2024-09-17 2 1 0 Senate 0 0

Tuesday, 17 September 2024

The PRESIDENT (Senator the Hon. Sue Lines ) took the chair at 12:00, made an acknowledgement of country and read prayers.

DOCUMENTS 4047 DOCUMENTS Tabling 4047 COMMITTEES 4047 COMMITTEES Meeting 4047 12:01 The PRESIDENT 112096 If there is no objection, the meetings are authorised. BILLS 4047 BILLS Sex Discrimination Amendment (Acknowledging Biological Reality) Bill 2024 4047 First Reading 4047 12:01 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland I seek leave to move a motion to provide for the first reading of the Sex Discrimination Amendment (Acknowledging Biological Reality) Bill 2024, as circulated. Leave not granted. Senator HANSON BK6 Pursuant to contingent notice of motion standing in my name, I move: That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion to provide for the consideration of a matter, namely a motion to provide that a motion for the first reading of the Sex Discrimination Amendment (Acknowledging Biological Reality) Bill 2024 may be moved immediately. I've been denied the right to actually introduce this bill. For the first reading speech, I was denied the right. That is very unusual in this place. Labor and the Greens have taken the highly unusual step of voting down a bill at its first reading that sought to reinforce the biological definitions of 'man' and 'woman'. This is a rare and alarming move that undermines our democratic process. By refusing the chance to debate this bill, Labor and the Greens are not only silencing important discussions but also disregarding the voices of Australians who support One Nation's position on upholding biological reality. It's hard to find examples of bills being defeated at the first reading. One such example is the Government Preference Prohibition Bill 1914, which was defeated at its first reading, triggering the first double dissolution in Australian history. In 1957, 14 bills related to banking reforms, including the Reserve Bank Bill and the Commonwealth Banks Bill, were also rejected at their first reading. I acknowledge that Senator Waters had legislation blocked at its first reading in the last parliament; however, her bill was a narrow proposal for a parliamentary inquiry into whether Christian Porter, a government minister at the time, should remain in his role. Our belief was that allegations of this nature belonged in the courts and not in parliament. There were serious concerns that this bill was using parliamentary privilege to make potentially defamatory claims against a government minister in an inappropriate manner. I will also point out that this is not the only example of my legislation being blocked at first reading. My Acts Interpretation Amendment (Aboriginality) Bill 2023, which is legislation to resolve outstanding issues around the definition of 'Aboriginality', has also been blocked at the first reading. In this instance, the coalition assisted Labor and the Greens. This is something I believe is a mistake, and I will be seeking to address it at a later date. I point out here that it's highly unusual for first readings to be stopped, and that's what the Senate has done on two of my bills. We, as senators elected to this parliament, have a right to introduce bills we believe are important to the Australian people; you can't even debate it. As I keep saying, you are the worst government we've ever seen. With the assistance mainly of David Pocock and a couple of the other crossbenchers, you shut down debate in this parliament. You're not open and honest. There's no accountability whatsoever. It is not up to you to decide whether sex discrimination should be debated or not; it should go ahead. There is due process in this place. This is why we are all elected to this parliament, regardless of our political persuasions. We should have the right to discuss these issues. It's not based on what you think is right or not right. It should be discussed and debated. When I tried to bring in bills about puberty blockers, gender dysphoria and sex hormones, you chose not to allow for an inquiry to happen based on your own principles. That's not representing the Australian people in this place. Then you turn around and call me racist or say that I am discriminating against people. You are discriminating against every woman out there who is crying out because every time men may decide they want to be female—put a dress on, put some make-up on, put some high heels on or do whatever they want to and think that they're female—women are getting a slap in the face. They are not females; biologically, they are not females. You are born either male or female. I can understand that some people are trapped in a body they don't want to belong to. But you can't disrupt society as a whole when the majority of people in this country claim to be either male or female. You are allowing them to impinge on women's rights in their private spaces, in change rooms, in sporting events, when there are only a small minority of people that claim to be that. Women have fought for their rights in this country for so long, but you're denying them their rights. Who are you to decide that without open and honest debate? Biological sex is important in how we deal with this. I have feminists out there who say: 'I've never supported Pauline Hanson, but, cripes, I've got to support her on this one. She's right in what she says.' What are you so afraid of? Is it purely for the votes? Is it for your own political games here? Look at common sense. Listen to the Australian people. They want debate on this. They want answers. They want common sense to prevail in this parliament. They don't want to be shut down. You have no right to do it to the Australian people. Stop shutting me down every time I raise something you don't like. 12:07 Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X South Australia Last week, when Senator Hanson introduced the bill to which she refers in this motion, my colleague Senator Duniam made a statement to the Senate, which I wish to quote in full in the context of the debate we are currently having: While the Senate has the opportunity to reject a bill at the first reading stage, in practice the first reading is almost always passed without opposition and is regarded as a purely formal stage. The coalition supports these normal procedures, as we have with many Greens, Labor and other crossbench bills— that we strongly opposed. The normal process enables bills to be fairly considered and debated by the Senate before a substantive decision is taken, and it should only be deviated from in the most extreme of circumstances lest we deny the right of senators to even have matters debated. As in all cases, a vote on the first reading should not be taken as a position on the substantive legislation, especially where a bill has not had the opportunity to be subject of a normal internal process. It was with concern that a first reading was denied last week in relation to this bill. I say that not because the coalition has a formal position on this bill—I say that, indeed, as somebody who, very clearly at a personal level, abhors the weaponisation of issues that affect, particularly, vulnerable young transgender or other individuals across Australia. However, it is important to ensure that this parliament is able to function and that issues that are considered in parliaments around the world—that have been the subject of consideration by, for example, both conservative and Labour governments in the United Kingdom—are able to be considered in this parliament. This parliament ought to have the same abilities for people to bring forward issues at least for consideration under the normal standards and procedures. It will become an increasingly difficult and dangerous precedent if parties that can muster the numbers deny the first reading of a bill. The structure and process that we have in this parliament for bills to be considered on three substantive votes are important. There is the first reading—simply enabling a bill to then sit on the Notice Paper and for senators to have the opportunity to use that time to consider it, often for it to be referred to a committee, but not always, and for that time to be an important point of understanding the content of a bill before a substantive or meaningful vote is taken. The second reading is the customary substantive and meaningful vote on the overall principle of a bill, but oftentimes senators choose to grant a second reading subject to potential amendments being considered and ultimately reserve their position on the third reading. Each of these steps plays an important role in the way we go about our business in this place. If we enter an environment where those who can muster the numbers routinely deny a first reading on issues, it will make it harder for senators to do their job. It will particularly make it harder for those on the crossbench to do their job and also potentially for those in opposition, now or in the future, to do their job, as well as any who could be the victim of being silenced in terms of having their bills enter into that formal process of parliamentary consideration. So we will be voting to grant that first reading, for that opportunity for the first reading to be had—not because we have taken a position in relation to the substantive nature of the bill itself but because we have a principled position in relation to the way the parliament should conduct its affairs and its business and the way the rights of individual senators to bring bills forward should be respected and subject to routine processes and consideration, rather than having those routine processes subverted through an early rejection at the first reading stage. 