of our own people. Foreign investment drives economic growth, it supports the creation of skilled jobs, it improves productivity and it gives us access to important overseas markets. Australian firms with foreign direct investment support one in 10 jobs in Australia. They also make a significant contribution to the one in five jobs in Australia that are export related. Businesses supported by foreign investment contribute more than a quarter of industry, value added, and foreign businesses pay wages that are, on average, $20,000 per year higher than those paid by non-foreign businesses in Australia. It's important that we remember these facts, particularly as protectionist pressures rise around the world and particularly as we go about updating our foreign investment framework. As I said, Australia has always welcomed foreign investment, and we've been a beneficiary of foreign investment. If we turn our back on foreign investment, ultimately, we as a nation will be the poorer for it. That said, there are good reasons to update our foreign investment framework to deal with new and emerging national security risks, including as a result of rapid technological change and changes in the geopolitical and security environment. There are good reasons to update our framework to strengthen compliance measures and to streamline approval processes, but in doing so we must take care to preserve the underlying principles of our system: that Australia is a country which welcomes foreign investment, that Australia runs a non-discriminatory foreign investment regime and that, where we put processes in place, there is a good public policy justification for doing so and that the measures we put in place are proportionate. It's also important that the public retains confidence in the integrity of our system. These bills, I believe, get this balance right. Earlier reforms to the foreign investment review framework were made in 2015. At that time the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act was modernised by bringing all foreign investment into the legislative framework, by strengthening the Treasurer's oversight and enforcement in the residential real estate sector, by providing greater scrutiny and transparency around agricultural investments, and by introducing fees so that the cost of administering the foreign investment regime was borne by foreign investors and not by Australian taxpayers. Under the current foreign investment regime in Australia, foreign persons must notify the Treasurer of certain actions where the investment meets certain criteria, such as monetary or percentage thresholds that are dependent on the sector, the nature of the investment and the country of the investor. During the coronavirus crisis, this year, the government announced on 29 March a temporary reduction to zero dollars of the monetary screening thresholds for all foreign investments subject to the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act. Prior to these changes, foreign government investors faced a zero dollar screening threshold, but private investments under $275 million—or under $1.192 billion for investors from FTA partner countries—were not screened. The presence of these thresholds means that certain investments in some of the most sensitive sectors are not liable to screening, which can create a vulnerability for Australia. These bills we'll be debating today address this vulnerability and seek to build upon earlier reforms. The bills will expand scrutiny of investments which pose potential national security risks. There will be a new national security test for foreign investors seeking an interest in a sensitive national security business, including where they seek to start such a business. Such investors will be required to seek approval before starting down this pathway regardless of the value of the investment. This will include when a foreign person seeks to acquire a national security business from the Commonwealth or from a state, territory or local government. These actions will not be exempt from the operation for legislation. Generally speaking, national security businesses will be connected with such things as critical infrastructure, defence, the national intelligence community and related supply chains. It will include businesses that develop, manufacture or supply critical goods, technology or services that will be used by defence and intelligence personnel in Australia or in other countries, as well as businesses that own, store, collect or maintain classified or personal data relating to Australia's defence and intelligence services and personnel. This mandatory notification will also be required for proposed investments in national security land where location or use of the land could prejudice Australia's national security, including interests in exploration tenements in national security land. National security land will, amongst other things, include defence premises or where a national intelligence agency has an interest in the land. The definitions of 'national security business' and 'national security land' will be prescribed in the foreign acquisitions and takeover regulations, and the government intends to provide guidance material on these definitions to support investors in navigating these reforms. The member for Rankin was correct to point out that investors will need such guidance. Schedule 1 to the bill also defines a new category of actions: notifiable national security actions, as they're called, to describe actions that must be notified to the Treasurer for review regardless of the value of the investment or where they are otherwise notifiable. And there will also be provision for investments not otherwise notified to be called in for review by the Treasurer if they raise national security concerns. Investors will also be able to voluntarily notify of actions that could be called in to obtain certainty about their particular investment should they wish. There will also be a last resort power, giving the Treasurer a final opportunity to review actions for which approvals have been given if exceptional circumstances arise. This last resort power can only be used if a national security risk arises in relation to the investment and other options to address this risk have been exhausted. The last resort power also allows the Treasurer to impose conditions, to vary conditions or, in extremis, to issue a disposal order and force divestment where there are no other remedies for the identified national security risk. The existing national interest test in the legislation remains unchanged, including the factors that are relevant for such assessment, such as the character of the investor; the level of competition in the market; the impact on the economy, the community and national security; and other relevant government policies. All these remain unchanged. These new bills will, however, provide for stronger enforcement powers through increased penalties, direction powers and new monitoring and investigative powers in line with those available to other regulatory agencies. This will include such things as access to premises by consent or as permitted by warrant to gather information. And these measures and these powers will improve regulators' abilities to monitor investor compliance and investigate potential noncompliance. The Treasurer will also have new powers to give directions to investors to prevent or address suspected breaches of conditions. Furthermore, increased civil and criminal penalties provided for in the bills will ensure better deterrence. Taken altogether, the measures will mean breaches relating to foreign investment can be adequately investigated and meaningfully punished, and they will ensure the size of the penalties provide an effective deterrent against noncompliance. The bills also provide for a new register of foreign owned assets, which will include the existing registers and will record foreign interests acquired in land and water rights and be expanded to include any acquisitions that now require foreign investment approval. The new register will provide a more comprehensive picture of foreign investment in Australia and ensure that public confidence in our system of foreign investment is maintained. The intent is that the temporary measures announced on 29 March of this year, where we introduced a zero-dollar threshold for review, will transition to this new system once legislated with a view to the new system taking effect from 1 January 2021. I do not believe that these bills should have a material impact on the level of foreign investment in Australia. I believe that our attractiveness as a foreign investment destination will remain. In the three years to 2019 our FDI inflows averaged 3.3 per cent of our GDP, compared to 1.7 per cent average for other OECD countries. We have an abundance of high-quality investment opportunities in Australia that cannot be met from domestic savings alone. We have a stable democracy. We have a strong rule of law. We have a highly skilled and a highly educated workforce, and we have a strong infrastructure base. We are proximate to the most economically dynamic region in the world and we have a well-managed economy. All these things mean that Australia will remain a very attractive destination for foreign investors. There has been widespread stakeholder consultation concerning this legislation. Exposure draft legislation was released on 31 July. Treasury has undertaken over 40 engagements with over 1,000 stakeholders. Treasury has received 54 submissions, and I note that similar jurisdictions around the world are taking steps to modernise and strengthen their foreign investment regimes. On 11 November the UK government introduced legislation, the National Security and Investment Bill, which increases government security and transparency within 17 sectors of their economy, focused on areas such as technology, data and infrastructure, with the UK government, under this legislation, having the power to unwind any transaction within the last five years if it deems that transaction to be a risk to national security. The United States passed its own Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act in 2018. France and Germany have introduced similar laws. Canada, Japan, the EU and New Zealand have all also recently updated their foreign investment rules. In fact a 2019 paper by the OECD found that, in the two years from 2017 to 2019, nine out of the world's 10 largest economies had modified or introduced new policies to manage foreign investment related risks. So Australia is in good company here. Undoubtedly, these new bills do create additional regulation, but I believe that this additional regulation is proportionate and reasonable in comparison to the risks being addressed and they get the balance right. In particular, they address existing shortcomings in our foreign investment review regime, most notably here the so-called screening gap whereby low-value investments from private foreign investors can proceed into Australia without any government oversight even where they may pose significant national security risks. These bills, however, also increase the monitoring, compliance and enforcement tools available to government, ensuring that there is an effective deterrent against noncompliance. Finally, they will increase public confidence in and transparency around foreign investment, including through the establishment of the new register of foreign ownership. Although there is some additional regulation, fundamentally, I do not believe it will deter foreign investment in Australia and, in many instances, it will in fact provide foreign investors with greater certainty. I commend these bills to the House. 11:32 Dr LEIGH BU8 Fenner Australia benefits from investment, but we haven't had enough of it in recent years. In preparing my remarks today, I turned to the Australian Bureau of Statistics figures on actual business expenditure. It showed that, if you looked at 2013, the year that the government came to office, you would see business investment was around $160 billion. By 2019 it had fallen to around $120 billion, and this year looks to be somewhere around $100 billion. So, Australia has an investment problem, and foreign investment can be an important part of rectifying that. Foreign investment, as the shadow Treasurer has noted, has played an important role in Australia's history and Labor has been supportive in a broad sense of the role that foreign investment has played. You need only look at the Japanese investment in our beef industry; investment by American firms such as Kraft, Kodak and Heinz; investment by Schweppes; investment by General Motors and Ford, before the car industry was goaded to leave the country by the coalition; investment in our oil and gas sectors, including by Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron and ConocoPhillips; and foreign investment in the movie industry. Among the movies made in Australia are The Matrix, Mission Impossible 2, TheGreat Gatsby, Babeand Wolverine. Australia has imported not only foreign capital but also the know-how, the additional productivity and the competitive benefits that can come from foreign investment. Foreign investment isn't without its dangers. Large multinationals have increasingly looked in recent years to channel profits through tax havens, with one study suggesting that two-fifths of multinational profits are now channelled through tax havens. We need tougher laws to make sure that tax havens aren't misused and, in an era in which firms are increasingly engaged in weightless production, that the opportunities provided by intellectual property to move the legal location of profits to low-tax jurisdictions isn't exploited in a race to the bottom on company tax. We need to ensure too that foreign firms are operating on a level playing field and that they're not simply snapping up local firms that could otherwise provide a competitive benefit to the economy. We know Australia has a market concentration problem. New research published just last month by Sasan Bakhtiari showed that market concentration in Australia has gotten worse over the course of the last decade. So we need to be careful as we move into foreign investment that it's boosting the competitive landscape and we're not ending up in a situation where we have just a few big firms dominating. The Productivity Commission this year brought out a paper on foreign investment in Australia. It noted that Australia has the fifth most restrictive foreign investment screening of the 36 OECD countries, so we are relatively restrictive when it comes to our approvals regime. Most of this is indeed due to the screening and approval regime, for which Australia has the second most restrictive scheme in the OECD. Only New Zealand has a more restrictive foreign investment screening regime than Australia, and the Productivity Commission pointed to research that suggests that New Zealand's more restrictive approach to foreign investment has indeed led to lower investment levels in that country and is potentially one of the reasons New Zealand's labour productivity has been relatively sluggish. The report notes that were we to decrease foreign investment flows by a quarter, the wages of Australians would fall by about two per cent. It goes on to model a scenario in which Australia's foreign investment rules were moved to a level of restrictiveness equivalent to New Zealand. It estimates the cost of that would be $82 to $731 per Australian household per year, and it notes that there would be a 0.26 per cent fall in gross domestic product and a 0.24 per cent fall in wages. The Productivity Commission points out that the model it is using assumes that unemployment stays constant, but it points out that in fact it is probably more realistic to think of the impact of more constrained foreign investment as being both on wages and on unemployment, meaning that were Australia to savagely restrict foreign investment we would see even worse wage growth than we've had in these recent times. That's hard to imagine, given that wage growth has fallen to historic lows under this government and was already trending down badly before COVID-19 hit, but wage growth would be worse according to the Productivity Commission with a more restrictive foreign investment screen and unemployment would be higher. It is worth noting that in the October budget the government announced measures aimed at increasing investment in Australia, with immediate expensing measures designed to encourage firms to increase their capital investment. If this bill has the effect of reducing investment, it would have an economic impact the exact opposite of that, and that means that Australia could face a slower recovery. The government assures us that there is not going to be an impact on overall investment of this bill, but they've presented no careful modelling that would support that. The modelling we have is the modelling from the Productivity Commission, and that certainly leaves Labor cause for pause. That's why the shadow Treasurer has foreshadowed that Labor will move a substantive amendment in the Senate requiring Treasury to review the impact and effectiveness of the bill within the first 12 months of its commencement. I urge the Treasury to work with the boffins of the Productivity Commission, whose analysis has suggested that there could indeed be a significant impact on investment from tighter foreign investment screening, which would then mean a slower recovery for Australia. It's certainly the case that we need to take national security concerns into account, but this can be done in a way that doesn't waste the time of foreign investors. The way in which screening was carried out for the Port of Darwin lease was ham-fisted, putting it politely. Coming only four years after the United States, our largest security ally, had agreed to rotate marines through Darwin, we failed to consult with the United States over the lease of the Port of Darwin. The investment in New South Wales energy grids is of much the same character. Australia failed to lay out the clear principles that would guide foreign investment in electricity grids. It's certainly appropriate that there be scrutiny, especially in areas such as telecommunications and electricity. Other countries have these approaches as well. But if the approaches are cack-handed and capricious then they simply deter foreign investors and ensure that Australia gets less foreign investment than we would have otherwise. There is significant uncertainty in this bill over the definition of a national security business, particularly given its connection to the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act 2018, which is currently under review. Industry and investor groups, particularly in the resource sector, have raised the concern that these proposed changes could create sovereign risk, might deter investment, might delay application processing and might make an already complex system even harder to operate. It's important that we carry out screening in a way that doesn't waste the time of potential investors—that foreign investment screening is done swiftly and carefully. The Foreign Investment Review Board has been under-resourced and too opaque. It's been operating in a way better suited to last century. It hasn't provided the sort of clarity of guidelines to investors that you'd expect of a country which is putting in place foreign investment screening that's among the most restrictive in the OECD. In concluding, I would highlight why it is important for me, as a Labor member, to see Australia receiving foreign investment, and that's because of the way in which foreign investment and immigration both affect the capital-labour ratio. You can think of a large-scale program of immigration as increasing the number of workers relative to the capital stock. We know in very broad terms that, if you have countries that have a lot of workers and relatively little capital, wages tend to be lower. Conversely, if you have countries that have a lot of capital and relatively few workers, wages tend to be higher. The starkest example of this is the end of the 19th century, when workers moved from labour-rich Europe to labour-scarce Australia and saw themselves earning more than anyone else in the world. One of the reasons why Australia was the so-called 'working man's paradise' in the 1800s was the fact that labour was relatively scarce. Foreign investment does the opposite. Foreign investment means that we take in greater capital, and that means there is more capital per worker and we're able, therefore, to see wages rise. So, as a Labor representative who believes in engaged egalitarianism, who believes in the benefits of multicultural Australia and who's immensely proud of the way in which Australia has been enriched over the course of the postwar era by large-scale migration, I see foreign investment as sitting alongside that. If we say yes to large-scale migration and no to foreign investment, then we shouldn't be surprised if, over the long term, that has some downward pressure on wages. But if we say we're going to take foreign investment, appropriately screened, and we're going to be open to migrants, again, through our points based system which underpins skilled migration, then we're able to be a country that is open to the world and continues to pay high wages. So our openness to foreign investment isn't contrary to Labor values. Indeed, it's from my Labor values that I believe that foreign investment does play a vital role in Australia. It's why I always find it strange when those on the Left say we should take more workers but no foreign capital and somehow assume that that's not going to have an effect of pushing down wages. I'd encourage my friends on the Left to be as open to foreign capital, properly screened, as they are to overseas workers and to recognise that those two things go together. They allow us to keep the capital-to-labour ratio where it is and to ensure that there is plenty of machinery and technology to sustain the productivity growth that supports strong wage growth. So it's as an egalitarian that I support foreign investment. This bill before the House is one which requires careful scrutiny. We're in a challenging international environment—there's no doubt about that—but foreign investors don't come from just one country. We need a broad-principles approach, not the hodgepodge of screening thresholds that we have right now. Australia needs to approach our foreign policy by working with allies, by hewing to an international rules based order and by understanding that our greatest periods of prosperity, as the University of Sydney's Stephen Kirchner has pointed out, have been our periods of greatest openness. The late 19th century was a great period of prosperity for Australia precisely because of our openness, and the surge in living standards that occurred during the 1980s and 1990s is a marker of our return to openness. When Australia has closed itself off from the world we have suffered not just culturally but economically. We're at our best when we're engaged egalitarians. It's that philosophy that I'll bring to every debate in this House. 11:47 Ms FLINT 245550 Boothby Our government has a proud track record of protecting our nation and our national interest of keeping Australians safe and secure. This package of bills before the House will build on that record, further strengthening our foreign investment framework and giving Australians confidence that their government has the power to ensure that foreign investment is in line with our national interest. Indeed, this package deals with one of the key policy issues I put my hand up for to represent my community in the federal parliament. I have been a longstanding advocate for governments of all persuasions to legislate in this area in order to protect our national interest. Before my parliamentary life I was a newspaper columnist for The Advertiser in South Australia and before that for TheAge newspaper in Melbourne, and I wrote a number of columns raising the need for reform in this very area. I also noted my concerns about foreign government investment in Australia in my maiden speech to this place. I know I'm not just speaking on my behalf when I raise these concerns and these issues. Safeguarding our national interest is not just a key policy priority for me; it is also a key concern to many tens of thousands of people in my local electorate of Boothby and many millions more people across Australia. These Australians, like me, know that the broad issues of foreign investment and foreign interference reach across so many parts of Australian life. Without the proper protections, oversight and enforcement options in place, these matters, left unchecked, may affect our national security, our food and water security, our critical infrastructure, our democracy, our educational institutions and, in a time of crisis, which we hope we never see, our very way of life as Australians. The things that we seek to protect by being discerning and thorough when looking at foreign investment are the very characteristics that make our nation such an attractive investment prospect. We have a stable democracy underpinned by the rule of law, a highly skilled and educated workforce and a wealth of natural resources, combined with the ingenuity of the Australian people. All of these factors have given us one of the highest qualities of life in the world. This is what could be at risk if lawmakers, such as us, do not put the right policies and protections in place. I'm pleased that this package of bills will add to our excellent record in this area. In amending the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act 1975 the key measures include: a new national security test requiring mandatory notification for investments in a sensitive national security business or land and allowing investments not otherwise notified to be called in for review if they raise any national security concerns; a new last-resort power, giving the Treasurer a further opportunity to review actions for which approvals have been given if exceptional circumstances arise and to impose conditions or issue a disposal order where there are no other remedies for the identified national security risk; stronger compliance and enforcement powers through increased penalties, directions powers and new monitoring and investigative powers in line with those of other regulators; integrity amendments that close potential gaps in the screening regime; and, finally, a new register of foreign owned assets, amalgamating the existing registers that record foreign interests acquired in Australian land, water entitlements and contractual water rights and expanding them to include business acquisitions that require foreign investment approval. The other part of this package will uphold the policy position of the federal government that the cost of administering our extensive foreign investment review framework should be borne by foreign investors and not Australian taxpayers. By amending the imposition of fees associated with foreign acquisitions and takeovers we are doing just that. The broad-ranging powers I have highlighted will heighten our government's scrutiny of proposed investments, ensuring that any investment that presents a risk to our national security is captured by this framework. It empowers our departments, agencies and government by giving more oversight and extending powers of enforcement to show that we mean business. By amalgamating the registers of foreign owned assets we can see how these reforms will work in tandem with our already long list of policy achievements in this area. Indeed, it was our government in 2015 that at long last established the well-overdue registers that cover foreign ownership of agricultural land and foreign ownership of water entitlements. I have written in my former life as a newspaper columnist and have spoken in this place about foreign ownership of agricultural land and its register. I wrote those columns before I ever imagined I would end up in this place. In particular I posed the question: how much investment from foreign nations should we be allowing in our own country, especially in relation to our farming land and our critical infrastructure? In this place I've also questioned why any business that used to be government owned and has been privatised by a government of either party in this place should then be purchased by a foreign government or a foreign state owned wealth fund. In essence, if we're privatising a business, why would we then allow a foreign government to purchase that business, given that we have a policy of trying to keep government out of business and letting businesses just get on with business? Tracking and mapping any such activity and now being able to prevent it altogether, thanks to our zero-dollar threshold, means that we can better protect Australian assets and businesses and know exactly who is purchasing them or seeking to purchase them. In addition to establishing an overarching and general register of foreign ownership of Australian assets this legislation will create extra obligations for notification on the register across a much broader range of interests. This much fuller picture of foreign ownership will ensure scrutiny and a clearer assessment of investments that may be contrary to our national interests. It will allow the government to better connect the dots and to accurately quantify the economic power any one nation is able to project into Australia whether directly or through state owned corporations. It is it is complementary to a bill recently passed by this House and currently before the Senate, Australia’s Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) Bill 2020. That bill seeks to establish a legislative scheme for the Commonwealth to assess arrangements between state, territory or local governments or Australian universities and a foreign government or related entities. In doing so, the government will consider whether such arrangements are consistent with our nation's foreign policy and, by extension, would ensure these deals and formal relationships are within our national interest. It goes so far as to possibly invalidate an arrangement if, once assessed, it is inconsistent with our own policy. Certainly, Australian governments do very well in independently building and maintaining important international relationships, but our nation must take a coordinated and consistent approach to foreign policy. We must be united in our goals as a prominent and proactive middle power on the international stage. Just as we expect private sector investments in Australia to be in line with our national security, we rightly expect the same from other Australian governments and our university sector. We are taking a truly national and whole-of-government approach to an issue which affects us all. This comprehensive approach is evidenced by other rigorous reforms in areas such as critical infrastructure, combatting espionage and interference, establishing the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme and reforming our electoral laws and donations. The tentacles of foreign interference risk have tried to extend far into many parts of Australia, sometimes cloaked under the guise of investment, and we are fighting back on every front. In protecting our nation's critical infrastructure such as ports and utilities, including water, gas and electricity, we passed the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act 2018. We also established the Critical Infrastructure Centre, which provides government with a coordinated and comprehensive assessment of national security risks to these assets. As a result of this, we now have reliable and up-to-date information on who owns and operates our infrastructure here in Australia and an understanding of any potential risks. Combined with the new authorities given under this bill—in particular, the ability to impose conditions or order divestment of an asset—these now create powerful protections for our infrastructure and the Australian industries and people they serve. While infrastructure and its ownership may be easier to track and trace, not all possible risks to our national security are so easy to track down. Around the same time as this legislation passed, the federal government concurrently tackled the seamy underbelly of foreign influence, espionage and political interference. With a tranche of legislation passed in 2018, our government comprehensively overhauled laws relating to foreign influence, espionage and foreign political actors in Australia. This legislation was the biggest reform to Australia's counterintelligence framework since the 1970s and the Cold War. I consider this one of the largely unsung achievements of the federal Liberal government and of the 45th Parliament. The passing of the National Security Legislation Amendment (Espionage and Foreign Interference) Act 2018 modernised and strengthened our laws pertaining to espionage and foreign influence and interference. It added new provisions for secrecy, sabotage and treason, fixing what were previously unwieldly laws that did not see a conviction under their offences in decades. This empowered our counterintelligence agencies to fulfil their brief in a modern world with various growing and emerging risks. This act also criminalised the use of force, violence or intimidation to interfere with Australian democratic or political rights, sending a clear signal to any authoritarian countries that we will not allow the tactics they employ within their borders to be exported to our nation. That is why the act also introduced a new offence for the theft of trade secrets on behalf of a foreign government, because we know theft foreign interference may target individuals, institutions and infrastructure but, as we have learnt in recent years, it can also target industry. We do know that the stealing of intellectual property is a big issue for industry, particularly as we compete to innovate and be at the cutting edge. This measure is helping to protect Australian companies and, in turn, their employees' livelihoods. To shed light on the nature of the official projection of foreign influence in Australia we established the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme, which requires persons who are undertaking certain activities on behalf of a foreign government, a public enterprise, a political organisation or a business to register. Many if not most people in Australia who fall into these categories have legitimate purposes and noble aims, and, indeed, they may be allies to our nation. So registration as part of the scheme should not be viewed as a crime. However, a failure to disclose ties to a foreign principal actor is. I have described our government's comprehensive approach to managing the national security risk posed by foreign investment as it is relevant to the bills before us and foreign interference as addressed by policies previously passed by this House and the other place. In doing so it is clear that these national security risks permeate throughout our society, from universities to industry, to food and water security, to infrastructure and to our farming land. Just as it touches those parts of Australian life, so too it has tried to extend itself to this parliament and others. We in this parliament are not immune to the effects of foreign interference or influence, nor should we believe that we are above scrutiny or accountability in this regard. That is why the last interlocking legislative reform I will touch on in highlighting our work in this area and speaking in support of this national security legislation is that of the electoral funding and disclosure reform we implemented before the last election. Those who were serving as parliamentarians during the last term, and, indeed, many around Australia, would remember the immense controversy surrounding the cash donations received by a then Labor senator. That episode sparked reforms that, in reality, should have happened much earlier, because why would foreign actors bother with espionage, sabotage, intimidation or extensive efforts to project their power into the nation when they could simply and easily go straight to the top, to our lawmakers? Thanks to the reforms of our government, they cannot do so. We banned donations from foreign political entities and broadened the definition of 'political parties' to include more organisations. We reformed a new category of political campaigner, based on political expenditure, and imposed similarly strict reporting obligations that proper political parties rightly hold. These measures were underpinned by new criminal and civil penalties if these new laws were breached. By doing this, we have helped to restore the confidence of Australians in their government and in a long, uninterrupted, stable democracy. We've restored their faith in us by holding ourselves to the standards that are quite honestly expected and by enshrining those standards in law. That is why I am proud to speak on yet another measure that will keep Australians safe and protect our national security. I commend the bills to the House. 12:02 Mr KATTER HX4 Kennedy I move an amendment: That all words after "whilst" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: "not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House calls on the Government to immediately stop all foreign takeovers of agricultural lands and place a ban on the acquisition of assets of strategic economic importance or strategic defensive importance to Australia". I consider these bills, the Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill 2020 and the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020, good bills. In this country 235 years ago, Australians heard about some people—'whitefellas', we called them—coming here. They gave us beads and trinkets and blankets, and we thought they were a pretty good outfit and it was pretty good to let them in. But the outcome for we First Australians was not very good—not very good indeed—and I think we all know that and admit that. The life expectancy in parts of Cape York is 40 per cent lower than in the rest of Australia. In the Torres Strait it is 20 years fewer than other Australians, just to quote but one figure—and we won't go into the ugliness of what took place, but it wasn't a real good idea. As a gentleman in England, called Mr Winston Churchill, said: 'If you do not learn from history, then you are doomed to have that history reimposed upon you.' It might be nice if some people in this place listened to that gentleman. At the time of talking, 40 per cent of Australia's electricity industry is owned by China. What country on earth would allow that for 40 per cent of its most essential service? Without electric pumps you can't get a drop of water to drink unless you're going to take a bucket down to the river, and too bad for those of us who don't have a river with water in it, I suppose! What sort of a country would allow that to happen? It's worse than that because if I add in the 15 per cent of Australia's electricity that comes from solar panels—well, the solar panels come from China. So you can take out another 20 per cent and add it to that 40 per cent. We now have 60 per cent. Then if you take out Queensland—because Queensland is still owned by a corporation which the government still owns at this stage, albeit tenuously—China owns 70 per cent of our electricity supply. What sort of a country are we? Are we Australians in this place? History will not record that Australians were in this parliament when the country was sold out. As far as agricultural lands go, the biggest agricultural operation in Australia is Van Diemen's dairies—owned by China. The second biggest is Cubbie Station—owned by China. The third biggest is the AACo—owned by foreigners. The fourth biggest is Consolidated—owned by China, or Chinese intermediaries. The fifth biggest is Kidman. I'll leave it to somebody else to argue who owns Kidman's. I could go on, but those are the biggest farming operations in this country. Bigger than all of them put together will be the Ord stage 2 and 3. A minister in the Liberal government handed over stage 2 and stage 3. I use the words 'handed over' because 31 Australians applied for that water and they were all knocked back. It was given to China. The only development project in the north-western third of the land area of this country—right in the heart of it—was given to China. The only deepwater port in the northern half of this country is Darwin—and it was sold. If ever there were a Judas Iscariot act—a minister in the LNP government sold the port of Darwin to China. It's the only deepwater port in northern Australia. Whilst the media are out there screaming about all these ports in the South Pacific being taken up by China, this government gave that port to China. It demonstrates the underlying corruption that's at the University of Queensland and in this place. That gentleman walked out of this place being paid $900,000 a year plus his ministerial superannuation salary of $300,000 a year. He walked out with close to $1.2 million. Let me say that the 30 pieces of silver has inflated! Since the time of Judas Iscariot, there's been an inflationary pressure. A cabinet minister in this place is the modern-day equivalent. Let me return for a moment to ownership of our essential services. Obviously water and sewerage are the two most essential services. All of our water pumps and sewerage pumps are made in China. They break down regularly and continuously. You can't just go and buy a giant water pump the size of a person's bathroom—maybe four times the size. You can't buy them off the shelf. They have to be poured, foundered, in a foundry in China. If something breaks down, then you're at the mercy of China. I'm just wondering what aspect of Australian life is not at the mercy of China. To underline the set of values that are exemplified by this place, the First Australians owned most of Cape York Peninsula and a fair proportion of the top of Western Australia. When we say 'own', well, they own it, except to quote the Western Australia state member representing northern Western Australia: 'Yes, we own it, except we're not allowed to break a twig on it. We're not allowed to take a rock off it. We're not allowed to take a glass of water out of the billabongs. Apart from that, we own it.' Well, of course, what she's saying is absolutely correct. The collective laws of Australia make it impossible for them to ever use that land, and, in any event, they can't get a title deed to it. They have some sort of Mickey Mouse arrangement called tribal lands, and the governments of Australia—state, mainly, and federal—have this wonderful handover ceremony where they hand over a million acres to some tribal grouping. When they find out it's worth something, that tribal grouping will be dumped because someone stacks the next meeting. But, quite apart from that primitive mechanism, Europe gave up tribal ownership 2,500 years ago; the Asians gave it up 3,000 years ago. Yet we impose that upon First Australians. We give them a draught horse and ask them to compete on the world market in agriculture using a draught horse instead of a modern-day tractor. Every single country in the world provides title deeds. There is a wonderful book out. There's great controversy, because the author didn't get a Nobel Prize and he should have got one—that's Hernando de Soto, an economist with the World Bank. He said the reason that Peru, the Philippines and Egypt are the poorest countries on earth is that they can't get a title deed. It takes on average seven years with around 270 legal processes to go through to get a title deed. Even if our poor First Australians had that, there is still no ultimate title deed. If you manage to jump through 400 hoops and you're still alive after you jump through them, you get a Mickey Mouse arrangement called a 99-year lease with all sorts of restrictive terms upon it. So we can't give a title deed out. It's not very difficult. When I was the minister, my blackfella mates said: 'This is what we want. We want a piece of paper—a title deed; the same as everyone else in the world. We want to own our own house—the same as the people in Cairns, Mareeba and Darwin own their house. We want the same thing.' Righto, mate. You can have it. We draft the forms, have them printed and put them into every council chamber. They walk into the local council—a blackfella council, not a whitefella council—take the form and fill it out. If the council doesn't object to it through meetings, you get a title deed—a freehold title—and ownership as strong as any person on earth enjoys. You've got freehold, fee simple, title with one exception. There's a clause in it that says you can't sell it to outsiders, so whitefellas can't come in and buy the whole place up and it ends up being a whitefella place instead of blackfella place. That was very, very bright of those people who developed that proposal and put that clause in. In subsequent reading, I found out that in America they didn't put that clause in in the American reservations. Within 29 years, all the reservations were gone. A bloke wanted to buy a team of horses. He might want to buy a sulky. He might want to set up a business in the town and he borrows money. He can't repay it, so the bank forecloses on his land and they ended up with no Red Indian reserves at all. This is about stopping foreigners from owning our country. And I think if we did a proper analysis of the ownership of the landmass of Australia—I was told at Mildura that you can drive for 37 kilometres and never set foot on a single kilometre of land that is owned by an Australian. And I heard the CEO from down there skiting that he'd been responsible for selling all those places to China and now it's working marvellously well. Ha! Well, I'll leave it to the Mildura people to figure out whether it's working marvellously well or not! But, whether you're in Mildura, whether you're in the Gulf of Carpentaria or whether you're in the central desert, figure out and have a look at who actually owns the land, and then figure out how much land we Australians own. Fifty-two cent of Australia is on the world register of deserts. So, if you take 52 per cent out and then you take 23 per cent out, which is supposed to be owned by we First Australians—of course, we own absolutely nothing; we're told we own it, like little children, like we wouldn't really understand what ownership means—that's 85 per cent gone. Of the remaining 15 per cent, how much is owned by Australians and how much is owned by foreign countries? I didn't pick the fight with China, and I'm not standing foursquare behind our Prime Minister on this issue. But the fact is there is a fight going on, and you people gave them ownership of your electricity, control of your water supply and sewerage supply and ownership of your land. So, in the history books, when we recall who was responsible for selling this country out, then you better look in the mirror, you people that are sitting in here. But I tell you what: Andrew Wilkie and I, we don't have to look in the mirror. We don't have to look in the mirror, because we're moving this amendment. Before I conclude, I just want to put a picture in, because 23 per cent of that Australia can be brought back into Australian hands in the First Australian reserves if you give those people title deeds. We will be forthcoming with title deed applications to this place, and I am getting very worried that the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs is so far refusing to meet with me. I warn him: let him do so at his peril, because when he visits First Australian communities in Queensland he won't be greeted as an honoured guest. I'll tell you what'll happen to him—no, I'm not going to tell you what will happen to him. But he has been given the opportunity to become an historic figure in this nation. For the first time, since the Queensland government fell in 1990, First Australians will be able to own their own land in freehold, fee simple, title. We have a choice of doing that, or continuing to sell it out to China. (Time expired) The DEPUTY SPEAKER HK5 Is the amendment seconded? Mr Wilkie C2T I second the amendment moved by the member for Kennedy and reserve my right to speak. The DEPUTY SPEAKER HK5 The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this, the honourable member for Rankin moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The honourable member for Kennedy has now moved as an amendment to that amendment that all words after 'whilst' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The question now is that the amendment moved by the honourable member for Kennedy to the amendment moved by the member for Rankin be disagreed to. 12:18 Mr TIM WILSON IMW Goldstein It's not fair to follow the member for Kennedy in this place, because nothing will be able to replicate the tenor or the tone of his speech on my part. My focus will be on the provision of the legislation before us in my short remarks. Of course, I do rise to support the Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill and subsequent legislation. I do so because—like all members I would hope in this parliament—I am deeply concerned about conserving our national security and sovereignty, and that investment of course can be used as a pathway of nefarious ends by foreign actors if it is intended to compromise our national security. As the member for Kennedy has rightly outlined, this country is not for sale. However, we do welcome foreign investment. We always have, we always will and we will continue to do so because we're not capital xenophobes. We want to build a country that's successful so that every Australian is able to go out and realise their ambition and their dreams. We need foreign capital to invest directly in the heart of our economy and our industries to help them grow. Just like we need technology, we need investment that is going to help the success and future of our country. I know that, for a long time, many members of the community have raised public concern about foreign investment being used as a backdoor to nefarious ends in our country. That's why the consistent approach of this government and many others has been to address these concerns through processes like the Foreign Investment Review Board to ensure that there was proper oversight. I realise that addressing that anxiety within the community isn't always achieved, because at the heart of concerns around foreign investment is the degree of influence that others will have over our country and the ownership of our country. But one of the beautiful things about the Australian Constitution is that it secures the proper recognition of property rights, and, as I wrote in my new book, The New Social Contract, that is critical to the success of the Australian continent and the modern Australian nation. But, critically, should there ever be a reason for concern, the Commonwealth can always take back property that has been purchased from any person, domestic or foreign, to make sure we secure the interests of our nation. That has not changed and that will not change, and that is protected in the Constitution if we want to exercise that power. Of course, we have to compensate people, but there is a pathway to do that. So, whether property is purchased or leased, the same provision applies: we can take it back. But, under this legislation, sometimes purchasing or leasing will not be approved in the first place. This goes to the heart and the tenor of the Prime Minister's focus—and I think he's got this absolutely bang on—on making sure not only that we secure Australia's future prosperity but also that we conserve our sovereignty. He has rightly made the observation that if you do not have your sovereignty then there is no point to your economic prosperity, and that is 100 per cent right. This legislation, which is part of a package of reforms, includes a national security test requiring mandatory notification of investments in a sensitive national security business or land, and allowing investments not otherwise notified to be called in for review if they raise national security concerns. It has a last-resort power giving the Treasurer a final opportunity to review actions for which approvals have been given if exceptional circumstances arise, and to impose conditions or issue a disposal order where there are no other remedies for the identified national security risk. It includes stronger enforcement powers through increased penalties, direction powers and new monitoring and investigative powers in line with those of other regulators; and integrity amendments that close potential gaps in the screening regime. It includes information-sharing provisions to assist the Treasurer's and tax commissioner's compliance activities and address national security risks, and to facilitate sharing, where appropriate, with other government departments and foreign governments. It sets up a new register of foreign owned assets, amalgamating the existing registers which record all foreign interests acquired in Australian land, and water entitlements and contractual water rights, and expanding them to include business acquisitions that require foreign investment approval. It includes amendments to make foreign investment fees fairer and simpler while ensuring that foreign investors, not Australian taxpayers, bear the increase in the costs of administering the foreign investment system that are a result of the reforms. It's a comprehensive package to make sure that Australians have confidence in the system. There will always be people who would like to see no foreign investment in Australia. That has always been the case; polling has consistently shown us that. But that is a fundamental misunderstanding of the important role of foreign investment in the growth of our country. We hope that we will continue to grow as a country and that foreign capital can be used to harness mutual benefit to build the strength of our country. A prosperous Australia is a strong Australia, and undermining a prosperous Australia will only undermine our strength and our confidence to stand up for ourselves, to defend ourselves as a country and to confront any foreign powers where we face difficult challenges. Now is not a time to go weak; now is a time to be proud and confident and prosperous and strong. That is what we should want for our country, and that is built on our economic prosperity, so that we can support the institution—the architecture—of our national sovereignty. That's what the legislation is about. It's about making sure that Australians can have the foreign investment framework so that they can have confidence that we are achieving all of those objectives. I commend the minister, and I commend the legislation to the House. 