12:12 Senator AYRES 16913 New South Wales What we just heard from Senator Birmingham was a quisling concession to far-right extremism by the party that used to represent the centre right of Australian politics. It is now unrecognisable to real Liberals now—an outfit that is just an appendage of One Nation and of the right-wing extremism that is out there in the community. It was a mealy-mouthed abrogation of Senator Birmingham's role as a leader of the Liberal Party and conservative politics in this place. It was giving the game away to far-right extremism and what goes on in the cesspool of social media that is out there doing so much damage to normal Australian democracy. It's the weird stuff that's going on there in social media that has taken hold of the imagination of Liberals and Nationals out there. I agree in one respect in relation to Senator Birmingham's outline—that it should not be a normal thing in here to deny a first reading of a piece of legislation, that we should not do it normally. Senator Hughes 273828 We should never do it. Senator AYRES 16913 But it does mean that we should do it when it matters and when it's a reaffirmation of this Senate's role. Senator Hughes says we should never do it. It wouldn't take very long, would it, to get to the kinds of propositions that each of us think should not be the subject of these kinds of pretend pieces of legislation? It's not really a piece of legislation. It's not really a bill. Really, it is an opportunity to propagate far-right propaganda. That's what this is. It is an attempt to weasel a way into the outrage debate by hurting little kids. That's what this really is. That's what this is really about. I think Senator Hanson has a point of order. Senator Hanson BK6 I want Senator Ayres to withdraw that implication, saying that it's not a bill. It is a bill, and it has every right to be introduced into the parliament. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 That's a debating point. But, Senator Ayres, I ask you just to be measured in this debate. It's not assisting the chamber, and you are sailing close to the wind. Senator AYRES 16913 I'm happy to withdraw it, if that assists, and to listen to your advice carefully, Deputy President. This discussion, really, is not about the kinds of propositions that One Nation advances in terms of these issues. I think we've all given up on them being a place of moderation, of the national interest and of the interests of ordinary families. But it is a test of what passes for what used to be the centre-right party in Australian politics but is now more extreme than it has ever been and more far-right than it has ever been. These questions of gender identity are questions that are deeply personal for individuals, particularly children. What is required by this is where words hurt and words matter. It's done with deliberate forethought and understanding of the consequences that this has for ordinary people and ordinary families out there. It is utterly damaging, and it ought to stop. What should this Senate be focusing on this week? We have a bill in here that will mean 10,000 more low-income Australians will be able to buy their own homes. The Future Made in Australia Bill, which should be dealt with in this place, will mean that we will rebuild Australian manufacturing. What does the party of the supposed centre-right of Australian politics want to spend this week on? This stuff. It ought to stop, and you ought to focus on what actually matters for ordinary Australians. 12:18 Senator HODGINS-MAY 310860 Victoria We voted down this bill on the first reading because we knew it was hateful and transphobic. This is done extremely rarely, but we have a duty of care to the trans community. Senator Hanson's was not a genuine attempt to legislate; it was a thinly veiled attempt to attack our trans community. And would we do it again? Yes, we would. Why? It is because we know that antitrans rhetoric causes lasting harm to trans and gender-diverse people by stoking the flames of transphobia and hate. Trans and gender-diverse communities are strong and resilient, but we know that they face disproportionate levels of harassment, abuse and even violence because of views like these. Our LGBTIQA+ communities should be supported and cared for, not used as a political football by people, like Senator Hanson, who would prefer to deny their very existence. I saw my speech last week was shared on social media and brought out thousands and thousands of people's vitriol and attacks. But do you know what? It strengthens my resolve and the resolve of the Greens to get up in this place and represent the views of the diverse, rich trans community, who are sick of this disgusting rhetoric, this disgusting level of debate, as is the broader Australian community. It's a disgraceful act of political disgust—it's just disgusting. All people have fundamental human rights and are entitled to equal protection under the law without any discrimination, including on the basis of sex, sexual or romantic orientation, gender identity or sex characteristics. To all the trans kids and young people out there, I want you to know that I and the Greens have your back. We will go in to bat for you at any chance we have. You deserve to be celebrated. You deserve to be safe and to be yourself. You deserve all good things in the world because you are magnificent. We must do more to call out transphobia. We need to work together to actively dismantle it because trans rights are non-negotiable. I said it last week, and I'll say it again: they are non-negotiable. We must work towards a safer world for the trans and gender-diverse community. They must feel safe, respected and valued, living their lives treated as equals and free from discrimination. The Greens will always stand in solidarity with the trans community against hatred and bigotry and against Senator Hanson's awful attacks. 12:21 Senator ROBERTS 266524 Queensland Labor and the Liberal and National parties said the practice is to allow first readings. That's correct. Yet, after saying that, the Labor Party contradicted it and joined with their mates, the Greens, again and again and again. Odgers', the authority, says that it's a parliamentary formality. It's rarely contravened. What's happening is that the Labor Party, the Greens and some crossbenchers are shutting down the voice of the representatives of the people. You're silencing not just the Senate; you're silencing the people. Now we have Senator Ayres declaring that this is not a bill. Why don't we just suspend the Senate and let Senator Ayres take over instead? Shutting down the voice of a representative of the people is silencing the people. Aussies believe in a fair go. Aussies believe in democracy; Labor and the Greens clearly do not. Let's not beat around the bush. We all know what this is about. It's about suppressing Senator Hanson because she resonates with Australians. She listens, and she resonates with Australians. This is the latest in many attempts to gag her and to shut her down. The first started when One Nation in 1998 got 23 per cent of the vote overnight in Queensland in the state election, and the Liberals and Labor went into a panic. They