12:25 Mr WILKIE C2T Clark I am supportive of the Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia’s National Security) Bill 2020 and agree that the key objectives and changes made in this legislation are important. However, I do have some concerns about the levels of unfettered discretion that this bill provides to the Treasurer, and I will deal with that matter by tabling amendments at the third reading stage and speak to those concerns at that time. To be clear, modern Australia was built in large part on foreign investment and will continue to rely heavily on it for the foreseeable future, but that doesn't mean that all foreign investment is okay or that foreign investors should have unrestrained access to our resources and economy—quite the opposite, in fact. There are many reasons why all foreign investment should be scrutinised carefully and why sometimes it must be curtailed and even prevented. For instance, broadacre prime agricultural land, genuinely strategic assets and scarce resources should always remain in Australian ownership and under Australian control. Frankly, it was utter madness to allow a foreign investor to gain control of the Port of Darwin for 99 years. You've only got to go to the website for the Port of Darwin where they boast that they are a vital defence asset. And it's madness that foreign investors own parts of the natural gas distribution network and, as the member for Kennedy has explained, our electricity generation capability. In the case of the best agricultural land, surely a better approach would be to allow only leasehold in lieu of freehold title. Unsurprisingly, foreign investment is one of the most frequent concerns raised with me by constituents—and no wonder, when 25.5 per cent of farmland in Tasmania is owned by foreign investors. I'll say that figure again: 25.5 per cent of farmland in Tasmania is owned by foreign investors, making this state together with the Northern Territory the jurisdictions with the highest proportion of foreign ownership of agricultural land. If you strip out leasehold, then Tasmania is by far the most foreign owned jurisdiction in the Commonwealth. Of course, Tasmania is benefiting from some of these investments, with capital improvements and the creation of jobs. But there have been many, many issues over the years, most noticeably with the sale of the Van Diemen's Land Company to the Moon Lake company. Just to explain, Van Diemen's Land Company, or VDL, is the biggest dairy-producing asset in the country, encompassing more than 20 separate farms. Surely that makes it a strategic asset. Moon Lake promised, when they bought VDL, to invest about $100 million in the farms, to create about 100 jobs and to do extensive environmental improvements, and they promised that, before long, they would be flying planeloads of fresh milk directly to China. Do you know what they have achieved? None of that. They haven't invested $100 million in capital investment, they haven't created 100 jobs, they haven't done environmental improvements and they sure aren't flying planeloads of fresh milk to other countries. None of what they promised has occurred. But I recall very, very clearly that, when this deal was on the cards in Tasmania, the government and the opposition and a whole lot of others lined up in a conga line. They couldn't do the deal quick enough with Moon Lake, and they bought all the garbage that was being spooned out to them at the time by the company that would become the new owner. And who's holding that company to account? No-one. The Foreign Investment Review Board is not challenging Moon Lake, the Australian government isn't challenging Moon Lake and the Tasmanian government isn't challenging Moon Lake. And how could they when they all celebrated the sale! No wonder the community is so disillusioned with the amount and the nature of foreign investment in this country. The government's bill today does go a way to fixing at least some of the issues, as it provides methods of enforceability and penalties if foreign investors ignore the conditions of sale imposed by the FIRB or the Treasurer. But surely it's in our nation's best interest, in the public interest, to go much further. For starters, the Foreign Investment Review Board should apply much tougher scrutiny of investment that could adversely affect Australia's agricultural, business and property sectors, including the commercial sector, as well as our cultural, environmental and heritage wellbeing. This scrutiny must apply equally to all foreign investors with no exceptions. An example of a specific reform that the government should be pursuing is that all purchases of agricultural land worth over $2 million should go before the Foreign Investment Review Board, instead of the current threshold of $15 million. And, as I've said already, there needs to be a much greater reliance—indeed, an insistence—on land leases, instead of selling the farm with a freehold title. Also, the current business investment requirement that all acquisitions of an interest of 20 per cent or more in any Australian business valued at over $261 million should, in fact, be applied to all foreign investment. And there must be no carve-outs—this is very important—for favoured countries or countries with which we supposedly have free trade agreements. So there should be no carve outs for investors from Chile, from China, from Japan, from Korea, from Singapore, from New Zealand and even from the United States. Moreover, residential properties should be subject to tougher foreign ownership restrictions. Yes, we've gone some way, but we've got to go further. For instance, foreigners should only be able to buy residential property if it is to genuinely be their permanent residence or genuinely their place of business. And all states and territories governments need to apply a stamp duty surcharge to foreign investors. All of what I've described would be in the public interest and enjoy strong public support, not because of racism or any spat we might have from time to time with any one country but because we are a sovereign nation with every right and, indeed, every obligation, to safeguard and enjoy our heritage, culture and resources. Sure, we are a remarkably diverse and stable multicultural nation, the equal or better of any nation on earth. I'm immensely proud of that, but that doesn't mean we should allow the fire sale to continue. The community would not accept that, and it is not in the country's interests. So I commend the government for focusing on these issues in recent times and for bringing this bill to the parliament, but I urge the government to go much further. The bill does have my support, and I look forward to attracting the government's and the opposition's support for my amendments, which will enhance the bill. 12:33 Dr GILLESPIE 72184 Lyne The Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia's National Security) Bill 2020 and the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020 are two of the more important bills that pass our analysis, and I rise in support of them. Australia, since it was first settled, has relied on foreign capital. As a young nation, in modern economic terms, we don't have deep repositories of capital. Everyone knows that wealth creation, wealth, capital and skilled labour, comes out of raw material, and Australia has that in vast quantities—namely, we have lots of arable land, we have water in some areas that is available and we have some great businesses that are doing all of that. But, historically, we've always relied on foreign investment to get that foreign capital into developing our assets. The same goes for our mineral assets and our agricultural assets. What I want is a system that guarantees that wealth creation is still within reach for Australian individuals and Australian controlled entities who pay taxes in Australia. What I don't want is for that dream to be out of reach for people who have a desire to get ahead and develop those assets that we as Australians should be controlling. You've seen around the world, with quantitative easing round 1, round 2 and subsequently, that there is an amazing amount of cheap money floating around the world that is flooding into investment locations because people need to get a return on it, and when it's so cheap you get asset inflation. That sounds great initially, but, if it means buying real estate—whether it's residential or farming land—or getting into business and taking over businesses and it's beyond the reach of average Australian individuals and businesses, then it's defeating the purpose for which we welcome the investment. I'm not saying we shouldn't have foreign investment. I'm saying we need foreign investment, but there's an issue, in that foreign investment, historically, has been in private capital by private individuals and private businesses, but there is a phenomenon whereby some investments are by state owned entities, which have other responsibilities apart from their fiduciary duties; they have a responsibility to the state that owns them—and that's where I have some misgivings. Ownership of land is very much a totemic, touchstone issue around the community. People see foreign investment coming into local regions and some have a reflex of not liking it. A lot of the things that the previous speaker, the member for Clark, mentioned about increasing charges and increasing the regulation of residential land have actually been addressed in previous parliaments. But this discussion also has to include the foreign ownership of water entitlements. We already have a register that the Australian Taxation Office has been running since 2015, and it's very informative to go through the actual figures: 10½ per cent of the water entitlements, a total of just over 4,035 gigalitres, around Australia is in foreign hands. You can't take the water overseas, but, when you have a lot of cheap foreign capital coming in and buying the water rights, because they're a tradeable commodity it can make the water very expensive. If Australian owned businesses do not have access to similarly cheap capital, with virtually zero or negative interest rates, that can cause inflation of that tradeable asset. A lot of this investment is in the Murray-Darling Basin, mainly in the northern section, and the biggest investors are America and China. They have 1.9 per cent each. In a similarly run register, as of 30 June 2019, 52.1 million acres, or 13 per cent, of our arable agricultural land is foreign owned. That is actually a 0.9 per cent reduction. Also, the previous speaker was talking about leasehold rather than freehold. It's interesting to note that 83 per cent of foreign ownership of agricultural land is leasehold ownership, not freehold; and 85 per cent of agricultural land ownership is pastoral or for livestock production. Again, the top two investors are countries you wouldn't think of, and they are the United Kingdom and China. We also have to register any shareholding that has at least 20 per cent foreign ownership in it, so a lot of those figures reflect water and land that are also owned in part by Australian businesses and individuals. In freehold ownership, the top owner is the Netherlands, followed by the USA and the UK. China is a distant fourth, and then there are many other countries, like Canada, Malaysia and Thailand. Many overseas businesses have invested for over a century in Australia. But, as I said, my concern is not with investment; it's with who is getting the benefit. We want the benefit of the investment to run to Australian companies and the Australian taxpayer, and for the wealth that is generated out of land and water to be circulating in Australia rather than circulating overseas. That is a bit of a dilemma. I'm sure you're all familiar with transfer pricing and the movement of funds out of turnover into fees and charges that parent companies overseas charge Australian businesses. I'd much prefer a lot of Australian companies having this size of investment in Australia, because they are going to pay the tax and keep that money circulating in Australia rather than overseas. But, if a business wants to invest in Australia, register here and pay taxes here, I say open the door. We need capital to grow our economy. Like many speakers on the other side here, I'm very frustrated at why our Australian super funds are reluctant to invest in Australian land and water and, in many cases, businesses. They're looking overseas, because maybe some of the returns are better over there. But the main reason—and it has been the subject of inquiries by standing committees in this parliament—is that the reporting requirements for Australian super funds have a very narrow time frame. In fact, they sometimes have to report three or four times a year, whereas a lot of these sovereign wealth funds from other nations have 10-year reporting time frames, particularly for agricultural land, so they have much more patient capital. We could get more investment by our industry and other super funds in Australia if those regulations and responsibilities could be modified so that there is a different investment mandate for them that won't breach their requirements here in Australia—similar to, as I mentioned, the Netherlands and some Canadian entities, like pension funds, which have huge investments here. They have much longer reporting time frames. As anyone who has an investment in agricultural land has realised, you have to hold property for a very long time to cope with the weather cycles and the commodity cycles. You have good years; you have bad years. But a lot of Australian investors see their super fund unit price going up and down. The boards get very worried that they'll be seen to be doing something against the best financial outcome for their members, so they think, 'Okay, we'll go overseas for better returns, and people will see their benefits going up pretty much immediately.' But that's not what we're talking about today. We're talking about these bills. The COVID phenomenon has changed Australia's outlook towards its own supply chain in everything, from manufactured goods to our critical bits of real estate, ports, airports, trade ways—like railways—and all the other utilities that make up the architecture of a productive industrial economy. These foreign investment reforms are addressing the concerns that have come to light because of a changing geopolitical landscape and the lightbulb moment for many Australians across the nation, including state and federal governments: the realisation that there are some things we have to have sovereign capability in. So the proposed reforms are really quite sensible. Having a national interest test for sensitive businesses or sensitive bits of real estate, with the ability for the Treasurer to call in owners of the foreign investment for review to check they're complying with the conditions of the investment, is a really sound principle. I actually thought this was already in place, but it appears it was not. So this reform is very welcome. Stronger enforcement powers, increased penalties of a civil and pecuniary nature, infringement notices and giving the Treasurer or his delegates increasing directions powers and increasing monitoring and investigative powers are all pretty sensible initiatives. Better information sharing and merging or amalgamating the existing registers that I was referring to—the ag land register and the water register—as well as adding residential land and businesses to that, will give governments much better oversight of these investments. Australians, including me, welcome investment by foreign entities in Australia, but we expect them to be true to their word, develop the business, develop the land, use the water, pay their taxes in Australia and not use complicated accounting techniques to transfer the wealth that that business or other entity is generating in the nation to a lower tax threshold overseas. That's another bit of legislation that we put through this House to try to limit that. This ownership register, where it's all there for people to see and for the Treasurer or his delegates to review, is a really sound bit of governance. I commend this bill to the House. 12:46 Mr ZAPPIA HWB Makin I speak in support of the amendment moved by Labor to the motion for the second reading of the Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia’s National Security) Bill 2020. As other speakers have already pointed out, this is a matter of considerable public interest out there in the community, and it's a matter that is often raised with me. It's also a matter about which there are widespread misperceptions, often causing unnecessary anxiety. But, notwithstanding any misperceptions, this is indeed important legislation because foreign investment always has been and continues to be a national security issue. That is why a Foreign Investment Review Board was established—I believe around 45 years ago. What has very likely prompted this legislation, however, is public concern, particularly in recent years, about the level of investment originating from China—a matter that both the member for Clark and the member for Kennedy referred to in their speeches—and also the rise of China's influence in world affairs in recent times. Ironically, as we debate this legislation, Chinese investment in Australia has fallen from a peak of $15.8 billion in 2016 to $2.5 billion in 2019. I suspect that since then, although figures are not available, it has declined even further. Notwithstanding all that, I believe the legislation still addresses some of the matters that public concerns have been raised about. The government, through this legislation, now wants to introduce a new national security test, strengthen the Treasurer's and tax commissioner's enforcement powers, expand information sharing between government departments, establish a new foreign investment register and establish a new fee structure for assessments. Whilst that all sounds good, I suspect that it is more about perception and spin than actual substance. Foreign investment has indeed boosted the Australian economy over the years and enabled Australia to grow and prosper. That is, I believe, an undeniable fact. It has, however, also transferred major decision-making from Australia to overseas boardrooms and transferred substantial profits overseas, something which the member for Lyne alluded to in his comments and which I agree with. But, when control of a major gateway to Australia, such as the Port of Darwin, is handed over to a company linked to a foreign government, the Australian government has failed to provide the Australian people with the national security expected of it and has failed in its own national interest. Not surprisingly, there was huge community backlash on that decision. The decision to lease the Port of Darwin for 99 years for $500 million was widely criticised, both within Australia and abroad. I believe it was a bad decision that made Australia a laughing-stock. The government did not need these new laws to have blocked the Port of Darwin lease, albeit the government will argue that that was a decision made by the Northern Territory government. The Port of Darwin lease was not the only investment that raised eyebrows. Other investments in agricultural land, housing, commercial property, and information and communications technology all gave rise to public concerns. When it suited the Morrison government to do so it was always able to block investments, although, having said that, I note that over recent years, out of the 108,990 applications that have come before the Foreign Investment Review Board, only 10 have been rejected. It seems a very small number. I accept that many others were withdrawn, but, nevertheless, most investments get through. The government was able to block investment when it wanted to. The Productivity Commission, in a research paper released earlier this year, stated that the term 'national interest' is undefined and ambiguous. It also stated: This ambiguity gives Treasurers broad discretion to define the 'national interest' as they see fit … I think that statement sums up the situation we have had for years. The Treasurer of the day has always had the ability to call in an application if the Treasurer saw fit to do so. The ambiguity gave the Treasurer considerable flexibility in determining whether the national interest was in any way being undermined. Therefore, the ability to reject a matter has always been there. That is why I believe this legislation is more about spin than substance. According to that same research paper from the Productivity Commission, there is around $3.5 trillion of foreign investment in Australia and Australian investment overseas amounts to $2.5 trillion. That's a considerable amount. Other speakers questioned earlier today why more of that money isn't being invested in Australia rather than being sent overseas. That's a fair question. Perhaps there should be more incentives to invest that money here. In 2018 the largest foreign investors in Australia were the USA, Japan, the UK, the Netherlands and, fifthly, China. China was well behind the USA in 2018 and even in the preceding years. Despite all the commentary about the level of China's investment in Australia, the fact remains that China sits well behind several other countries that have invested in Australia over the years. That includes investment in agricultural land, which again is a matter that was referred to by other speakers this morning. Foreign investment in agricultural land in 2018 was 13.4 per cent, and China's investment accounted for 2.3 per cent. My concern—and I believe it's a concern shared by many other people across the country—is that those figures may not be comprehensive, because foreign ownership is very difficult to track and because in past years there was very little interest in doing so. When investment comes from an overseas country one wonders who is behind that investment and how far you need to go to track the source of the investment to find out who owns what. Even with those figures, it's clear that many other countries have been investing more in Australia than China has over past years. That brings me to the matter of the register itself. This legislation proposes to introduce a register, and it is something that I would support. I believe it's long overdue and I believe that Australians have the right to know who is investing in Australia and, in particular, from which overseas country. Yet the proposed register will not be a public document because of, supposedly, sensitivities and privacy considerations. I'm not quite sure which sensitivities and privacy considerations should override the public interest and deny the Australian public the right to know just who is investing in Australia. If an overseas entity wants to invest in Australia that's fine, but why shouldn't they disclose exactly who they are and what they're investing in; and why shouldn't the Australian public have the right to know that? Indeed, that is one of the concerns about foreign investment and why this legislation is even before us, including the very notion of having a public register. I also note with interest—and the member for Lyne alluded to this matter in his remarks only a few moments ago—that we have a register with respect to water ownership in this country. The member for Lyne quite rightly pointed out that about 10.4 per cent of the water in this country is owned by foreign entities. Of that, most of it, 9.4 per cent, is in the Murray-Darling Basin. My concern, similar to the member for Lyne's, is twofold. Firstly, a substantial amount of that water is owned by foreign entities at a time that many of the landholders in the Murray-Darling Basin are not getting their full water quotas. The issue there is simply this: because they can't get their full water quotas, they in turn go to the water market to buy additional water in times of need. If water is being owned by overseas entities throughout the Murray-Darling Basin purely for speculative purposes and being held in order to push the price of water up, then it disadvantages our growers, and I believe that that ought to be stopped. Secondly, I believe that if water is to be owned, regardless of whether it's by foreign entities or by people here in Australia, it ought to be tied to landownership. In other words, the water is there to support the growing of our agricultural products and should not be used by speculators as a mechanism to simply profit from whilst our farmers struggle to make ends meet. For both those reasons, I not only believe that the register is important but also believe we need to ensure that our farmers get priority over the water and get it at affordable prices. There are other matters in this legislation that I won't go into detail on, but I note the comments with respect to much of the legislation being provided in the form of regulations. I can understand why that will be, but, because of that, it will be interesting to see how this legislation works. Labor's suggestion that there be a review of the legislation is indeed appropriate, so that we can see, after the legislation and the regulations are in place, just what other changes may be necessary or if, indeed, the legislation is meeting the objectives it needs to meet. Likewise, with respect to the fees associated with the legislation and the fees for foreign investment, those are matters that I know have caused some concern from representers and may need to be reviewed. The last matter I will touch on, briefly, is the issue of the calling powers, which allow the minister in future to call in and review applications that have been made for foreign investments even after they have gone through. Regrettably, those powers are not retrospective and, I understand, will start from January 2021. I don't have any problems with that particular proposition, but I suspect that because of the new regulations and this new legislation it's unlikely that foreign investment will get through if it doesn't meet the standards and criteria that we are debating right here and now and that would be acceptable to the Australian public at large. So I can't see that those powers would be particularly used in the future. Nevertheless, they do give the minister of the day that additional authority and it is something that could well be used. Indeed, if that authority had been in place, perhaps the Port of Darwin—and other investments that have proven to be controversial—could have been reversed but, as it is, they can't be. With those comments, I support the amendments moved by Labor and I support the intent of this legislation. 13:00 Mr WALLACE 265967 Fisher Before the COVID-19 crisis, foreign investment into this country totalled $3.8 trillion. Our attractiveness as a destination for overseas capital has only ever been increasing. Foreign direct investment inflows to Australia in the three years to 2019 averaged 3.3 per cent of GDP, compared with an average of 1.7 per cent for other OECD countries. In particular, foreign investment in critical businesses with important implications for protecting our national security is growing. In the energy sector, for example, EnergyAustralia—one of our trio of companies which together supply nearly 70 per cent of retail customers—is owned by China Light and Power. In the ACT, 50 per cent of the power distribution company ActewAGL is owned by a joint venture of the Chinese company State Grid Corporation and Singapore Power International. State Grid Corporation also partly owns most of the distributors in Victoria as well as the largest stake in South Australia's energy transmitter, ElectraNet. Likewise, the Hong Kong listed Cheung Kong Infrastructure own a 51 per cent share in two of Victoria's distributors and in the South Australian Power Networks' electricity distribution network. However, it is not simply very large companies making very large investments. Innogy, Neoen, Goldwind, ESCO, thyssenkrupp, Canadian Solar, Acciona and Engie are all foreign owned and are all engaged in building hundreds of megawatts worth of smaller renewable energy generation projects in Australia. Most of this investment derives from our close strategic and military allies like the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union. However, our fastest-growing source of overseas investment is China and Hong Kong. By the end of 2019, this investment had reached a total of $218.9 billion. In general, foreign investment is welcome. However, as I've previously described to the House, there is evidence that some foreign investment may have geopolitical intentions beyond simple commercial benefits. Analysts at the Lowy Institute, among many others, have highlighted how, for example, China's Belt and Road Initiative is designed to achieve important but unstated national security and foreign policy aims for the Chinese Communist Party. These include geopolitical priorities like providing reserve entry points for China's fuel supplies, delivering access to potential future military ports and increasing China's economic influence over other nations in our region. This is only one example among many of the foreign policy objectives that are fulfilled all over the world by foreign investments made by many national governments. The Morrison government has already acted to protect our most significant infrastructure through the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act of 2018, which I was pleased to support. However, foreign investment can be complex, and unravelling the national security implications is not straightforward at all. Certainly many investments, even those of considerable size, have limited implications for national security. Investment in non-essential services or companies like retail chains are unlikely to be a significant risk. However, some seemingly innocuous and modest investments could have an indirect impact on our critical national security assets or organisations and that is what this bill will address. Through my work as chair of the parliament's defence subcommittee, I've had the privilege of visiting many ADF installations. However, the sensitive asset that particularly comes to mind is Open Pool Australian Lightwater, or OPAL, in Lucas Heights. OPAL is one of the world's most effective multipurpose research facilities and is vital for Australia's medical supplies, as the deputy chair well knows. However, it's also a potentially dangerous nuclear reactor—and I say 'potentially'. The site is patrolled 24 hours a day by armed Australian Federal Police, who were a very visible presence during the time I was there. OPAL maintains a risk and audit committee and its security processes have been subject to approval by relevant Commonwealth bodies. In short, the Commonwealth has considerable control over the OPAL reactor and, of course, its security, as is right and appropriate. We would not allow foreign investment in it or in any other national security asset. However, not far away, OPAL is surrounded with private land. It is supplied with much of the equipment and supplies it requires by private companies. Private contractors provide services, specialist technology and some personnel to the site itself. The impact that these private enterprises could have on the efficient and effective operation of this critical national security asset is potentially significant. The same is true of those businesses which supply the ADF or our intelligence services. The commercial ecosystems that surround large and technologically complex organisations are huge. The impact they can have on the direct defence of this country should not be underestimated. The situation is perhaps even more clear in the case of critical infrastructure like energy and transport facilities. Though the government has protected these directly with the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act, the possible impact on them and on our community of any inappropriate activity among the many private suppliers and contractors could be significant. The possibilities are not difficult to imagine. Organisations so closely linked to critical infrastructure, defence and intelligence assets could potentially put this country and its citizens at risk through the inappropriate use of sensitive data, unauthorised technology transfer and even direct interference through the disruption of supply chains or services. Such ideas are not fantasies. Overseas aggressive foreign powers have shown a strong interest in, for example, disrupting electricity supplies. Cyberattacks against the electricity grid of Ukraine in 2015 and 2016, for example, left more than 200,000 citizens without power. Media reports regarding the activities of private company Cambridge Analytica in the US and UK, and reports of Russian interference in elections in the US and elsewhere, suggest the compromising impact that a large-scale data breach by a hostile power could have on our economic and political life. This bill will help to prevent that outcome by ensuring that the government has the ability to stop investments that are a threat to national security. Before the government's recent and temporary COVID-19 measures came into effect, private foreign investors in most sectors needed only to seek government approval for investments of more than $275 million. This means that investments in some of our most sensitive sectors like software, low-volume high-tech manufacturing and digital technology were not ordinarily screened, even where an investment could raise national security concerns. These sectors are especially important to our defence and intelligence interests, yet they are made up of many smaller, specialised companies which would not attract investments over the threshold. The bill before the House will provide that the Treasurer must be notified of all foreign investments of any amount which involve national security businesses or land. It will also provide the Treasurer with the ability to call in any other foreign investment if he or she considers that that investment may pose a national security concern. This second power ensures that all ownership can be considered without the unnecessarily onerous requirement that absolutely every foreign investment be referred to the government. If the Treasurer identifies that a proposed investment could cause a national security concern, he can approve it with conditions which would allay that concern, require that assets be divested before the investment can go ahead or prohibit the investment entirely. Importantly, this power is flexible. Our nation's national security situation is fluid and responsive to the actions of billions of people, businesses and state actors. The actions of foreign investors themselves will sometimes have the ability to change that. In circumstances where a significant change has taken place, the Treasurer must have the ability to review and alter previously acceptable investments if they now pose a risk to national security. Though the criteria to be met are appropriately robust, with the last-resort power this bill provides for such a rare, but important, situation. Finally, this bill ensures that the Treasurer's new powers will be enforceable with a series of substantial new penalties for noncompliance. It also ensures that there will be comprehensive information available to the government regarding foreign ownership of assets with a potential national security implication. By creating a single public register of land, water and national security assets held in foreign ownership, the Treasurer will have the information he needs to respond to emerging threats. From the many hundreds of millions of dollars of foreign investment into Australia each year, this measure is expected to affect only a very small number of investments. The regulatory burden and disincentive to investment will be negligible. It is estimated that the reforms will result in around 100 additional applications and 1,800 additional registrations being made by investors each year. The total compliance cost will be, in aggregate, just $1.5 million a year, and the bill further mitigates this by reducing the complexity of the fees system and removing as many of the low-risk investments from the need to make an application as possible. The Morrison government is far from alone in recognising the necessity of making this change. Between 2017 and last year, nine out of the world's 10 largest economies have introduced greater government oversight of foreign investment with national security implications. Foreign investment across Australia is welcome. On the Sunshine Coast alone we need billions of dollars worth of new infrastructure and jobs for the future for our young people. The Morrison government is already spending more than $3.5 billion on infrastructure in my community, and more funds will always be needed. Foreign investment offers one important option for finding those funds and delivering projects quickly and efficiently. Foreign investment also helps to increase our ties with other economies in our region and encourages greater prosperity for all of us. However, as I've sought to outline today, this overseas investment is not without some risk. We cannot ignore the fact that there are growing threats to Australia's national security from some of the very nations with which we trade. The world's strategic situation is rapidly changing, and competition between nations for exports and investment is ever increasing. We cannot guarantee that a state which is our friend today will not have powerful incentives to act against our national interest tomorrow. We need a foreign investment screening process which is robust, comprehensive and flexible to meet those changing threats. Alongside the government's legislation on critical infrastructure and arrangements with states and territories, this bill is another important step towards securing our nation from foreign interference. I commend the bill to the House. 13:14 Mr JOSH WILSON 265970 Fremantle I'm glad to say something in the debate on the Foreign Investment Reform (Protecting Australia’s National Security) Bill 2020 and the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment Bill 2020. As the member for Fisher observed, at a time of COVID-19, nations around the world are considering their circumstances. At a time when we reflect on matters of national security and broad public wellbeing, countries have an interest in ensuring that appropriate regard is given to how we own and control certain essential parts of our economy and our public service delivery world, and that has been true here in Australia. This bill, essentially, provides greater capacity to screen proposed foreign investments in Australia. There's always been a regime in place—the Foreign Investment Review Board—that has facilitated that kind of screening. Typically, there are certain areas where consideration is particularly relevant. There are value thresholds that are set, and, if you fall below a particular value threshold, you may not be subject to screening. In the circumstances of a global pandemic, Australia, like other countries, is reconsidering how we apply that screen or that filter to proposed investments so that we can be sure of protecting Australia's national interest. I would observe that this change, to some degree, runs against some of the things that have been done in recent bilateral or multilateral trade agreements. Foreign Investment Review Board settings are often part of trade agreements, and, in Australia's case, because we are a virtually tariff-free jurisdiction, when it comes to settling trade agreements, we have to think about the kinds of things we can negotiate with. They include intellectual property rights. They can sometimes include—wrongly, in my view—temporary foreign labour access without proper labour market testing and so on. They can certainly go to the conditions in which investment is allowed, including the Foreign Investment Review Board settings. So there have been a number of trade agreements in which we've essentially said to other countries that part of what we're prepared to offer them is different thresholds. Of course, when you come along with the change that's being made in this bill, you basically take that back to zero. So, if there's an appropriate national security concern, then it doesn't matter how low the quantum of the investment is; it can still be called in and looked at. Of course, while agreeing to the bill, we on this side note that there are aspects of the way the bill will work that are yet to be determined because the definition of 'national security business' and the definition of 'national security land' will be determined by regulation subordinate to this bill. But, certainly, it's already the case that some of the countries with whom we've entered into trade agreements in recent times have noted with some concern the kinds of changes that are being made here. I think it was Mexico, one of the signatories to the Trans-Pacific Partnership 11, that expressed some concern back in October about what Australia was doing with respect to investment screening. So it does beg the question, going forward, how that will change the investment landscape globally. As a person who has spoken many times about the dangers of investor-state dispute resolution mechanisms, I also say that it's quite possible that investor-state dispute resolution mechanisms would be used to challenge the kind of thing that we're proposing here. It's not out of the question that a nation whose company is seeking to invest in Australia and is blocked on national security or national interest grounds may seek to challenge that in one of these tribunals, and that's something that we should be concerned about. It's right that in a relatively short time, in six to twelve months, we should look to review what's being done by this bill. It's something that was first proposed in June. We're putting it in place now, in December. There have been many concerns raised by stakeholders, investment experts and civil society groups about how exactly this will work. As I said earlier, some definitional aspects of it have yet to be established, so it's right that we should have a good look at it shortly. Broadly, the bill goes to the question of how we protect Australia's national interest and national security. In that area—foreign investment, foreign ownership, sovereign capability and self-sufficiency—there are many bits and pieces, and this part just goes to how you screen and consider proposed foreign investment. As we do this, it's worth all of us in this place reflecting, and certainly I think it's worth the government reflecting, on some of the other key areas around national security and national interest control. I don't think there's any doubt that this government was a bit late to the game in relation to critical commodities. We are blessed in Australia, in addition to having a lot of traditional resources, to be well represented when it comes to so-called new energy metals, the kinds of resources that are going to be necessary in the renewable energy transformation that is occurring around the world. We should have taken a comprehensive look at those resources much earlier—how important they are, where they are, who's investing in them, what purposes they're used for and so on. The definition of 'critical commodity' is something that is rare but vitally important. The United States got going on this front earlier than Australia did, probably back in 2017. They landed their strategy. The Morrison government's strategy wasn't settled until last year. But some of the observations in the US strategic assessment were sobering. The US identified 31 critical minerals. I think 14 of the 31 were entirely imported. For close to half of those critical minerals, the United States is entirely reliant on imports. We have joined with the United States in looking at a couple of minerals in recent times where you could almost say the ship has sailed. There are a couple of key minerals for which China controls around 85 per cent to 90 per cent of global production. It would be healthier for the globe if critical minerals were not concentrated necessarily in that way. It would certainly be critical for Australia. So I think that's something the government should look a bit more closely at in future. When you think about areas of national security and national interest where that question of protecting Australian ownership has already disappeared, there's none that sticks out more plainly and more worryingly than Australian shipping: 99 per cent, I think, of imports and exports to Australia go by ship. This isn't surprising; we're an island continent. Three decades ago, our national merchant fleet had 100 ships: 100 owned and flagged Australian vessels. That's an issue the member for Maribyrnong has identified and argued about repeatedly over the last five years plus. It's why Labor went to the last election with a proposal to create an Australian strategic fleet. We talk about Australian ownership and national security and our capacity to be masters of our own destination, but we've gone from having 100 ships in our merchant fleet, three decades ago, to having 10. That's where we sit now, and with not a single Australian flagged and owned fuel tanker. That's no basis on which to maintain your sovereign self-sufficiency and security position when you are an island continent, and yet that's not just been allowed to happen; it's been a positive policy of neglect that coalition governments, both this one and the previous one, have prosecuted. Their almost laughable use of permanent temporary permits, which have meant that our shipping might, by some people's estimation, become more efficient, have made us really vulnerable. And it's not just the assets themselves. It's not just the ships that we no longer own, that are no longer flagged here; it's the maritime workforce that goes with that shipping. One thing we've certainly discovered through COVID-19 is, if you want to take a fast and loose, just-in-time inventory management approach to all the things that we rely on and all the things that come here by ship, you're going to get caught out if there's a global crisis, if there's any kind of interference or separation as far as freight and logistics on a national base. Australians are going to get hurt and they're going to get hurt quite quickly. From government that bang the national security drum—it's one of their favourite instruments; they bang the national security drum a lot—they cannot be serious about our national security and turn a blind eye to the circumstances of Australian shipping. It is a scandal. Mr Katter interjecting— Mr JOSH WILSON 265970 The member for Kennedy is quite right. If you take the next step from shipping you go to our liquid fuel insecurity. When you don't own and operate an Australian tanker and you're relying on foreign shipping to get liquid fuel to you, you'll be doubly worried when you consider that at various times we've only got 20-odd days of liquid fuel. That position has been in place for many years, and the government has been incredibly slow to do anything about it. We were supposed to get the final report of the review into liquid fuel security at the end of 2017. We still haven't got that report. We've been out of compliance with our IEA requirements for some time. We're the only country, I think, out of compliance. We're supposed to be lodging a strategy shortly to be back in compliance by 2026. I will not hold my breath. Things, in many ways, are getting worse before they get better. We've seen in my own home state of Western Australia the proposal to close the BP refinery. It's not the case that that refinery is the only one that's in trouble; other refineries are in trouble as well. That means we won't be importing crude, potentially. We'll have to rely on refined fuel, and that puts us at greater risk. So we support this bill, but there are many other areas of national security interest that the government should attend to and hasn't done a great job of over the last seven years. Debate adjourned. Australia's Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) Bill 2020 40