infiltrated her party to bring down the branches. They hammered her raw, new state MPs. Liberal and Labor, federally and state, concocted legislation to falsely jail her. She was jailed but released on appeal, the only political prisoner in this country's history. Then she was falsely denigrated as a racist when she's never uttered a racist word in her life. The worst thing Aussies can do is call a woman a racist. That's the worst thing they can do to a woman. Why? I'll tell you why. It's because it stops people being proud of voting, so they're quiet and don't then vote for One Nation. But people are waking. Look at social media, listen to people on the streets and listen to people in the regions. I want to thank Senator Ayres for putting on his display, because this is being broadcast and the people at home will be watching it. The name of Senator Hanson's party—our party—says it all: One Nation. The Greens cannot debate her position on merit. They have no data and no logical argument. People can see this, and awareness is spreading. Why don't the Greens and Labor use the opportunity to debate her bill, get their facts on the table and put their views forward? That's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to represent the people. If you've got a transgender community, go ahead and spread that. The Greens are not putting forward a logical argument. People can see this, and that's why the One Nation vote is increasing. Let's have a look at biological gender. That's the only gender. Let's have a rational debate. Let's send the bill to a committee to have a rational inquiry. Let the people of Australia speak to this bill. What are you protecting? It's the suicides. When children disfigure their bodies and chemically stunt their mental and social development and then, when they sadly learn that it's not reversible, they suicide. That's what you're doing. Women's rights are smashed in physical sports. They are deprived of years of training— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 The minister is on a point of order. Minister? Senator Gallagher ING Senator Roberts needs to make his comments and remarks through the chair and not act in such an aggressive way towards other senators. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 Senator Roberts, please address your comments through me. Senator ROBERTS 266524 What about men being in dressing rooms for girls and playing rugby league in a sport for women? Censorship and lies are a form of control. Always, beneath control, there is fear. Labels are the refuge of the ignorant, the incompetent, the dishonest and the fearful. Of what are you afraid? Open debate. People in Australia are not afraid of open debate. We have respect for the parliament. Senator Hanson rarely calls out; I never call out, because this parliament stands for the people. That's why I don't call out. In recent years, people have had enough of your gutlessness. When you target Pauline Hanson, her support and popularity rises. Thank you so much. Parliament is for people's voices to be heard. When people's representatives are silenced, it hurts the people. We need debate. 12:26 Senator GALLAGHER ING Australian Capital Territory I'll make some comments in the time left. One, we don't support the suspension, because we have a program to get to, and there are many other ways, forms and times in the program where senators can raise issues, like the one Senator Hanson is raising today. We would like to get back to our housing bill, which this Senate debated all day yesterday. We have a small window of time today to debate that, so that's the first point. Two, we did take the rare step of not agreeing with the first reading. It is a rare step. In my time in this place, we have used it one other time, in response to a bill that Senator Anning tried to introduce. For us on this side of the chamber, the reason we took that decision—and we did think about it carefully—was the debate that would happen in this place if a bill like that was introduced. I think the performance from Senator Roberts just confirmed that the decision we took last week was right. Senator Roberts called for a rational debate and then gave a speech like that. There is no rational debate, Senator Roberts, on this. There are many other places Senator Hanson and you can speak about the matters that are contained in a bill that Senator Hanson seeks to introduce. But we draw the line at that bill being the subject of debate in this chamber, where we are leaders in our communities and leaders of the country. And you may scoff, and you may put it on your social media so that we get inundated with all the hate and abuse that comes with that. That's fine. We disagree on bills all the time in this place. They're on policy, and that's fine. This is a vibrant democracy. But when you have bills that seek to harm people, including young people, we will draw the line. That is a red line for us. We do not apologise. We know how vulnerable the gender-diverse community is. We know how they struggle. We do not think the Senate is a qualified place for that debate. That debate should be had at home, with friends and with health professionals that seek to guide some of those difficult decisions for young people in this country. They are qualified. An irrational debate in this place that seeks to hurt and undermine young people—we will draw the line there. This is not about disallowing free speech or shutting down democracy. People introduce bills in this place all the time. For every private member's bill that comes in, if it isn't from our side we will disagree with it. That's what they're being pulled in for. We have to draw a line in this chamber that says, 'No, we're not going to let this parliament and everybody in it share their views on your personal choice.' That is the reason why we took this decision. We agree with many of the comments from Senator Birmingham about the rights, policy and practice, convention, Odgers' and all the rest. Indeed we agree with almost everything he said. We allow bills to come into this place all the time, many of which we would disagree with. But when it concerns people, and when it's such a deeply personal and divisive debate that you seek to bring into this chamber, don't pretend it's otherwise and don't pretend that it's just a matter of policy interest for you; it's not. That's not how the debate about the gender diverse community goes in this country—we know that. The parliament should protect the communities that we represent. Every person should be protected in this place, and that's why we took the decision that we took last week. That's why we have denied leave for it today. But we are not trying to stop Senator Hanson from speaking or raising issues. She is a senator and a leader. You have the forms of this place in which to do that, and you do it. You represent the interests that you seek to bring into this chamber. You seek to bring in a bill and have that bill debated—have it open for hours of discussion in this place—and we say no. We say that's not right. We think that, for young people in particular, the Senate should stand up on something like this and say no—and we have to win a majority of votes. It's not as though you're being shut down without the will of the chamber; the chamber has to support that. They did last week, and I hope the chamber will oppose the suspension this morning and oppose the bill being brought on. The PRESIDENT 112096 The time for the debate has expired. The question is that the suspension motion moved by Senator Hanson be agreed to.  

The Senate divided. [12:36]
(The President—Senator Lines)

 27 AYES Antic, A. Askew, W. Babet, R. Brockman, W. E. Cadell, R. (Teller) Cash, M. C. Chandler, C. Colbeck, R. M. Davey, P. M. Duniam, J. R. Hanson, P. L. Henderson, S. M. Hughes, H. A. Hume, J. Lambie, J. Liddle, K. J. McGrath, J. McKenzie, B. McLachlan, A. L. O'Sullivan, M. A. Paterson, J. W. Rennick, G. Reynolds, L. K. Roberts, M. I. Ruston, A. Scarr, P. M. Smith, D. A. 30 NOES Allman-Payne, P. J. Bilyk, C. L. Ciccone, R. Cox, D. Faruqi, M. Gallagher, K. R. Green, N. L. Grogan, K. Hanson-Young, S. C. Hodgins-May, S. Lines, S. McAllister, J. R. McKim, N. J. O'Neill, D. M. Pocock, B. Polley, H. Pratt, L. C. Shoebridge, D. Smith, M. F. Steele-John, J. A. Sterle, G. Stewart, J. N. A. Thorpe, L. A. Tyrrell, T. M. Urquhart, A. E. (Teller) Walsh, J. C. Waters, L. J. Watt, M. P. Whish-Wilson, P. S. Wong, P. 0 PAIRS

Question negatived.

 MOTIONS 4052 MOTIONS Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force 4052 12:38 Senator LAMBIE 250026 Tasmania by leave—I move: That the Senate: (a) notes that the refusal to release the final report of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force twenty-year review: (i) undermines the findings of the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide, (ii) perpetuates an environment of secrecy and evasion, and (iii) represents a failure of the government to uphold the principles of accountability and transparency which are essential for maintaining public trust and ensuring the well-being of our defence community; and (b) calls on the Minister for Defence to immediately release the final report of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force twenty-year review. The Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force, the IGADF, was set up 20 years ago to promote trust and justice in the Australian Defence Force. I hate to have to break this to the Minister for Defence—wakey, wakey!—and to the head of the IGADF, the inspector-general, Mr Gaynor: you have utterly failed every veteran who has ever served. There is no trust that the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force does anything but drive veterans into an early grave. The veteran community has zero confidence that the IGADF does the job of oversighting military justice, even with the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force's military justice audits of Australian Defence Force units. Abuse of power, especially at the commanding officer level—as noted in the royal commission report—is absolutely rife. The delay in finalising the inquiry of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force into the military justice cases inflames the moral injury suffered by veterans, because justice delayed is justice denied. When veterans take Defence to civilian courts, Defence fights tooth and nail, like a dog, and often uses the results of Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force inquiries, even though so many are found to be defective and flawed. The Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force is responsible for making sure that inquiry officers are trained in procedural fairness, but we still see breaches of the most fundamental principles of procedural fairness within Defence itself—like not giving people a fair hearing, relying on irrelevant evidence and, on the other hand, ignoring relevant evidence. As far as most veterans are concerned, the loyalties of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force are to Defence, not to the diggers that the body was set up to protect. What a joke! Regardless of the fact that the head of Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force, the inspector himself, calls himself Mr Gaynor—he uses 'Mr' on all correspondence—let's be quite clear about this: Mr Gaynor was a brigadier, and the perception remains that he is beholden to the chain of command. And, by God, he is—he is! The track record of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force just confirms this perception for most veterans. It is more than clear to me that the organisation that has the job of providing oversight on military justice has absolutely no oversight of itself—absolutely none. Going to the Federal Court for a review of IGADF decisions made against veterans is expensive and risky, and people know Defence will fight hard and then hit the veteran with the legal costs. That's because they have no shame. Even after a royal commission, they have no shame. One example of Defence's behaviour in the Federal Court is a case in which the judge was about to make an adverse finding against Defence, so Defence settled at the last minute to avoid the finding. It was not because it was morally the right thing to do by the digger—oh no. This was a case in which the member was found not guilty at court martial, but his unit took administrative action against him to kick him out anyway. The inspector-general thought that was okay, though. Of course he would! The federal government was about to think differently, and it would have been on the public record. But, in typical cover-ups, Defence are sneaky little buggers who get you to sign a nondisclosure agreement before you get a payout. They run you into the ground, they wear you out, and then they get you to sign a nondisclosure agreement before they pay you anything, so that you don't get to speak about it. This is the absolute filth that is taking out veterans! And the filth continues three years after a royal commission! Veterans, once they are worn down, just give up. They give up because there is nothing left to fight with. On so many occasions, if the person does keep fighting, Defence settles before the matter goes to trial. God forbid their performance was out in the public arena—they wouldn't want that—because their performances is about a D-minus. There is way too much secrecy surrounding the inspector-general's inquiries, and this just adds to the perception that the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force is above the law. And, my God, do they think they are above the law—oh yeah! That's the culture that is taking out veterans. And it's not just the IGADF; it is the whole top chain of command. Yet I haven't seen one sacking—not one sacking. Do you know why, Madam Acting Deputy President Bilyk? Because your minister doesn't have what it takes to get rid of them and clean them out. You'll never get culture change in this area until you clean them out, but Minister Marles is not up to the job—never was, never will be. It doesn't help, either, that the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force has never been subjected to any sort of proper review or inquiry—in 20 years, not ever. Adding insult to moral injury is Minister Marles's stubborn refusal to publicly release Justice Duncan Kerr's review into the military justice system. A lengthy review is a way to avoid taking action. That's right: the government of the day is sitting on that review because it doesn't want to deal with the crap that's in it. It must be bad. Three months to write it, six months to sit on it, three years at a royal commission, and the government doesn't have the courage to release the review. What an unbelievable slap in the face to these veterans out there retelling their stories, showing courage to come forward, and your government won't release the review. Why not? Why not? They gave it their best for three years. They all came forward. They all came forward and continued to show the courage that they showed on the battlefield, but you don't want to show the courage to tackle this. The inspector-general's inquiry into the military justice arrangements for dealing with sexual misconduct—it gets better. This report was initiated in July 2021 and finalised in December 2021—five months—yet, more than three years later, the report and its recommendations remain under review by the Department of Defence. Didn't we just put a new general in? Didn't you just pay for another position—more top officers at the top? What is she doing? Abuse and sexual abuse were highlighted; yet Defence has nothing to say about it? Three years later, it doesn't want to make a remark on its filth? There are countless stories of cover-up. We've heard them for three years—cover-up after cover-up after cover-up—yet Minister Marles seems committed to kicking our veterans to the kerb while he continues this toxic cover-up of culture. Justice Kerr's review was meant to give those veterans some trust in the government that sent them to war to put their lives on the line. Instil trust back into them. Release that report and take action. Make people pay for this. I don't want to see another robodebt, where nothing is going to happen to those people up the top. Veterans want actions. They want compensation. And they're not talking about money; they want people to be held responsible. It is not that difficult. I am begging you: please, release that report. No more hiding, because it is killing veterans. Did you not hear the last three years? That report must be released. 'There's nothing to fix here'—just release the report. And get ready, Inspector-General, because he's failed to do the job. Don't go and do what you do with the rest of them and give him a medal. Get rid of him and put someone in there that can do the job, because your changing culture starts with him. If you want to change culture, you have to start there and you have to show by example you are not putting up with this brutality that is happening to veterans anymore. It has gone far enough, so I'm asking the government to show some courage. I'm asking you to be brave. Release that report. Release it today. 