Australia's Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) Bill 2020

Consideration of Senate Message 40 13:29 Mr IRONS HYM Swan I move: That the amendment be agreed to. Question agreed to. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 It being approximately 1.30, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour. STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS 41 STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS International Day of People with Disability 41 13:29 Mr SHORTEN 00ATG Maribyrnong I rise to mark the International Day of People with Disability, 3 December. Today is the day which was created by the United Nations and initiated in 1992. It is a day when we recognise the dignity, the rights and the awareness of people with disability. But today it's perhaps a bittersweet day. We celebrate the existence of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, the first such scheme in the world. It's an endeavour to make Australia the best in the world in the way in which we treat people with disability. It's a credit to the grassroots of disability activism and it's a credit to all sides of politics that 10 years ago there wasn't an NDIS but now there is. But after the last eight years of the coalition, we can also, I think, mark some of the challenges that remain for people with disability. There are deaths of NDIS participants which are marked by neglect—not good enough. There is the treatment of the NDIS as an ATM for the government and the taking out of $4.6 billion—not good enough. There is the failure to properly listen to and consult with people with disability about the proposals to initiate independent assessments in the NDIS—not good enough. There is the royal commission saying that people with disability were treated as invisible—not good enough. The theme for today's international day of disability is Building Back Better. I would suggest to people with disability that the message be 'must do better by this parliament'. Wentworth Electorate: Schools 41 13:31 Mr SHARMA 274506 Wentworth With no cases of community transmission of COVID-19 in New south Wales over the last few weeks, I was delighted to be able to visit several local primary schools in my electorate to congratulate graduating students and to view some of the completed grant projects. School visits, and seeing the positive impacts made by projects completed from government grants, as well as having the opportunity to answer some of the hard questions from the children, is, as many people here would know, one of the most enjoyable parts of being a member of parliament. St Margaret Mary's Catholic Primary School in my electorate was ecstatic about the difference the new grant-funded toilet in the kindergarten class had made to the students, who'd previously had to walk down several flights of stairs and use the sometimes intimidating older students amenities. I was pleased also to open the multimedia learning and technology space at St Charles' Catholic Primary School and the newly renovated library at Galilee Catholic Primary School. But a particular highlight of the week was attending Wairoa School in Bondi. Wairoa School caters for students with intellectual and other disabilities. It provides an outstanding caring and nurturing educational program for children with multiple disabilities often. It has a tremendous art and painting program, and whilst I was there I was lucky to see some of their works that have been inspired by Brett Whiteley's collection. The local schools grant enabled Wairoa School to purchase several LED touch screens, and I was privileged to participate in a class and see the learning enrichment and added excitement that the touch screen gave the children. I look forward to more school visits in the coming weeks. Immigration Detention 41 13:32 Mr GILES 243609 Scullin I rise to remind the House of a shameful anniversary. On this day a year ago this parliament voted to repeal the medevac laws. On this side of the House and in the Australian community, we haven't forgotten and we won't forget. The medevac laws were modest, measured and working to do justice. The parliament in putting those laws through this place and the other place had done its job, with Labor and the crossbench working together, listening to the experts, listening to each other to find common ground and, above all, listening to our consciences, doing what was right for vulnerable people in our care. We made a law that said this: it's doctors who should be responsible for giving medical advice. In this parliament we said that we would act on their advice when it came to refugees in our care. What did the government do? They came to this place full of hubris and full of arrogance but without an argument. They ripped down something that was working simply because they could, to reintroduce cruelty for its own sake. This repeal a year ago today has hurt people. It has damaged and continues to damage lives. More than that, it has damaged our society. Australian Defence Force Parliamentary Program 42 13:34 Mr WALLACE 265967 Fisher This week I had the pleasure of hosting Commander Jacqueline Swinton of the Royal Australian Navy in my office here in parliament—and she's in the gallery—as part of the outstanding and, dare I say, world-leading ADF Parliamentary Program. Commander Swinton joined the Navy as a legal officer in 2007. Since that time she's taken part in operations at home and overseas, including Operation Slipper in 2012 in Afghanistan, Operation Resolute in 2014, Operation Fiji Assist in 2016 and our counterterrorism fight against smuggling in Operation Manitou in 2017. Alongside working on legal and gender matters, Commander Swinton held the demanding role of staff officer to Chief of the Defence Force in 2018, and recently completed the Joint Command and Staff Program in Canada. This week, however, she left all of that behind to join me in meetings with ministers and at Parliament House events. She went along to question time in both chambers and has supported my work with tasks in my parliamentary office. The ADFPP has given me the terrific opportunity to travel all over Australia and parts of the world to see the professionalism of our service men and women up close. I've seen many dedicated and hardworking leaders who want to push themselves for new challenges. Commander Swinton absolutely fits that description. Jacqui, I hope you've enjoyed your time in my office, and I wish you the best for the future. Werriwa Electorate: CNA-Italian Australian Services 42 13:36 Ms STANLEY 265990 Werriwa I recently had the pleasure of attending the opening of the CNA-Italian Australian Services community garden. Work on the My Garden Your Garden project began in August and aims to promote inclusion and participation from different cultures by committing to their community garden. A team of volunteers and staff have worked hard to allow the garden to be ready for the Christmas season. The motivation for the garden was brought about by research on age-friendly cities benefiting from green space in the community. The space offers a place where seniors and community members can enhance their wellbeing, social inclusion, physical activity and positive nutritional health. It's early days, but the project already looks to be a resounding success, with tomatoes, figs, beans, watermelons and parsley already maturing. The garden was funded from a grant from Club Marconi, with contributions by Fairfield City Council and CNA themselves. CEO of Club Marconi, Tony Zappia, and Fairfield Mayor, Frank Carbone, were both in attendance to see the literal fruits of their support. Also in attendance were the state members for Liverpool, Prospect and Fairfield and Liverpool Councillor Nathan Hagarty. I'd to thank Marco and Giovanni Testa and all the team at CNA for their hospitality and showing me around their beautiful garden. I'm trying very hard to keep the grafted watermelon alive! Australian of the Year: Dr James Muecke 42 13:37 Mr STEVENS 176304 Sturt Yesterday, Dr James Muecke, the Australian of the Year, was here at Parliament House. Since he was elevated to that august title this year, his focus has been on raising awareness of diabetes and particularly the impact of sugar on our diets. Yesterday, he undertook a testing in front of the building, and a number of the members of the House and the Senate took the opportunity to go out and have a little blood prick as well as an ultrasound of their livers. A lot of us found some quite surprising results there. At the age of 37, I never thought that even at my age I would need to start making some changes to my diet and think very seriously about the amount of sugar consumption that we have in some unsuspected parts of our diet and the way in which that can lead to significant chronic health issues later in life, particularly type 2 diabetes and other issues to do with our liver and so on. I really do commend Dr Muecke, who's a constituent of mine. It's been a difficult year, of course, as Australian of the Year, given travel restrictions. He has not had the same platform as he would ordinarily have had to travel around the country and raise awareness of this very important issue, but he's done it commendably well given the challenges. I commend his message to everyone in the House, and I thank him very much for the service that he's provided to our nation over this year. Australian Parliament Sports Club 42 13: Mr GOSLING 245392 Solomon There's a sports competition going on at the moment , with t he Australian Parliament Sports Club playing a variety of teams made up of members o f our Australian Federal Police and Australian Defence Force, fir ey s and journos. This morning it was tennis. My tennis partner was none other than the Labor leader, Anthony Albanese, and we were beaten, unfortunately, by a couple of Australian federal policemen, fantastic blokes, whose names were also Anthony and Luke. So Anthony and Luke won—great fellas. I don't think I did my promotion prospects for the future any good with my performance! We also played a rugby game as part of this fantastic Parliament Sports Club program. The idea of it is really to acknowledge our first responders—our police and our members of the Defence Force—and, in a social way, get to know them. I really want to give a massive shout-out to the sterling work of Mr Andy Turnbull, who runs the Parliament Sports Club. It's a wonderful club, established in 2005. We've had generations of politicians and other sportspeople taking part since then, raising $750,000 for charities during that time. The club strengthens relationships with parliamentarians and businesses from around Australia and internationally. It's a great organisation. (Time expired) Queensland Government 43 13:40 Mr THOMPSON 281826 Herbert It's just 33 days since the Queensland state election, and already the state Labor government has delivered a multibillion-dollar broken promise, and it's going to seriously hurt my community in Townsville. During the campaign, the Labor Treasurer told Queenslanders they would only borrow a few billion extra dollars in the budget, to take the debt to $106 billion. On Tuesday, the newly reinstated Treasurer revised that up by a casual $24 billion. It's a lot of money. That's a sevenfold increase in just four weeks. No-one is saying we don't have to borrow money to help our economy recover from the effects of COVID-19, but there is absolutely no excuse for misleading the people of Queensland at an election. This isn't the Treasurer's money, it's not the Premier's money and it's not the Labor Party's money; it's the taxpayers' money. One example in Townsville is a $40 million upgrade to the Kirwan health facility. Only half a million dollars will be spent this financial year. Another $30 million was promised for Big Rocks Weir, but now another business case is being done. It's not going to help the Townsville community. The people of Townsville deserve better from their state Labor government. Petition: Kurdish People 43 13:42 Mr WILKIE C2T Clark I rise on behalf of the Kurdish Society of Tasmania to table a petition that has been considered by the Petitions Committee and found to be in order. The petition calls on the Australian government to support the self-determination of the Kurdish people and to embrace the establishment of an independent Kurdistan, which is critical for the economic and social aspirations of the Kurdish people and the preservation of Kurdish national identity. The Kurds have been fighting for statehood for over a century, and their collective struggle for sovereignty has been marked by persecution, suffering and violence. Any move towards independence has been destroyed time and time again. This petition asks the House to recognise that the Kurdish people deserve the homeland they were promised by the colonial powers after World War I. The right to exercise self-determination is enshrined within international law. Indeed, it's a fundamental principle of the international system and one that ensures that people have the right to form a sovereign government and freely decide their fate without interference. The Kurdish people should have this right. I present this petition to the House and call on the Australian government to publicly support the Kurdish people's right to self-determination. The petition read as follows— Many people know the history of the Kurds - an indigenous people of the Middle East dating back as far as historical records go. Borders were drawn in the 20th century, divided Kurds, and have been disputed ever since. Kurdistan has suffered countless tragedies. The independence of Kurdistan is, hence, not only crucial for economic and cultural aspirations of the Kurds, but also a way to preserve and protect her people, language, art, and music. We therefore ask the House to, as leaders of a pro-democratic country, take responsibility and embrace Kurdistan's right to self-determination, which is a right guaranteed by the charter of the United Nations, by declaring support for the Kurdish Independence and their right to self determination. from 80 citizens (Petition No. EN1760) Forde Electorate: STEPS 4208 43 13:43 Mr VAN MANEN 188315 Forde I rise today to talk about a fantastic Christmas initiative that happened in Forde on the weekend. Community group STEPS 4208, based in Ormeau, arranged for a motorcyclist to dress as Santa and travel through Ormeau and Pimpama in hopes of raising funds for mental health research. STEPS 4208 is a group of like-minded people who came together in October this year with the purpose of raising awareness of mental health in the 4208 and 4207 postcodes. These are people who have come together because they know about the mental health and wellbeing issues in their community and they know they have increased after the stresses of this year. Organiser Sue Haywood said: So we're trying to organise events to bring people together to basically put a smile on their face, to get them talking and if these people need help, we can get them in touch with the right organisation to help them. The money raised from the ride is going to LIVIN, an organisation that delivers the LIVINWell mental health and stigma reduction program in schools and community groups across Australia. I want to applaud this event put together by STEPS 4208. Connection to others, being able to have a laugh and a smile at Santas on motorbikes, and having fun in our communities or on our own are important for our mental health. However, doing all these things in order to raise funds and awareness about this serious issue and its effect on others is truly important and in the best Christmas spirit. Brooke, Mr Don 44 13:45 Ms MURPHY 133646 Dunkley Twenty years ago Don Brooke had throat cancer; he survived. Ten years ago Don had prostate cancer; he survived. In March this year, pancreatic cancer was strike 3; this time the treatment didn't work. When Don only had months to live, he and his wife, Helga, needed to obtain the pension for the first time in their lives, as Helga was now Don's full-time carer. It was so much harder than it should ever be for anyone, let alone someone who just wanted to make sure his wife was financially stable when he was gone and not left unable to pay the medical costs for his palliative care. That's how I came to know Don, when his granddaughter asked for help so he didn't have to spend more of the finite time he had left on the computer, rifling through paperwork and not getting people on the phone at Services Australia. We got it sorted in time—a bittersweet victory, because he shouldn't have needed my help. Don's wife, Helga, wants people to know he had always wanted to go on his own terms, and Victoria's voluntary assisted dying scheme gave him that at the end. It gave him the dignity of dying as the remarkable husband, father, and pop that he was. It gave a modicum of peace to his family, knowing that he was in control and that the disease that was killing him wasn't able to kill his sense of self. Don's family thanked the leaders of Victoria for making it possible. Don died peacefully earlier this week at his home in Langwarrin, surrounded by family and those who loved him. He was beat but not beaten, and voluntary assisted dying gave him that. Bonner Electorate: Lindum Rail Crossing Upgrade 44 13:46 Mr VASTA E0D Bonner Following the disappointing election announcement by the Queensland Labor government that they would not fund an upgrade to the Lindum level crossing, I have been working directly with Councillor Lisa Atwood and the Brisbane City Council to find an alternative solution. As a result, I will be bypassing the Queensland government and working directly with the Brisbane City Council to deliver the Lindum corridor road upgrade. In 2018, I delivered $85 million towards upgrading the Lindum level crossing. The Brisbane City Council committed $40 million, subject to the Queensland government coming to the party. We cannot let the lack of state funding prevent this vital safety upgrade from getting underway. While the jointly funded federal and state Lindum Station Precinct Study was conducted to help deliver an all-government solution, we cannot sit back any longer and watch other level crossings, like Coopers Plains, receive $66 million in state funding while Lindum level crossing gets zero. Given the Queensland Labor government's decision to ignore the state asset, I've been working with Councillor Atwood and the Minister for Population, Cities and Urban Infrastructure, Alan Tudge, to workshop a solution. As a result, we will be redirecting our $85 million funding away from the state government and delivering it directly to the Brisbane City Council so they can begin the upgrades to the Lindum road corridor. During the Treasurer's budget speech he warned the states, 'If you don't use it, you'll lose it,' and the Queensland Labor government has not only lost this federal funding— (Time expired) La Trobe University 44 13:48 Ms CHESTERS 249710 Bendigo () (): I am deeply concerned that La Trobe University are moving their arts degree online only for regional students. An online-only option for arts will mean that many students may not choose to study. What's the point when, at the same time, this government is doubling the course cost for arts students? La Trobe University in Bendigo is well known for having world-class health and education departments. We are leading the state when it comes to some of our health courses. Why can't we do the same for arts? Why do regional arts students have to go to an online-only option when their metro peers will still get the opportunity for face-to-face study? I acknowledge some students do enjoy and prefer the online option; however, it doesn't work for everybody. Up to 50 per cent of students in a recent survey said that they'd found this year to be hard, that online learning isn't the best and that they haven't got the outcomes they'd hoped for. I urge La Trobe to rethink this decision and give regional students, as well as their metro peers, the opportunity to study face to face. Let them have their tutes face to face. We have the space at Bendigo La Trobe, as at many of the other La Trobe campuses. It's disappointing that they've done this, particularly in a year when the students will pay double the cost yet study online. It's unfair. (Time expired) Mallee Electorate: Agricultural Shows and Field Days 44 13:50 Dr WEBSTER 281688 Mallee This week I had the pleasure of informing 16 agricultural show committees that they were recipients of funding through the Supporting Agricultural Shows and Field Days Program. Every representative I spoke to was overjoyed and many were brought to tears after such a difficult year. Agricultural shows and field days in Mildura, Charlton, Edenhope, Murtoa, Nhill, Natimuk, Warracknabeal, Cohuna, Swan Hill, Donald, St Arnaud, Kaniva, Kerang, Horsham and Dimboola will all share in over $200,000 worth of funding. The representatives told me how hard this year has been on their cash-strapped committees, with many running on empty. This funding will see shows in these communities return bigger and better in 2020-21. While it has been a tough year for show committees, it's also been a year for innovation. Horsham Agricultural Society hosted the first online ag show in Victoria, complete with virtual animal nursery, fashion parade and concert. I know the committee, led by Zack Currie, will put their funding to good use for next year. Ag shows and field days are the soul of regional communities across the country. They foster community spirit and highlight the prosperity of our regions. I look forward to attending our shows in 2021. Pensions and Benefits 45 13:51 Ms RYAN 249224 Lalor I rise today in this place to call for a royal commission into the government's robodebt scandal. I do so because of the number of people in my electorate who were impacted by this diabolical system. It was sending out 20,000 notices a week at its height and had real impacts and unfair impacts on people's lives. I sat with a resident locally who had finished university and qualified as a teacher. She was unable to find work in that first six months, which is not unusual, and was therefore getting support. This young person went on to find a permanent job in January. Years later, in her recess time, she was desperately trying to get on to Centrelink to talk about the debt they had issued to her—cramming it into her day. She was triggered, because she'd had a tough year mentally that year being unemployment benefits and trying to find work. She'd had an incredibly tough year. She had just purchased a house. She had a mortgage. And now she had a Dun & Bradstreet letter to say that she owed thousands and thousands of dollars. We know now that this was unlawful. This was intolerable, and we should have a royal commission to hear every story. (Time expired) Ryan Electorate: Coo-ee Walk 45 13:53 Mr SIMMONDS 282983 Ryan Last week I had the honour of attending St Andrew's Catholic Primary School in Ferny Grove for the official opening of their Defence Family Memorial. Located near the Gallipoli Barracks, St Andrews has a large defence family community within their school. Next year, in fact, they will have 75 defence families enrolled. Mr John Leyden, St Andrew's school principal; Mrs Rebecca Woolmer, defence school mentor; and Mrs Debra O'Hare, the business manager, worked to create the Coo-ee Walk to honour the service men and women and their families in the school community. They named the memorial the Coo-ee Walk to signify the call to service of the defence mums and dads at St Andrews. In 1915, roughly 20 men who were determined to enlist started to march from central west New South Wales to Sydney. By the time they got there, their numbers were up to 300, and this was known as the Coo-ee March. When the parents return home from service, the St Andrew's community comes together at the Coo-ee Walk to welcome them home and thank them for their service. We must never forget the sacrifice that our service men and women make in being away from their families, and we must never forget the sacrifice that their children make in having mum and dad serve their nation and be away from them. I was so pleased to be able to support the St Andrew's Coo-ee Walk project by providing $18,000 through the Local Schools Community Fund. Any initiative to support ADF personnel is invaluable to my community in Ryan, and I'll continue to advocate for these families. Well done to the whole St Andrews Catholic primary school community for their efforts! (Time expired) Wavecare Inc. 45 13:54 Ms LIU 282918 Chisholm I would like to take a moment to talk about an invaluable organisation based in Glen Waverley. I had the pleasure of recently attending the AGM of Wavecare Counselling and following up with a visit to meet their team last week. I spoke with Raymond Paterson, the CEO of Wavecare Counselling, and Denis Carruthers, Wavecare's chair. Both of them shared with me the incredible work they do in our community. The year 2020 has put an enormous strain on the mental wellbeing of many people. It comforts me to know that organisations like Wavecare are there to help. The social isolation experienced during extended quarantine was a new and terrifying reality for many. For some people, the feelings of anxiety and depression were amplified. It has only been through the dedication, unrelenting hard work, care and patience of Raymond, Denis and their team that many people in Chisholm have been led back to the path of recovery and mental wellbeing. I personally want to thank the team at Wavecare for everything they contribute to Chisholm. I love Chisholm and I love organisations like Wavecare. (Time expired) Employment 45 13:56 Mr STEPHEN JONES A9B Whitlam It's good to see the Prime Minister is going to be back in parliament again with long pants on. He'll be missing the close company of his image advisor. He can cover his knees, but he can't cover the fact his government is leaving people behind. While the Prime Minister and the Treasurer declare that the recession is over and give themselves a trophy, 2.4 million Australians are either out of work or looking for work. But the group of Australians who have been ignored the most by this government are older workers. For this group of Australians, the government has shown utter contempt. One in every five Australians from the ages of 55 to 65 is out of work. One third of them were made redundant from their last job. Although they know the statistics say one thing, they know they're not going to get another job. The best they can hope for is to go on an unemployment benefit of $40 a day and eat into their savings until they qualify for the age pension. They're discriminated against in job interviews, and the government makes this worse by providing subsidies to younger workers, pushing them to the back of the queue. To rub salt in the wounds, they see your government paying $4,000 a day in free flights to the former finance minister, who described their unemployment as— (Time expired) International Day of People with Disability 46 13:57 Mr ANDREWS HK5 Menzies How we treat the most vulnerable in society is truly a mark of our humanity. That we seek to uphold the dignity of each individual person marks our society—indeed, I would say, our civilisation. This requires us to consider how we include all members of our communities in society, especially the vulnerable and the disabled. I make these comments today because it is International Day of People with Disability. Designated by the United Nations, this day goes back several decades. The theme this year is apposite, 'Building Back Better: toward a disability-inclusive, accessible and sustainable post-COVID-19 world'. I was delighted, as chair of the Joint Standing Committee on the NDIS, to be able to co-host an event with the member for Maribyrnong this morning to mark the day. It was pleasing that many of our colleagues from this chamber and some from the other place were able to attend, including Senator Hollie Hughes, representing the minister. Many of us have been impacted by COVID-19. But for the disabled, their families and their carers, that impact has been compounded. It's right for all of us to pause to reflect on this and to redouble our efforts to ensure that we all contribute to an inclusive, accessible, and sustainable post-COVID-19 world, especially for the disabled. Prime Minister 46 13:59 Mr WATTS 193430 Gellibrand I rise to welcome back our Prime Minister to question time, in the flesh—our marketing-man Prime Minister! Last question time, I counted the number of references to the advertising company funded slogan that the Prime Minister is currently running out, 'the comeback'. He's 'come back' to parliament today, in the flesh. Let's see if there's more substance to him than the hologram Prime Minister that we saw yesterday. We on this side of the House are not holding out much hope. The Australian people want a prime minister of substance that delivers to them, that leaves no Australian behind, that holds no-one back in the recovery. It's time that the Australian Prime Minister started delivering, in the flesh, in this chamber, and I welcome him back today to question time. The SPEAKER 00APG In accordance with standing order 43, the time for members' statements has concluded. QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE 46 QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE COVID-19: Income Support Payments 46 14:00 Ms BURNEY 8GH Barton My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Social Services. Can the government confirm that Australians who withdrew their super early and have it in the bank are now subject to the liquid assets waiting period for payments like JobSeeker, and that the government wants to extend that waiting period to half a year? 14:01 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden I thank the member for her question. For the benefit of the House, the liquid assets waiting period is the period that people must wait before being paid an allowance if they have funds above the maximum reserve the day after the date they ceased work or study, or at a date of claim. It varies from one week to 13 weeks at present and is applied as whole weeks, and the maximum reserve amount available to a customer is to be used to calculate it. The vast majority, about 95 to 97 per cent, of people do not have a liquid assets waiting period applied. On average, people who fulfil the full 13 weeks have about $74,000 in liquid assets, and a liquid asset does not include a house or a car. In many circumstances—and I'm sure the member will be interested in this—the liquid assets waiting period can be waived where the customer would be in severe financial hardship. People do not need to spend any specific amount of their liquid assets before they're allowed onto payments. Once the waiting period is served, no matter the amount of assets they have outstanding, they will receive their payments. The SPEAKER 00APG I just ask the minister to pause for a second. I always allow a preamble and some context. We're quite a way into the answer—in fact, quite a way into the time allowed for the answer, almost half. He really does need to bring himself to what was a specific question with respect to early withdrawal of superannuation. The minister has the call. Mr ROBERT HWT The bill before the House that the member refers to will increase the maximum length of the waiting period from 13 to 26 weeks—the maximum length, noting that the current period from zero to 13 weeks is a scale, and 95 to 97 per cent of Australians— The SPEAKER 00APG The minister will resume his seat. The Manager of Opposition Business, on a point of order. Mr Burke DYW It's on direct relevance, Mr Speaker. The question very specifically asks whether it applies to people who have accessed early superannuation and if that's the cash they have in their bank. The SPEAKER 00APG The minister does need to address himself to the question. Mr ROBERT HWT Increasing the maximum wait only affects those— The SPEAKER 00APG No, I'm just going to say to the minister— Mr ROBERT HWT from a cash point of view— The SPEAKER 00APG The minister will pause for a second. I have been as clear as I can. And I uphold the point the Manager of Opposition Business made. The question, without me going through it again, was whether the subject matter the minister's talking about applies to early withdrawal of superannuation. That was the question. He needs to address it—or resume his seat—or I'll move on to the next question. Mr ROBERT HWT The liquid assets waiting period applies to all cash held by Australians, regardless of source, because it deals with liquid assets. The new maximum 26-week period will only apply to single people with no dependent children with total liquid assets of $18,000 or more, or $36,000 or more for all claimants, noting that it will not actually apply to 95 to 97 per cent of Australians, regardless of the form of liquid asset, which excludes their house or their car. People with Disability: Employment 47 14:04 Ms BELL 282981 Moncrieff My question is to the Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and Minister for Government Services. Will the minister update the House on what the Morrison government is doing to remove employment obstacles for those with a disability? 14:05 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden I thank the member for Moncrieff for her question and acknowledge her hard work in supporting over 1,800 NDIS participants in her electorate. Today is the International Day of People with Disability. I know that everyone in the House would celebrate the opportunity for us to reflect on what that collectively means for us and to reflect on the contribution made to our great society and the economy by the skills and talents of some 4.4 million Australians identifying with disability. It's also an opportunity to mark the important contributions that Australians with disability make in the workforce and to focus our attention on how we collectively can continue to change employer attitudes so that everyone who wants to work in Australia has the opportunity to do so. We all know that getting a job and keeping a job is an absolute game changer in people's lives, and this shouldn't be different for anyone with a disability. This couldn't be truer for Daniel, a valued member of the Parliament House concierge team, who I met yesterday. He lives with Asperger's syndrome and severe anxiety. The job here in Parliament House amongst us, with us and alongside us every day gives him financial security, enables him to plan for his future and gives him choice and control over his life. This morning I met with two other very impressive young men—Nicholas and Gordon—from the Aurora Neurodiversity Program at Services Australia. This program aims to recognise the skills and abilities of great Australians with autism and employ job-ready candidates in the Public Service. As a nation I know that we all want to rise to the challenge of improving outcomes for people with disability, especially as we come back from the COVID-19 pandemic. That should start with government and the Public Service. That's why today the Morrison government has released a new APS employment strategy to make employing Australians with disability a mainstream part of the everyday culture of the Public Service. This strategy demonstrates an ongoing commitment to providing meaningful employment opportunities for people with disability and sets the goal that, by 2025, seven per cent of the APS will be Australians with a disability. If we can approach recruitment differently, focus on ability and provide adequate supports, together we can make a substantial difference. I'm pleased that the National Disability Insurance Agency currently has 11 per cent of its staff being Australians with a disability. This is leading the APS. It's a tremendous initiative. It's something that we should all lean heavily into. As a nation we can collectively take pride in our Public Service leading the way. COVID-19: Income Support Payments 48 14:08 Ms BURNEY 8GH Barton My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Social Services. Can the minister confirm that the cost to a single person of the half-year waiting period for a payment like JobSeeker can be up to $10,600? Can the minister confirm that super withdrawn early is counted as a liquid asset, which can trigger a half-year waiting period when they don't have a job? 14:08 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden I thank the member for her question. I can only assume the member is speaking in her question with respect to the liquid asset waiting period. She should note my previous answer where I mentioned that 95 to 97 per cent of people will not be subject to it. All liquid assets, regardless of their source, form part of the liquid asset waiting period. On average right now, with the 13-week liquid asset period, an individual Australian has $74,000 in liquid assets. That's what the average is right now, noting that those liquid assets also exclude a house or a car. As we move from 13 weeks to 26 weeks, which is the bill in front of the House, the liquid assets waiting period will impact only those who have greater capacity to support themselves, based on those numbers. COVID-19: Economy 48 14:10 Ms HAMMOND 80072 Curtin My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister inform the House how the Morrison government is ensuring it gets the balance right on the health and economic challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic as we build our comeback from the virus and its effects? 14:10 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook I thank the member for her question and I welcome the new member for Groom to the chamber, here for his first question time. It's great to have him here with us. He joins a government team that has been focused absolutely on the welfare and wellbeing of Australians in one of the most difficult years our country can recall, especially in our most recent lifetimes. Over the period of our government we have always worked hard to get the balance right to address the very serious and complex challenges our country faces: to respond to them today, to enlist the recovery that is necessary for Australians to be able to move forward and to build for the future. In particular in relation to the pandemic, this has been the case. From the outset, we have always said it's about saving lives and it's about saving livelihoods. This is a twin goal that has now been taken up around the world as absolutely the balance necessary to manage the impacts of this global pandemic whether here in Australia or anywhere else. Our economic recovery is dependent upon the platform that has been built off our health response—a health response done in partnership with the states and territories, with specific measures to support states and territories in building up their health capability and response. Significant amongst those has been the priority our government has placed on supporting the mental health of Australians with the additional measures that were brought into place. But that health plan has been one that has looked forward. As we look into 2021, we look forward to a vaccine. That is true. It is a vaccine that will be safe and a vaccine that will be delivered in an orderly fashion. It is one that will be supported, should it be so, should the tests confirm, by the Therapeutic Goods Administration. So we will move swiftly, but we will move safely and we will continue to protect the health interests of Australians by ensuring we manage those issues in a balanced way, to get it right, on the ground, so Australians can be confident in the vaccine program that we have invested in so heavily and which will be delivered next year, subject to those approvals. On the economy, the opposition should be pleased to note that the comeback is underway. The recovery plan that we outlined in the budget is working. But there is a long way to go. Our focus is not just the 80 per cent of Australians who found their way back into a job, who saw their jobs being restored, but the 20 per cent and more of those we would like to see come back into the labour force— (Time expired) Pensions and Benefits 48 14:13 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler My question is also addressed to the Minister representing the Minister for Social Services. Hasn't the government, on the one hand, encouraged people to take $20,000 out of their super but now on the other hand wanted to use that to make them wait six months and deny them up to $10,600 in payments when they don't have a job? Why does this government want to pocket a budget saving from the superannuation of people who lose their jobs? 14:14 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden As I have been saying all week, the government clearly rejects the assertions of the Leader of the Opposition. For the benefit of the House: superannuation benefits as a whole are not included in the liquid asset waiting period. This is important. If someone accesses their super early and that amount is included in their liquid assets then it may be included liquid asset waiting period calculation, depending upon when they accessed their superannuation. For example, if a person gains early access to an amount from their superannuation account before the day they become unemployed, the amount is included in the calculation for the person's liquid asset waiting period to the extent that the amount continues to be part of the person's liquid assets. Any use of the amount to repay a debt before becoming unemployed would not be part of the person's liquid assets on the day the person became unemployed. If a person gains early access to an amount from the person's superannuation after the day the person becomes unemployed or incapacitated, then the amount is not included in the calculation of the person's liquid assets for the purpose of determining the length of any applicable liquid asset waiting period. Climate Change 49 14:15 Mr BANDT M3C Melbourne My question is to the Prime Minister. Next week Boris Johnson's Conservative government will host the global Climate Ambition Summit, at which countries will be required to outline their plans for stronger 2030 targets to respond to the climate emergency. Will Australia attend the summit and announce stronger 2030 targets? Or will your government continue Australia's increasing international isolation by retaining weak 2030 targets that are driving us to catastrophe? 14:16 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook I thank the member for his question. Indeed we will be participating, and I have communicated as such to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. I look forward to participating in that program, as we have participated in similar topics over the past few weeks at the APEC Summit, the G20 Summit, the East Asia Summit prior to that and a recent meeting with the President of the European Union. We will participate in that program. It will be a great opportunity to correct the mistruths that have just been spoken by the Leader of the Greens and are often presented, because Australia is a country that has made commitments, has kept commitments and has beaten commitments when it comes to reducing emissions in this country. As the Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction recalled to the House only this week, Australia's emissions have fallen 16.6 per cent from June 2005 and 18.9 per cent from June 2007, when they peaked; they're just the facts. It is also true we have beaten the Kyoto targets that we set by some 459 million tonnes. It is also our government's policy, as I've already had the opportunity to convey, that we believe the future of getting to net zero emissions is by technology, not by taxes. The 'if' and 'when' is not the question; the 'how' is the question. If you don't know how to do it, you'll never get there and you'll never achieve it. This is the practical contribution that Australia brings to the table. On the engagement we have entered into with countries like Japan around hydrogen: what the member opposite may want to consider is, if you want to achieve those sorts of goals, you have to be able to produce hydrogen at a rate of $2 per kilo. That's a target that actually reduces your emissions, and they're the specifics that our government is pursuing to ensure a net zero emissions future. This is a government that is committed to practical action and getting things done, and working with other countries to achieve that. It's not good enough for advanced economies like Australia to achieve the things we're achieving. In like economies, like, we know, New Zealand, emissions have only fallen by one per cent compared to our over 16 per cent or compared to the 13½ per cent in the previous comparison. And Canada's emissions have fallen by zero. So Australia is pulling its weight. Australia is making its contribution, and we will continue to do that so long as we have the opportunity to do so, which we look forward to doing. The Leader of the Greens should stop talking Australia down. COVID-19: Regional Infrastructure 49 14:19 Mr CHRISTENSEN 230485 Dawson My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development. Will the Deputy Prime Minister inform the House how the Morrison-McCormack government's investment in regional infrastructure is supporting our comeback from the COVID-19 pandemic? 14:19 Mr McCORMACK 219646 Riverina I acknowledge Kay Catanzariti in the public gallery and acknowledge what she's doing for workplace safety. Ms Catherine King interjecting— Mr McCORMACK 219646 No need for that, member for Ballarat. I thank the member for Dawson for his question. Yesterday we heard encouraging reports from the Treasurer about our economic comeback from the COVID-19 global pandemic. As a government we are supporting businesses to create and to maintain jobs. In the member's electorate of Dawson, 4,200 businesses have accessed JobKeeper and more than 17,000 are eligible for the instant asset write-off measure which has made such a difference to so many small businesses across our nation. Australia's consumer confidence is clear and evident in our GDP increase of 3.3 per cent over the last quarter. By investing in infrastructure—$110 billion, a record amount—over the next decade, we're getting on with the job of making sure that our regional communities in particular have connectivity, we're busting through congestion in our capital cities and we're making our nation what it needs to be. Since the establishment of the National Water Grid Authority we have completed five water infrastructure projects, and we're getting on with building a whole lot more. One of the projects we are now planning for is the Urannah dam in the member's electorate. This project will be capable of delivering water to an irrigation precinct up to 25,000 hectares. The member for Dawson knows how important that is, and so do we. Ms Butler interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Griffith. Mr McCORMACK 219646 She ought to go and talk to our state member, Mr Speaker. With the start of the environmental impact statement process, we are one step closer to the project commencing. That is what we're doing. We're increasing agriculture from $61 billion to $100 billion. The minister for agriculture knows how important this is going to be by 2030. In a recent trip to the member for Dawson's electorate, we visited the Mackay Northern Access Upgrade Project, a project which has created more than 150 jobs in the local economy. This $120.3 million program of works includes the building of additional turning lanes, road alignments, intersection upgrades and targeted duplications. The CEO of Tourism Whitsundays, Natassia Wheeler, in her destination sentiment report, has indicated that island resorts saw an average of 60 per cent increase in inquiries and a 40 per cent increase in bookings following the announcement of the borders reopening. That's what we need. We need tourists to flood and flock to our regional areas. The member for Dawson knows it and we know it. We'll get planes back in the air, we'll get jobs back on the ground. That's what it's all about. They are unable to fill all their orders because of a workforce challenge, so I say to people listening to this or watching this: there are jobs in the regions—good, well-paying jobs. Have a look. Come to the regions. You won't regret it! It's a great place to live, work and invest. COVID-19: Hotel Quarantine 50 14:22 Ms CHESTERS 249710 Bendigo My question is to the Minister for Health. I refer to confirmation today that a worker in Sydney who tested positive to coronavirus worked at two hotels, only one of which is a quarantine hotel. Given that quarantine is a Commonwealth responsibility, why are hotel quarantine workers still working across multiple sites? 