12:49 Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X South Australia The women and men of the Australian Defence Force who wear and have worn the nation's uniform are the finest of Australians. We owe them eternal gratitude for the service they give and have given. They have given that service in an environment where much is expected of them. Much is expected of them in the way they defend Australia and defend Australian values and interests, and much is expected in the way they conduct themselves in their operations. Senator Lambie, we pay tribute to your service in the Australian Defence Force and acknowledge the passionate advocacy you have continuously brought to this Senate for the veterans of Australia and for their families and loved ones. The work of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force and the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide are critically important pieces of work and analysis in relation to the conduct and operations of our Defence Force and the support and services given to our veterans. Both are complex areas, and both have rightly been the subject of careful, thoughtful scrutiny. The opposition concurs with Senator Lambie that it is important that transparency be given over the work of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force and the review undertaken. We agree that there ought to be that degree of public transparency that enables public accountability to occur. For that reason, on the broad principles, we agree with Senator Lambie and will support her in the intent behind her motion. I have circulated some amendments to that motion that seek to address two particular issues of concern the opposition has. The first is that, whilst absolutely recognising the connectivity for Australian veterans and their families between some of the work of the IGADF and of the royal commission, we don't believe one should be used to reflect upon the other. So we propose not to support—and propose an amendment to remove—the statement that suggests that the status of the IGADF report undermines the findings of the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide. We understand why both are critically important to our veteran community and we want to ensure that the veteran community has confidence in relation to both. But we do not wish to draw the linkage or make prejudicial statements in relation to one or the other of these important pieces of work. The other is in relation to Senator Lambie's call for the immediate release of the IGADF report. We have supported Senator Lambie in calling for its release. We continue to support the call for its release. We have acknowledged and recognised that the government have said they are committed to its release but are working through the processes for its release. We respect the difficulty for the government, given the gravity of the circumstances and issues being dealt with, in ensuring that the report is released with appropriate consideration of its content and the manner in which it is released. But we believe the government needs to give certainty to this Senate and, more importantly, to Australian veterans and serving Australian personnel about when it's going to come to an end—when it's going to happen. So we propose an amendment to substitute the word 'immediately' for the words 'to commit to a firm timeframe to'. We respect the work of government to ensure that the report is properly released, but they can't just keep saying, 'Trust us; we'll get to it at some point.' There needs to be certainty about when that is. The opposition is seeking to treat this responsibly and carefully, given the sensitivity of the issues, and to give the government the benefit of the doubt about the work to be done for the release of this report. We are not saying it must happen here, now, today; we are saying, very clearly, the government must come clean and be upfront with Australian veterans and the defence community about when and how it is going to happen. Enough of saying 'some day'; it's time to say which day. Enough of saying 'some time'; it's time to say precisely when. It's time to give that certainty and that confidence to our veterans and our defence community. I seek leave to move the amendments circulated in my name on behalf of the coalition together. Leave granted. Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X I move: Omit paragraph (a)(i). Paragraph (b), omit "immediately", substitute "commit to a firm timeframe to". They are intended to reflect and deliver upon the spirit, intent and content of the motion Senator Lambie has brought to this chamber and to acknowledge the sensitivities and the work the government is undertaking. We hope that, with that, we can see a motion pass this Senate that makes clear the Senate's intent that this report should be released. It gives the government the clear message they should say precisely when and how it will be released, to end the doubt, and makes it possible for all stakeholders interested in this matter, as well as for this Senate, to hold the government to account in relation to the steps it takes not just in response to the royal commission but also in response to the work of the IGADF. 12:56 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia First, I acknowledge and respect the contribution from Senator Lambie. I heard her contribution on radio on this issue previously. Her sincerity is undoubted. It would be good to get a resolution on this, to expedite matters. I indicate that the government will support the amendment moved by the opposition. We ask that paragraphs (a) and (b) be put separately; we will be voting a different way on (a) and (b). I now propose to close this debate. Senator WONG 00AOU If I may, Senator Shoebridge, your party has spent days now trying not to get to Help to Buy. We would like a vote on that. I propose to seek to close this debate so that the Senate can do what Senator Lambie has said, which is to make its position clear to the government of the day; I understand that. Senator Shoebridge 169119 I have a short contribution that will be quicker than a division. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT HZB Senator Shoebridge, you don't have the call. Senator WONG 00AOU With respect, Senator Shoebridge, if you could give me a guarantee you'd be two minutes that would be fine, but my experience so far has been that that is not the case. If you would like to make a statement by leave for two minutes, I'll sit down and then I'll close the debate. Senator WONG 00AOU He hasn't said that to me. Senator Hanson-Young, I trust you, but— Senator WONG 00AOU I just asked you. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT HZB Through the chair, Minister Wong. Senator WONG 00AOU Sorry. It doesn't appear that he's willing to make— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT HZB Minister Wong, can you resume your seat. Senator Hanson-Young? Senator Hanson-Young I0U After fast consideration, we'll take your two-minute statement option. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT HZB Senator Shoebridge, you have the call for two minutes. 12:58 Senator SHOEBRIDGE 169119 New South Wales We're here because, once again, Defence has failed to provide anything like transparency. Indeed, one of the reasons why Senator Lambie has moved this motion—which was about to be supported by every other party in this chamber apart from the government—is Defence and this government have form, and the previous government had form as well. Time and time again, even in budget estimates, we're asking for basic information and basic transparency. The existence of the director-general is a reason given to refuse to provide answers. We ask for basic information about defence tragedies and defence accidents such as the crash of a Taipan helicopter in Jervis Bay last year. We've been asking for transparency on that for a year and a half, and the answer we repeatedly get from the government is, 'We're not going to tell you, because this is off to inquiry with the Inspector-General.' The Inspector-General, of course, comes from the Defence Force and is seen to be very culturally attuned to them. Nobody below a one-star rank in the Defence Force genuinely believes that it provides the independent oversight that was promised. It was set up as an administrative office by a former CDF and from that moment on was treated with suspicion by those who wanted transparency in the space. We can't understand why the government won't introduce it immediately. We can't understand why they won't provide it to veterans. We can't understand why the government last week did what it did in trying to muddy the waters for the veterans royal commission. We can't understand their approach to ignoring the demands for veterans, and we will be supporting this motion unamended. 13:00 Senator ROBERTS 266524 Queensland I seek leave to make a short statement. Senator Wong 00AOU Of two minutes? Senator ROBERTS 266524 Under two minutes. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT HZB Leave is granted. Senator ROBERTS 266524 No more hiding—that's what we want. We want no more hiding from the Department of Defence, as Senator Lambie has just said. The hiding is killing enlisted people and killing veterans. We've got to stop the hiding. I support Senator Lambie. One Nation supports Senator Lambie's motion. I don't need to say much more, because yesterday I spoke at length about the partial release of documents that we have been chasing for years now about the Taipan helicopter. Had we gotten those documents and had Defence analysed them, it could well have saved four lives that were tragically lost in the Whitsundays. We asked for the release of documents. After years, we got a redacted executive summary of a report. There were no correspondence, inquiries or other documents— Senator Shoebridge 169119 And it shows systemic failure. Senator ROBERTS 266524 And it shows systemic failure. Thank you for those words. It shows a rot from the top. The most important strategic weapon we have in our Australian Defence Force is its culture, and it is being destroyed. We need to end the hiding. I support Senator Lambie's motion. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 I believe you are seeking leave for a statement, Senator David Pocock? 13:02 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory For a two-minute statement—hopefully less. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Leave is granted. Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 I also stand in support of the motion and thank Senator Lambie for her advocacy on behalf of the Defence and veteran communities. What Senator Lambie is asking for is simple transparency over the IGADF 20-year report. The report was due to be released in March, six months ago now, and we're seeing this pattern from the government of sitting on reports or responses to reports and not releasing them. The ANAO has refused to conduct an audit on the IGADF until after considering the IGADF 20-year review, which the government is yet to release. We're talking about an office that hasn't been audited since it was established 20 years ago. You have to start to ask the questions. What is the government hiding? Senator Lambie has used every mechanism available to try and get transparency around the 20-year review. Veterans deserve transparency. Our Defence community deserves transparency. It's time for the government to deliver on the promise for greater accountability and transparency and to do what's right for communities that sacrifice so much for our country. 13:04 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia I thank the Senate for their cooperation on this, including you, Senator Shoebridge. In order to expedite this, I move: That the question be now put. I think that would be the question on Senator Birmingham's amendments. Question agreed to. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 The question before the chair now is that the amendments by Senator Birmingham be agreed to. Question agreed to. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Now, the question before the chair is that the original motion as amended be agreed to. Senator WONG 00AOU I ask that they be put separately. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Thank you for the reminder. At the request of the government, paragraphs (a) and (b) of the motion will be considered separately. The question now is that the original motion as amended at paragraph (a) be agreed to. Senator Wong, you have the call. Senator WONG 00AOU by leave—I think the amendment has already been carried. This is simply in relation to paragraph (a), as amended. I can indicate the government is voting no on that paragraph, and we ask that our opposition be recorded. If Senator Lambie wishes, we're happy to give her leave to record her opposition on the amendments, which was the previous vote, or she can recommit— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Senator Hanson-Young? 13:07 Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U South Australia If Senator Lambie would like a division on the amendment, she has a right to ask for that to be put. Honourable senators interjecting— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Order! Senator Lambie, can I just seek clarification on whether you are seeking a division in relation to the amendment? Senator Wong? Senator Wong 00AOU Senator Lambie would need to seek leave for that. What I'm saying is we have voted on that. We are quite happy to have her opposition to the amendment recorded, which is the same as having voted against, if she wishes. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Senator Shoebridge? 13:08 Senator SHOEBRIDGE 169119 New South Wales by leave—On behalf of the Greens, we'd like our opposition to the amendment to be noted. We didn't support it. We're happy for the matter then to proceed and have votes on the separate questions, both of which we will support, as amended. But we would like, for the record, our opposition to the amendment, which we think watered down the motion, to be noted. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Your opposition is recorded. Thank you for that clarity. Senator Lambie? 13:08 Senator LAMBIE 250026 Tasmania by leave—I would like my opposition recorded as well, thank you. 13:08 Senator ROBERTS 266524 Queensland by leave—I would like our opposition, as well, to the amendment recorded. 13:08 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory by leave—And also me, thanks. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Senator Cadell, are you seeking the call? Senator Cadell 300134 I'm just seeking clarification on which way you called the division on paragraph (a) for the substantive motion. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 We're putting it again, just to have clarification. Senator Hanson, are you seeking the call? 13:09 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland I am seeking the call. The amendment was put up. There's point (a) and point (b). What I would suggest is to put the amendment back up again, separate point (a) and point (b) and let us vote on that, because apparently the opposition to the amendment would clearly get up to oppose the amendment in its totality. But I don't oppose point (b) of the amendment. I do oppose point (a) but not (b). I want it separated and to put the vote back up again. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Senator Hanson, Senator Roberts asked for your opposition to be recorded. That's why he was on his feet. I'm seeking clarity to see if that still stands. An honourable senator interjecting— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 The question before the chair is that the original motion as amended, in respect of paragraph (a), be agreed to. A division having been called and the bells being rung— Senator Shoebridge 169119 I think that some members may be acting on a misapprehension here. The amendments having happened, my understanding is that what we're dividing on is paragraph (a) as amended. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 That's right. Senator Shoebridge 169119 I understand the government opposes that and would be comfortable having their opposition noted and not require a division. Perhaps Senator Lambie and others may, on reflection, not require a division because at least we get something with amended paragraph (a) being adopted. I think that was the discussion I just had with Senator Lambie. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 I would ask Senator Lambie to clarify whether a division is required so that we can cancel the division if it's not. The question before the chair is that the motion, as amended, be agreed to. Paragraph (a) was the question before the chair, and I had an indication that there was a division required. So are you seeking leave to cancel the division? Is that correct, Senator Lambie? Senator Lambie 250026 That is correct. Leave granted. Question agreed to. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 And I am recording the government's opposition to that motion. The question now before the chair is that the motion as amended, in respect of paragraph (b), be agreed to. Question agreed to. BILLS 4057 BILLS Help to Buy Bill 2023, Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023 4057

Help to Buy Bill 2023

Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023

Second Reading 4057 13:13 The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Senator McKim—Minister Wong? Senator Wong 00AOU Can I indicate—we've obviously had a lot of contributions on this legislation. It's a bill which was introduced to the parliament over 290 days ago. It was introduced to the Senate over 200 days ago. I know that the Greens don't want to vote, but, if you have a position to vote with Mr Dutton, you should allow this to come to a vote. This is a ridiculous waste of time. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Minister Wong, could you just take your seat for a second? Senator McKim was in continuation, and I did provide the call. You have a point of order, Senator McKim? 13:13 Senator McKIM JKM Tasmania Thank you, Acting Deputy President; I was trying to indicate that I do have a point of order, and thanks, Senator Wong, for allowing me to do this. As you've pointed out, I was in continuation. I just seek your advice or the advice of the table on whether Senator Wong is able to interrupt my contribution in the way that she has or whether I have precedence to finish my speech prior to any contribution from Senator Wong. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 Thank you, Senator McKim. I have sought advice from the clerk, and you do have the call in continuation. Senator Wong 00AOU You really don't want to vote on this. Senator Watt 245759 Why do you want to vote against housing? You said you won't. Senator McKIM JKM Thanks very much, Acting Deputy President Cox, for confirming that I do have the call. I will take the interjections from Senator Wong and Senator Watt here and turn the question back around. Why are you putting forward legislation that will provide fractional help to 0.2 of one per cent of Australian renters and actually disadvantage the other 99.8 per cent of Australian renters? That is the question that you have to explain to the Australian people and, in particular, to Australian renters, 99.8 per cent of whom are going to be disadvantaged by this legislation, because, as with so much of your government's housing policy, you are going to contribute yet again to turbocharging house prices in Australia, which, of course, will price more and more people out of the market. I find it strange that the Greens have to explain to you why making the market and housing less affordable for 99.8 per cent of renters is a bad thing, but I'm going to give it a go. The reason that it's a bad thing is that, over a long period of time now, we have seen the creation of a housing bubble. There are a lot of reasons for that. One is the political stitch-up between Labor and the coalition on massive tax breaks for property speculators—about $196 billion of tax concessions for property speculators over a decade. That drives up house prices. So, when someone wants to get in the market and buy their first home, they are competing at auction with someone who might own two, three, five, 10, 50 or 100 investment properties, or, in a small number of cases, many hundreds of investment properties. Those property speculators have the advantage of these massive tax concessions in the form of negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount. In the early years of the pandemic, we also saw the Reserve Bank of Australia engage in massive money printing or quantitative easing. They printed about $400 billion worth of money. Of