14:22 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders I thank the member for her question and I acknowledge the work of the New South Wales government in dealing with this latest case today. They have not just one of the finest systems in Australia for contact tracing; arguably they have one of the finest systems in the world. It's the gold standard for Australia. It is the gold standard, we think, for the world. One of the critical things Australia has done is put in place border protections, beginning on 1 February, at the earliest stages as part of our national plan to deal with COVID. At the time, that was criticised by some in the international community and specifically criticised by the World Health Organization, but we made those decisions. Another critical element has been to follow the medical advice. What we have done—perhaps above almost any other nation—has been to follow the medical advice. As part of that, we have developed arrangements with the states, and I would respectfully note that the states embraced and took full responsibility for delivering the hotel quarantine scheme under their public health responsibilities and as part of the national cabinet process. They are overwhelmingly doing a great job. Obviously, Victoria had a significant challenge. As long as we have engagement with the rest of the world— The SPEAKER 00APG The Manager of Opposition Business, on a point of order? Mr Burke DYW The question is quite specific to the issue of people working across multiple sites. The SPEAKER 00APG I just say to the Minister for Health: there was a specific question there. He's given some context, which I have enabled him to give, and I think that's useful. I think he was actually just coming to the point as the point of order was made—or had just come to it, with respect to what the states are doing. Mr HUNT 00AMV Indeed. As part of those responsibilities, when we set out the arrangements that the Prime Minister led with the states, they specifically, expressly and clearly took responsibility, but we have provided support through provision of the ADF. We have provided support through the work of Jane Halton, a former distinguished secretary, and through the Chief Scientist of Australia. They have set out the standards expected, and individual states are responding to and adopting those standards. We welcome all of those elements. So the premise of the question is fundamentally wrong. It is incorrect in fact. However, it is important to understand that wherever we are in a situation of engaging with the outside world, on a day when there have been over 600,000 cases and the highest rate of loss of life ever through the pandemic, what we see is that we protect Australians through hotel quarantine. There will be risks associated with that, but we have put in place a system which has made Australia the envy of the world. Economy 51 14:27 Mr GOODENOUGH 74046 Moore My question is to the Treasurer. Will the Treasurer please explain to the House how yesterday's national accounts figures demonstrate how the Morrison government's strong and decisive economic management is helping the Australian economy make its comeback? 14:27 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong I thank the member for Moore for his question and acknowledge his experience in small business and as a local councillor before coming to this place. Around 70,000 students in the electorate of Moore will get a tax cut as a result of the legislation that we supported on this side of the House. Yesterday we had the national accounts numbers. They were an encouraging set of numbers that show that the comeback in the Australian economy is on. It is on! The comeback is on! We saw an increase in GDP in the September quarter of 3.3 per cent—the single largest increase in quarterly GDP since 1976. We saw strong growth in every state and territory, except for Victoria. If Victoria had achieved the growth that we'd seen on average across the other states and territories, we would have seen growth in the September quarter of five per cent. What we have seen in the national accounts is a consumption-led recovery—a 7.9 per cent increase in household consumption. It's up in recreation, up in transport and up in hotels, cafes and restaurants. This is after a fall of 12.5 per cent in the June quarter. So household consumption is coming back as the restrictions are eased and the health crisis is brought under control. Australia is performing better on the health and economic front than nearly any other country. If you look at year-on-year comparisons in the economy at the end of the September quarter, Australia has done better than the United Kingdom, than France, than Germany, than Japan, than Canada and than New Zealand. This is something that all Australians can be proud of. This is the latest economic data on the back of other important data which has shown the recovery is underway: 178,000 jobs were created last month, consumer confidence is up in 12 out of the last 13 weeks, building approvals are up by 3.8 per cent and capital city prices are up by 0.7 per cent. And today we have ABS data that shows construction loans are up by 65.6 per cent since July in line with the HomeBuilder program, which is helping to save and create jobs right around the country. We've also seen Australia's AAA credit rating reaffirmed, an upgrade on our economic forecasts from the OECD and fewer people on JobKeeper as the economic recovery gets underway. Qantas 51 14:30 Ms CATHERINE KING 00AMR Ballarat My question is to . This week Qantas sacked 2,000 workers, bringing the total jobs lost by the national carrier to 8,500. Why is the minister for transport congratulating himself and using marketing slogans when 8,500 Qantas workers have lost their jobs this year alone? If the purpose of JobKeeper was to keep employees connected to their employer, why has the government allowed Qantas to claim taxpayer money and then sack thousands of workers, some of whom are in the gallery today? 14:31 Mr McCORMACK 219646 Riverina I thank the member for Ballarat for her question. I acknowledge the Qantas workers in the public gallery and I acknowledge Michael Kaine, the secretary of the Transport Workers Union, who I'm seeing after question time. I too am worried about those workers who've lost their jobs. I know what it's like to have lost a job, I do. It's very tough, and you sometimes cannot see the light— Opposition members interjecting— Mr McCORMACK 219646 Having asked the question, why don't you give me the respect to answer your question? So just listen to the answer. Because of the downturn in the aviation sector, hit first and hit hardest, when the global pandemic—and it has been a global pandemic—many airline companies right throughout the world have actually closed. We are very fortunate in this country. Ms Catherine King interjecting— Mr McCORMACK 219646 Here she goes again! At the start of the global pandemic what we wanted to see were two viable competitive airlines flying domestically at the end as we came out of the back of COVID-19. I can say that, thankfully, that's what we have now. Virgin came into the pandemic, saddled with billions of dollars of debt. I'm pleased that through Bain Capital and the assistance that has been provided they are still flying. Next week Virgin will be flying, Rex will be flying, Qantas will be flying. Yes, albeit in a limited fashion, but JobKeeper has helped keep these airlines flying. The Domestic Aviation Network Support has helped those companies fly. The Regional Airline Network Support program has helped those regional aviation companies fly. For those 35 towns that would otherwise not have had respiratory devices, face masks, even medical personnel visit them, they were able to get that assistance thanks to the RANS assistance that was provided. There was $2.7 billion on a sector-wide basis. Everything that we've done has been on a sector-wide basis. I hope those Qantas workers who don't have a job are able to return to their places of employment. Ms Catherine King interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Ballarat will cease interjecting. Mr McCORMACK 219646 Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce said: We've seen a vast improvement in trading conditions over the past month as many more people are finally able to travel domestically again. There's been a rush of bookings as each— Honourable members interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The Deputy Prime Minister will just pause for a second. I'm not going to go through everyone interjecting; I will just start ejecting people. A question's been asked. Members will not yell interjections across the chamber. I'm warning everybody who's interjecting. Deputy Prime Minister. Mr McCORMACK 219646 Mr Joyce said: There's been a rush of bookings as each border restriction lifted, showing that there's plenty of latent travel demand across both leisure and business sectors. Between Qantas and Jetstar, there were over 200,000 fares sold for flights— Mr Thistlethwaite interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Kingsford Smith will leave the chamber under 94(a). The member for Kingsford Smith then left the chamber. The SPEAKER 00APG The Deputy Prime Minister will resume his seat. The Leader of the Opposition on a point of order. Mr Albanese R36 The question went to the 2,000 workers who'd been sacked. The SPEAKER 00APG No, you need to state the point of order. Mr Albanese R36 Relevance. [Inaudible] The SPEAKER 00APG The Leader of the Opposition, the microphone's off. Mr McCormack interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Deputy Prime Minister, better just to focus on your answer and let me deal with those matters, okay, without giving traffic directions all over the chamber. The Deputy Prime Minister has the call. Mr McCORMACK 219646 Mr Joyce said: … there were over 200,000 fares sold for flights to Queensland in 72 hours after the border openings with Sydney and Victoria were announced. So there's the message. Economy 52 14:35 Mr RAMSEY HWS Grey My question is to the Treasurer. I wonder if he could explain to the House how the coalition government's economic plan is bringing Australia's economy back to life. 14:35 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong I thank the member for Grey for his question and acknowledge his experience as a farmer before coming into this place. Some 65,000 taxpayers in the electorate of Grey are getting tax relief as a result of the legislation that he and others on this side of the House have supported. Some 25,000 pensioners, carers, veterans and others on income support have received payments as a result of the initiatives of this government. Now, Australia has been hit by a once-in-a-century pandemic and the most significant economic shock since the Great Depression. To put it into perspective: during the GFC the global economic contracted by 0.1 per cent. This year the IMF is expecting the global economy to contract by 4.4 per cent. The Morrison government has responded with an unprecedented level of economic support: $257 billion. Now, $130 billion has already gone out the door to the pockets of Australian households and businesses: $70 billion through JobKeeper, around $34 billion in the cash flow boast, about $16 billion through the coronavirus supplement and more than $9 billion through $750 payments to millions of pensioners and carers. We've also given Australians access to their own money with early access to super: some $36 billion where people have got access to their own money, which is helping to support the economic recovery. The economic response from the federal government has helped the economic recovery get underway. It is a recovery which has seen 178,000 jobs created last month, which has seen the effective unemployment rate come down from a high of 14.9 per cent to 7.4 per cent—a significant fall. Consumer confidence is coming back, and we also know that business confidence is coming back. In the budget, we announce a series of other measures to support the economy, including tax cuts for more than 11½ million Australians; a JobMaker hiring credit, which will get young people who are unemployed into work; business investment incentives to encourage more investment and greater productivity across the nation; supporting apprentices as well, with a 50 per cent wage subsidy to those employers who take them on; and other important programs such as JobTrainer to support the training of people across the economy. So our initiatives are helping the Australian economy come back from a once-in-a-century economic shock. (Time expired) Workplace Safety 53 14:39 Mr BURKE DYW Watson My question is to the Minister for Industrial Relations. Today I met with—and I understand the minister also met with—Linda, Pam and Kay. They're in the gallery. They lost their husbands and a son in horrific workplace accidents and received no answers about the deaths of their loved ones. The government's now had the Boland report into workplace health and safety for nearly two years. It recommends changes to make workplaces safer, including an offence of industrial manslaughter. When will the government make these changes, and when will the delay end? 14:39 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce Yes, that meeting did occur. I thank all of those present for their time at that meeting and for telling me and sharing their stories. The issue of industrial manslaughter is not an uncomplicated one, as the member would know. As a minister, I'm not closed-minded to the concept of an industrial manslaughter offence, and I think that those offences have been adopted in the Northern Territory, Victoria, Western Australia and Queensland, and New South Wales has now added gross negligence to its category 1 offences. All of those offences and changes have been quite different, and there is obviously an issue here of harmonisation as well. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, that has not been a focus of the relevant ministerial meeting this year, but we are convening in early 2021 to consider this issue. My view is that some of the offences that have been instituted by states are better than others. I think that the offence structure in Western Australia is not a good option or model and that there are better options and models there, but this is a matter that we would hope to resolve in terms of both harmonisation and the Commonwealth position in early 2021. COVID-19: Vaccine 53 14:40 Dr MARTIN 282982 Reid My question is to the Minister for Health. Will the minister please update the House on how the Morrison government's COVID-19 vaccine strategy will help protect Australian lives as well as underpin our economic recovery? 14:40 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders I want to thank the member for Reid, who has been a great advocate for mental health throughout her career but in particular during this, the year of COVID-19. What we've seen is that the government's been able to contribute $500 million as part of our response to that but also as part of our broader response to COVID-19. We're doing incredibly well as a nation, and there are so many people across the nation to thank for that. There were zero cases in the 24 hours to midday yesterday. There was one today within the community. But we are doing extraordinarily well. At the same time, we know that Australia will not be safe until the world is safe. Therefore, a vaccine is a fundamental part of the next stage of our defence and our COVID plan. We know that overnight there were more than 600,000 cases and, agonisingly, the world had the greatest loss of life ever. That's why we welcome the news out of the United Kingdom of an emergency authorisation for the first of the vaccines, the Pfizer vaccine. What we have seen in Australia is that our vaccine strategy is underway. We have five stages to it, and the first of those stages was the selection of vaccines. That has been done. The second is the acquisition, and we have secured four vaccines, or 134.8 million units—in particular, the Pfizer vaccine, with 10 million units; the Novavax vaccine, with 40 million units; our own University of Queensland-CSL vaccine, with 51 million units; and the Oxford vaccine, with 33.8 million units. We're also now in the process of approvals—the third stage of that strategy—and in particular the TGA has given priority approval process to three vaccines so far. They are going through the stages of giving their data, and then, subject to those approvals—the first of those the head of the TGA, Professor John Skerritt, reaffirmed today is hoped for by the end of January—we go to stage four, which is distribution. That's about making sure that we begin with our health workers, our age workers and, subject to approvals, our residential care, elderly Australians and critical service workers. But we work on the basis of making sure every Australian has access to a free, voluntary vaccine during the course of 2021. Finally, we have the post-vaccine circumstances, which allow us to open up the economy and to open up society in a freer way. We are making real progress, and I want to thank all of those involved for their work this year in keeping Australians safe. The vaccine program will help protect lives, save lives and improve job prospects for all Australians. Employment 54 14:44 Mr MARLES HWQ Corio My question is to the Minister for Energy. In September the government announced it would support Australia's four oil refineries, including Viva, which employs 700 workers in my electorate. Since then, BP has announced the closure of its refinery in Western Australia, with the loss of 650 jobs. Labor is keen to support a well-designed package, but this critical industry can't wait forever. When will the government finally deliver on its September announcement so even more workers don't lose their jobs? 14:44 Mr TAYLOR 231027 Hume I thank the member for his question and I acknowledge the keen interest he has in this issue as a local member with a refinery—the Viva refinery, which is an important employer in his electorate as are the refineries right across Australia. We acknowledge the important role they play. We have been meeting regularly with the refineries since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic and we have been very conscious of the significant challenge they have faced. On the one hand they have seen a very sharp reduction in demand for their product, particularly aviation gas and gasoline—and, to a lesser extent, diesel, which has tended to hold on better. But they have also been faced with the double whammy of a very sharp reduction in their refining margins. With that in mind we announced a package several months ago, which was included as part of the budget, with a focus not only on fuel security but also on making sure we give our local refiners every chance of success and backing our local refining sector through a production payment. We are seeking, through our discussions with the refineries, to get that production payment in place as quickly as possible. We realise the urgency of this. Indeed, I spoke with management from the Viva refinery today; they were very cordial discussions. We have also been in regular discussions with the unions; I spoke with the AWU and representatives of the refineries yesterday on exactly this issue. We will continue to work with the refineries on a regular weekly basis—often more regularly than that, actually—to get this production payment in place, and we look forward to ensuring not only that we have the fuel security this country deserves for our farmers and our tradies— Ms Madeleine King interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Brand! Mr TAYLOR 231027 but also that we give those important jobs every chance of success into the future. Ms Madeleine King interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Brand is now going to leave the chamber under standing order 94(a). There's no point in people looking at me confused, after, 15 minutes ago, I said I'm warning everyone who's been interjecting. The member for Brand then left the chamber. COVID-19: Health Manufacturing 54 14:47 Ms FLINT 245550 Boothby My question is to the Minister for Industry, Science and Technology. Will the minister update the House on how the Morrison government is supporting Australian health manufacturers as part of our comeback from the COVID-19 pandemic to make our nation more safe and more secure? 14:47 Mrs ANDREWS 230886 McPherson I thank the member for her question. Australia entered the global COVID-19 pandemic in a strong position with fairly good supplies of the medical equipment that we needed. But we knew that we needed to ramp up the supply of some of our medical equipment as soon as we possibly could. Specifically what we needed to ramp up was our PPE manufacture. When this pandemic hit, we had one manufacturer of surgical masks here in Australia and they were producing about two million masks a year. Now, with a lot of support from the government and specifically from the ADF, who went in to support Med-Con in Shepparton to ramp up their production capacity, we now have a number of manufacturers here in Australia. This year alone they will produce about 400 million surgical masks. That is a significant scale-up in Australia's manufacturing capacity, from two million surgical masks a year to 400 million masks this year. But it's not just surgical masks that we have ramped up our manufacturing capacity in; we also now have manufacturers of disposable surgical gowns and we now have manufacturers of high-tech ventilators. So a lot of work has been done by this government, with support from many manufacturers, to make sure that we are in the position to meet the needs of Australians during the pandemic. That's why there is a key part in our Modern Manufacturing Strategy that looks at how we can enhance and increase our supply chain resilience, because we know that we need to make sure we are in a good position to be able to identify and then manufacture or procure the products that we need in times of crisis. I have spoken a number of times about how important it is for all levels of government to use their powers of procurement to secure our sovereign capability. And we, as a government, are doing precisely that. Last month we extended our agreement with CSL on flu vaccines and antivenene to take it through to the middle of the next decade. Because of that, CSL will invest about $800 million in new high-tech vaccine manufacturing capability, and this investment will see 520 construction jobs coming online next year and it will lock in a range of high-skilled manufacturing jobs. This government understands how important it is that we invest in manufacturing here in Australia, and that is precisely what we are doing. Workplace Relations 55 14:50 Ms O'NEIL 140590 Hotham My question is to the Minister for Industrial Relations. Yesterday the minister confirmed he would not be a party to legal action involving printing company Ovato, which is denying 300 workers' redundancy payments. This will leave them with no income over Christmas while they wait for their Fair Entitlements Guarantee applications to be processed. Why does the minister only intervene in matters that support cutting workers' pay and conditions, and why won't he intervene to help these 300 workers who face a Christmas with no income? 14:51 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce To be fair, it's just not correct that we intervene or not intervene on the basis that you've noted. It's also the case— Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Members on my left! Mr PORTER 208884 that I confirmed the Commonwealth government was not intervening in that, publicly, some time ago—not yesterday in the chamber. I do that cautiously after receiving advice, often very extensive advice, on each matter on a case-by-case basis. But we do not intervene in each and every case, and I can assure you that it's certainly not the case that we make our decision to intervene on that pejorative criteria that you raise. We just don't do that. National Security 55 14:52 Mr YOUNG 201906 Longman My question is to the Minister for Home Affairs. Will the minister update the House on how the Morrison government is working to keep Australians safe from the threat of terrorism and violent extremist ideologies? 14:52 Mr DUTTON 00AKI Dickson I thank the member very much for his question. He, like all Australians, wants to make sure that we can keep our country safe. We know that during the period of COVID there are many terrorist organisations and people that seek to propagate that information, that ideology, the sick, perverted views that they have to other young impressionable minds who are on the internet, not only in our country but across the Western world as well. So it's absolutely the fact that this threat has not gone away, and the record amounts of money that we're putting into ASIO, the Australian Federal Police, AUSTRAC and other agencies within the Department of Home Affairs is all directed at keeping Australians safe. We want to make sure that we can deal with the threat whenever it may eventuate, and, as Australians know, since September 2014 we've now had 117 people charged as a result of counterterrorism operations—a very significant number—and there are now 22 people currently before the courts for terrorism related offences. These are people that would seek to do significant harm to Australians. What we've seen in Paris, in the United States, across Asia, the Middle East et cetera are the sorts of atrocities that these people would seek to perpetrate on innocent men, women and children in our country, and we are working day and night to make sure that they are not successful. I want to commend the work of the Queensland Joint Counter Terrorism Team, made up of officers from the Queensland Police Service, the Australian Federal Police and ASIO, for the work that they've done in thwarting a most recent alleged attack. In relation to that matter, people will know that the allegation is that a Canberra resident was arrested and charged only last Friday, and the allegation before the court at the moment is that that individual was planning to conduct a terrorist attack in the Bundaberg region in the name of an extremist Islamic ideology. Whether it's in our capital cities or our regional cities, we know we need to make sure that we are supporting our agencies, which we are absolutely doing. I think all Australians will recognise that over Christmas and the new year period this year our officers will be working 24/7 on the front line. There are many people in the Department of Home Affairs who will support their work, and I commend those officers for the work that they do to keep us safe. This government has now passed 20 tranches of national security legislation, many at the request of the director of ASIO or the commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, to make sure that we have the most modern and up-to-date laws, particularly dealing with the reality of encryption and the way in which these terrorist groups hide the spreading of their evil messages on the internet. We'll continue to work day and night to keep Australians safe. (Time expired) Ministerial Arrangements 56 14:55 Mr SHORTEN 00ATG Maribyrnong My question is to the Minister for Government Services. Who was the social services minister who announced the illegal robodebt debt scheme in 2015? Who was the Treasurer who announced $2 billion in savings from the illegal robodebt scheme in 2016? Who was the Prime Minister who, finally, a year after 85,000 Australians had to take their own government to court to get justice, agreed to pay $1.2 billion to the victims of the illegal robodebt scheme? The SPEAKER 00APG The Leader of the House has the call. I think I know where he's going. Mr Porter 208884 Yes. I do not believe that under standing order 98 those questions, which are effectively about ministerial personnel from times past, can be considered to be officially connected to the present minister's duties. The SPEAKER 00APG My view is that the question is clearly out of order. It doesn't relate to the minister's responsibilities, and question time is not a time for quizzes. National Security 56 14:57 Mr THOMPSON 281826 Herbert My question is to the Attorney-General. Will the Attorney please update the House on how the Morrison government is working to ensure our world-class national security agencies have the tools they need to keep Australians safe and secure? 14:57 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I thank the member for the question and for his service to our country through the ADF. As the member knows, our government has no greater priority than keeping Australians safe, and our national intelligence community is absolutely essential in defending Australia's interests against threats to our sovereignty and our security and to further our national interest. On behalf of the government, I want to thank all of the men and women who work tirelessly to keep us safe in our intelligence community. Proper resourcing of the intelligence community and furnishing the intelligence community with updated legislative tools has being a core focus of our government. Since 2013 we've introduced and passed 19 tranches of national security legislation to ensure that our various national intelligence community agencies are well equipped to meet current and future challenges, but, given the scale and the pace of change in the threat environment that we face, we have to be continually testing whether the legislation, the principles and the structure that underpin the intelligence community are all fit for purpose. That's why in May of 2018 the government commissioned Mr Dennis Richardson AC to conduct a comprehensive review of the legal framework governing the national intelligence community. That has been, and will be, the most significant review since the Hope royal commission in the 1970s and eighties. I take this opportunity to inform the House that tomorrow the government will release the full unclassified version of that report, which goes to around 1,300 pages. For the further information of the House, I think I can fairly summarise that the essential conclusions of that critical work are that the key principles underpinning Australia's intelligence legislation are sound and of enduring relevance; that the legislation framework, when viewed as a whole, has been well maintained and is largely fit for purpose; and that, also importantly, the work of our agencies to keep us safe has been of extremely high quality and consistently undertaken within the proper limits of the law. Of course, in those 1,300 pages that we will release tomorrow there are also a range of suggestions for improvements, and some of them are very complex. Many of them relate particularly to telecommunications and surveillance devices, and I look forward to working with members opposite on reforms in that area. There is going to be a need for an ongoing evolution in Australia's security agencies, and I can also inform the House that tomorrow, as well releasing the 1,300 pages of the Richardson review, we will be providing at the same time detailed government responses to each recommendation to enable and inform debate going forward on these critical issues and the way in which reform will need to show an evolution in our national security agencies. I'm absolutely confident that this review will provide a sheet anchor for further reform in this very important area, and I look forward to cooperating with the opposition on those matters going forward. Pensions and Benefits 57 15:00 Mr SHORTEN 00ATG Maribyrnong My question is to the Minister for Government Services. If the government has done nothing wrong on robodebt, why did the government agree to pay $1.2 billion to its victims, including $112 million in compensation? 15:01 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden I thank the member for Maribyrnong for his comeback question, once again. As we've been saying all week, on 19 November last year the government announced that it would be refining its program, based on its view that collecting debts using averaged income data from the ATO was insufficient. Mr Dreyfus interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Isaacs will leave under 94(a). He's been warned multiple times. The member for Isaacs then left the chamber. Mr ROBERT HWT That process had been ongoing for 26 years. For 26 years, governments of the day had been using averaged income data. As I informed the House yesterday— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Maribyrnong, on a point of order? Mr Shorten 00ATG On relevance: the question was very specifically referring to the landmark class settlement of two weeks ago, and the minister well knows that the 400,000 people included in that landmark settlement were people who were robodebted between 2015 and 2019. He is being irrelevant going back 26 years. The SPEAKER 00APG I say to the member for Maribyrnong: taking a point of order is not an opportunity to debate the matter or to further explain the question. That's why there is a time limit on questions. You had up to 30 seconds. The Leader of the House, on the point of order? Mr Porter 208884 With respect to standing order 98 and that contribution from the member for Maribyrnong, it appears that he is asking for an expression of a legal opinion. This matter has— Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Members on my left! The member for Fremantle and others! Mr Porter 208884 I think the member realises that the matter has been settled on a legal basis with no admission of liability on central issues of negligence. It seems that he is asking for a legal opinion. The SPEAKER 00APG Without detaining the House with a long explanation, certainly the practice around that standing order makes a number of distinctions, but, even so, the beginning of the question wasn't doing that. I have a different problem, and that is that it was a very specific question. I say to the minister that he has had about a 50-second preamble. He needs to either bring himself to the question or wind his answer up. Mr ROBERT HWT This government didn't invent income averaging. But the reason why the government sought to settle a matter was based on the announcement on 19 November last year, where the government arrived at the conclusion that the use of income averaging, a practice that had been going for 26 years, was not sufficient. As soon as the government reached the conclusion that it was not sufficient, despite 26 years of history, the government then sought to repay, as any government would. The fact that the use of income averaging went back to the Keating days means, frankly, that this government ended Labor's use of income averaging and, as part of that, commenced repaying Australians where an insufficient debt was raised because income averaged ATO data had been used for a quarter of a century. Agriculture Industry 57 15:05 Mr CONAGHAN 279991 Cowper My question is to the Minister for Agriculture, Drought and Emergency Management: Will the minister outline to the House how the Morrison-McCormack government is assisting farmers to maintain and improve soil health through the national soil strategy, which will be key to supporting our economic comeback from the COVID-19 recession? 15:05 Mr LITTLEPROUD 265585 Maranoa I thank the member for Cowper for his question, and I acknowledge the diverse and rich agricultural contribution the people of Cowper make. On Saturday it is World Soil Day, and the importance of that, particularly to us here in Australia, is that 95 per cent of our food comes from soils. Soil health is imperative not only in supporting our $63 billion agricultural industry but also in supporting our ambitious goal of $100 billion in agriculture by 2030. That's why the federal government created a national soil strategy, currently led by the Hon. Penelope Wensley AC, former Governor of Queensland. We continue to work, as part of our Delivering Ag2030 plan, on the implementation of that strategy, and we're doing that with real money. There is real money for the CRC on High Performance Soils. There's over $40 million being put into that to give our farmers the research and the technology to be able to understand and improve soil health and get better productivity and profitability. We have $34 million in a biodiversity stewardship fund. ANU have just completed the methodology around that, and we will be looking to move into pilots early in the New Year. That's also about rewarding farmers for the custodianship, the environmental stewardship, of their land and making sure that they can market their product with the acknowledgement of all their hard work. We've also got $14 million that the Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction is putting in to create a measurement for soil carbon. This will be a game changer, particularly if we can get it under $3 a hectare, that will change farming practises and it will also go to the productivity of our farms and how we manage them. It has significant impacts in carbon abatement and in reducing our carbon footprint. That is all with science, all with technology. That's a significant road ahead. We've also got $86 million going into eight innovation hubs that will intersect with our CRCs, our research development corporations and our universities. This will make sure that we are getting closer to those people who we need to use this science, our farmers. This will be out in the regions, in regional universities, because if we're going to make a difference, we need our farmers to adopt this type of technology. The way they do that is to be able to see, feel and touch it, and that's why we are going to the regions to do it. This morning the Parliamentary Friends of Soil, led by the Deputy Prime Minister and the member for Barton, poignantly announced an award in honour of former Governor-General Michael Jeffery. It is an award for soil health that may be awarded to any farmer, land manager or educator. I have to acknowledge the work that Major General Jeffery has undertaken. He has been a strong, passionate advocate for soil health since his retirement as our Governor-General. He's a distinguished Australian who has done so much for our nation in so many fields, but this is a passion that he and his family hold dear, and he has done a significant job for Australian agriculture. Pensions and Benefits 58 15:08 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler My question is to the Minister for Government Services. Did the Prime Minister's illegal robodebt scheme cost lives and cost taxpayers $1.2 billion? 15:08 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden The use of averaged income data that's been going on for a quarter of a century has been a staple part of governments of many persuasions' use of raising debt. No amount of posturing by the opposition will change that fact—none of it. Nothing will change the fact that the data matching bill started in 1990 under Hawke, the minister was Richo. We know now that in 1994, averaged income data was being used under Keating. Hawke, Keating, and Richo—you couldn't make this stuff up. That's where it began. For a quarter of a century the same process was followed, to the point where the process has now been found to be insufficient. It is this government who did not invent income averaging; it is this government who realised the insufficiency and has paid it back. Mr Albanese interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Has the minister concluded his answer? The minister has concluded his answer. COVID-19: Energy 58 15:09 Mr SHARMA 274506 Wentworth My question is to the Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction. Will the minister outline to the House how the Morrison government is focused on development and deployment of new technology as part of our comeback from the COVID-19 recession to reduce emissions here and around the world? 15:10 Mr TAYLOR 231027 Hume I thank the member for Wentworth for his question. As a former diplomat, he knows the crucial role that low-emissions technologies are playing and can play in bringing down emissions not just in Australia but all around the world. He knows that achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement requires a portfolio of technologies and the need to bring the cost of those technologies down into line with higher-emitting alternatives. That's why this government has announced and is investing in the Technology Investment Roadmap, which has five priority technologies: hydrogen; carbon capture and storage; soil carbon, which we just heard about from the minister for agriculture; low-emissions steel and aluminium, which is crucial for our manufacturing sector; and stored energy. For each one of those there are clear goals, such as $3 a hectare a year in the case of soil carbon, which we just heard about; and $2 a kilogram or under $2 a kilogram for hydrogen, as we heard from the Prime Minister. Why? Because at that point those technologies come into line with their higher-emitting alternatives. The whole focus here is on technology, not taxes, because it is real actions and outcomes that matter, and Australia has been delivering the outcomes. Emissions are down 16.6 per cent since 2005. If you look at other major commodity exporting countries like Canada and New Zealand, in that time emissions have barely budged. We have so much to be proud about in this space, with crucial projects happening right across the country, like the Latrobe Valley Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain project in the member of Gippsland's electorate. There's $500 million of investment, with investment coming from all over the world, focused on getting the cost of hydrogen to a point where it's at parity with or better than higher-emitting alternatives. On this side of the House, we celebrate Australian achievement. We believe in enterprise, we believe in this country and we believe in technology, not taxation. Mr Morrison E3L I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. STATEMENT BY THE SPEAKER 59 STATEMENT BY THE SPEAKER Chief Opposition Whip 59 15:13 The SPEAKER 00APG I have a brief statement members will be interested in from the Chief Opposition Whip and member for Fowler, Chris Hayes. He's asked me to update you, if that's okay. He's been in the building during the course of the week but, obviously, not in the House. I will read his statement to you, which he wanted me to do: 'Following my collapse in the Federation Chamber, a serious medical condition has been identified and I will be undergoing heart surgery tomorrow. While I will take a little break, I look forward to returning to my duties early in the new year. I'm indeed indebted to Dr Mike Freelander and Dr David Gillespie for their immediate medical assistance and to Tanya Plibersek for staying with me throughout this frightening ordeal. I also need to thank the parliamentary staff who organised my highly coordinated exit from the building. I reiterate what I said three years ago about the incredible professionalism of paramedics and staff at Canberra Hospital. We are very fortunate to have people of this calibre serving in our public hospitals. Bernadette and I appreciated the kind and comforting words of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, and the many well wishes we've received from all sides of the House. Finally, I wish you a happy and peaceful Christmas and pray that 2021 is a vastly better year for all. Chris Hayes MP.' 15:14 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook on indulgence—I'm sure the Leader of the Opposition would join with me in wishing the Chief Opposition Whip all the best for his surgery. We join him in his prayers for his healthy recovery and for those attending to his care in the weeks ahead, particularly in the course of the surgery. Of course, I know Bernadette and the rest of the family will be anxious but at the same time have great faith as well. We wish them all the best. We thank you for the opportunity to hear that message he sent today. That is exactly what we'd expect of the Chief Opposition Whip. He is a tremendously good bloke. 15:15 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler on indulgence—Mr Speaker, thank you for participating in that message. I have spoken pretty regularly with Chris and Bernadette. His reference three years ago to Royal Canberra Hospital was, of course, due to him riding a motorbike to Canberra—something that Bernadette has discouraged very strongly for a long period of time! He ended up in emergency at Royal Canberra Hospital. He ended up there again, under different circumstances this time. But both times, as he has said, he has been very grateful for the care that we get. One of the things I say about public hospitals is that when Kerry Packer had a heart attack he ended up in emergency at Royal Prince Alfred public hospital. We have a great system here in Australia, and we should be very proud of it. I wish Chris and Bernadette all the best for tomorrow's operation. I thank the Prime Minister for his generous and genuine words. Chris Hayes is very much liked by everyone in this building. He does not have an opponent, and sometimes our opponents are all over this place, of course, as we know. In politics, he is someone who is liked across the spectrum, and we all wish him well. DOCUMENTS 59 DOCUMENTS Presentation 59 15:16 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce Documents are tabled in accordance with the list circulated to honourable members earlier today. Full details of the documents will be recorded in the Votes and Proceedings. PERSONAL EXPLANATIONS 59 PERSONAL EXPLANATIONS 15:16 Dr ALLEN 282986 Higgins Mr Speaker, I would like to make a personal explanation. The SPEAKER 00APG Does the member for Higgins claim to have been misrepresented? Dr ALLEN 282986 I claim to be misrepresented. The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Higgins may proceed. Dr ALLEN 282986 I would like to make a statement about a personal matter that occurred in the Federation Chamber today. The member for Bruce had an unparliamentary outbreak that was vicious and personal. But, worse than that, it was misleading. In this case, the member for Bruce accused me of holding a view that I do not hold, simply because I live in a certain postcode. Essentially, the member for Bruce was judging me by my postcode. Quite simply, this misrepresents me as a person but also misrepresents my constituents of Higgins. It is class warfare. It is un-Australian. Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Members on my left! The member for Higgins has stated where she believes she was misrepresented. It's not a matter for a wider debate. Very generally, for the benefit of all members, the subject matter—and I haven't seen all of the footage—was brought to my attention, I need to say, by officials within the House. While debates become robust, certainly, on what I've seen, I do have to say that the conduct in that contribution by the member for Bruce was unacceptable. There's no point in any of us ducking that. I also want to say to the member for Macarthur, who I've appointed to the Speaker's panel, that from what I saw he certainly discharged his duties absolutely to the best of his ability in what were difficult circumstances. I haven't had the opportunity to speak to the member for Bruce. I've certainly spoken with the Deputy Speaker, but I haven't had the opportunity to speak to the member for Macarthur. That's all I'm going to say at this point, but I certainly reserve my rights to come back to the subject at another time. The member for Chifley? 15:19 Mr HUSIC 91219 Chifley Mr Speaker, I seek your guidance. I was in the Federation Chamber at the tail end of the contribution. I wish to draw to your attention—though you may already be aware—to the fact that the member for Higgins did seek the call from the Deputy Speaker and did put the same or similar points then, and I would ask for your guidance as to how many opportunities you get to address those complaints. If you've addressed them once, do you have the right to do it again here today? The SPEAKER 00APG The answer is you do. I've seen the footage, as I said. I haven't studied all the context of the debate, and I wasn't in the chamber. But I only know what I saw, and what I saw was the member for Higgins raise a point of order. For the member for Chifley and others: raising a point of order does not prevent you claiming to be misrepresented, under the standing orders, here in the House. I won't go any further on the subject at this time. MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE 60 MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE Pensions and Benefits 60 15:20 The SPEAKER 00APG I have received a letter from the honourable member for Maribyrnong proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely: The Government's failure to take responsibility for its illegal robodebt scheme. I call upon all those honourable members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places. More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places— 15:20 Mr SHORTEN 00ATG Maribyrnong Today the matter of public importance concerns the government's failure to take responsibility for its illegal robodebt scheme. It is remarkable and it is a sorry state of Australian politics that the current government has no-one at all responsible for one of the biggest government social security scandals—indeed, scandals—that this nation has ever seen. I speak, of course, of the $1.2 billion robodebt scandal. I'll just explain briefly, for the benefit of those who are listening to the parliamentary broadcast, a little bit about robodebt and then what the government knew and failed to do, what they ignored from external legal experts, the harm it has caused and now the government's remarkable contortions of the truth as they seek to rationalise this fundamentally unlawful scandal. I'll begin with robodebt itself. The amount of social security payment to which a recipient in Australia is entitled is calculated on the basis of reported fortnightly income. In about late April 2015 the Commonwealth, through Services Australia, introduced an automated debt-raising and debt recovery scheme known as the online compliance intervention system—sadly, better known as the robodebt system. It was then social security minister Scott Morrison who took credit for this new development. The robodebt system divided the annual income received by a recipient of social security benefits by the data obtained from the Australian tax office. The essence of it was that they averaged a person's annual income according to tax data and gave it a notional 14-day average, for each of 26 fortnights. They assumed that the social security recipient received this notional income every fortnight, and, where there was a differential between that and what the social security recipient reported in a given fortnight—when perhaps they had obtained work and then, for another fortnight or another month or three months, they were unemployed—the government said, 'Well, if the tax office says this is what you get notionally every 14 days then, if there's a discrepancy between what you as the recipient told Social Security and what the tax office computer says, we will raise a debt against you.' At the same time, they took out any human oversight. So, once the tax office raised the red flag, it was treated as more than a red flag; it was treated as something that had to be disproved—not disproved by the government, who were making the allegation, but disproved by the person who, they said, had inappropriately received the social security payment. That is the robodebt. They characterised the notional amount allocated by the tax office and said, 'This is true,' and if a social security recipient, due to the vagaries of work or whatever, had a different amount—bang—the social security recipient was deemed to be at fault, and that recipient, going back many years and through bank records, had to desperately try to prove to the government they hadn't claimed money falsely. This is robodebt. The problem is that the government discovered that robodebt was wrong—not, as the current minister says, sometime late last year. They discovered it was wrong, really, from when the first notices started going out. What the government had done is unjustly enriched itself. It had breached its duty of care. It said it had powers under the Social Security Act to raise debts against our own citizens which it simply didn't have. They didn't have the power. They were notified as early as 2 January 2017 that there was a problem. I say today—and I challenge the minister to contradict me—that documents exist that prove that Minister Alan Tudge was warned in January 2017 that one-third of the debt notices were wrong and that Minister Alan Tudge was told that, out of a sample of 5,290 robodebts, 90 per cent of them were wrong. They were told that debts had to be reduced. I challenge the government, if it is claiming to be at all truthful, to assert that their senior officers weren't told on 7 January and 8 January. I challenge the government to prove that documents do not exist which show that, on 23 January 2017, on 24 January 2017 and on 25 January 2017, documents weren't raised saying, 'There is a problem here.' Again, on 1 March, the minister was informed. Again, on 15 March, the government was informed of the need to change the system. On 24 April, Minister Tudge became aware of recommendations to change the system. He never sought to contradict that. I challenge the government to say that they were never told on 22 April of criticism by Professor Terry Carney that the scheme was illegal. I challenge the minister to prove that no document exists that on 18 September the then Minister for Human Services, Paul Fletcher—and what government minister hasn't got their sticky fingerprints over this scandal? I challenge them also to prove that they didn't know of 76 Administrative Appeals Tribunal decisions made by 50 different tribunal members. I challenge them to prove that they were unaware of it. I challenge them to prove that they're unaware of the operation of section 8(f) of the Social Security Act which says that the government must take notice of decisions of the Administrative Appeal Tribunal. This is the scandalous nature of this government's neglect and incompetence—its class war against Centrelink recipients. Whenever a vulnerable person—and they knew these were vulnerable people—had the wherewithal or the resources to support the activists to get it to the AAT, this sly, cunning and mendacious government would settle the claim at the door. Boom! No worries. They had a litigation strategy never to test the legality of their actions because they wanted to rake in the money from the weak and vulnerable. What they would do, though, is settle it. What they should have done is one of two things. If they had a flood of decisions saying that it was unlawful, they should have modified their policy. Alternatively, if they didn't think that the decisions were right, they should have appealed them. They did neither. They ran a cynical, disgusting, mendacious, crooked scheme where they just hoped that they'd shut the people up who had the capacity to get through the system and appeal. They never changed what they were doing, and they never actually appealed the decisions that said that what they were doing was wrong. The other thing that makes this government mean class warriors—picking on Centrelink recipients and treating them as second-class Australians—is that they knew that this scheme was causing harm. I challenge the government to say that they don't have documents and voice recordings of desperate people ringing up Centrelink operators saying: 'I don't know what to do. I'll take my own life.' I challenge them to prove that, because I say the documents exist. I can give them the dates. I know that one of the documents was about a call to Tamworth. I know that another one of the documents relates to a call to Queanbeyan. I know. The reason I know is that they're in the pleadings of the class action. And why do you think the government settled the claim? Because they never wanted this evidence to get out. That is why Labor is pushing for a royal commission. The government knew that people were suffering great trauma and great harm. Let me go briefly to the defences of this government. Minister Robert is doing to the law what Houdini, ultimately, did to escape artists—giving them a bad name. He says that it wasn't unlawful; there was not a sufficiency of law. What gobbledegook! What half-twisted logic is that! 'There's not a sufficiency of law.' You can just see, down at the criminal bar in Melbourne and Sydney, all those defence lawyers saying: 'Your Honour, my client says what he did was not illegal. There was just not a sufficiency of law, your Honour.' Then they go on to say something even worse, and this will horrify people listening. When we assert that robodebt can be a trigger for people to self-harm and worse, he says, 'Oh, we get suicide calls and threats of self-harm every day.' Well, Minister, you may well, but not everyone complaining about Centrelink is having their complaint or their threat of self-harm triggered by illegal actions of the government. Yes, there are vulnerable people, but not all vulnerable people are complaining about actions which are triggered by the illegality of this government. So the government knew. The government acted unlawfully. They had no legal remit—no power to do it. And then this government told bald-faced lies, saying, 'Oh, we've been doing it for 30 years.' It's bloody rubbish to say it's been going on for 30 years—excuse my language. What rubbish! I'm calling those lies out, and every time you hear it you know the person saying it is lying. It was the online compliance scheme boasted of by our own hose-holding Hawaiian Prime Minister. And the worst thing about all this? No-one's responsible. 'What a coincidence! Deidre Chambers!' Scott Morrison, Alan Tudge, Paul Fletcher, Christian Porter, Stuart Robert— The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 The member— Mr SHORTEN 00ATG The ministers—I beg your pardon. The current ministers are all involved. They got Christine Holgate to resign for $3,000 watches. This mob should resign in shame. (Time expired) 15:31 Mr ROBERT HWT Fadden It's a pleasure to respond to the waffle that our comeback member for Maribyrnong, in his pitch for the centre of the front bench, has just delivered to the House, notwithstanding that Labor's own lawyers, Gordon Legal, have acknowledged that the settlement is not an admission of liability, does not reflect any acceptance of the allegations that the shadow minister has been rolling out and does not reflect any knowledge of unlawfulness. However, the shadow minister does make one particularly good point: we should go back and understand the history of how we arrived at this point. That history is reflective. On 15 November 1990, the Hawke government introduced a piece of legislation into the other house: a data-matching bill. The minister at the desk, Senator McMullan, introduced the bill by saying: We expect that by matching data it will be possible to detect where a person has provided inconsistent information to one or more agencies and is thereby receiving incorrect payments … The advantages of matching data on income, family structure and tax file numbers are enormous. So who was the minister at the time in the Hawke government? Graham Richardson, the fixer himself. You can't make this up. Hawke and Richo began it. I've got Graham Richardson's media release from 30 years ago, and here's what it said: The Federal Government tonight announced further measures to detect incorrect payments in the income support system. It is planned that the changes will involve: the use of Tax File Numbers to automatically verify … information … increased computer matching1between various Government income support agencies … to detect "double-dipping" … The press release continued: "The Government has stopped hundreds of millions of dollars in incorrect payments. The level of voluntary compliance has also … improved," the Minister said. The Government now plans to use newly developed technology to close … significant loopholes … In the Senate, as the debate continued, going through to 18 December 1990, we find that Labor guillotined the debate, so quick they were to get this bill through parliament. We then learn what the situation was in 1994 from letters I've tabled in the House previously—not just the letter from the ISIS computing system which shows it was drawn on as the base document but also a letter to an individual saying: I am writing to you about your Newstart Allowance. The Department of Social Security … compares its records with those of other government agencies under a program called the Data-matching Program. It goes on to say the following: If you do not reply we will use the Tax Office's information about your income and we will write to you about how much money you need to pay back. Let's unpack that, because you can't deny the fact. Let's unpack it for a second. Here is the background. Let's unpack it. Opposition members interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 Members on my left will cease interjecting. Mr ROBERT HWT We know that income support payments are determined on a fortnight-by-fortnight basis but the ATO use annualised data. So in 1994 this letter tells me if this citizen did not reply to this letter, the government of the day—in this case the Keating government—will use the tax office information which is not fortnightly, it is annualised. The tax office doesn't have fortnightly information, it's only got annualised. We will use this annualised information about your income and we'll write to you about how much money you need to pay back. How in 1994 could the Keating government write to someone about how much money they had to pay back on their Newstart fortnightly by using the ATO's income data? They did it by income averaging. Hence, why income averaging, which is the basis upon which the Commonwealth has reached agreement with Labor's lawyers and which this MPI is about, goes back 26 years. That fact is not in dispute, and the documentation shows it clearly. Hawke, 'Richo', Keating—that's the genesis of data matching; that's the genesis of using averaged ATO information. Then it continued. In 1998 the 1990 bill was updated. The Data-matching Program (Assistance and Tax Amendment) Bill 1998 No. 2 replaced the 1990 bill. And what did Wayne Swan have to say about it on 25 November 1998? He said the bill: … seeks to make the data-matching program a permanent feature of the social security system, and the opposition welcomes this.        The Data-matching Program (Assistance and Tax) Act of 1990 gave effect to measures announced in the 1990-91 budget. Now, of course, the government does not seek to highlight that fact. This Labor initiative introduced a method for detecting inconsistent payments— Mr Albanese R36 Go Swanny! Mr ROBERT HWT Swanny in 1998 said: This Labor initiative— Oh, it goes on, shadow minister opposite. Let's go to the budget paper 2009-10. Let's have a look at what it says. The Government will increase the number of compliance reviews that Centrelink undertakes, using information obtained from existing data matching programs … We know from 1994 that all of this is based on averaged income data, because that was the basis by which reviews were done. Then we've got 13 July 2010: the member for McMahon, who was then Minister for Financial Services, releases a press release: 'Centrelink reviews recoup millions for taxpayers'. 'In the 2008-09 financial year, Centrelink conducted 3.8 million payment reviews resulting in the reduction of 641,000 payments.' It continues. 'These reviews saved taxpayers $87.4 million a fortnight'—Labor boasting about reducing outlays by $2.27 billion. Let's have a look at those 2008-09 payment reviews: 898,000 on age pensioners; 874,000 on Newstart, 500,089 reviews on disability support pensions. I'm just getting started, the little gobby member opposite; I'm just winding up. On 29 June 2011 the member for Sydney and the member for Maribyrnong put out a media release: 'New data matching to recover millions in welfare'. It starts: A new data matching initiative between Centrelink and the Australian Taxation Office is expected to claw back millions of dollars from welfare recipients who have debts with the Australian Government. Claw back—that's the member for Sydney and the member for Maribyrnong on 29 June 2011, building on the data-matching initiative. Let's go to Budget Paper No. 2 2011-12, which says: The measure will provide Centrelink and the Department of Veterans' Affairs with the capability to match customer data with Annual Income Investment Report data— Annual; not fortnightly, annual. Even here it is annual. They're comparing it with annual. The issue at stake is the use of averaged income from the ATO, and every step along the way we find the Labor Party using annualised data. Why? Because that's how the process has been done since 1994. For 26 years averaged ATO data has been used—a quarter of a century. This government simply continued a process that had started in 1994. It's this government that called it to account, it's this government that stopped the use of averaged annual income from the ATO and it's this government that said, 'This is not sufficient.' In 2012-13, when the demise of the then Labor government was taking place, they continued: … providing $41.3 million over three years to increase the number of data-matching reviews— to expand where the reviews sit. And, if you look at the number, they did. Just going back to the 2010-11 financial year—the year the member for Sydney was at the desk—we saw that 24.4 per cent of debts raised that year were solely or partially using an average. That's a fact. In 2009, 16.8 per cent of reviews were done solely using averaging or partially using averaging, using computing, using automatic data-matching. Remember the letter from 1994, because those opposite say a human was involved. Well, if that was the case, explain why it said: If you do not reply we will use the Tax Office's information about your income and we will write to you about how much money you need to pay back. Explain that. This process has been going for 26 years. They know it, we know it and we stopped it. 15:41 Mr DICK 53517 Oxley How pathetic is it in this parliament that, when a government bungles a scheme to the tune of $1.2 billion and 400,000 Australians are impacted through no fault of their own, a minister in that government cannot simply rise to his or her feet and apologise for that? How difficult is that? We know that, if it weren't for this MPI today and the hard work of the member for Maribyrnong and every single federal Labor member who stood up and sided with the victims, it would have been this minister who would still have been collecting Rolex watches and not paying his NBN bills. He is laughing as he leaves the chamber, to the disgust of the victims he has overseen. We know it is the member for Maribyrnong who has led the charge on this issue from the minute he became the shadow minister in 2019. In August, he started the conversations with the victims. He started raising it in this parliament. It was Labor who uncovered this unholy mess made by this government. Time and time again, when it comes to the question of who was on your side, the answer is, 'Not Prime Minister Scott Morrison and his team.' So let's contrast that with the government and how the Prime Minister, the Attorney-General and the now minister have handled this issue. I want to go to this outrageous claim that somehow this began under Gough Whitlam or Malcolm Fraser or some nonsense that this government is perpetrating. Let's look at the facts. When this scheme was introduced, there was an averaging tool to look for debts. Labor demanded secondary proof points. There was human intervention and human oversight. This government and this minister have used robodebt in an unchecked, out-of-control algorithm, with all the safety guards and human oversight removed and a guilty-until-proven-innocent burden of proof put on the person accused. So what do you think it is? Yes, under Labor, around 20,000 debts a year were raised. What do you think that figure rose to when robodebt was unleashed? Was it 50,000 a year? Was it 60,000 a year? No, it was 20,000 debts unleashed a week. That's how this government made a mess of this scheme. Under persistent questioning by Labor, in and out of the parliament, the minister—even today, when given the chance—has still said, 'We will not apologise.' How insulting that is to the 400,000 Australians who did absolutely nothing wrong, who were in fear because they were falsely accused. I bet they won't have the guts today—all the speakers who drew the short straw to speak on today's motion. I bet none of them are going to get on their feet and apologise for this. They all had people coming into their electorate offices. I know they had the phone calls. They had the pensioners. They had the disability support pensioners. They had all of the vulnerable Australians contacting their electorate offices, worried about the thousands of dollars that they didn't owe. They would have secretly made the representation and got them off, but none of them are going to have the guts to get up in the parliament today and apologise. Not one single person has the decency to apologise to those Australians. We need a royal commission into robodebt. The government must listen to what the victims and the advocates want for justice for their voice to be heard. The government must answer questions. When did they know robodebt was illegal and why didn't they stop it instantly? Who was responsible and what consequences will they face for this mass robbery of Australian people? What was the legal advice the government received and was it wrong, non-existent or simply ignored? We will not let this issue be swept under the carpet. It is a $1.2 billion national disgrace. You may think it hasn't happened, but out in the community people have been hurt as a result of this government's actions. Stop lying to them. Stop hiding from the truth. Start standing up for the victims and give them some justice. 15:46 Mr CONNELLY 282984 Stirling I really appreciate this opportunity to rise and provide some commentary around this particular social services mechanism and, importantly, what it means for people on the ground. I made the point just recently in this place that I personally have been a recipient of government welfare. My personal circumstances were such that my wife's mother was diagnosed with cancer on the far side of the country. My wife and kids moved straightaway, because she was given only 12 months to live with terminal cancer, and I didn't have a job to move straight into. I hadn't actually considered it at all until somebody said to me: 'Hey, Vince, you know you'll be eligible for the dole'—as we then colloquially referred to it. I took the view that this would be for a short period and, like all of us, we'd paid tax. For my wife, the kids and my mother-in-law that was very welcome. I would encourage any Australians who have faced personal circumstances not of their making and need to rely on welfare until they can get a job not to feel ashamed, but then to look forward to getting back and going and getting a job, as I and millions of other Australians have, and continuing to contribute to our wonderful society. Social welfare is extremely important. That is why we have a safety net. That is why, as a government—and I know that the opposition and everyone in this place agrees—we need to look after those people who are vulnerable, particularly at certain times in their life. However, I have been personally deeply disappointed in what the Leader of the Opposition has sanctioned and the member for Maribyrnong has led. It is an argument, which has been prosecuted quite poorly, that there is somehow a direct, unbroken and singular link between suicides and this particular social welfare mechanism. That is irresponsible and it is harmful. I would estimate that every single person in this place, on all sides of both chambers, has in some way been touched by suicide, and I reckon I'd be right. So I think it is irresponsible to try and draw a link and to accuse a particular government minister or even previous ministers of having blood on their hands. It is a disgraceful commentary, and I really implore that this come to an end. The sense that I have that this is an irresponsible argument is also borne out by research. In fact, research suggests that the factors that contribute to someone taking their own life can be very complex and that there is no single reason why a person dies by suicide. In fact Mindframe's guidelines for communicating about suicide emphasise the importance of not implying 'that the death was spontaneous or due to a single event, as most people who die by suicide have underlying risk factors'. I don't think anybody would argue that a lot of the people who are recipients of social welfare aren't doing it incredibly tough—they absolutely are. That is why we need to be careful about our language. We do need to talk about suicide. It's encouraging that we're talking more about mental health than we ever have before. For those members of my direct family who have and are suffering from mental health issues, we've come such a long way since particularly 15 years ago, when my own wife first presented at an Army hospital and said, 'I'm not feeling well; I think I might have depression,' and was told: 'You're a mother of two kids and you're in the Army. You should probably just get out.' I don't blame the medical doctor on duty, but it is incredibly unfortunate for treatment not to be provided; that exacerbates the circumstances. So people are doing it hard. We are talking more about mental health, but we need to be responsible. We don't want people to have any sense that suicide is the solution to their problems. I make the request that we move on from the argument. We've heard arguments from both sides prosecuted about the mechanisms of this instrument. It's pleasing that the government has identified that the scheme was certainly imperfect and that it has been iteratively improved; that's what any responsible government would do. But again, in my closing remarks, I urge that we talk about the mechanics of the program and not about harmful links to suicide. (Time expired) 15:51 Ms COKER 263547 Corangamite The Online Compliance Intervention scheme—it sounds harmless, but it is what we now know as robodebt. This heartless, illegal scheme has resulted in the most costly and biggest class action and settlement in the history of Australia—$1.2 billion in repayments and compensation to victims of this disgraceful, nasty scheme. This government's Online Compliance Intervention scheme has driven untold anguish into the hearts of countless innocent Australians. It has led to innocent Australians self-harming and tragically taking their own lives. This disgraceful scheme has happened under this government's watch. It is their responsibility. The Morrison government has made a pretrial admission. It has admitted in this country's justice system that it was wrong and that it owes robodebt victims their money back and compensation. That is the Morrison government's legal position. But its talking points are a bit different. The government's first law officer offered these callous words to victims: At the moment those moneys have been refunded. There will be an argument as to whether or not we undertake to try and recoup any debts using other methodologies. Such uncaring words, with no recognition of the carnage the Morrison government has caused. The government's position is that they don't need to talk about robodebt anymore, that they don't need to talk about the current Prime Minister being the social services minister who hatched this nasty plan, that they don't need to talk about the current Prime Minister being the Treasurer who reached into people's lives and illegally demanded their cash, and that they don't need to talk about the current Prime Minister being the candidate who sold himself to the Australian public as the only economic manager strong enough to run a program like this. The government hoped this automated payment collection system would collect billions of dollars from the poorest Australians. That was the expectation. When asked to defend the automisation, they claimed that Labor governments have used similar programs in the past. That is a lie. This government is the first government ever to introduce an automated system that shattered the presumption of innocence, and this government has maintained a delusional lie for years now that the robodebt program was fair, appropriate and legal. But robodebt is none of these things. It is an absolute disgrace that has hurt too many Australians. About one in 60 Australians were part of the successful class action against the Morrison government, receiving a total of more than $1 billion in repayments and compensation. I've heard harrowing stories from my constituents in Corangamite—constituents that can't afford necessities because the government has thrown their finances in the gutter and constituents that hate their federal government for what it's done to their lives. Many find it extremely offensive that no-one in the Morrison government is taking real responsibility for this $1.2 billion scam—not the Minister for Families and Social Services, not the Treasurer, not the Prime Minister. So what we need is a royal commission to expose the truth. When did the government know robodebt was illegal, and why didn't they stop it instantly? Who is responsible, and what consequences will they face for this mass robbery of the Australian people? This Morrison government must immediately enable an independent inquiry, a royal commission, into this robodebt scandal. We must move on. We must ensure the Australian people are never again exposed to such a callus, illegal scam overseen by its own government, the Morrison government. 15:55 Mr CHRISTENSEN 230485 Dawson We just heard from the previous member—I'm not sure what her electorate is, I'm sorry; it's one of those faceless no-name backbenchers—that there was no automation in the previous system under the Labor Party. Herein is the lie. The minister for the NDIS went all the way back to the 1990s. I don't have to go back to the 1990s to show that this program, that Labor calls robodebt, was something that they actually dreamt up. I can go back to 29 June 2011 when the member for Maribyrnong, who comes into this chamber beating his chest over this, and the member for Sydney put out a press release. In the press release the member for Maribyrnong said: The automation of this process will free up resources and result in more people being referred to the tax garnishee process, retrieving more outstanding debt on behalf of taxpayers. That's case closed. We just heard before that there was no automation in the system. I've got a press release here, from 29 June 2011, where the member for Maribyrnong talks about automating the process and how much money it will save. Now the government has realised that the system was flawed. The government has realised that the system that had been in place for a long time—the automation of it instituted by the Labor Party—is flawed, and the Prime Minister, on 11 June 2020, apologised. He apologised in this House. He said: And I would apologise for any hurt or harm in the way that the government has dealt with that issue and to anyone else who has found themselves in those situations— in response to a question from the member from Maribyrnong. But we haven't heard any apology from the Labor party who instituted the program, who now stand up and pretend they that they had nothing to do with it, claiming that it is a lie. Fact check: press release, from 29 June 2011, with the member for Maribyrnong stating: The automation of this process will free up resources and result in more people being referred to the tax garnishee process, retrieving more outstanding debt on behalf of taxpayers. They came up with it! These people, these hypocrites, these people who have the audacity to preach integrity from the den of corruption, come in here and tell us that it is all our fault and we should hang our heads in shame when they actually came up with it. It was a scheme that existed under Labor. It was a scheme that existed under the coalition. And it is a scheme that we are now doing away with. But what chutzpah to come in here when they developed it. What chutzpah! And what absolute disgracefulness to actually point to suicides and say that those suicides were a result of this program. What a disgrace to actually allege that members of this House have blood on their hands. What a disgrace. That is what they do. The previous member on our side actually said that there is quite a lot of research about mental health and suicide and they should not be—under all the research that's available, all the mental health guidelines that are available—claiming that one particular event has caused a suicide. We know that no one particular event actually causes a suicide. But that is what they're doing. If they want to go there, if they want to get that personal and talk about who caused whose deaths, we can look back in very recent history to a little scheme that Labor dreamt up called the pink batts scheme, which did have a royal commission into it. The royal commission determined that people like Matthew Fuller, a 25-year-old who was electrocuted in Brisbane; Rueben Barnes, a 16-year-old who was electrocuted in Rockhampton; Mitchell Sweeney, a 22-year-old who was electrocuted in Cairns; Marcus Wilson, a 19-year-old who died of heat exhaustion, died under the program. It was determined by a royal commission that Labor did indeed have blood on their hands. The commissioner said: In my view each death would, and should, not have occurred had the HIP— the Home Insulation Program— been properly designed and implemented. That is the problem. These guys do not go through the detail. They didn't go through the detail when they instituted the automation of this. It's now up to our government to fix it—and fix it we have—and compensate, and we are. (Time expired) 16:00 Mr DAVID SMITH 276714 Bean US President Harry Truman used to have a sign on his desk saying 'The buck stops here'. If the Prime Minister had a sign on his desk, it would say 'I don't hold a hose'. In fact, no-one in this government holds a hose on anything or appears to care about the consequences of either maladministration or inaction. That callous indifference to consequence was on show again for all to hear in question time this week. Members of the House will remember that last September we had an MPI debate on robodebt. In that debate I provided examples of affected Bean constituents and called out this terrible scheme. Today I speak again to call out this government's failure to take responsibility for its illegal scheme, a scheme that has done so much damage to so many families in Bean and across the country. You can just imagine the minister responsible for robodebt ringing around trying to find some members to talk in the September MPI debate and defend this shameless scheme. He may have said: 'Trust me. We'll give you some talking points you can obfuscate on. Just go in the chamber, blame them, attack the member for Maribyrnong, take no responsibility, say it's a scare campaign and, if you want to go there, remind people on welfare that they should consider themselves lucky for the support of the tax system.' I'm sure he got a few knockbacks from MPs, like the member for Bass, but the minister did find a few members who were willing and able. We had the minister himself try his rubbish we-all-collect-debt argument. He failed then and is failing now to take responsibility for this scheme. We had the member for Petrie, who spoke 'with pleasure' on this matter. Then we had the member for Barker, who too was 'pleased' to defend the scheme, saying that the pursuit of justice was nothing more than a roboscare campaign. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 Does the minister have a point of order? Mr Howarth 247742 Just for the member, I am the member for Petrie and I haven't spoken on the matter. Mr DAVID SMITH 276714 I apologise to the member for Petrie. It was one of your other colleagues though. Haven't those talking points aged well? I'm glad the member for Petrie didn't use them. In contrast, I raised the case of a constituent of mine. The mother of a person with an intellectual disability had undergone a review of past income by Centrelink through the robodebt catastrophe. After receiving a threatening letter demanding a debt be paid the daughter passed the letter to her mum. Luckily, her mother appealed the decision on her behalf and demanded that Services Australia review all payments. I can update the House that the outcome of that stressful review was that Services Australia actually owed her. As this devoted mum said, her daughter was very lucky because she had parents who could appeal the case for her. I know that other cases have ended disastrously for the individuals involved. To focus only on the Liberal members in the last debate lets the real architect off the hook for what has been described as the worst example of maladministration and callous indifference to vulnerable Australians. It was the member for Cook himself who instituted this process to collect what the government hoped would be billions of dollars of overpayments. It was this government that attempted to justify the practice by claiming that Labor had done similar in the past—a claim we hear again and again from the minister. A lie repeated remains a lie. For years this government has been in denial about robodebt's fairness and legality, and its obfuscation does not end there. This week we even had the blocking of the tabling of a simple and saddening note from a mother of a victim of this scheme. I had hoped Mr Robert provided some more humble and sincere talking points for today's debate, but I was sadly disappointed. Since the last MPI the government has made a last-minute pretrial admission conceding that it owes robodebt victims their money back plus compensation. It is likely that the government owes victims of the robodebt scheme more than $1.2 billion. The settlement is some level of justice for victims who have been treated terribly by this government. The robodebt scheme has wreaked untold damage and harm to hundreds of thousands of people. As has been noted by many, the ministers responsible, all of whom are still in cabinet, and the public sector chiefs who oversaw it should be held to account and shouldn't remain in their positions. They shouldn't be simply reshuffled in coming weeks. This whole episode is a shameful moment in Australian history. We need a royal commission into this failed and damaging scheme to get the answers the victims, the parliament and the Australian community deserve. 16:05 Mr ALEXANDER M3M Bennelong Thanks to the member for Maribyrnong for raising this debate. I note that this week for me has been bookended by speeches on motions brought forward by the member for Maribyrnong. The first on Monday praised the workers of Services Australia for their hard work over the chaos of this year. In turn, I opened by praising the member for bringing forward such a heartwarming and bipartisan bill. Unfortunately, I cannot end the week with the same sentiment. This motion makes an assumption: that the government is shirking responsibility with regard to debt recovery. I don't think that's fair. Obviously, all policies have consequences, but some policies have unintended consequences. I wish they didn't, but they do. Foresight would be a wonderful gift, but, sadly, neither party has it. When there are painful consequences, we must adapt to redress where those have happened, and the government has done just that. As of Monday, 406,889 people have had their refunds completed, with a total value of $707.7 million in refunds paid. That's about 95 per cent of people and about 95 per cent of refunds by value. The remaining five per cent is made up of a number of people who need tailored solutions owing to different conditions, like incarceration, and around half are simply waiting on people finishing their applications for the refund to be triggered. Aside from the responsibility to make this right, which we are doing, there is also a responsibility to acknowledge what has happened and apologise for any harm caused. Both sides of the aisle here agree that the government shouldn't be defrauded and legitimate debts should be repaid. That is not a controversial statement and not the issue here. But, if the government has caused harm, hurt or pain to anyone, we sincerely apologise for that. On this point, I would like to quote our Prime Minister, who said these words in this chamber: The business of raising and recovering debts on behalf of taxpayers is a difficult job, and it deals with Australians in many very sensitive circumstances, and of course I would deeply regret—deeply regret—any hardship that has been caused to people in the conduct of that activity. The government has many difficult jobs that it has to do, dealing with Australians in very sensitive circumstances, and that is true particularly at this time. It is our instruction that we would hope that all agents of the government, when pursuing the debt recovery option, would be sensitive to people's circumstances. In relation to the particular gentleman that you referred to, that is a very distressing situation that you've raised. And I would apologise for any hurt or harm in the way that the government has dealt with that issue and to anyone else who has found themselves in those situations. But the issue is the one of ensuring how the government can best do this, and, where there are lessons to be learnt here, they will be learnt, and that is what the Minister for Government Services is employing now. I'll ask the Minister for Government Services to add to the answer. I would like to echo these words and sentiments of the Prime Minister today. It's worth noting here that the government has taken a sympathetic view to debt recovery in this debilitating of all years. The government acknowledges the pain that many people have undergone this year and knows the impact this has had on the bottom line of many families' budgets. Recognising how financially difficult this year has been, the Australian government put in place a temporary six-month nationwide pause on Services Australia's debt-raising and recovery activity on 3 April 2020. On 25 September 2020 the government announced that this pause would remain in place until 30 October. Debt-recovery activity will now not recommence until February 2021. Delaying debt recovery until February 2021 will provide time for people to consider their circumstances and engage with Services Australia about their options, so they can understand these in a transparent way and have time to plan for the future. To conclude, I would like to again reiterate our sympathy and deep regret to anyone who has been caused hardship, but the government is working to fix this and working hard to ensure that, in this most chaotic of years, Australians are supported by this government and the assistance schemes that we have created. 16:10 Ms STANLEY 265990 Werriwa There is no easy way to say this, and it doesn't give me any joy, but the government is engulfed in scandal. From sports rorts to the Leppington triangle to the illegal robodebt scheme, this is a government with scant regard for public accountability and taxpayers' money. The defective robodebt scheme has caused unnecessary stress for some of our most vulnerable Australians, resulting in anxiety, poverty and suicide. For many years, the Morrison government has been in denial about the scheme's fairness and legality. And, at the last minute, this government made a pre-trial admission, conceding it owes robodebt victims their money back plus compensation—an admission that will cost taxpayers $1.2 billion. The settlement, for approximately 400,000 class action members, not only is the costliest settlement in Australian history but involves the most people of any settlement by any Australian government. This is gross malfeasance—complete and utter mismanagement of government services with no regard for people's wellbeing. It is clear this case was settled so the government can continue to fawn over its most prized attribute: not being held to account. Coalition ministers across this House understand the implication of taking a witness stand. They can bluff and bluster on talkback radio, give their mates at News Corp an exclusive one-sided drop, walk away from a press conference and gag debate in this House. However, the minister for human services and the government services minister knew they could not do any of that if they were in the witness box to answer for this illegal and unfair scheme. Those officers in this House sat here pretending robodebt was above board, arrogantly denying it had ruined lives across the country. For months, the Minister for Government Services denied the scheme was unfair, inaccurate or illegal. When the minister put the scheme on hold, he said it was only a refinement, affecting a small cohort. That small cohort is over 400,000 desperate Australians. How many people does the government have to drive to anxiety, poverty and suicide before they publicly acknowledge their mass robbery of the Australian public? The minister went on not to apologise to the victims of this nasty scheme, even after having many opportunities to do so. I acknowledge the member for Bennelong for having the guts to apologise this afternoon. But for many of those opposite 'sorry' seems to be the hardest word to muster. It's a tough ask for this government, perhaps because they need to bring back the empathy coach for all ministers. The Attorney-General, who calls the scheme 'legally insufficient', those opposite and the spin doctors in the ministerial wing might have been impressed with bitter, empty, legalistic gobbledegook. Terms such as 'legally insufficient' and 'refinement' are familiar terms used by the government. Here are a few more terms: lazy, callous unfit and negligent. Deflecting scrutiny and avoiding accountability are all hallmarks of this government, unfortunately. At every level, this scheme has had the current government and its ministers overseeing the implementation. The Prime Minister must explain what the consequences will be for ministers, including the members for Fadden and Aston, for their involvement in the single greatest social security scandal in this nation's history and the subsequent cover-up. Surprising no-one, those opposite reverted to their usual excuse: it's all Labor's fault. However, a similar Labor government program used secondary checks, human intervention and oversight. In his contribution, the minister read a number of letters that were issued during previous Labor governments. Although the minister read the words, he didn't seem to understand the subtlety. When you wrote back to explain that it was not correct, a human being would have read that answer. They would have reviewed it, and the possibility of the debt not being needed would have been obvious. Not normally familiar with due process and accountability, the coalition government instead has used, unchecked, an out-of-control algorithm with no human oversight. The $1.2 billion settlement fronted by taxpayers is not accountability. The public want to know: When did the government know robodebt was illegal and why did they not stop it instantly? Who is responsible and what consequences will they face? We need to assure the Australian public that this absurd justice can never happen again, and anyone who attempts to denounce this fundamental call to action should be ashamed. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 There being no more speakers, the discussion has concluded. BILLS 69 BILLS Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill 2020 69

Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill 2020

Report from Committee 69 16:16 Mr HASTIE 260805 Canning On behalf of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, I present the advisory report, incorporating a dissenting report, on the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill 2020. Report made a parliamentary paper in accordance with standing order 39(e). Mr HASTIE 260805 by leave—I'm pleased to present the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security's advisory report on the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill 2020, which includes additional comments. ASIO does some of the most important work in the national security space, keeping Australians safe from politically motivated violence and espionage. They are our shield against the unseen arrows of our adversaries. It's important that the government and this parliament make sure that the tools ASIO has to do its important role are reviewed and updated. A parliament anchored in the principles of limited government will restrain the powers of an agency such as ASIO where it has been shown this is necessary. The Morrison government takes seriously the balancing of individual rights and liberties with the intrusive powers needed to keep Australians and our democracy free of interference, and the Morrison government has brought forward these powers with these principles in mind. It upholds Westminster accountability, especially with this bill. This bill amends the compulsory questioning framework in the ASIO Act by enabling ASIO's continued use of questioning warrants but removing its ability to use questioning and detention warrants; replacing the existing detention framework with a more limited apprehension framework; enabling the use of questioning warrants in relation to espionage, politically motivated violence—including terrorism—and acts of foreign interference; providing the power for a police officer to conduct a search of a person who is apprehended in connection with a questioning warrant; and permitting ASIO to seek a questioning warrant in relation to minors aged 14 to 18 but only where the minor is themselves the target of an ASIO investigation in relation to politically motivated violence. I do have a prepared speech here; however, I note the time and I just want to cover off very quickly the additional recommendations for inclusions in the bill. We recommend that the sunsetting time be reduced to 10 to 15 years; that the committee may review the operation, effectiveness and implications of the questioning powers ahead of the sunset date; and that a legal practitioner be able to be appointed as a prescribed authority, and they must have engaged in legal practice for least 10 years and be a Queen's Counsel or a Senior Counsel. I direct the public to contents of the report itself. I will give my time to opposition members who would like to speak. 16:18 Mr DREYFUS HWG Isaacs by leave—I wish to make some brief remarks on the report. I simply wish to say that the chair has tabled the report of the intelligence committee on the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill, and I need to clarify that there is not a dissenting report from Labor members; there is additional comment from Labor members—because Labor members of the intelligence committee support the passage of this bill, and Labor will be supporting the passage of this bill. There are seven recommendations in the report which Labor very much hopes the government will accept, because all of them will improve the safeguards that are necessary when this parliament legislates for powers that are as extensive as the power that is conferred on the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation by this bill. We would hope to see further changes made, and that's what the additional comment by Labor members deals with. I say again: the Labor members' recommendation to this parliament is that the bill should be supported by the parliament. BILLS 70 BILLS Australia's Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020 70

Australia's Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020

Consideration of Senate Message 70 16:21 Mr GEE 261393 Calare I move: That the amendment be disagreed to. 16:21 Mr MARLES HWQ Corio Can I start by saying the premise of the Australia's Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020 is that Australia's national government should be responsible for our foreign relations. That's a reasonable proposition and one which Labor supports. But what we've seen throughout the process of this bill is a government which has gone about this bill in a really hopeless way. The bill has been rushed. It's been poorly drafted. It was put into the public domain initially in order to get a headline, to distract from the government's failings in relation to the aged-care system. We know all of this because those Australian entities which are affected by this bill had no idea that it was actually being drafted. Despite the fact that the opposition has made very clear that we do support the principal objective of this bill and that we wish to engage in a constructive approach with the government to fix the flaws that are part of this bill and engage in a process of looking at amendments which would make this better legislation, we have been met with crickets from the government. There has been no attempt to consult with us whatsoever. Today the shadow minister for foreign affairs wrote to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, outlining our concerns in relation to this. We would have expected more from the government in terms of working with Labor in trying to fix the government's own bill. There is no clarity on whether the 99-year lease in respect of the Port of Darwin is captured by this bill. We regret the fact that the government did not support amendments in the Senate which would have required the minister to provide a statement of reasons when making decisions in respect of this proposed act and to have review of those reasons and that decision by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. We do welcome the government's agreement to the opposition's amendment in respect of requiring the production of an annual report on the exercise of the minister's decision-making powers under this act, but we will insist on the amendment which was passed by the Senate, which was moved by Senator Patrick and was identical to an amendment that was circulated by the opposition, which was aimed at ensuring that this bill, this proposed act, is not excluded from the Administrative Decisions (Judicial Review) Act 1977. This is a moment where the Prime Minister needs to take some responsibility for our nation's foreign relations. Labor has, as I said, engaged in a constructive process which has been aimed at developing bipartisanship around the issues and the objectives which are contained in this bill. This legislation may ultimately be about assigning responsibility, but leadership—leadership on the part of our Prime Minister—is about taking responsibility, and it's time the Prime Minister did just that. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the amendment be disagreed to.