course, that was effectively free money to the retail banks. They turned around and lent a large proportion of that effectively free money printed by the RBA to their highest margin product, which was, of course, home loans, again turbocharging the housing bubble. We all remember the massive spike in house prices that occurred in the first 18 months to two years of the pandemic, turbocharged by the Reserve Bank of Australia in a money-printing extravaganza that a former governor of the Reserve Bank, Philip Lowe, admitted was the wrong decision and was overegged. Now Labor wants to come in and contribute yet again to the housing bubble in Australia. What Labor need to explain is why they're so keen to see this legislation progress, given that it is literally a lottery that only 0.2 of one per cent of the renters of Australia will be successful in. And, yes, it will provide that very small number of people—somewhere in the region of 10,000—with a very small marginal benefit, but it will be to the detriment of the other 99.8 per cent. That's what Labor has to explain here. It's not just the Greens saying that this is going to push up house prices. This bill was taken to a Senate inquiry where we heard a range of expert evidence that this legislation would push up house prices. For example, Professor John Quiggin, professor of economics at the University of Queensland, said: These schemes have been around forever, but the money is eventually capitalised into house prices, so the beneficiaries gain at the expense of everyone else. So what Labor are going to need to justify to the renters of Australia—who are not exclusively but overwhelmingly younger Australians—is why they want to put upward pressure on house prices and price more and more renters out of the housing market. That's what Labor have to explain, and they've been abjectly unable to explain that—as we know from Labor's failure to invest in constructing new affordable social housing and from Labor's failure to accept the suggestion of the Greens, who are in here fighting for renters, that we should have a cap on rent increases in Australia to provide renters with relief from rents that have gone up by 30 per cent since the Labor Party came into office. Let's have a look at people on JobSeeker. Honourable senators interjecting— Senator Hanson-Young I0U A point of order—I can't hear my colleague over the shouting from Senator Wong over there. She's a little bit sensitive today! The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 I'll just give a reminder to those who are in the chamber—there's a lot of chatter this afternoon—that Senator McKim, like all senators, should receive the same respect of being heard in silence. Senator McKIM JKM It's very unusual that people close to me can't hear me, but I guess there's a first time for everything! But I want to talk about people who are on youth allowance, just briefly. Basically, someone who is on youth allowance can afford only $102 a week on rent before they hit rental stress. What do you reckon you're going to get for 102 bucks a week currently in Australia, where rents have gone up by 30 per cent since Labor came into office, just two short years ago? Do you know what you can get for 102 bucks a week in Australia? Absolutely nothing. I also want to talk about my home state of Tasmania. Almost half of Tasmanians who have a mortgage are in mortgage stress, which is defined as having to spend 30 per cent or more of their annual household income on mortgage repayments. In a housing survey in May this year by EMRS—a very reputable polling company in Australia—89 per cent of Tasmanians, almost everyone, agreed that Tasmania is in a housing crisis. Just to put that in context, you could poll support for breathing and you'd only get 95 per cent; you wouldn't get 100 per cent support. So 89 per cent means that Tasmanians overwhelmingly agree that Tasmania is in a housing crisis. And of course this is not just a housing crisis in Tasmania. This is a national housing crisis. It is time for Labor to get serious about addressing this absolute societal calamity that we are living through in Australia—this housing catastrophe in which millions of Australians are in either rent or mortgage stress, where homelessness is increasing, where people right across the age spectrum are being done over by landlords who are able, under Labor's policy settings, to increase their rent by whatever they like. And then they say, 'Oh, well, the market can determine it.' Well, here's a message for the Labor Party: housing shouldn't be a market. Housing is a human right. Everyone in this country has a right to a safe and affordable home. The former housing minister for the Labor Party, Ms Collins, said the quiet thing out loud on 7.30 about 12 to 15 months ago. She said that she wanted to see housing as an asset class. Talk about saying the quiet thing out loud! Housing shouldn't be an asset class; housing should be a place for people to live. It should be a place where people can live safely and securely at a decent temperature with decent amenities and decent facilities at an affordable rate, whether they have a mortgage or are in the rental market. Instead of actually taking the significant action that is required to address this housing crisis, Labor are fiddling around at the margins because they want to be seen to be doing something even though they're not actually doing anything. This is all about the perception for the Labor Party, and it has nothing at all to do with actually taking meaningful action to address the housing crisis in Australia. Rents have gone up 30 per cent since the Labor Party came into power. Since the Labor Party came into power, mortgages in this country have increased on average by over $1,600 a month. That's the situation that Labor have overseen, and that is the situation they should be acting to fix. Instead, they're bringing in legislation that will actually continue to put upward pressure on house prices and price more and more renters—a significant number of whom are young Australians—out of the market. Young Australians are seeing their dream of one day being able to afford their own home evaporate. Rather than fixate on when this vote is going to be, playing some political game that only they themselves understand, the Labor Party should actually be fixating on solving the housing crisis. What this bill is not going to do is solve the housing crisis. What this bill will do is exacerbate an element of the housing crisis. Even though it will provide marginal benefit to 0.2 per cent of Australian renters, it will make housing less affordable for the other 99.8 per cent. Folks, single parents are skipping meals. Honourable senators interjecting— Senator McKIM JKM This is actually not funny, for those who are laughing, but single parents are skipping meals to be able to feed their children. People are having to dumpster-dive to put food on the table. Poverty is a political choice, and it's a political choice made by parties that won't increase income support and that still support the $190-odd billion that goes into tax breaks for property speculators in the form of negative gearing and capital gains tax discount. The housing market in this country is skewed in a grossly unfair way towards property speculators, many of whom have 10 or 20 or 30— Senator Hanson-Young I0U On a point of order: I'd just like to bring the state of the chamber to the attention of the Acting Deputy President. Senator Wong 00AOU You are so desperate. Senator Watt 245759 Wow! Are you that embarrassed about voting against housing? (Quorum formed) The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 296215 It being 1.30 pm, we'll now move to two-minute statements. STATEMENTS BY SENATORS 4060 STATEMENTS BY SENATORS Respiratory Syncytial Virus 4060 13:30 Senator RUSTON 243273 South Australia Hospitals across Australia are absolutely overrun. We're seeing record levels of ambulance ramping, and a key indicator of hospital stress is ambulance ramping. This is placing Australian patients at serious risk. We know that the significant number of respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, cases this year has been a major contributor to this health crisis. There have been more than 145,000 cases of RSV already this year, which is particularly concerning because of the impact it has on the health of young babies and older Australians. In good news, vaccines have been developed and approved by the TGA to combat the risks of this virus. However, it currently costs $350 to access an RSV vaccine because they have not been listed on the National Immunisation Program by the Albanese Labor government, despite more than three months ago the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee recommending that the government do so, for eligible expectant mothers. In the middle of the cost-of-living crisis, we know that mothers and older Australians are struggling to afford this additional cost. Some states like Queensland and Western Australia have been forced to step in, in the absence of federal leadership, which has seen very positive results. The RACGP has expressed their concerns that this has led to a postcode lottery in our country. So we're experiencing a dual cost-of-living and hospital-ramping crisis right now, and it's getting worse by the day, yet the Albanese government is sitting on its hands and not providing national free access to this critical preventive health measure. The lack of urgency shown by this government is in complete conflict with the urgent situation. We call on the government to do something—show leadership and end this postcode lottery. Housing 4060 13:32 Senator GREEN 259819 Queensland What we saw a few moments ago in this chamber was an outrageous attempt by the Greens political party to prevent a vote on the Help to Buy Bill. We have seen, and we will