The House divided. [16:29]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

 62 AYES Alexander, JG Allen, K Andrews, KJ Andrews, KL Archer, BK Bell, AM Broadbent, RE Chester, D Christensen, GR Conaghan, PJ Connelly, V Coulton, M Drum, DK (teller) Dutton, PC Entsch, WG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Hamilton, GR Hammond, CM Hastie, AW Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Joyce, BT Katter, RC Kelly, C Laming, A Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Liu, G Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI Morrison, SJ O'Brien, T O'Dowd, KD Pasin, A Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Sharma, DN Simmonds, J Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Thompson, P Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Vasta, RX Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wilson, RJ Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG Young, T 58 NOES Aly, A Bandt, AP Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Burns, J Butler, MC Butler, TM Byrne, AM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Coker, EA Conroy, PM Dick, MD Dreyfus, MA Fitzgibbon, JA Freelander, MR (teller) Georganas, S Giles, AJ Gosling, LJ Haines, H Hill, JC Husic, EN Jones, SP Kearney, G Khalil, P King, CF King, MMH Leigh, AK Marles, RD McBain, KL Mitchell, RG Mulino, D Murphy, PJ Neumann, SK O'Neil, CE Owens, JA Perrett, GD Phillips, FE Rishworth, AL Rowland, MA Ryan, JC Sharkie, RCC Shorten, WR Smith, DPB Snowdon, WE Stanley, AM (teller) Steggall, Z Templeman, SR Thistlethwaite, MJ Vamvakinou, M Watts, TG Wilkie, AD Wilson, JH Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

 16:32 Mr GEE 261393 Calare I present the reasons for the House disagreeing to the Senate amendment and I move: That the reasons be adopted. Question agreed to. ADJOURNMENT 72 ADJOURNMENT COVID-19 72 16:32 Mr GILES 243609 Scullin The COVID-19 pandemic is the greatest health challenge of our time. As I speak, more than 1.4 million have died from the virus and more than 63 million people have been infected. While we have great hope about the future, following the discovery of vaccines, we also understand that this battle does not end with the discovery of vaccines. Millions of people have been infected with the virus and survived. Sadly, many have not fully recovered. Many suffer from a condition known as long COVID or post-viral fatigue after contracting COVID-19. These so-called long haulers are the people I speak up for today. There is no agreed medical definition or list of symptoms shared by all patients. Two people with long COVID can have quite different experiences. However, the most common symptoms reported are crippling fatigue, breathlessness, and muscle and joint pain. Others report suffering mental health problems, including depression, anxiety and brain fog. In the northern and western suburbs of Melbourne, in particular, people are now battling from the longer term effects of their infection. Tonight I call for greater support, awareness and understanding for people with long COVID in Australia and for greater focus on them as we build our policy response to our recovery for people—like my friend Ben. Ben contracted COVID-19 in March and, since July, he's had long COVID. On a good day he struggles with mild fatigue. On a bad day he's flat on his back in bed. He can no longer go for a run or do any strenuous activity. He's told me it's not a linear recovery; it's up and down. He doesn't hold much hope of a full recovery, at least not in the next six months—another six months like this. Fortunately, Ben's flexible work in professional services enables him to continue to work, but Ben's worried about what will happen to people with long COVID who work in more physically demanding jobs. Of course, Ben's not alone. We know that more than 27,000 people have contracted COVID-19 in Australia and more than 25,400 have recovered. That we know so little about the long-term effects of COVID-19 is a source of considerable concern. Indeed, Dr Anthony Fauci, America's top diseases expert, recently told a University of Melbourne webinar that the currently unknown long-term effects of COVID-19 are his greatest concern, citing a study showing that some long-haulers suffer from heart inflammation. A review by the National Institute for Health Research in the UK found that long COVID may in fact be a number of different syndromes such as post-intensive-care syndrome, post-viral fatigue syndrome and long-term COVID syndrome. The professor of genetic epidemiology at King's College London even warned in a recent report that long-haulers 'could turn out to be a bigger public health problem than excess deaths'. The study found that 10 per cent of people infected with the virus had symptoms for a month, with between 1.5 and two per cent having them after three months. The median age of those with long COVID is 45. Women are more likely to be affected than men. Another study found that, six weeks after leaving hospital, around half of patients were still experiencing breathlessness. Approximately one-third of hospitalised patients sustained heart damage. In short, we still don't know enough about the long-term effects of this virus. We must ensure that we are giving people suffering from long COVID the necessary support. We must ensure that research into the long-term effects of the virus continues well after the rollout of the vaccine. We must also ensure that there is no lasting stigma afflicting these people, especially in the workplace. Ben's concerns for others at work must be matched by action. We can't assume understanding on the part of every employer. There's a role and a responsibility for government here. I'll finish by saying this to the people suffering from long COVID-19: we are with you, we won't forget you and I for one will stand up to ensure you get the support you need in your recovery. Australian Defence Force 73 16:36 Mr HASTIE 260805 Canning On 1 July 2020, at the launch of the 2020 Defence strategic update, the Prime Minister said: The enduring responsibility of Government, though, is timeless—to protect Australia's national interest, our sovereignty, our values and the security of the Australian people … we need to also prepare for a post-COVID world that is poorer, that is more dangerous, and that is more disorderly … …   …   … Coercive activities are rife. Disinformation and foreign interference have been enabled and accelerated by new and emerging technologies. It is in this strategic environment that I must address today's front page of The West Australian newspaper, which carried this headline to an opinion piece by Mr Alan Jones: 'The brutal truth is ScoMo gave China opening to attack SAS & he should say sorry to troops'. I feel very strongly about this. I am a veteran of the Special Air Service Regiment and a member of the Morrison government. I too found the tweet by the People's Republic of China to be a repugnant slur on the serving men and women of the Australian Defence Force. It was calculated, deliberate and designed to undermine the political and social cohesion of our country at the same time as Australian exporters across a number of sectors are being hit with tariffs designed to hurt their businesses and our national prosperity. This was a toxic mix of economic coercion and political disinformation enabled by Silicon Valley social media oligarchs. The Prime Minister has stood up for the ADF. He has called for an apology from the People's Republic of China. He has called on Twitter to delete the post itself. Our diggers don't ask for much. They want strong leadership and a boss who has their back, and the Prime Minister has called out this slur. Since the Brereton report was released, the PM has also consistently defended the conduct and integrity of our troops. Australia is seeking to be honest and accountable for alleged wrongdoing by a small number of individuals entrusted to wear our flag. We are owning our mistakes, and this is in stark contrast to the People's Republic of China. We are yet to receive an apology from them. Twitter has not removed the offensive post. They are happy to censor many things, but they don't have our backs when it counts. If it wasn't clear already, we Australians are alone responsible for our sovereignty. Authoritarian regimes actively undermine it. Silicon Valley doesn't care about it. It's up to us, it's up to our leadership and it's in weeks like this one that we need to stand together. We live in an imperfect world. It's full of imperfect people, and the release of the Brereton report has been imperfect. I am angry at the leak of the Crompvoets report two weeks prior to the release of the Brereton report. I am unhappy that the author of the Crompvoets report appeared on 60 Minutes four days prior to the release of the Brereton report. I also disagree with the decision to release the unredacted Crompvoets report alongside the redacted Brereton report. The Crompvoets report detailed unproven rumours of Australian soldiers murdering Afghan children. It may have prompted the Brereton report, but its evidentiary threshold was far lower. The Brereton report neither rules these rumours in nor rules them out, so why are they out in the open for our adversaries to use against us? It has undermined public confidence in the process and allowed the People's Republic of China to malign our troops. I believe in accountability and transparency, I believe in the rule of law and I believe in the presumption of innocence. Now is not the time to attack our troops. Now is not the time to attack our Prime Minister, who is standing up for our troops and our sovereignty. Difficult days lie ahead and Australians, all Australians, must stand together. Petition: Australian New Zealand Food Standards Code 74 16:40 Mr GEORGANAS DZY Adelaide I rise to table and present a petition on behalf of the publican, staff and patrons of the Duke of Brunswick Hotel. The petition has been approved through the petitions committee. The petition read as follows— The Australian New Zealand Food Standards Code (Code) section 3.2.2 prohibits venues that serve food and beverages from allowing companion animals in areas (other than outdoor dining areas) where food is handled. Handled in this context includes not only the preparation of food, but also its service to customers. The ban applies despite research of Food Standards Australia New Zealand finding little evidence of any risk posed by their presence if away from the areas where food is being prepared (See: Risk assessment – Proposal P1018). We the undersigned request that the Government amend the Food Standards Code so as to permit States and Territories to allow their venues to choose whether or not to allow companion animals in their premises in non-food preparation areas. Venues should not be compelled to allow animals into their premises, but similarly venues that wish to allow for the social benefits of animal companionship should not be prohibited from doing so when the risk to public health is negligible. We therefore ask the House to pass appropriate legislation or legislative instrument to amend the Code so as to allow venues to permit (if they choose) companion animals in any non-food handling area of their premises. from 1277 citizens (Petition No. EN2026) Petition received. Mr GEORGANAS DZY The Duke of Brunswick Hotel is a pub like no other. It is the heart and soul of the local south-western community in the Adelaide city. It's also home for many, whether they're two-legged people or furry four-legged animals. For example, Heather can often be seen relaxing with her pooches, Chanel and Snuffleupagus, or having a chat with Bruce at the bar, with Chloe on his lap, who often pops in after a walk for a beer and a snack. In fact, when Chloe ran away from home once she came straight to the pub, straight to the Duke of Brunswick Hotel, and that's the important role it plays in this community. Publican of the Duke of Brunswick Hotel, Simone Douglas, and her staff have worked incredibly hard to ensure that their venue is not a drain on the community but actually puts back into the community. For example, Simone personally letterboxed the entire area around the pub, providing people with her mobile phone number if they needed help, food or just a chat during the peak of the corona pandemic. In addition, it is the only deaf-friendly pub in South Australia, with all front of house staff trained in basic Auslan. It's also the only veteran-friendly pub in the state, with staff trained in PTSD and veterans' affairs. And it is the only pub which is accredited as gluten free by Coeliac Australia. This makes the Duke of Brunswick Hotel a destination venue attracting many customers, including people who live with autism because of the important role of nutrition plays for people on the spectrum. Dogs and companion animals also play an important role and they help to create the inclusive and welcoming atmosphere at the pub. Unfortunately, however, the pub has now been told that it can no longer allow dogs or companion animals in indoor areas where food is handled. This is because it is prohibited by the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code, even though the food standards agency itself has found little evidence of any risk by companion animals provided they are away from food preparation areas. And this despite it being common practice in many parts of the world, including Europe and the US, for people to bring their dogs with them to venues. So the owners and patrons of the Duke of Brunswick Hotel, and those that have signed this petition, are calling for the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code to be amended so that venues can allow companion animals where food is served, if they choose to. This is an important petition because, considering the ongoing COVID restrictions and lockdowns coming and going, we must do everything we can to help businesses recover. This petition is about choice—giving the choice to people and to pubs that want to continue this practice. The Duke of Brunswick does not want to make it mandatory that all hotels allow dogs; they just want to ensure that venues and patrons who choose to have a companion animal can do so. Surely that should be possible, especially given important the role that dogs play in our lives. Many of us have dogs; I've have had dogs all my life. They are our friends, we treat them as members of our families, many of them are inside our houses and they grow up with our children. These animals, our companions, are part of our families, and during this time of social inclusion they couldn't be more important. During the recent bushfires, for example, Simone put out the message that anyone who didn't have a safe place to stay with their pets could go to the hotel. People converged on the Duke of Brunswick with their dogs and their pets because it was a safe place to go. As the bushfire season fast approaches this year, they won't be able to do the same. The owners are only asking for the choice to offer their patrons—all 1,277 of them who signed this petition—the kind of pub they want. This would be good for business and good for the community. I've got to say, many of us in this place have grown up with dogs. If you speak to every second person, they'll have a pet dog. They live with us; they're inside our homes. There is no danger posed by this. As Simone, the publican of the Duke of Brunswick Hotel, has said: 'It's about choice. We don't want to make it mandatory; it is about giving people the choice to be able to take their pets to the pub with them'. Chisholm Electorate: Box Hill City Oval 75 16:45 Ms LIU 282918 Chisholm I would like to take this moment to discuss an exciting opportunity that has been proposed in my electorate of Chisholm: the redevelopment of the Box Hill City Oval. This project would enormously benefit the sporting communities in the Box Hill area. The proposed works would help the clubs meet the growing demand for dual-gender facilities and meet public access expectations. This work, which will create a lively sporting precinct that supports regional sports administration, educational institutions and community groups, is sorely overdue and would be enthusiastically welcomed by our community. The Box Hill City Oval is the highest-profile sporting venue in our area. It has a rich and long history in the local community, with the primary grandstand having been built almost a century ago. However, it is perceived as a walled-off sporting club. The people associated with the facility, including the Box Hill Hawks, have been pushing to change this perception by upgrading their facilities. The Box Hill City Oval should be a welcoming, accessible and highly functional facility that can be used for a wide range of sporting and community activities. This upgrade will help bring the facility into the modern age, and not just architecturally. Year by year the number of women participating in Aussie rules football continues to climb. Census data shows that more than 127,000 women and girls pulled on their boots to play footy in 2018. This represents a growth of 14.2 per cent in female football participation, and this is showing down at Box Hill City Oval. The existing facilities do very little to accommodate the continuing rise in female participation and interest, but there are plans to change all that. Developing new VFLW locker rooms and amenities will go a long way towards recognising the massive increase in demand for, and participation in, women's sport. The same can be said for cricket. In the summer of 2018-19, registered female cricket participation grew by 14 per cent, and, at that point, women accounted for approximately 30 per cent of cricket participants across Australia. This number will no doubt continue to grow, and the Box Hill City Oval needs to grow with that demand. So it's not just the Hawks who stand to benefit. The proposed redevelopment of the Box Hill City Oval includes upgrades to the changing facilities and clubrooms of the Box Hill Cricket Club, the mighty fighting Mustangs. This will give the club the capacity to expand their numbers and also to better cater for those who just want to sit back, relax and watch a great game of cricket down at their local oval. Chisholm is a multicultural electorate, and, as such, it is important that any major community program reflects that. Not only will the Box Hill City Oval be able to meet the demands of football and cricket in my electorate; it will provide sorely needed activity space for badminton, table tennis, ultimate frisbee, tai chi, walking and riding tracks, outdoor gym equipment, netball and so on, to reflect the diversity of needs and wants in Chisholm. I have been in constant discussion with many of the local sports clubs presidents and players and other supporters of this project. I can personally vouch for the overwhelming support of the wider community for this project. International Day of People with Disability 76 16:50 Dr FREELANDER 265979 Macarthur We are getting towards the end of quite a difficult year. Many of us are thinking about our families and thinking about ourselves. But today is actually a very significant day; 3 December marks International Day of People with Disability. It's a day for us to share messages of inclusivity, to celebrate and recognise the achievements of people with disability and to focus on the ability of individuals rather than their disability. It's perhaps one of the most important days of the year, and we all ought to be part of it. There are 4.4 million Australians who live with disability, and this is an opportunity for us to celebrate each and every one of them. I have worked with people from every corner of the world, from every part of the country, from every racial group, from every socioeconomic group, and I can tell you that disability doesn't discriminate. I've had the joy of working with numerous families through the years. Many of my patients have some form of disability, be it people like Ethan with cerebral palsy, Nafese with cerebral palsy, George with Down syndrome and Nathaniel with autism. I've experienced and witnessed the heartbreak of some truly difficult and harrowing stories, and I've also experienced firsthand the joy and love that people living with disability can bring to the lives of others. I love this year's theme: 'Building back better: toward a disability-inclusive, accessible and sustainable post COVID-19 world'. I think that's a great message. Many people think that, with the advent of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, helping people with disability is done and dusted. That's not the case, clearly. We must build a world that's inclusive of all, and we must make that world accessible. It's astounding to me that this parliament has very few people with disability serving in it, and I think we can do a whole lot better. Throughout my career I've witnessed some revolutionary initiatives which have transformed the lives of people living with disability. A simple thing like making our train stations accessible to people with disability has really opened the world for many people who have mobility issues, may be wheelchair bound or have cerebral palsy. I have a patient with cerebral palsy who has to use a wheelchair, and he now travels from Campbelltown to North Sydney and back every day on the train to go to work. I think this is absolutely fantastic. A simple thing like that has made an absolute revolution to the lives of people with disability. Of course, even simple things done years ago, such as the advent of Medicare, have enabled people with disability to access medical treatment that they previously hadn't had. We've spoken about the NDIS. I remember speaking to Julia Gillard close to 20 years ago when she first came into the parliament, when she came out to the electorate as a guest of Chris Hayes. She said, 'We must do better for people with disability.' Even then she was thinking about the NDIS. To give credit, it has bipartisan support; former Prime Minister Tony Abbott was a very strong supporter of the NDIS. We have done well but there is a long way to go. The latest quarterly figures show that, for example, the NDIS is currently serving over 400,000 participants, and that's made a remarkable difference to them and their families. Children with autism who may have severe literacy difficulties, even post-school, can now access speech therapy, occupational therapy and job support. Again, this is life-changing for these people. My electorate of Macarthur is a wonderful place to live and work, and its people are its greatest assets. But we have a relatively high level of people living with a disability, and the NDIS and the move to a more accessible world has made a marked difference to many of these people. The reason for my consistent advocacy for this and for continued advocacy for supports in my electorate—such as the Shepherd Centre for children with severe hearing loss, which I'm pleased to report the state government has just announced funding for—is that everyone needs to be included in our society. People with disability, the gifts of our society, have as many rights as anyone else, and I will continually advocate for them. International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women 76 16:56 Dr MARTIN 282982 Reid On 25 November, we marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Gender violence, sexual violence and physical violence against girls and women is a reality for many around the world. Violence can take many forms and can be experienced by any individual, irrespective of gender, race, culture or age. However, we must acknowledge that violence, particularly against girls and women, can be shaped by cultural, gender and sex based power imbalances that aim to oppress women not only as individuals but collectively. Women and girls are disproportionately impacted by violence. One in three women worldwide experience physical or sexual abuse in their lifetime. In Australia, on average, one woman a week is murdered by her current or former partner. Gender based violence is complex and extends beyond physical or sexual abuse. It may also include non-physical forms of violence such as psychological abuse, verbal abuse or financial abuse. When these form a pattern of behaviour, it is known as coercive control. Coercive control can include behaviours such as isolating an individual from support networks, acts of humiliation, threats, sexual coercion and restricting an individual's movement, appearance and access to financial independence. Most survivors of gender based violence state that coercive control was present in their relationship even when physical violence was not. Sadly, the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a dramatic rise in gender based violence across the globe. Gender inequality is a significant driving force for violence against women and girls, yet we must acknowledge that economic, social and cultural factors play a role in sustaining and escalating this violence. The coronavirus pandemic has caused greater financial stress, increased substance abuse, poor mental health and isolation within the home. While none of these factors excuse domestic violence, or intimate partner violence, they can often act as a trigger for abuse. From the very beginning the Morrison government has been concerned about the ways in which gender based violence could be exasperated by the pandemic. This is why the Morrison government acted swiftly to commit $150 million for the domestic violence COVID-19 support package, which has now been fully distributed to states and territories. This funding is in addition to the $340 million that the Commonwealth has already invested into the fourth action plan, delivering over 160 initiatives to tackle domestic, family and sexual violence as well as ongoing funding for 1800RESPECT. Addressing attitudes of disrespect towards girls and women is one important way to address gender based violence. This is an issue that must be examined through different lenses. My committee work in both the Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs and the Joint Select Committee on Australia's family Law System has explored the systemic changes needed to better support survivors of gender based violence. Likewise, it is an issue that must be approached through a bipartisan lens. The recent relaunch of the Parliamentarians for Action to Reduce Violence Against Women and Children is an essential way to connect with parliamentarians of all political persuasions on research and reports to discuss opportunities to improve current programs working to address gender based violence. More must be done to address the increase of gender based violence in Australia and around the world. Drawing on my experience as a psychologist, I have long argued for evidence based programs that start in early childhood. They're essential to breaking cycles of violence and gendered violence. In January this year I called for better integration of mental health programs into the school curriculum to target a number of issues, not just preventing domestic violence behaviours. This call has now been echoed in the Productivity Commission's Mental health report. Children who have grown up experiencing or witnessing domestic violence have a greater risk of depression, anxiety, relationship issues and substance abuse. They are also more likely to become victims or perpetrators of domestic violence in their adult years. Teaching children emotion regulation skills, distress tolerance skills, impulse control and empathy are important ways to prevent domestic violence in the future. House adjourned at 17 : 01   The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Zimmerman ) took the chair at 10:00.

Thursday, 3 December 2020

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Zimmerman ) took the chair at 10:00.

CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS 78 CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS Dobell School Awards 78 10:00 Ms McBRIDE 248353 Dobell For many school students, this year has been a marathon with hurdles along the way. When lockdown started, COVID-19 restrictions meant students were forced to step away from their normal lives. They had to cope with not being able to go to school each morning and not being able to play sport, kick a footy on the weekend or even celebrate a birthday with friends. For many students, this began to take its toll. Kids Helpline saw a 36 per cent increase in demand between March and August this year. With so many school and extracurricular activities wound back in 2020, it's important to recognise students who stepped up. So the Dobell School Awards this year are recognising students who, despite the challenges they faced, stepped up to help their friends, families and community. Brian McCarroll of Chittaway Bay Public School receives a Dobell award for his positive action to support others in the school and to improve the school environment. Benjamin Hickmott of Glenvale School the North Entrance campus is acknowledged for completing a Cert II in Kitchen Operations at TAFE and being an active member training with the Toowoon Bay Surf Life Saving Club. Hannah Tierney from Gorokan Public School is recognised for admirably fulfilling her role of school captain and for her contagious positivity and great initiative to organise an assembly during online learning. Chloe Koppman from Killarney Vale Public School raised over $1,000 and dyed her hair blue to support CanTeen Australia. Ember-Rose Rutherford from Mackillop Catholic College is recognised for her constant service within the school and outside, with many hours of community service dedicated to the St John Ambulance. Tahle Ham and Chelsea Avis from St Cecilia's Catholic Primary School—my old school—are recognised for their incredible maturity and responsibility, and for the considerate and cooperative way in which they help in any way possible. Maddison Sullivan from Tacoma Public School is acknowledged for the support and enthusiasm she showed helping staff and students during online learning. Teegan Harrison from TLSC Tumbi Umbi Campus, who is campus captain, went above her title, providing support for the wellbeing of peers. Bella Wettig of Tuggerah Public School was awarded for her exceptional contributions to girl guiding. Maya Fry of Warnervale Public School was awarded for the fair play and humility she showed in both the school and sporting community. Sharlotte Fisher of Wyoming Public School was recognised for her generosity, kindness and initiative to make poppies, magnets and cards for the older people in our community. And Jamison Hondroyiannis from Wyong Creek Public School was recognised for the love and support he showed to peers and teachers. As the school year draws to a close, I'd like to recognise all the principals, teachers, support staff, family, friends and carers who worked so hard to keep our students safe and keep them learning. The Dobell award aims to highlight the effort that these students make and to help their community and, most importantly, to thank them for who they are and what they do. They couldn't do it without support. Finally, I'd like to recognise my work experience student, Isabel, who helped draft this speech today. I wish her the very best for Year 11 next year and happy 16th birthday. Thank you, Isabel. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 203092 We join with congratulating Isabel on that fine speech—the best contribution the member for Dobell has made to this chamber! An honourable member: Hear, hear! Byrnes, Mr D'Arcy 78 10:03 Mr ENTSCH 7K6 Leichhardt I rise today to pay tribute to one of my constituents and a great Far North Queenslander who recently passed away. D'arcy Byrnes of Byrnes Quality Meats will be fondly remembered by all of those who were fortunate enough to know him as a giant in the Australian meat industry. Originally a carpenter, D'Arcy purchased his first butcher shop in 1960 in Atherton with his wife, Raylee, after trading in his Mareeba milk run business. It was from these humble beginnings that D'Arcy went about quietly building his empire. D'Arcy then purchased a slaughter yard near Tolga in 1962—a cornerstone of his business empire to this day. This proved to be a masterstroke when regulations surrounding slaughter yards were changed during the 1970s and D'Arcy had the foresight to obtain his abattoir licence. With so many slaughter yards across the region unwilling to upgrade, they eventually closed, leaving D'Arcy with one of the only abattoir licences in our region. It was around this time that D'Arcy moved his family from the tablelands to Cairns, where he built his family flagship wholesale and retail stores at Manunda. D’Arcy started building up a loyal customer base and further expanded the business operations by purchasing a wholesale and bulk storage facility at Portsmouth in Cairns. Over the years, D’Arcy also purchased three cattle stations covering at one point five million acres near Coen in Cape York to help service his Rocky Creek abattoir and ultimately his stores. You could say that D’Arcy was one of the first proponents of the 'paddock to the plate' concept. Byrnes Quality Meats grew to become a Cairns institution that employs some 150 locals. In an interview in the Cairns Post recently, D’Arcy said that, over the years, he had seen the grandmother and the mother then the daughter and the grandkids all coming into his shop. In fact, you can find Byrnes meats on the menu of pubs, restaurants, hotels, eateries and other butcher stores across the region, which are all of his products. I must admit I've eaten my fair share of Burns Quality Meats over the years, and the cuts of meat have never disappointed. I'm sure that there are thousands of other people who have enjoyed D’Arcy's products over the years as they fired up their backyard barbecue. D’Arcy is survived by his wife, Raylee; his son, Victor; daughter, Darcia and six grandchildren. D’Arcy was a leader, a hard worker, a gentleman and an absolute pioneer. He will surely be missed by all of those who knew him, but his legacy will continue through the business that he established nearly six years ago. One of the things that I will miss every wet season is getting a phone call from D’Arcy giving me an upgrade on the road and telling me what needs to be done so he could get access to his properties in Cape York. Can I say to you: D’Arcy, rest in peace, mate. Fielding, Ms Tina, Brand Electorate: Schools 79 10:06 Ms MADELEINE KING 102376 Brand Tina Fielding is a remarkable woman from my local community who is achieving things that most people can only dream of; so remarkable, in fact, that WA's screen funding development agency, Screenwest, in partnership with Carers Western Australia, selected Tina to be part of a 12-part short documentary series titled Different Lens. The series provides an insight into what life is like for 13 Western Australians living with a disability just like Tina. The reason for the spotlight is Tina has written, co-produced and is the leading star in her very own short film entitled Sparkles. Sparkles is the story of a young woman with Down's syndrome who leaves her past behind and embarks on the long journey from Kalgoorlie to Perth. She encounters new and unlikely friends along the way, teaching all of us to be proud of who we are and where we've come from. Directed by Tina's mentor, the wonderful Jacqueline Pelczar, Sparkles was created with support from Screenwest through the Elevate and Generate funding initiatives. Sparkles is due to be released soon and will hopefully feature at the Perth Film Festival. I was lucky enough to see a preview just yesterday and I want to say to you, Tina, I loved it. I can't think of a better way to celebrate the International Day of People with a Disability than to celebrate Tina Fielding and Sparkles. On a different note, I'd like to give a shout-out to the graduating students from schools across Brand. To the students of all Baldivis Secondary College, Comet Bay College, Gilmore College, Kolbe Catholic College, Living Waters Lutheran College, Mother Teresa Catholic College, Tranby College, Peter Carnley Anglican Community School, Ridge View Secondary College, Rockingham Senior High School Education Support Centre, Safety Bay Senior High School, South Metropolitan Youth Link Community College, Warnbro Community High School Education Support Centre and, of course, Malibu School, which is one of my favourites: this year has undoubtedly been substantially different to the year you had planned or thought would occur. Regardless of what has happened throughout this year, all you students who are graduating this week, next week or even last week, can say you've made it to the end. Reaching the end of something means it's also the time for new beginnings and you are about to all start a new chapter in your life. Here's where your future begins. It's okay to still be deciding what your future looks like; there's plenty of time for that. What you do may change along the way and that's alright. You're on the cusp of your adult life and, as daunting as that may be, there's always a bright future ahead. Whatever you choose to do, whether you go to university or to TAFE or you get a job, just remember what this year has shown you—that through the struggles of COVID and restrictions on education, circumstances can change in an instant, so it's best to make the most of the opportunities while you have them. Good luck to all graduating students, to their families, and the teachers and staff of all the schools across the district who have helped them along their way. Best of luck for 2021 and congratulations on your achievement. Trade with China 79 10:09 Mr PASIN 240756 Barker Australia has a proud history as a trading nation. Whether it be primary production, mining or manufactured items, we've always punched above our weight, contributing to the high standard of living Australians enjoy. Free trade allows each nation to play to their strengths and specialise according to their competitive advantages. Basic economics tells us that, by producing more of what we're good at, we improve our productivity and competitiveness, and this of course drives improvement in living standards. Currently, we produce enough food for 75 million people, despite a population of around 26 million, so we export our produce to every corner of the world. Our iron ore and other minerals have allowed other nations the resources to industrialise, lifting millions out of poverty. Australia's bilateral relationship with China is an important one, worth $252 billion in two-way trade last year alone. Many producers in my electorate of Barker have benefited from China's demand for our premium produce. The China free trade agreement has been mutually beneficial, but the recent tariffs, restrictions and anti-Australian sentiment by China is extremely disappointing. The 80 per cent tariff placed on Australian barley has been followed by a 12 per cent tariff on beef and a tariff of up to 207 per cent on Australian wine. Many other industries have been affected, with Chinese importers of Australian goods being told by customs officials not to buy sugar, timber, coal, lobster and copper. The decision to impose a tariff of up to 207 per cent on Australian wine will likely wipe out the $1.2 billion worth of wine exports to China, while decisions around Australian lobster led to 20 tonnes of Australian lobster being stuck on the port at Shanghai's airport tarmac and created the type of uncertainty that's crushed that important industry. I feel for the many producers in my electorate whom I know are suffering because of these baseless decisions to target Australian goods through tariffs and restrictions. Our government has repeatedly put out an olive branch, but that's been met with silence and provocation. I can't be more profound in my condemnation of the recent tweet by the Chinese government, which was simply deplorable. The Chinese Communist Party recently published their 14 grievances against Australia that, if fixed, they say, would recover the relationship. These grievances are an attack on our liberal democracy, raising issues with our free press, the banning of Huawei on national security grounds, the reforms of our foreign investment schemes and also individual MPs' ability to speak out. I'm hopeful that in the future China will re-engage with us and resume our mutually beneficial relationship, but we can never compromise our sovereignty, even in the face of trade threats. Corio Electorate: Geelong 80 10:12 Mr MARLES HWQ Corio Geelong is defined by the beautiful bay on which we are located, after which my electorate is named: Corio Bay. For as long as I've been here, I've been advocating for a walking path from Eastern Park, Limeburners Point, through to Limeburners Lagoon on the northern side of Geelong and the Hovell Creek linear path. This would be a unique walkway which would be absolutely stunning in the context of our nation. It would give a fantastic depiction of Geelong and would be a place of recreation for people throughout our city. One of the features of that part of the path which exists right now, and it progresses around the bay, are the unique bollards which were first commissioned by the City of Greater Geelong from artist Jan Mitchell in 1995. These bollards depict famous people in Geelong's history and famous scenes. For example, there's a bollard of Matthew Flinders, who first climbed the You Yangs next to Geelong as he was surveying Australia back in 1802. There is a depiction of lifesavers at Eastern Beach, which is an iconic part of Geelong and is an area that I think should be on the National Heritage List. There is a bollard of Peter Lalor, who is famous, of course, for the Eureka Stockade, but, after that, he found sanctuary by living in Geelong. James Harrison, one of the first inventors of refrigeration, is perhaps Geelong's most noted citizen. He also established the Geelong Advertiser back in 1840. There's a bollard dedicated to him, as there is to a Koori hunter, and the list goes on. They are a fantastic part of the walk. With the Balmoral Quay apartments development next to Rippleside Park, which is halfway along the walk, we have seen the walk extended continuously from Eastern Park through to Mackey Street. There's a way to go to achieve my dream of getting it right around the bay to Limeburners Lagoon, but it is a significant part of the walk that has now been extended. Currently the bollards only go to Rippleside Park. It would be great—and I call on the City of Greater Geelong today—to extend the program of art with the unique bollards beyond Rippleside Park, past the Balmoral Quay apartments and right through to Mackey Street. It would provide an opportunity to celebrate more of Geelong's history and to make those bollards the critical feature of these paths. A starting point would be to have a bollard dedicated to Graham 'Polly' Farmer, the great footballer of Geelong's history, who played 101 games for Geelong, who revolutionised the way in which handball occurred and who died last year. It would be a great tribute to him, and it would be fantastic for Geelong's walk. Australian Training Awards 80 10:16 Mr PEARCE 282306 Braddon The North West, the West Coast and King Island are world class in so many areas. Our region is geographically dispersed and made up of hundreds of small towns, but those living in the electorate of Braddon have never considered this a barrier to achieving great things. This was highlighted yet again when it was recently announced that Moriarty's Caitlin Radford is this year's Australian Apprentice of the Year. Congratulations to Caitlin, a fifth-generation farmer, for being awarded this prestigious accolade. Caitlin has farming running in her veins, and it isn't surprising that she's chosen a life on the land—and she's doing it with distinction. Caitlin completed a Certificate III in Agriculture at TasTAFE and is now undertaking a Diploma of Agribusiness Management through TAFE. Speaking about her national recognition, Caitlin said that winning the award was an incredible honour and that to be a representative not only for agriculture but for young people and young women in agriculture was amazing. Caitlin hopes to share her experiences and encourages others across our region to gain a qualification in their chosen field. Caitlin currently share-farms with her 86-year-old grandfather, local farming legend Reuben Radford, and together they're combining decades of experience with Caitlin's youthful perspective, business knowledge and scientific studies. I know that we've got a bright future in agriculture in Tasmania and across the entire VET sector, with passionate young role models like Caitlin inspiring the next generation to achieve great things. I'm confident in saying that our region provides world-class training through our VET system. At the recent Australian Training Awards, the north-west coast of Tasmania had three nominations and placed first in two of them. Along with Caitlin's award, Fairbrother were awarded the Australian Apprenticeships Employer Award for their ongoing commitment to the training and development of their staff. Established in 1973, a small family owned and operated business on the North West, Fairbrother have steadily grown to become a world leader in building and construction. The company's commitment to training is world's best practice, from senior management down. This is a business that understands that their apprentice training is vital to the company's role and continued success. Fairbrother hired their first apprentice in 1974, and in 1996 the first female apprentice started. By 1998 they had 100 apprentices. By 2020, Fairbrother had trained 388 apprentices in carpentry and joinery. Congratulations to Caitlin, Fairbrother and all the other nominees across all categories in the Australian Training Awards this year. COVID-19: Mass Participation Sporting Events 81 10:19 Dr LEIGH BU8 Fenner In a usual year, there are 21,000 mass participation sporting events across Australia, including fun runs, ocean swims, community cycling events and challenging obstacle course races. They attract millions of participants, employ tens of thousands of people, raise tens of millions for charity and contribute more than a billion dollars to the economy. They keep us healthy and, most importantly, they're fun. We enter for the adrenaline and the medal, but it's the race experience and the friendships that keep us coming back for marathons, triathlons and Spartan events. COVID has savagely hit mass participation sporting events. Most events were cancelled, including the world's largest run, Sydney's City2Surf, the world's largest Olympic distance triathlon, Noosa Tri, and the world's second largest ultra trail run, UTA in the Blue Mountains. Cameron Hart, of Events Management Queensland, tells me that the cancellation of the Gold Coast Marathon and the Pan Pacific Masters Games saw massive regional economic impacts to the Gold Coast. Wayne Larden, who organises the Sydney Running Festival & Marathon, had to cancel this year's event, except for a special marathon on a 400-metre track for eight 'legends' of the event. Wayne points out that he'll have to roll over entries and sponsors to 2021, which will make next year a tough year for him too. Dave Beeche, of Ironman Oceania, told me that the Queensland government has been 'outstanding' in organising COVID-safe plans to allow two Queensland events to proceed, but he has still had to lay off 30 per cent of his workforce. As one athlete who completed Ironman Cairns told Dave, 'For a few days life felt relatively normal. I'm sure I speak on behalf of all the athletes lucky enough to be here.' Chris Heverin, of Spartan Australia & New Zealand, told me that he had to cancel nine of his 12 planned events in Australia and New Zealand, which means 40,000 participants miss out, as does their charity partner, the Leukaemia Foundation. Even now, event organisation is tough because of COVID restrictions. Cameron, Wayne, Dave, Chris and others this year formed the Australian Mass Participation Sporting Events Alliance. They're calling for a stimulus package from government to support an industry that has lost almost 100 per cent of its revenue this year. They're asking for the same kind of support that the Australian government has provided to the arts and music industries and that the New Zealand government has provided to mass participation sporting events. Mass participation sporting events keep us healthy, support the economy and charities and build community. If we want mass participation in sporting events to thrive, the government needs to give serious consideration to providing them with greater support. And I call on the sponsors of these events to show generosity as they support them in the year ahead. COVID-19: Country Shows 82 10:22 Mr RAMSEY HWS Grey Hot off the press! We all know that COVID-19 has created a lot of issues throughout Australia and particularly with country shows. In my electorate of Grey, not one of our country shows was able to operate this year. So I'm pretty happy to announce that 18 of them plus the Eyre Peninsula Field Day—which is a very big biennial event held on Eyre Peninsula; the other big field day in South Australia is held in the other second year on the York Peninsula—will receive $70,000 of assistance. Eighteen other shows will receive $1,500 to $15,000 to recognise the costs that they are incurring in their off year, if you like. Just because you're not actually operating the show doesn't mean to say that the bills are not still mounting up on building maintenance, electricity and administration costs. The government put in place a package to support these country shows so that they can be there for the next year. Next year, the Crystal Brook Show, which I think is the oldest operating show in my electorate—but somebody will probably get on the blower straight after I give this speech and tell me that I'm in error—will have been operating for 147 years. Obviously 2024 will be a really big year, as we go for 150. Through my lifetime I've seen a number of shows disappear. They don't seem to come back. But the ones that are left have all really focused on change and being able to adapt to a new world. People don't grow vegetables in their garden and exhibit them like we used to; we don't see home butchery; we don't see sausages and bacon made by farmers—all the things that I remember seeing when I was a young fellow. Those things are not happening so much anymore, and they're now more focused on the things that are relevant to the communities in which they live. Of course, the equestrian events are big; whereas the sheep pavilions are pretty scant on most occasions now because of the restrictions around biosecurity and whatever. Having said that, we've just seen a large shed built on the back of an investment from the Commonwealth government at the Jamestown Show, where there is a significant sheering competition and still a concentration on sheep. So each show is adapting to the environment in which they live. They're still a very important part of our local communities, and I feel a little sad for those that have passed them up. I don't think they can get them back. In every page, I will argue for the support that they need to continue their work in their communities, because they do bring communities together. They even bring the volunteer community together. In my hometown of Kimba, in fact, we have a grey nomad volunteer base of Queenslanders running the gate, and I've actually even met them on the gate in Kimba. BlazeAid, Turbans 4 Australia 82 10:25 Ms McBAIN 281988 Eden-Monaro The challenges of 2020 have highlighted the painful fragility of our human existence, and of our human structures and way of being. We must harness the fear and helplessness that comes with that and deliver solutions for our future. Inspired by the community leadership that has also been such a large part of 2020, I rise to celebrate and acknowledge the contribution of two groups whose empathy and can-do attitude has been a beacon for the values that take us forward. Many will be familiar with the work of BlazeAid. Since the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires, this army of volunteers has restored fences in paddocks wiped out by natural disaster. This year, in the mighty Eden-Monaro, BlazeAid has played a pivotal role in rebuilding after our Black Summer. We've played host to camps in Braidwood, Cobargo, Towamba, Bemboka, Tumbarumba, Adelong and Bombala. The Braidwood community farewelled BlazeAid last week. A total of 444 people pitched in, providing assistance worth an estimated $1.8 million to 265 properties. The numbers are just as impressive at all other camps. These volunteers come from all walks of life and from right around the world. Some 32 different countries were represented at Braidwood. They travelled to some of the most remote and isolated parts of Eden-Monaro to kickstart our recovery and renewal. On top of that, their presence and interest gave such a lift to people doing it tough. While the camps at Bombala, Bemboka and Braidwood have now closed, there is still much to do. Thank you to those who have given so freely of their time. We look forward to paying forward our contribution. I encourage anyone looking for hope or looking to make a contribution to volunteer at one of the remaining camps. Head to the BlazeAid website. As International Volunteer Day approaches, Turbans 4 Australia deserve a special mention. Turbans 4 Australia is a Sikh charity that helps anyone in need regardless of their race, religion and ethnicity. This band of good hearts and hands, which has a group based out of Queanbeyan, made meals and food hampers for visa holders left jobless and without government assistance in the darkest days of COVID-19. With bushfire smoke still in the air, they also travelled to the scarred communities of Eden-Monaro to cook meals, share their brand of mateship and deliver two semitrailer loads of water, groceries, toiletries and tools to help farmers. Now, with Christmas approaching, they are organising a toy run for families in the Bega Valley. Some of those who have benefited from the assistance offered by Turbans 4 Australia have returned to offer their own time and energy in the effort and to extend a helping hand. In an increasingly divided world, the work of these groups inspires us to be tolerant and inclusive. It's a contribution that inspires my work and, I hope, the work of the wider community as we all look to make the experiences of 2020 count in the future. Calare Electorate: Community Events 83 10:28 Mr GEE 261393 Calare Today I rise to acknowledge some of the wonderful people in my electorate doing great things and setting an example for their fellow Australians about what it means to be part of a local community. Canowindra is a town of just over 2,000 residents in the Central West of New South Wales. Locals in Canowindra have contributed in many ways to helping the community thrive and to bettering the lives of those living around them. Canowindra High School runs the Duke of Edinburgh program for students in years 9 to 12. This program has been running for several years and has recently been coordinated by former teacher Andrew Phelan and current teacher Janeen Coutanche. This extracurricular program takes an immense amount of organisation outside of school hours. Through the commitment and dedication of the many teachers involved, the students have experienced amazing heights, learned new skills such as leadership, archery and first aid, and have been actively involved in volunteering in their community. Alison Stephens, the current owner Canowindra Tyre Service, is also an incredibly valuable asset to Canowindra's community. Al is recognised as a successful businesswoman and is also heavily involved in both Canowindra Public School and Canowindra High School through the P&C. Al is significantly involved on many levels in local sporting organisations such as netball, junior rugby and the swimming club. Within this involvement she has become a mentor and role model. Kathleen Balcombe is a chemistry teacher at Canowindra High School and current year adviser of year 11. She's a fantastic teacher and another wonderful role model within the school community. Kath has raised her family in Canowindra and has been involved in the community for many years. She keeps her students' best interests at heart and encourages those of all abilities to participate within the school. An inspiring local, Andrew Pull, has been instrumental to the success of women's rugby league in the local area. The growth of women's rugby codes in recent years has been significant and has provided equality in local sporting communities. Well done, Andrew. Canowindra is a wonderful example of a rural community that, thanks to people like Andrew Phelan, Janeen Coutanche, Alison Stephens, Kath Balcombe and Andrew Pull, inspires young people to seize opportunities and gain knowledge and experience about the wider world. I'd like to finish by recognising Claire Wright, the year 11 student at Canowindra High School who wrote this constituency statement for me. Claire is a young champion of her local community and country Australia, and I have no doubt that she will go on to do great things in life for both Canowindra and our nation. I have been mentoring Claire this year, through Regional Development Australia Central West's TEN4TEN mentoring program, and I have been very impressed with the example that she sets for others. One of Claire's goals in life is to study science to help farmers with sustainability practices on their land. She is Canowindra High's girls captain for 2021 and is part of the next generation of inspiring country leaders. Well done, Claire, and a big hello to everyone at Canowindra High who may be watching us this morning. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 203092 I thank the member for Calare and, with the member for Dobell, I congratulate Claire for her contribution and hope she writes all your future speeches as well! Christmas Island: Phosphate Resources Ltd 83 10:31 Mr SNOWDON IJ4 Lingiari This evening on Christmas Island there will be a great celebration for the 30th anniversary of the establishment of Phosphate Resources Ltd's phosphate mine on Christmas Island. Phosphate mining commenced on Christmas Island in 1896, and, after a number of iterations, in 1981 an Australian government owned company, Phosphate Mining Company of Christmas Island, took over the mine. Then, sadly, in 1987 the then Labor government closed the mine, much to the chagrin and opposition of the Christmas Island community. The Union of Christmas Island Workers, led by the redoubtable Gordon Bennett and his union executive, as well as the wider community members, fought to have the mine reopened. Gordon was a revered, enigmatic and brilliant organiser, leader and communicator and a very good friend to many. Sadly, he is no longer with us. After a mighty campaign, including taking the Australian government to the Federal Court, in 1989 the government agreed that the mine could reopen. The UCIW led efforts to have the union and community members fund, as shareholders, a new company, Phosphate Resources. A joint venture was formed between the community, Christmas Island Phosphates and Clough Engineering. The mine reopened in September 1990 and remains in operation today. Since then, the mine has exported over 16 million tonnes of phosphate, created hundreds of jobs and paid hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes, royalties and dividends and many millions in community grants. It has won a national export award. Since its establishment it has seriously been the backbone of the Christmas Island economy and it continues today to be its mainstay. It has now developed a very successful diversified business and is active in many areas of the island economy. It is now looking for investment opportunities in infrastructure and tourism. The company has been built on strong social and environmental foundations, with a track record of supporting and working with the local community. The current managing director, Mr Lai Ah Hong, was one of the union members who, along with so many others from the community, put his own money in to get Phosphate Resources up and running. Lai is a good friend to many and a wonderful leader of the company. Other original shareholders maintain their stake in the company today. The success being celebrated on Christmas Island is testimony to the perseverance, hard work and sacrifice and underlying belief in the power of community engagement and action. Congratulations to Phosphate Resources. Congratulations to the Union of Christmas Island Workers, the workforce generally and the wider Christmas Island community. It's a great day for Christmas Island. Today it's a tribute to you all. Petrie Electorate: School Chaplains, Petrie Electorate: Youngcare 84 10:34 Mr HOWARTH 247742 Petrie As COVID-19 was unfolding around us earlier this year, the chaplains in my electorate of Petrie observed that anxiety levels amongst students in the schools were rising. In some cases mum and dad had both lost their jobs and were stressed about money. Parents were working from home and trying to do home schooling. TV news was gloom and doom. At school the teachers and other educators were stressed. Life was stressful all round, and it was contagious. I want to tell you a positive and proactive story from the chaplaincy program out of Hercules Road State School and Scarborough State School, where chappy Nathan Grady worked to develop 'Chappy TV', a fantastic online program to inject fun back into kids' lives. It delivered fortnightly as part of the school assembly, and it was something the students looked forward to. We know, developmentally, that children need fun to grow and relax. With this in mind, this chappy hosted online Lego master championships, dance competitions among the teachers and students, and joke sessions, found an adult-size school uniform and did funny skits promoting positive messages in a manner the children could engage with. 'It takes a village to raise a child' is an old African proverb, meaning that an entire community of people needs to wrap around the children to help them flourish in a safe and healthy way. I want to congratulate all the SU chaplains for the work they do and have done through this tough year, and I hope you will recharge for 2021. Today being International Day of People with Disability, I would like to take the time to celebrate the work being done by Youngcare and its CEO, Anthony Ryan, to see the ability in disability. Last week I visited a new unit development in North Lakes, where a revolutionary design concept is being built for people living with severe disability, where they can live safely and independently as part of their community. Anthony Ryan told me that there isn't a parent or carer who has visited the soon-to-be-completed site at North Lakes that hasn't cried with happiness within 10 minutes of being there. These people have been caring for a loved one but are ageing themselves and are fearful of not being able to continue that level of care. People like Brian, who acquired a severe brain injury after smoking a cigarette on annual leave overseas that was laced with China white; or Trina, a scientist, struck down in the prime of her life by a stroke. I was surprised at how bright, airy and well-appointed the units were. The attention to detail for people living with disability was impressive, and each room had an en suite and 24-hour care. The most important consideration for Youngcare is to make sure that these homes are situated near other community assets like shopping centres and schools. I commend Youngcare for the work they are doing. COVID-19: Travel Agents 84 10:37 Mrs PHILLIPS 147140 Gilmore COVID-19 has hit every industry in Australia hard, but some have suffered more than others and some have had more help than others. One of the first things to happen when the virus appeared was the closure of our international borders, for good reasons of course. This had a profound impact on our local travel agents. Not only did they lose all their incoming business, but they also lost the business they had already secured. Travel agents don't get paid until their client actually travels. When COVID-19 happened, travel agents weren't out of work. They had more work ahead of them than they had ever before. They just weren't going to be paid for it. They had to refund hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of their customers' travel—hours and hours of work that is still going on, but no income. It didn't take long before I started to be inundated with emails and calls from desperate travel agents asking for help. Back in June I visited Bronwyn and her team in Batemans Bay. Bronwyn had managed to keep her workers on with JobKeeper, but they were still struggling. They had all worked tirelessly to try to get their clients who were stuck overseas home. It was difficult and distressing work. And now their sole focus was on refunds. The story was the same everywhere I went. Jo from Ulladulla told me about the agonising undoing of cruise ship and tour bookings. Jo had done so well with her business and seen tremendous growth, but she said that now it would be easier if it wasn't so successful at all. Shane from Berry was working two other jobs while refunding customers and doing her utmost to keep her travel business open and support her community. A few weeks ago I met with three of Nowra's longest-running travel agents, Emma, Lindy and Jennie. Between them they have almost 100 years of experience in the travel industry, but they were struggling. They had processed more than $2 million in refunds. Bob from Gerringong has been a travel agent working in the travel industry for over 40 years. Bob told me he's never seen things this bad. I chatted with Suzanne from Kiama only this weekend. She wanted to know when help is coming. Leonie and Julie from Nowra were also asking this question: where is the targeted assistance? Things won't get better for agents until borders are opened, but, with JobKeeper being wound back, every one of these agents was questioning how they would survive. Sadly, many local travel agents have already gone out of business and workers have lost their jobs because help was nowhere to be seen until this week, until December. While I welcome the news that the government has finally started listening to the struggling travel agents, with one-off grants, why has it taken this long? Agents have had to beg to get any help at all. Thankyou to all the travel agents who shared their stories with me. You are all the reason we managed to finally secure this commitment from the government. Williams, Aunty Eileen 85 10:46 Mr VAN MANEN 188315 Forde I want to pay tribute to one of our significant elders in the Logan community, Aunty Eileen Williams, who, sadly, passed away on 27 September 2020. Aunty Eileen was a Yugambeh elder, a daughter, a sister, a mother, a grandmother, a teacher and a storyteller. We are lucky to have a record of Aunty Eileen's life shared through our Aunties and Uncles Digital Stories Project, supported by funding from this government's Your Communities Heritage Program and run by the Logan City Council. Born a descendant of Bilin Bilin, known as the King of Logan, Aunty Eileen's father was from Beaudesert and her mother grew up in Cherbourg. Aunty Eileen grew up at Mount Gravatt and Holland Park in Brisbane with her two sisters, Robyn and Loris, and her three brothers. Family was important to Aunty Eileen. Her sister Aunty Robyn Williams said they used to call themselves the 'black Brady Bunch'. Education was also a huge part of Aunty Eileen's life. Aunty Robyn said of his sister, 'The most important thing was that Mum and Dad wanted us to be educated, and that's the passion Eileen and I have.' At 38, Aunty Eileen went to university as a mature-age student and became a teacher. She remained involved in education for her whole life and used her skill of speaking the Yugambeh language to teach the language at local schools. Aunty Eileen was a founding member of the Beenleigh Housing and Development Company when it was formed in 1994. Following this, she was a board member until her work commitments as a teacher became too much and she took a step back. Aunty Eileen was always a strong advocate for her mob to find suitable housing. She was also involved with the language program Jinndi Mibunn. Just before she passed away, she was made a life member of the Beenleigh Housing and Development Company. Jinndi mibunn, or 'nest of the eagle', is the concept that underpins the work of the Beenleigh Housing and Development Company. The eagle's nest is a shelter for the vulnerable offspring. It is part of essential nourishment and protection. The Beenleigh Housing and Development Company's vision is related to mibunn, the eagle, that still graces the twin rivers of Logan. They say, 'We too survive with pride and success in a system that is both natural and Western.' Aunty Eileen played a vital role in the cultural education and nourishment of her community by playing an integral role in preserving traditional knowledge. She gifted something deeply important to the lives she touched: she gave them a connection to their history and their country; she lived with pride, giving others a sense of where they came from and who they are. I extend my deepest condolences to Aunty Eileen's family and all those who were fortunate to have known her during her wonderful life. International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women 86 10:43 Mr PERRETT HVP Moreton Last Wednesday was International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. It launched 16 days of activism that will conclude next week. I want to use my time today to talk about two Brisbane women. They didn't know each other. They lived in different suburbs—one amongst the green hills of Brookfield; the other in the leafy eastern suburbs. Both have three children and both have been murdered. Both have been murdered by a person who made a public vow to love and cherish them. Their murderers were their husbands. All of Australia was shocked in 2012 when Allison Baden-Clay was found dead under the Kholo Creek Bridge in Anstead, 10 days after being reported missing by her husband. That same man has since been convicted of Allison's murder and is in jail for that crime. We were shocked at the time and still are. In 2012, calls for government action to prevent other women being murdered were loud. Fast forward eight years, and the nation was again shocked and appalled when Hannah Clarke and her three young children were murdered on a suburban Brisbane Street by her husband, the children's father, earlier this year. Again the calls were loud for governments to do something—anything—that might make a difference and prevent women from being murdered. Sadly other women had been murdered in equally tragic circumstances in the intervening eight years, but Allison and Hannah's murders in particular received widespread publicity. Last week the Prime Minister said during his address to the Our Watch webinar to mark International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, 'as we seek to deal with this issue.' While the coalition government, now in its eighth year, has had plenty of time, nothing much of substance has changed. So far this year 48 women have died as a result of violence. This week I met with Allison Baden-Clay's cousin Julia McKenna. Julia lives in Moreton, and we spoke about the awful domestic violence and coercive control that Allison endured before she died. Julia and her fellow directors run Friends With Dignity, a volunteer based, not-for-profit that assists survivors of domestic violence nationwide. Allison and Hannah's tragic deaths have left lasting legacies. Their families and friends have each set up foundations to honour these remarkable women. They are ordinary people doing what they can to prevent other women being murdered, while the Morrison government 'seek to deal with the issue.' I have a private member's bill sitting in this parliament right now. It makes an amendment to the Family Law Act that has been called for by experts, academics and frontline workers for years. It could be done this year, but it takes political will—and it takes bravery, something that both Allison and Hannah had in spades. I call on the Morrison government to act during these 16 days of activism: bring on my private member's bill, debate it, vote on it and change the law. It won't fix everything. People will still be people. Some men and some women will still do the wrong thing. But this small step will save lives. Torrens, Mr Kevin, Grafton Clock Tower 86 10:46 Mr HOGAN 218019 Page I'd like to acknowledge the life of Uncle Kevin Torrens, an elder of the Western Bundjalung people from my community. Uncle Kevin was born in Casino in 1952, and he grew up in Tabulam. Since he was a child he has always loved being on the land and hunting for bush tucker. As a young adult Uncle Kevin was committed to developing educational opportunities for Indigenous and non-Indigenous people. He worked for over a decade at Balund-a in Tabulam, a pioneering program that aims to reduce reoffending and enhance the skills of people sent to the facility. He was a cultural mentor for residents and other colleagues. Balund-a has a tremendously positive impact on the lives of people spending time there as well as the families and communities that they return to. In the 1990s Uncle Kevin was asked by his father-in-law, Bernie Hickling, to get the ancestral lands of their people returned to them. The 800-hectare piece of land is known as Jubal, and through the Indigenous Land Corporation he worked tirelessly in developing the application for the lands to be returned to the traditional owners. Uncle Kevin passed away on 15 November this year. I extend my thoughts to his wife, Marjorie, and his children, Mary, Marilyn, Kelly, Gina, Wesley, Cindy and Leonard, and their families. He was very much loved by the whole community and will be greatly missed. In the heart of Grafton stands an iconic Grafton clock tower. It's a landmark that we all love, and it's nearly as famous as our Jacarandas. In 1908 the Grafton Municipal Council were preparing to celebrate the town's 50-year jubilee, and they set up a committee to organise and oversee the celebrations. The mayor encouraged suggestions to find a suitable memorial to the occasion, and it was announced that a town clock tower would be constructed as the memorial. The council voted that 400 pounds should be expended from council funds on the celebrations, and the major part of that was to be for the construction of a suitable clock was tower for the city. It was built by Jacob Walter and officially unveiled in July 1909. It rises to a height of 42 feet from ground level and is on a solid concrete foundation, which is 18-inches thick. It has played a very important part in Grafton's history, with locals using the clock tower's time as their main reference point to the time. Real estate agents use adverts like 'Charming three-bedroom house only 500 yards from the clock tower.' The 111-year-old icon has played an important part in special events too. In 1953 it was decorated with flags, bunting and a huge crown for the street parade in celebration of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Nowadays it wears a crown of lights every year for the Jacaranda Festival. This is an important local landmark, and it is great to recognise it here in parliament. Ipswich Show: Thomas, Mr David (Rusty) 87 10:49 Mr NEUMANN HVO Blair Previously, the Ipswich Show had been cancelled only twice before—both times during World War II and World War I—but, sadly, this year it was cancelled. While the show is not run to make a profit, it contributes more than $1 million to the Ipswich economy every year. In my electorate, there are seven agricultural and rural shows, and I am pleased to support all of them. Next year will be the first Ipswich Show in 55 years without David Thomas, widely known as Rusty. Rusty was the president of the Ipswich Show Society. Sadly, he passed away suddenly last month, aged 76 years of age. Rusty had been involved in the Ipswich Show since 1966. He was a larger than life, colourful character and a true showman. His company, Kay-Dee Promotions, provided rides and sideshow attractions to agricultural shows right across Queensland. The 2020 show was meant to showcase the new upgrades to the indoor sports centre and an extension to the exhibits pavilion at the Ipswich Showgrounds. The work was modernising the facility and increasing the floor space by 40 per cent, providing greater capacity as an evacuation centre. The showgrounds is the major evacuation centre in the region and provided an evacuation centre in 2011 and 2013. These upgrades are part of a larger upgrade which received $8.9 million in federal government funding. Once completed, the showgrounds will be home to a world-class convention and exhibition centre. Importantly, it will be able to provide accommodation for 300 people as an evacuation centre, with bathrooms and showers and kitchen and sleeping facilities. Rusty was passionate about the project. He was very much a salt-of-the-earth character and was never afraid to lobby all levels of government. Rusty understood that there was more work to be done around the city as a whole, and one of those things was the Ipswich to Springfield rail line, which, once built, would benefit the Ipswich Showgrounds and the Show Society. The proposal would connect Ipswich and Springfield via Ripley. Ipswich's population is expected to grow from 230,000 to 558,000 people by 2041, with 70 per cent of that growth in the corridor between Ipswich and Springfield. The proposal would provide a passenger station right behind the showgrounds and the University of Southern Queensland Ipswich campus—a vital public transport corridor—and reduce congestion on the roads. The Queensland government has contributed $1 million towards the $2.5 million business case required, and I'm calling on the Morrison government to match it. This would provide opportunities for growth and jobs in the region—and it would be a great legacy for Rusty Thomas. My sincere condolences to his wife Kay and his three children and grandchildren and to the Ipswich Show Society and vice-president and good mate Darren Zanow. Vale Rusty. International Day of People with Disability 87 10:52 Mr WALLACE 265967 Fisher Today, 3 December 2020, is International Day of People with Disability, and events have been planned all around the country to celebrate this. In my speech this morning I thought I would try to touch the hearts of some people around Australia who, no doubt, right now are receiving word that their child—their child to be or they may already have a child—has a disability. In February or March of 2002, my wife and I were just those people. I remember very, very well getting the 10-week scan, the doctor looking very concerned, getting referred to a specialist and then being told that it's unlikely that you are going to bring home a child—and I remember the fear and the trepidation that that caused. I wanted to say to anybody who is in that environment right now, whether you are grandparents, aunts and uncles or of course the parents who are receiving that news, that—whilst of course I'm not making any judgements about people—where there's life there's hope. It's very difficult to raise a child with disabilities but, speaking from experience, Sarah, who was born with a lot of problems and has had over 50 operations—has brought us a lot of joy. She graduated from year 12 a couple of weeks ago. She is a national multiclass swimmer and she is my inspiration. So for any families out there that are facing this right now, children with disabilities bring so much joy to families. I just want to say to families now that may be experiencing this: you are not alone. There are so many different organisations and groups out there that will help you get through this. It's tough, it's hard and it's not fair. There will be a loss of tears, there will be a lot of anger, but your community, your fellow Australians, will wrap our arms around you and we will support you through this. For all those who are living with a disability: your government—and it doesn't matter whether it is us or Labor—and your state governments will do what we can to support you, and God bless. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 203092 I thank the member for Fisher for that speech, which I'm sure was appreciated by all members. Economy 88 10:56 Ms SWANSON 264170 Paterson I think that wanting something better for our children is actually evolution in action. At the moment, our children are facing an uncertain future and, possibly, greater hurdles than anyone has ever faced in the past in their financial future, their work future and their educational future. If we wind the clock back to March, we learnt that young people filled 15 per cent of all jobs and, at the time, this seemed promising. At the time, the government was quick to claim the credit yet since March 40 per cent of all jobs lost have been of those young Australians aged between 14 and 24. The government has paraded its subsidy for businesses that incentivises turning out old staff for new, which doesn't really seem to create new jobs but just seems to suggest the idea of it. The road to recovery isn't to pit old people against young people. Parents in my electorate want to trust that their children will be afforded better, if not comparable, opportunities to what they had. As I said a moment ago, that is evolution in action. We all want something better for our kids. Even if we don't have children, we accept the notion that we want progress, that we want the world to be a better place for those who are coming after us than perhaps we achieved. On one hand, the government wants to spruik about how it is going to create jobs for young Australians but then, on the other hand, it wants to stop the superannuation guarantee being raised to 12 per cent. This is just nonsensical to me. We know from ATO data midyear that young Australians between the ages of 18 and 30 have pulled $3 billion—with a 'bill'—from superannuation. In many cases, whole accounts have been drained and closed. How are we going to protect this next generation of Australians from unemployment and generational poverty? The government's apparent plan for young Australians does seem to be a bit of an afterthought. First you leave them with no option but to raid their retirement income savings and then you try to avoid them getting an increase in their super guarantee; it really makes no sense. We know that universal superannuation is the one thing that helps protect all Australians, particularly if we can encourage young Australians to get involved early with their super, to make contributions, to value that super. How many times do you meet older Australians who say 'I wish I had invested more in super when I was younger'? We have to encourage people to do that. (Time expired) Go Local First Campaign 88 10:59 Mrs MARINO HWP Forrest The government has launched, as we know, the Go Local First campaign. That's really all about helping the economic recovery post COVID. There's nothing better that any Australian can do than choose to buy from a local small business this Christmas. No matter where they are in your communities, please support your local small businesses. If you buy and sell locally, you keep local jobs. That's what I think all of us in this place are supportive of. We all know those small and family businesses are the backbone of our economies and the backbone of our small communities. They contribute a third of Australia's GDP and almost half of the workforce. The wonderful thing in my part of the world, and, I think, in everybody's part of the world, is that these small family businesses often offer our children and young people their first job, and, when we're very mature—that's a really nice word!—they often offer us our last job. They're always there in our community, as we saw during COVID. It was small local businesses and local people looking after other local people and making sure they had the items they needed during COVID. Please not only do that but, if you're going to buy a gift of wine this year or consume some wine—in the right way, of course—make sure it is an Australian wine. It's a great gift. In my part of the world, the south-west of Western Australia, some of our wines—like wines from many parts of Australia—are some of the best in the world. So I really encourage people to buy Australian wine. I want to thank local businesses that stayed open and provided key services during COVID. It was a great challenge, but they did so. It was local people, as I said, looking after local people. So please support these same small businesses now when you're doing your Christmas shopping. Go back to them and say, 'I need to buy from you.' Quickly I want to thank our farmers and transport workers who, during COVID, made sure that the food was on the shelves, even if there were some logistical challenges that we saw with some of the panic buying. Our transport workers and farmers just kept making sure that the food and the supports were there. Finally I want to really thank all Australians for their patience, for their courage and for their kindness to each other during what has been a challenging year. We've seen that kindness repeatedly in each of our communities. Can I ask every Australian to stay safe on the roads. We have got more people on our roads now than ever, and we will see that accelerated so much during the Christmas period. Give yourself plenty of time. Keep your lights on. Make sure the trucks can see you. Stay safe online. Have a happy Christmas and a great 2021. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 203092 In accordance with standing order 193, the time for members' constituency statements has concluded. MOTIONS 89 MOTIONS National Apology to Victims and Survivors of Institutional Child Sexual Abuse 89 11:02 Mr MARLES HWQ Corio When I was preselected for the electorate of Corio, one of the first people who reached out to me was Leonie Sheedy, who was the convener and one of the founders of Care Leavers Australasia Network, a group that represented and provided advocacy on behalf of those who had grown up in orphanages. She made clear to me that I had a particular responsibility, representing the community of Geelong, to be engaged in the issues facing those who had grown up in orphanages—something like half a million Australians, a number which staggered me. The reason she said I had a particular responsibility was that Geelong had had a greater number of orphanages within it than any other city in Australia outside a capital, which, to put it another way, meant that there were probably a greater number of people who had grown up in orphanages living in my electorate than perhaps any other in the country. So, from the very first day of my being in this place, this is a journey that I have followed, from the Senate report that I mentioned through to the first of the national apologies, which was given by Prime Minister Rudd on 16 November 2009. The then Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, Jenny Macklin, was a critical part of seeing that apology be given. I worked very closely with the member for Blaxland and the member for Swan in seeing that apology come to fruition. All of us have been patrons of CLAN ever since. A number of others in this place, such as the former senator from Queensland, Clare Moore, the member for Kingston and indeed the member for Maribyrnong, who is here with us now, have also been active in advocating on behalf of CLAN and their issues. I remember that apology very clearly. It was a moment of enormous relief—a sense of relief that thousands of people around the country had, that there was a belief in the stories of their childhood that they were telling in a way that that belief had never been given before. But there was also an astonishing amount of pain—a sea of pain really—which you could see on the faces of so many on that day. The sheer scale of what had been and what this meant was put on graphic display in that first apology, as it was, that was delivered two years ago—and I do note the presence in the chamber at the moment of the member for Maribyrnong, who was part of the apology that we are speaking of today. From there, there was, of course, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which was instituted by the Gillard government and remains, I think, one of the great achievements of the Gillard government. It allowed in a granular way people to tell their own particular stories and for them to be heard by the state, by our nation, and for that to materialise into something that was both a record of what had occurred but was also practical in terms of what should happen going forward. Perhaps the most significant piece of policy which came out of that was the Redress Scheme, which I was amazed came to fruition. It's a wonderful piece of policy, commenced on 1 July 2018—and, in that sense, is a credit to governments of both persuasions—but it remains inadequate. That's an important point to note: it does remain inadequate in terms of the level of compensation that it offers but also the speed with which people are able to access it. What became clear to me at that time was that the symbolism of this story, of this journey, as important as it is, only has meaning if it is matched by action, and there is much more action that needs to be done beyond redress. For example, we do need to have particular measures in respect of aged care for those people who started their lives growing up in institutional care. Last Saturday week I had the pleasure of being the guest speaker at the annual general meeting of the Care Leavers Australasia Network, which took place in Geelong in what will be the Australian Orphanage Museum, a premises that has come into the possession of CLAN but really on behalf of the nation, to establish the museum in that place. The museum itself was an important step in the process because. For those who have grown up in orphanages who don't have family with whom they can commune throughout their lives, who can be a touchstone of their youth, a museum, a place they can visit where they can see things that are familiar to their youth, good and bad, is a really important measure in terms of being able to ground their adult life. So there is an enormous desire amongst this community to have an orphanage museum for them but also to help tell their story to the rest of the nation. One of the things that has come through dramatically in my working with CLAN is the strength of the survivors—people like Vlad Selakovic, who is in my electorate, Leonie Sheedy and Joanna Penglase who helped establish CLAN. Leonie has taken the time throughout her life to listen to the individual stories of literally hundreds upon hundreds of people who have survived. To immerse oneself in that sea of pain in the way in which Leonie does is an act of enormous courage and selflessness. She's a saint and a national treasure, and I really want to acknowledge her today. Whilst acknowledging what more needs to be done, this is also a moment to just remember what has been achieved. That apology back in November 2009 was to the forgotten Australians. That's a term those who grew up in orphanages don't like to use anymore, because there is a sense now that their story is not forgotten anymore; their story is part of the national story. That has changed our history and it has changed our perception of who we are as a country and what our journey has been. Finally, I want to remember one person in particular, and that's Anthony Sheedy. Anthony, at the age of two, was put into an orphanage and spent his youth growing up in a series of orphanages, including one in Geelong. He thought he was an orphan. He literally thought he didn't have parents. When he was 12, miraculously, his parents came and visited him. Imagine that. They spent the day with him. He might have thought on that day that they were going to take him home. They didn't. They left him there that night and he didn't see them again. It's an incredible interaction and I can't imagine what that was like for a 12-year-old. He was physically and sexually abused repeatedly throughout his time in orphanages. At the age of 15, he was put in handcuffs and taken to an orphanage in Bendigo. His adult life was one of misery. He took solace in alcohol. He drifted between boarding houses. At the age of 60, he was discovered by his sister, Leonie Sheedy. He volunteered in my office in the last nine years of his life, where he did achieve some sense of happiness. The person I met was somebody who was cheery and cheeky. He loved Frank Sinatra and a loved the Cats. He was at the apology in November 2009. I remember him on that day. When he died suddenly of a heart attack in 2011, in his effects was a letter which would have begun the process of getting redress. That never occurred, and it's a reminder that we need to get redress now for all those who are out there so that no more miss out. (Time expired) COMMITTEES 90 COMMITTEES National Disability Insurance Scheme Joint Committee 90 Report 90 11:12 Mr SHORTEN 00ATG Maribyrnong It is fitting that we are discussing the Joint Standing Committee on the NDIS's final report on planning on this day. Today is the International Day of People with a Disability, an annual event which was started in 1992 by the United Nations. It's a day which is about promoting the dignity, the wellbeing and the rights of people with disability, and awareness. I said earlier, at an event in the Mural Hall, that there is much that we can celebrate about disability in Australia, and that includes the formation and creation of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. But we can't merely assume that, because the NDIS has been created, that is sufficient in and of itself. It is not. I take issue with the coalition's management of disability in the Labor-created National Disability Insurance Scheme across a range of areas. It is a great achievement. I want us to be the best in the world at disability, and the NDIS should be the best scheme in the world and proof of Australian exceptionalism. People with disability have been making the best of the NDIS that they possibly can. It was the result of a grassroots campaign by those in the Australian disability movement and their carers and the people who love them. It was a demand for a greater slice of resources and, indeed, of power. In the last number of years, disability has continued to further emerge from the shadows of invisibility. So, today, there is much to support, but more can be done. We have to take stock today—and this report is also an opportunity—of the unfinished business that remains to improve the lives of people with disability. One in five Australians reports as having a disability. The situation isn't as good as it should be. There are the deaths of NDIS participants by neglect in their own homes, and that is not good enough. Treating the NDIS as an automatic teller machine and ripping billions out of the scheme is not good enough. The failure to properly listen and consult with the disability community about the proposed rollout of independent assessments is not good enough. Omitting people with disability entirely from COVID-19 planning is not good enough. Australians with disability being, in the words of the royal commission, '"neglected" and "left feeling invisible and ignored" during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic' is not good enough. The management of plans by the NDIS within the NDIS, my focus today, is not good enough. Might I just pause, though, as I say that on these fundamental issues the government's performance is not good enough. I should acknowledge members of the Joint Standing Committee on the NDIS from both the government and the opposition. Those individuals are taking their responsibility as legislators rather than servants of the executive very conscientiously. With 42 recommendations for improvement on plans, this report is a good report which puts the executive of the government on notice from all sides of the parliament of Australia that the NDIS's plan administration is not good enough at this point. The report states, correctly, that 'planning, when it works, changes lives for the better', but it also confirms what has been felt by too many of the 400,000 and their families in the scheme, that the planning process is broken. Under the current Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, Stuart Robert, the NDIS, which has had $4.6 billion ripped out of it, is too dysfunctional and too chaotic on too many occasions. Plans and planning are no exception. I make no criticism of many of the staff of the National Disability Insurance Agency—they're conscientious—but the sum of the parts which is the National Disability Insurance Agency is less than the contribution of everyone in the world of disability. Something is not working. There is a pathology of maladministration, of chaos, and that is seen all too often in plans. Planning is the process which defines a person's relationship and life on the NDIS. Once someone is granted access to the scheme, a planner decides how much funding is needed for the person to live a life of choice and control as set out in their goals. This 319-page report finalises evidence gathered over 18 months since the inquiry was established in July 2019. It makes no fewer than 42 recommendations following the publication of 157 submissions to the inquiry from individuals and organisations. It echoes the findings of the 2019 review of the NDIS Act and Rules by David Tune AO PSM. Mr Tune concluded: Consultation feedback suggests the NDIA is not making consistent decisions during planning. Some participants with similar disability support needs reported they received very different types and values of supports in their plans, where the differences did not appear to be linked to their goals and aspirations or their informal supports. This was particularly evident in cases of young siblings with the same disability and similar levels of functional capacity. Planning determines the support provided under the scheme. It determines the quality of life for those profoundly impaired Australians who rely upon the NDIS. Their life is effectively in the hands of a planner making these momentous decisions. One submission to the report stated: Planning determines so many things about my life and NDIS has absolutely control. This can never not be terrifying for anybody who is severely disabled. The consequences of the dysfunctional planning process have been well documented. Who can forget the story of brothers Jordan and Logan Weir? They suffer exactly the same rare genetic condition, but one of them received $100,000 more in support than the other. It's a tough thing for Labor to have to watch on as the world-class and vital NDIS is left to fall into levels of disrepair after seven years of government absentee management. The planning report details these issues, including that in some cases planners listed a person's disability incorrectly or incorrectly reported the goals or what other support was available to them. Planners were sometimes unaware of participants' disabilities and relying on internet search engines for their information—NDIS by Google! Planners may be ignoring or changing expert recommendations provided by treating allied health practitioners about the supports which are appropriate for the particular participant who they have been treating for years. The NDIS Minister Robert has responded to the inquiry's report by spruiking the government's latest reforms. The reality is that the reforms so far announced are based on shaky evidence and do not necessarily promise a fix for the problems with consistency and fairness in planning that are outlined and required by this report. Most significant of these, independent assessments have sparked outrage, anxiety and fear amongst participants when they were blindsided by the surprise announcement in September. Only last week did a little bit of the pressure start to bleed out, when the government backflipped on the announcement to introduce them from the start of 2021, to defer implementation until the midyear. The pressure is mounting on the government but the fight is not over. It is understandable that vulnerable Australians have trust issues with a government that unleashed the $1.2 billion unlawful robodebt scandal on 400,000 vulnerable Australians who relied on the social security safety net. Many fear that the government is really using independent assessments to lower the bottom line of the NDIS by controlling eligibility and plan size. This is a familiar tune from a government who went after the vulnerable on robodebt. The government has also failed to test independent assessments in the planning process. They had a pilot of 500 people, self-selecting, opt in of only some disabilities, and only 140 replied to the survey on the pilot, and only 100 of the 140 liked it. This government is rushing to change a system based upon the reports of a self-selecting sample of 100 out of 400,000. This report is a valuable addition to the knowledge of the government. It is a valuable contribution. This report, in my opinion, shows that the parliament can work. What we see on the committee are legislators, regardless of their political affiliations, thinking about the parliament and its responsibilities to the parliament rather than simply going cap in hand, meekly serving the executive. The recommendations on planning are good recommendations. They do deserve serious consultation and listening. Today, International Day of People with Disability, is a fine day to restart the process of reform, but reform based on that eternal principle of the disability movement—'nothing about us without us'. 11:22 Ms TEMPLEMAN 181810 Macquarie I am very pleased to speak on the report by the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme, and I commend the work that they're doing in a bipartisan way to address the significant issues that people are facing with the scheme. When it's working, the NDIS is working really well. When it's not, it is taking an horrific toll on people—participants and carers alike. I do note that a bit over a decade ago we wouldn't have been having these sorts of discussions, because the NDIS didn't exist. Its existence does give us hope that we can make things better, not just for some people with a disability but for every person with a disability. I want to preface my remarks on the report today by acknowledging that it is the International Day of People With Disability, and that is really a day about 20 per cent of the population, because one in five Australians identify as having a disability. The theme of this year's Day of People with Disability is 'build back better'. Having just come from the morning tea in Parliament House organised by the shadow disability minister, Bill Shorten, and by the chair of the committee on whose report we are speaking today, Kevin Andrews, it was really terrific to be able to acknowledge the contribution that people with a disability and their carers make, the role they have, the respect they deserve and the dignity that they should be receiving. I think this report does go to that ensuring that people are treated with dignity as we, hopefully, build back better from what we have seen in 2020. At the event, the point was made that things did get tougher for people with disabilities and their carers during COVID, but Canberra disability advocate Dougie Herd actually voiced thoughts in the room when he said that the restrictions that we had experienced during COVID were something that many people with a disability routinely experience—the separation, the restriction of lifestyle—which is why it is so important that we do heed the words of the theme of this year's International Day of People With Disability and do strive to build back better. What the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability raised about the serious failure of the government to consult with the disability community during COVID-19 and their response to it gives us even more reason to address those concerns. The commission found that there was a lack of consideration for people with a disability, including the absence of a plan for testing and the availability and delivery of personal protective equipment to them and their support staff. They recognised how much extreme stress that, among a whole lot of other issues, caused people. It's very clear: people with a disability don't want things to go back to where they were pre-COVID. They want and they deserve things to be better, and that's what this report is about. It's about looking at where the NDIS has come from, where it is now, the problems that it has, the things that are broken within it—the things that are simply not working for far too many people. The evidence given to the inquiry matches much of what I hear in my own electorate of Macquarie. I'm told that my office continues to be one of the most active in raising issues with the National Disability Insurance Agency. That's because not only do I have a deep commitment to making sure the NDIS works; my team has that commitment. Kim in particular in my office is the person that people speak to first about the problems they're facing, and she hears firsthand the distress and the experiences that they're going through. We don't want to get those phone calls. We want to make sure that everybody is experiencing the NDIS the way it was intended—as a just and fair process, where they're treated with respect and dignity. The key theme of this report is around planning, and I have to say that that is one of the biggest issues that is raised with us. In a survey that I've commenced to identify what people are finding are the biggest issues right now, to which I've had dozens and dozens of responses, planning is right up there. I'm seeing people at breaking point. In the lead-up to their plans or their child's plan being redetermined, they are beside themselves trying to get together the paperwork and the documentation. Then they're asked for more documentation. This matches the evidence that this inquiry heard, and it matches some of the recommendations that have been made. I welcome the 42 recommendations in this report, plus the 14 from the interim report. The number of recommendations from a bipartisan committee shows that there are serious things to be addressed. One of the other things that is touched on—and I know there will be more work for the committee to do on this—is independent assessments. My survey certainly shows that that is one of the greatest fears for the future that people have. There's been very poor consultation about it, and people have genuine concerns that the whole purpose of independent assessments is to reduce the amount of funding that they receive as a participant or that their child receives as a participant. They think it's going to be about taking away supports, and nothing they have been told has reassured them otherwise. They wonder how a conversation of between one and maybe four hours with one person they've never met before is going to paint the full picture of what they or their child needs and why the reports that they have been used to getting aren't sufficient evidence to show what their needs are. I want to come to some of the recommendations. This inquiry and the report of the committee touched on so many issues. There's the inconsistency of plans. You only need to have two mums talking together about their children, each with different but not dissimilar needs, to see that there is massive inconsistency. What worries me the most, in some ways, is not the conversations I'm having with mums; it's the mums who aren't talking to me, the mums who have just walked away from the National Disability Insurance Scheme because it's too hard to navigate. I hope that the government will consider implementing some of these recommendations—in fact all of them—so that that doesn't occur. Planner errors come up time and time again—simple things like the form having the wrong disability articulated on it. I get that planners have huge workloads. The workforce issue is another key area to be looked at, and I note that the committee is aware of that. Planners who go above and beyond are delivering terrific plans to children and adult participants in the scheme. But one of the things we've seen, for instance during COVID, is the concern that because money couldn't be spent during COVID that unspent money is going to be taken away. It really doesn't matter how often governments say that won't happen. When your review date comes up, when your plan is up for review, you don't have any transparency about why the decisions are being made. You don't always get reasons why a particular decision on a previous support is being taken away, even when it's been recommended. It's clear that planners don't all understand every disability. How could they? How could planners understand every single disability? One of the recommendations is around having planners who are specialised in a number of ways around specific disabilities, but also specialised to help participants who have been hospitalised who are being transitioned out. That requires a different level of knowledge and understanding. One of the things that I think will be really welcomed, and I urge the government to adopt this recommendation, is that where planners are rejecting the advice of a medical professional, and when the plan doesn't reflect that expert advice developed specifically for that participant, that the NDIA is required to provide written reasons for this decision at least one week prior to any joint planning meeting. That gives the participant and their advocates and supporters time to digest and get their head around it. I have constituents who talk to me about feeling they were smashed in their planning meeting because they were just blindsided by some of the decisions that were made. The recommendation No. 1 that participants and their nominees receive a draft plan at least one week prior to their meeting—how can that not be happening already? It's just a disgrace. I really welcome these recommendations, but it is up to the government to implement them. That's the key. We need to see a government that doesn't just talk about its commitment to the NDIS, but demonstrates it. This provides a way for them to show they do actually care. 11:32 Ms COKER 263547 Corangamite I rise to speak on the NDIS planning report tabled on Tuesday by the parliamentary Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme. I am proud to sit on that committee and I'm proud of this report. I would like to thank the chair, the deputy chair and the rest of the committee membership for their efforts and collegiality through this and other inquiries. I'd also like to thank the committee secretariat, who do a fantastic job keeping us all on track. Finally, I would like to recognise that ferocious advocate for the NDIS, the member for Maribyrnong, Bill Shorten. The shadow minister for NDIS and government services has made the health and wellbeing of Australians the focus of his considerable energy and formidable skill through his entire career. He was instrumental in the creation of the NDIS. It will come as little shock to anyone in this chamber that he worked closely and tirelessly with the committee members to best represent the interests of NDIS participants and stakeholders. In this report the committee scrutinised the planning process of the NDIS. Planning is a defining process in the life of an NDIS participant. When someone is granted access to the scheme, a planner decides how much funding is needed for the participant to live a normal life as set out in their goals. The report accurately notes that planning, when it works well, changes lives for the better. The report also confirms what my constituents tell me every day: the planning process is broken. The 319-page report finalises evidence gathered over the course of 18 months since the inquiry was established in July 2019. It makes 42 recommendations about the planning process, following the publication of 157 submissions to the inquiry from individuals and organisations. The evidence in this report supports the findings of the 2019 review of the NDIS Act and rules by David Tune AO. The findings of that review state: Consultation feedback suggests the NDIA is not making consistent decisions during planning. Some participants with similar disability support needs reported they received very different types and values of supports in their plans, where the differences did not appear to be linked to their goals and aspirations or their informal supports. This was particularly evident in cases of young siblings with the same disability and similar levels of functional capacity. Planning defines the support people need, and supports inform the quality of life people with disability receive. Nothing could be more central. As one submission stated: Planning determines so many things about my life and the NDIS has absolute control. This can never not be terrifying for anybody who is severely disabled Like cases should be treated alike. This is a fundamental principle of justice. There have been a number of public failures against this objective, like the Weir brothers, who suffer exactly the same genetic condition but receive drastically different levels of support. This is unacceptable. The planning report details aggravating issues, including, in some cases, planners listing people's disabilities incorrectly or incorrectly recording their goals or what other supports were available to them. Planners were sometimes unaware of participants' disabilities and were relying on internet search engines for their information. Planners may be ignoring or changing expert recommendations provided by allied health practitioners about the support that is appropriate for a given participant. It is gut-wrenching to watch as the world-beating scheme established by the Gillard government earns a reputation for inconsistency and dysfunction. Minister Roberts's response to this report has been predictably lacklustre. The reality is that the reforms the minister is now relying on to fix these issues are simply not up to the task. The most significant of these independent assessments sparked outrage among participants and the sector when they were blindsided by the surprise announcement in September. This report highlights the forthcoming inclusion of independent assessments within the general issues report which the committee hopes to table before the end of the year. On page 139, the report states: The committee also holds concerns about the compulsory nature of independent assessments, especially where an expert who has worked with a participant over a longer period of time may be better placed to make recommendations to benefit a participant. The committee will address broader concerns related to the independent functional assessments further in its forthcoming report into general issues around the implementation and performance of the NDIS. I hope the general issues report can succeed where the government has failed and properly engage with the disability community on independent assessments. The proposed independent functional assessments are causing great fear and anxiety. The government must pause the rollout of independent assessments and engage in real consultation with NDIS participants and the workforce. Now, it is important that we recognise that there are challenges to delivering the scheme fairly and consistently. This is why this report on planning is so important. Inconsistency is a problem, and the Labor Party stands ready to work collaboratively with the government to find solutions. But ramming through independent assessments with little community consultation is not the answer. The issue is that the government's chosen path to solving this problem is more harmful than the problem. Even though there has been a voluntary pilot program, we don't know much about it. We don't know much about it because evaluation and evaluation reporting has been weak and deficient. This is unacceptable. Even though extensive consultations have been undertaken on other areas of policy change following the Tune review, consultation on independent assessments has been near to non-existent. Even though there have been serious concerns raised by very many, including the Australian Association of Psychologists, Every Australian Counts, People with Disability Australia, Women With Disabilities Australia, the Rights Information and Advocacy Centre, and Synapse, the government has chosen regulation over legislation on independent assessments in order to avoid scrutiny. It does not surprise me that organisations have expressed serious concern with the government's plan. Every day in my electorate I speak with people who have been mistreated as a result of this government's fixation on cutting the cost of disability support across the country. Rachel, a disability advocate in Geelong, told me it is shameful the NDIA has not consulted people with disabilities. She said that, if they had, they would hear what Rachel was hearing: anxiety, fear, and distrust. She said, 'Participants turn to our organisation feeling traumatised after receiving a robotic letter stating they have 28 days to provide more evidence of their disability, or they will be removed from the scheme. Participants fear independent assessments will be even worse.' Rachel said the NDIS is supposed to be about choice and control, but this process is taking all the control away. This is not the person-centred NDIA that we all fought for. This is heartbreaking, and it is heartbreakingly familiar. In my electorate of Corangamite, I've formed an NDIS reference group to help me in my work on the NDIS joint parliamentary standing committee. The group includes advocates, carers, members of the workforce and participants. And their message is clear: they fiercely oppose independent assessments. Now, the Morrison government needs to immediately pause the rollout of independent assessments and engage in genuine transparent consultation with the sector. We need to build a pathway to meeting the challenges of inconsistency that isn't more poison than antidote. Unsurprisingly, this government does not hold the trust of NDIS participants. Since 2013, the coalition has viewed the scheme primarily as an expenditure line. What the government appears to really be chasing with independent assessments is its bottom line, by controlling eligibility and plan size. This is a familiar tune with a government that last year ripped $4.6 billion out of the scheme. This government is failing to run the NDIS, because it very often puts cash before care. Labor stands for choice and empowerment for NDIS participants in the workforce. The very first step in that commitment is an open conversation about how the system works, not ramming through a flawed process without compassion and care for those the scheme should serve. Let me make my position crystal clear: I do support the NDIS, Labor supports the NDIS, but, on this International Day of People with Disability, there is so much work to be done to ensure the scheme best serves its participants. And I do question if the Morrison government is up for this task. I urge the government to act on every one of these recommendations, and I hope they do. Thank you. 11:42 Mr CRAIG KELLY 99931 Hughes I move: That the debate be adjourned. Question agreed to. Debate adjourned. ADJOURNMENT 95 ADJOURNMENT COVID-19: Northern Territory 95 11:42 Mr GOSLING 245392 Solomon I want to pay tribute to the people of Darwin, Palmerston and the greater Darwin area. Their work and their solidarity with each other, with all Territorians, during COVID have been absolutely outstanding. But, more than that, Territorians in the Top End have been working hard to support the return of Australians from overseas. At each successive stage of the ongoing crises in 2020, from bushfires to COVID, Territorians have been volunteering, whether they be firefighters going down south to fight fires or helping in the local community by making sure everyone had enough to eat when so many were left without support. Territorians supported their neighbours. They supported workers who had lost their jobs. They supported businesses, to try to make sure they didn't go under. They supported international students who were struggling in those early months in particular. We supported the return to Australia of evacuees from Wuhan in China, and from the DiamondPrincess cruise ship. And, as the pandemic escalates, thousands of stranded Aussies are now coming home for Christmas—not enough of them, but thousands are coming home—through Darwin, and I'm so proud of what we're doing in the Top End for the nation. I want to give a shout-out in particular to all the health professionals; the emergency responders, those first responders who do such a wonderful job; the members of the Australian Defence Force; service providers; and the cleaners and the workers—so many professions. We realised and it brought it home that, if you're stacking shelves in a supermarket, you're an essential worker. So many sectors of our economy contributed to keeping us all safe, fed and connected in 2020 in the Top End, and I'm very proud and thankful for all the work of Territorians during this time. It's been a very tough year for all Australians and history will record this year as a year of painful dislocation, deprivation and loss for too many in our country, across the Indo-Pacific and around the world. But this year has refocused our minds on our national priorities as Australians. It has opened our eyes to some of the major opportunities in our own market, in sectors of our economy like tourism and manufacturing, that we have neglected for far too long. In the NT, our new Territory Economic Reconstruction Commission, or TERC, gave us its final report. It flagged big opportunities in renewables, mining and other resources as well as manufacturing capabilities. Decarbonising the economy and achieving net zero emissions will benefit the Territory, which is already moving to becoming a regional leader in exporting renewable energy to Singapore through a $200 billion Sun Cable project. It's great the Northern Territory is now open to the whole of Australia, and I invite everyone to visit Darwin, where the weather is warm and we also have beautiful Top End storms coming through now. The $5 million NT Summer Sale, which runs from 1 October to the 31 March 2021 offers a $200 discount for every $1,000 spent on an NT booking made through campaign partners. You can go to your travel agent and make a booking to come up to the Territory and, for every $1,000 you spend, you will save $200, so get on it. For military history buffs, you can't go to Gallipoli or visit the Western Front and you can't walk the Kokoda Track, so why not visit Australia's World War II battlefields in Darwin? Next February is the 79th anniversary of the bombing Darwin, and I welcome all Australians to come up and commemorate that with us. The million dollar fish competition is still on, so when you are up in the Territory and you throw a line in, you could win a million bucks. You will have a good time no matter what you do. You might win a $5,000 fish with half of it going to a charity of your choice. I wish everyone a safe and happy Christmas, and please come up to the Territory. Cammeraygal High School, Climate Change, Electric Vehicles 96 11:47 Mr ZIMMERMAN 203092 North Sydney Cammeraygal High School in my electorate is one of the newest high schools on the North Shore. It is a fantastic school that has now been in operation for six years. The teachers of Cammeraygal High School asked me to record a message for their presentation day because, like so many schools, they're restricting numbers to their traditional presentation day ceremony. I thought I would do one better—that is, to send them a shout-out from this parliamentary chamber. I am so proud of all the achievements of the students and teachers of Cammeraygal during its relatively short life. This year, as has been the case for every school, has put all the students of Cammeraygal High School and their teachers to the test. I know that adapting to the pandemic that we currently endure has been a real challenge for those in the education system. I just want to say, on behalf of our entire community, how proud I am of the way in which the whole school community at Cammeraygal has adjusted to cope with what has been a really difficult year. Cammeraygal High School has had extraordinary leadership at the teacher level, led throughout its history by Kathy Melky, a very fine principal. I send her my best wishes and promise this year not to embarrass her in the way that I did at last year's presentation day ceremony. Cammeraygal High School also has incredible student leadership. I want to particularly acknowledge the two outgoing school captains, Pratham Gupta and Abigail Bobkowski. I have known Pratham since he was in year 7, when I first attended the school. In fact it was the very first function I did as the newly elected member for North Sydney. I remember his excitement and the excitement of young Chriso Chindilas, who showed me around their brand new school and they have every right to continue their excitement, as I know they have to this day. In fact, I thought back then that Chriso, as a 12-year-old, was a future politician. I'm a bit scared because it is almost the time when he will turn 18 and could well be a candidate for parliamentary office—but I would encourage him to wait a few more years before he does! I want to say to the entire school community—to the teachers, the students and the parents—congratulations on completing your first six years and having your first year 12 HSC students graduating this year. You really are such a fine school that's grown and matured and is providing everyone who comes through your doors with such excellent education and grounding in life. Well done to every student who has been involved. To change tack a little bit, the last three months has been a very important time as the world and Australia comes to terms with the challenges facing the globe because of climate change. Just this week, we have seen some important reporting from federal government agencies about where we stand. Firstly, we've had the CSIRO and Bureau of Meteorology report State of the Climate 2020, which reminds us of the extraordinary challenge that we as a nation and, in fact, the world faces. That report confirmed the fact that, since 1910, Australia's climate has warmed on average by 1.44 degrees. It also points to the fact that CO2 equivalent gases are at their highest levels in two million years, at 508 parts per million. But, on the other side of the equation, we've also had the positive news, released by the government this week, from the climate change National Greenhouse Gas Inventory, which points to the fact that emissions for the year to June 2020 are at their lowest levels since 1998—in fact, down 16.6 per cent since 2005. There are of course a range of reasons for that, including the impact of the pandemic, but we are seeing the transition in the way in which Australia is operating well underway. I'm actually excited and optimistic about our capacity. I've seen in my own work the incredible contribution that's being made by our scientists. Just recently, for example, I was at UNSW talking to their scientists. That university itself is responsible for so much of the technology that the world is now using to bring down its emissions. But I do want to pause on one area, and that's the transport sector, and say how disappointed I am that we have seen in the last month several states moving to introduce taxes on electric vehicles. Transport accounts for 18.3 per cent of our emissions. We need to be encouraging new technology like electric vehicles, not putting clamps around its progress. For a country that still faces enormous challenges in seeing EVs reach maturity, it is just absolutely outrageous and ridiculous that states like Victoria and South Australia are introducing taxes and New South Wales considering it. I want to conclude by pleading with them to recognise that this is the type of technology that we need, and taxes and charges are not going to help encourage Australians to buy EVs, which we surely need them to do. Morrison Government 97 11:52 Mr HILL 86256 Bruce That was kind of cute, actually, with Professor Kelly over having to listen to a speech from the government about climate change. It's almost like they didn't run the scare campaign at the last election that Labor was coming to take your ute with electric vehicles. That was terrific—oh, the irony! I want to talk about the poor and the vulnerable. It will hard to pick the most egregious, the most nasty, the most scandalous and mean attack this government has made, now in its eight year, on the poor and the vulnerable in this country, because there's frankly too many to choose from. One thing that is clear is that the Prime Minister has been up to his neck in every attack on the vulnerable in Australia. He's been in the cabinet for over seven years. He was the social services minister, then the Treasurer and then the Prime Minister. He owns every single one of the attacks. You could choose the attacks on pensioners. They spent five and a half years trying to raise the age pension age, the retirement age, to 70, with no consideration for what that would do to blue-collar workers who had wrecked their bodies for their entire working lives. Every single budget they have introduced contains cuts to the pension—a little snip here and a little tuck there. It's in their DNA. This year they froze the pension and gave pensioners $250—the crumbs off Scott Morrison's table, while they're hurtling towards $1.7 trillion of Liberal debt. Then there were the DSP medical reviews. They were a good one! Remember? They were sending letters to people with Down Syndrome asking when their Down Syndrome would be cured. They were sending letters to amputees saying, 'Has your amputated leg grown back?' This was a budget savings measure that this mob of Liberals defended budget after budget until they scuttled away from it. This week in parliament we saw them vote for the single biggest cut in Australian history, which will push 1.5 million of our fellow Australians into poverty, by pushing the Newstart rate—or JobSeeker, or whatever marketing spin they put on it—back to $40 a day. You could say, though, that that's just routine, everyday business for the Liberals. That's what they do. When you strip away all the rhetoric and all the nice hair they have to go on TV, the pretty suits—they probably smell nice, but I try not to get that close to them to find out—when you trip away all the marketing nonsense, they're funded by the wealthy in Australia to defend the people who already have the most. That's what they are. But even for them, I reckon the biggest scam they've perpetrated is robodebt. They used the power of the state, the full power of the Commonwealth government, the Commonwealth logo, and put it on fake debt notices and sent it to 430,000 Australians. They sent these fake, illegal debt notices that were ruthless and impersonal and reversed the onus of proof. Apparently, elsewhere in Australia, you actually have to prove there's a debt before you send an invoice to someone and say they have to pay it. But not if you're the government. You just get the Commonwealth logo out, send it the most vulnerable people and say, 'Hey, you've got to pay this.' 'But I don't owe this money.' 'Bad luck, got to pay it.' It's the kind of thing which would make you ring up ASIC and say, 'I've had a scam perpetrated on me.' You'd ring the government and say, 'Save me from this scam.' But they are the government. That's the disgrace of it. They used the power of the state to extort vulnerable people. I will quote Alan Jones for a moment. As he said, it only stopped when the hot breadth of the court was on their throat—the largest class action ever in Australian history: $1.2 billion. No wonder they want to get rid of class actions and make it harder for poor people with no access to justice. They just had to pay out the largest class action in Australia's history. The minister, though, still pretends it wasn't illegal. If what you were doing wasn't illegal, why did you pay $1.2 billion? Maybe it was because they didn't want their ministers cross-examined in open court on what they knew. Maybe they didn't want their ministers to have to go— Dr Allen interjecting— Mr HILL 86256 Look at the Tory, the arch-Tory from Higgins, who waltzes in here. It's exactly what I was saying: you represent the wealthiest people in our city, and you come in here and take the piss when I'm talking about vulnerable people being extorted. You are a disgrace, an absolute disgrace! We are talking about the most vulnerable people in the country and she comes in here and laughs. She represents Toorak. I represent Dandenong. These are people for whom $70 is a fortune. You are a disgrace. That is the modern Liberals. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 Can the member for Bruce withdraw the unparliamentary language and restrain himself from using personal abuse. Mr HILL 86256 What? She is a Tory. Sure, whatever you want. I withdraw it. Do you know how much these people are being asked to pay? Do you know what it's like if you're living on Centrelink on $40 a day, to be asked to repay $20 a fortnight. You have no idea— Dr Allen interjecting— Mr HILL 86256 She says we introduced it. She's perpetrating the lie that the minister says. Why is no minister being sacked? The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 Can I ask you to address— Mr HILL 86256 The Prime Minister is part of this scam. He perpetrated the scam and he is continuing to defend his illegal action. That response says everything you need to know about the modern Liberal Party. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 Can I ask the member for Bruce to address his comments through the chair. Mr HILL 86256 You, Chair, need to know about the modern Liberal Party. The Toorak tractor brigade laugh at the people who got $20,000 fake debt notices, told to repay, docking their pay— The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 The member for Bruce has finished. Mr HILL 86256 It's utterly disgraceful. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 The member for Higgins on a point of order? Dr Allen 282986 I'd like him to withdraw. I was not laughing. I would not like that on the record of Hansard. I'd like him to withdraw. Mr HILL 86256 You were laughing. Dr ALLEN 282986 I was not laughing. I would like that to be withdrawn. I think that was actually incorrect information. I have been misrepresented. I would be very upset to think that anyone in Australia would think I would be smiling, smirking or laughing at any of the comments that the member was making. I find that very offensive. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 I understand the member's comments, but the member has left the chamber. Dr Allen 282986 I would like that noted for Hansard. Cashless Debit Card 98 11:59 Mr RICK WILSON 198084 O'Connor I rise today to add my support for the continuation of the cashless debit card. As the member representing the constituents of the Goldfields cashless debit card trial sites, I call out the opponents on their baseless rhetoric. They say this card is racially discriminatory, yet more than 50 per cent of the trial participants in my area are non-Indigenous. They say it's stigmatising, yet the card is physically indistinguishable from a normal Visa debit card. It is accepted by far more retailers than the bright green BasicsCard. Labor scaremongers that this is all the beginning of a nationwide rollout to all working-age welfare participants and that age pensioners are the next target. Nothing could be further from the truth. Labor quotes extensively from submissions to the recent Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee inquiry, yet most of the contributors have no presence or experience in the Goldfields. Likewise, not one Labor MP or senator has engaged with the Goldfields trial nor asked me about the overwhelmingly positive outcomes this card is having on the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in my electorate. I stand here proudly as one of the initiators and ongoing supporters of the cashless debit card in the Goldfields. It was conceived at the behest of respected community leaders, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, and introduced after extensive consultation with the communities of Coolgardie, Leonora, Laverton, Menzies and the City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder. These people, along with me, had long witnessed firsthand the severe social dysfunction and outright harm being experienced in these communities due to welfare dollars being misspent on drugs, alcohol and gambling. We've all seen marked improvement since the rollout of the card began in March 2018. I was in the Goldfields only last week and I had multiple meetings with local government leaders, health and social service providers, education and employment training organisations, Indigenous leaders, police and cashless debit card trial participants. The universal call was for the continuation of the card. People were not asking, 'When will this end?' They were asking, 'When will we have certainty, instead of ongoing extensions of the trial?' They also asked, 'When and how can we bring the Ngaanyatjarra Lands and Tjuntjuntjara into this program?' They asked this because most social problems within the trial sites are due to people with large amounts of cash coming into their towns from areas not on the card. The COVID-19 pause on card activations, and the increase in welfare payments, has seen increased public drunkenness, violence and disorder throughout the Goldfields. This social harm has been well documented in the local media. It was also presented at the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee hearings. Unfortunately, those opposite conveniently dismiss these lived experiences as anecdotal and ask, 'Where is the hard data?' The University of Adelaide evaluation is underway and it is unfortunately overdue. Its ultimate findings will now be out of date, with its data collection preceding the pandemic. But, as we've seen in the past, every evaluation has been roundly criticised by those who think they could do better. The University of Adelaide baseline evaluation of the Goldfields was criticised because the data was collected three months into the trial. I quote from some of its outcomes: … a majority of respondents were of the opinion that early impacts were starting to be observed. These impacts primarily centred on alcohol and drug use and misuse, child welfare and well-being, spending and financial management … It went on to conclude: The introduction of the CDC was predominantly found to be having a positive effect on the prevalence and severity of crime, family violence and anti-social behaviour within the Goldfields. I prefer to talk to real people about the impacts the card is having on their daily lives—people like disability support pensioner Nichole, who has been able to save money and move out of home and is now putting money away towards her wedding. Her mum, Sharon, was her carer until Nichole became fully independent. Sharon also works in the disability sector and is a firm supporter of the card. Another DSP recipient told me the card had helped him conquer his gambling addiction, something he could not have done on his own. Harry and Garry run the Leonora Supermarket and have expanded into selling whitegoods, to compete with payday lenders, who have long preyed upon residents living so distant from retail outlets. They say most cardholders pay directly with their Visa debit card, while others use the WA No Interest Loans Scheme. Shari and Jo, who run the Laverton cashless debit card shopfront, are working with participants with poor computer literacy, helping them manage their direct debits. Don Cannon's family run the Laverton Supermarket and say they have seen families spending more money on food since the introduction of the card. Don commented on the transition of the card to payWave, having concerns about potential elder abuse, as he witnessed when cash was widespread in the community. The shires of Laverton and Leonora both repeated their concerns about the influx of nonparticipants into their towns. I drove past Leonora pubs that had queues outside at 11 o'clock in the morning, waiting for midday opening. But I leave the most disturbing feedback until last. The Leonora St John Ambulance service has recently been unable to attend emergencies in certain parts of the town due to alcohol and drug fuelled violence resulting in one of the volunteers receiving serious injuries. North-West Sydney: Infrastructure 99 12:04 Mr HUSIC 91219 Chifley Hallelujah! After a decade, a decade of fighting, Doonside residents finally got the New South Wales government to agree to fund the installation of lifts at the Doonside railway station, one of few on the Western Sydney line. The biggest beneficiaries of this are the 16 per cent of the Doonside population who are over the age of 60 and nearly a thousand residents who reported needing assistance in their day-to-day lives because of disability. These are people that need to use public transport and couldn't because they were structurally prevented from doing so because the New South Wales Liberal government refused to put in these lifts. It took us 10 years. We had the community petition the New South Wales government, and the state member for Blacktown submitted over 11,000 signatures in a petition to the New South Wales parliament. They were ignored. We had to put in one of the largest lodgements of human rights complaints against the New South Wales government's Transport for NSW, through a lodgement that I coordinated in my local area, because we believe that people with a disability and the elderly in our area were being denied access to public transport. It took all of that and they finally agreed to it, and now the big issue is whether or not this will be done quickly. When lifts were announced for Rooty Hill station in the 2015 budget, they only opened this year. The disabled and elderly in our area cannot wait any longer. I will quote Martha Lynch, President of Doonside Senior Citizens, who was a great supporter of this campaign. She said, 'After all this time, we won.' She's absolutely right. There are other infrastructure issues in my area in north-west Sydney that still need attention. For example, residents have to regularly park a kilometre away from Schofield station due to a lack of parking. Before the last New South Wales election, the do-nothing transport minister, Andrew Constance, announced that a $40 million multistorey car park would be open by December 2020. Instead of that, we're now getting a concrete football field, a cheaper single-level car park. Last month, they gloated how construction was beginning on 60 new commuter parking spaces, but that's about 640 fewer than what was promised. I was contacted by Melissa from Schofields, who had written to me concerned about the impact of this single-level car park. She said: 'Whilst other residents and I have been looking forward to the construction of a car park for communities in Schofield station as their chosen transport hub, the construction of an at-grade car park in the chosen location has highly detrimental impacts on our entire estate.' She lives near the station and is worried about the increased footprint of the single-level car park, which could encroach within a hundred metres of homes. Again, this is a case of New South Wales Liberals announcing something and not delivering in line with what they said they would. I also was contacted by Mario from Berkshire Park, just outside the electorate, who travels along this slow-moving car park that's Richmond Road. He said, as a resident of Berkshire Park, 'Over the last 20 years I've seen traffic queues getting longer and longer on Richmond Road, from Berkshire Park, Windsor Downs and then extending down to the M7 motorway. It's 12 kilometres long and takes 40 or 50 minutes to travel during peak times.' It's just ridiculous. It is absolutely ridiculous and should be upgraded now. When I look at all these things in our area, be it how long it took to get an upgrade for the Doonside lifts, the choked Richmond Road, the failure to extend the Metro, the failure to decongest the T1 line, the common thread through all of this is one person—one useless person—and that is the New South Wales transport minister, Andrew Constance. He can't get ferries to fit under a bridge, he can't get new trains to fit on a rail line and he can't see sense that the people of north-west Sydney, with 200,000 moving in, are completely falling off the radar of state and federal governments. He is the blocker in getting state funding in. He's also the blocker in getting the Feds to fund, because whenever the Feds go to Andrew Constance and say, 'Do we need to do this project?' he says no. Quite frankly, it is well beyond time. This bloke has proved to be a blocker for improved living. He's now got one of his people out of Transport for New South Wales on the Greater Sydney Commission. That was just announced in the last 24 hours or so. We need better, and commuters in my area should not put up with this terrible situation. Higgins Electorate: Cycling Infrastructure 100 12:09 Dr ALLEN 282986 Higgins Investment in cycling infrastructure and other modes of active transport has clear environmental and health benefits for the community. As an avid cyclist, I love getting out into my community on weekends for a ride with my family or, on my way to work, heading down to the office on my two wheels. I'm acutely aware of the need to invest in this space to we ensure that we're reducing road congestion in our built-up cities, protecting our environment and promoting healthy lifestyles. It is clear that regular outdoor activity improves community cohesion and mental health. Everyone who's got on a bike and gone down a big hill knows that! We know that cycling-friendly neighbourhoods can facilitate social interactions between neighbours, fostering social capital and even improving a sense of safety. Constituents in my electorate of Higgins share my passion for cycling and regularly advocate for the need to invest more in cycling infrastructure to meet the demands of our growing population. Just last week it was great to jump on my bike and go for a ride around Higgins with the team from the Stonnington and Port Phillip bicycle groups. Following our ride they told me how we can improve and increase safe active transport routes, with potential for dedicated lanes in and around the major hubs in our community. They also highlighted the absence of safe places to ride within and surrounding the Higgins community. I know that. I've got four kids and I'm always a bit nervous about sending them down main roads because of the dooring that can happen when cars open doors or just because it is a heavily congested environment. Opening up good bike lanes is incredibly important in getting kids active and helping families move around the electorate, so now more than ever it's important to invest in safe infrastructure. In this light, I was pleased to tell the group about an election commitment made by the Morrison government to provide $400,000 to the City of Stonnington for the Yarra bike trail project. This important project will upgrade a section of path along Alexandra Avenue along the Yarra. It will widen the path and install a barrier fence between the road and the path, providing protection and separation between cyclists and the adjacent traffic. Thanks to Alex Scott from the Stonnington Bicycle User Group and Julie Clutterbuck from Port Phillip for organising this ride and for the excellent feedback as fellow cyclists. Around the country many of our urban transport systems are struggling to cope with increasing numbers of trips, particularly during peak periods. Importantly, a shift to more walking or riding, particularly for short journeys, can add capacity to our roads. We saw this so effectively during the COVID lockdown. We saw that people who were moving about on foot or on bikes meant that our roads were quieter and safer and that there was less pollution in our inner-city area as well. It was an opportunity to understand what it could look like if we were to move to more active forms of transport. Certainly cycling infrastructure is a very fast and effective way to create more jobs. As we all know, investment in jobs and infrastructure has never been more critical. It generates more employment than any other type of transport spending, creating six jobs for every $1 million invested. Importantly, cycling infrastructure can be delivered quickly. Bicycle Network, Australia's biggest bike-riding organisation, has identified 750 kilometres of shovel-ready projects across Australia. These projects would take less than a year to complete and inject considerable economic and environmental benefits to communities right across Australia and of course in Higgins. I worked on a recent tool known as the IMAP Bicycle Network Model, which shows the cumulative benefits of a connected and protected bicycle network. That's been organised by the inner-city councils within Melbourne. The model provides a platform for the network to be planned in an integrated way and can estimate future usage for new infrastructure proposals in the Greater Melbourne area. The data has identified the areas in my electorate that are important, including Chapel Street, Orrong Road and Williams Road in Prahran, and Melbourne Road, Commercial Road, Waverley Road and Glenferrie Road. I concur that these are important areas that we need to work on to provide safety for bikers. The prospective introduction or expansion of infrastructure would be incredibly welcomed by Higgins. Whether you wish to go for a leisurely weekend ride with the family or an environmentally friendly and efficient commute to work or whether you want to just get out and get active, the provision of the enhanced local cycling infrastructure will be a key to improving our way of life and bringing joy to so many people across so many communities. I look forward to continuing to champion the need for further cycling infrastructure across our local community. I am very pleased that the Morrison government is committed to helping our communities. I am very proud of the infrastructure that is already committed, which will start early in January now that we are out of our COVID lockdown. There are a lot of new projects that are going to get off the ground and are going be very important for the people of Higgins. Question agreed to. Federation Chamber adjourned at 12:14