continue to see, this filibustering from the Greens political party because they're so ashamed of their position of having to vote with the Liberal Party to block housing that they called a quorum to try to get that vote pushed off. It is outrageous for communities like the one that I live in, regional communities that need housing now, that the Greens political party continue to block this type of legislation. We have seen it before many times. We have seen them vote with the Liberals time and time again. I wouldn't expect much more from the LNP. They didn't put a cent into social housing. They didn't have a homelessness minister for half of their government. They never cared about increasing housing stock in this country. But I would expect more from a party that has spent the last 2½ years yelling and shouting and screaming about how important it is that we do something about housing in this country. When the Albanese Labor government brings a bill to this parliament, one that has the potential to help low- and middle-income wage earners get into their own home, to move from renting to owning their own home, the Greens vote against it. Why do they do that? Because they're obsessed with the idea that, if they go out and campaign and doorknock on the housing issue, they'll be able to get votes from the Labor Party. This is not about politics; this is about people getting a house to live in and building a home with their family. This is not about votes in Griffith, and the people of Griffith and Brisbane expect more from the people that they elect when they come in here. They elect people to come to parliament to do something, to get on with the job. Instead, we see this filibustering from the Greens political party— (Time expired) Afghanistan: Human Rights 4061 13:34 Senator WATERS 192970 Queensland In the three years since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, women have been banned from most forms of paid employment, prevented from walking in public parks and shut out of the criminal justice system, and girls have been stopped from going to secondary school or university. Just three weeks ago, the Taliban went even further and banned women from speaking in public and from looking at men other than their husbands or relatives and required women to cover the lower half of their faces in addition to the head covering that they must already wear. In spite of this crackdown, Afghan women continue to resist, speak out and champion their rights. The Taliban must be held to account for the human rights violations that they are perpetrating, and the Australian government must do everything in its power to ensure that they are held accountable. This ongoing assault on Afghan women is not just a local issue; it's a human rights crisis that demands global attention and action. We cannot look away while an entire generation of women is systematically erased from public view. Minister Wong has expressed solidarity with the women and girls of Afghanistan, but we must do more. The Australian government must urgently increase humanitarian aid to Afghanistan and increase its refugee intake for people fleeing Afghanistan. Australia's military involvement significantly contributed to the political instability that we are now witnessing. The oppression of women and girls and the curtailing of their human rights by the Taliban is a crisis, and we urgently need to respond. Drysdale, Mrs Wendy Elizabeth, OAM 4061 13:36 Senator McGRATH 217241 Queensland I rise today to farewell and pay my respects to a good friend of mine and many in this chamber, Wendy Elizabeth Drysdale OAM, who, sadly, passed away last week. Wendy was a fiercely loyal and passionate supporter of Liberal values and contributed significantly to many community groups over the years, including the Liberal National Party. A daughter of a prisoner of war, Wendy's service was not just taught at the knees of her parents but was soul driven—a personal crusade to do good, to be good and to do right. It was why, each year, she helped organise the fall of Singapore service, to remember the gunners of the 2nd/10th Field Regiment—those men who were guests of the Emperor, just like her father. With Jeff, who she married in 1983, Wendy constantly worked on fundraising, supporting many community groups over the years. She was a great fundraiser, including for the Liberal National Party, and collected for charities. Wendy was renowned for her prize-winning fruitcakes, chutneys, relishes and lemon butter, and was especially proud to have entered her pumpkin-and-ginger jam in the Ekka this year, to win first prize in the ABC's competition. On Australia Day 2017, Wendy received an Order of Australia award in recognition of her service. To Jeff, Lizi, Jason and Ada-Ellen: your loss is our loss. May Wendy rest in peace and all that she fought for over the years continue to grow, to thrive and to do good. And, indeed, may all of us do good and be good in her memory. Housing 4061 13:38 Senator GROGAN 296331 South Australia Let me start with a number: 40,000. That's quite a big number. Obviously, it depends on what you are talking about. It's quite a big number when you think of it in terms of houses—40,000 houses. That's 40,000 individuals or couples or families, with a home—40,000. It's quite a big number, and, with the crisis we're seeing from the neglect of the previous government of our housing system, 40,000 homes, and 40,000 families, couples or singles moving into new homes, buying their own home, would indeed have a significant impact. To each one of those 40,000 families, couples or individuals: I can tell you what we've seen play out in this chamber over the last two days, and what we've seen play out in the debate over the last two years on housing. We've seen those opposite in the coalition say, 'You don't deserve it. Assistance from the government in housing? You don't deserve it.' And what we've seen the Greens political party down there say to those 40,000 individuals, couples and families is: 'You're not worth it.' That is disgraceful—disgraceful, as they stand there and just keep on pumping the same story: 'Oh, it's not enough, so it's not worth it.' To those 40,000 families, couples and children—all of those people desperate to buy their own home and move into their own home, while a government is desperately trying to do that as one part of a strategy—the Greens are saying, 'You're not worth it.' It's a disgrace, and the behaviour intended to ensure that we don't go to a vote because you're so humiliated by the way you're going to vote is a disgrace. (Time expired) Public Sector Governance 4062 13:40 Senator LAMBIE 250026 Tasmania Last week we got the final report from an investigation into robodebt and breaches of the Australian Public Service Code of Conduct. A total of 97 code breaches were reported, ranging from failure to exercise reasonable care and diligence and a failure to behave with honesty and integrity to providing false and misleading information. The Public Service Commissioner named two agency heads, including Kathryn Campbell, saying, 'Leaders matter; leaders set the tone and are accountable.' But, because Kathryn Campbell was an agency head, no sanction can be applied. How disgraceful! Just like in defence, there is no accountability. I don't think being publicly named is accountability. What about the 430,000 Australians who were hounded and, in some cases, ended up taking their own lives? Instead of taking this public slap on the wrist and apologising to those Australians, Kathryn Campbell went crying to the Australian newspaper like a baby, claiming she was being used as a scapegoat. As Minister Bill Shorten pointed out, the definition of 'scapegoat' is someone wrongly blamed for the activity of others. You were in charge, Ms Campbell. You are not a scapegoat; you are a disgrace. There were many public servants who tried to warn their bosses that robodebt was probably illegal. I heard from public servants who did the right thing. They were punished. This is the problem: senior public servants, like the top brass in the Defence Force, don't suffer any consequences for their actions. The NACC, headed up by a friend of defence, Major General Paul Brereton, decided in June not to investigate the robodebt scheme—once again, 'Nothing to see here.' This was even more shocking because royal commissioner Catherine Holmes delayed delivering her report so that the NACC could investigate. That's what it's like up here, Australia: jobs for mates and protecting your mates seem to be all that matters. Kathryn Campbell gets to keep her pension, and she can apply for another job in the Public Service. She just has to disclose that she breached the code. This is not accountability; this is just getting off scot-free. New South Wales: Local Government Elections 4062 13:42 Senator KOVACIC 306168 New South Wales Last Saturday 's New South Wales local government elections saw a series of very impressive results for local New South Wales Liberals as they were entrusted by their local communities to represent them. In Ryde, Mayor Trenton Brown and his Liberal team have been emphatically returned to council with Shweta Deshpande and Daniel Han in Central Ward, and Sophie Lara-Watson and Keanu Arya both looking very promising in East Ward, as are Justin Li, Kathy Tracey and Cameron Last in West Ward. The Ryde Liberals' strong result is a credit to their dedication to fighting for their community and ensuring that they get their fair share. This is a fresh, professional and diverse team that presented a vision for Ryde that the good people of Ryde have wholeheartedly endorsed. In Parramatta, it was great to see strong, committed, local Liberals on the ballot once again. The community in Parramatta has been let down by years of poor governance by populists and those on the Left. To Tanya Raffoul in Dundas Ward, Sreeni Pillamarri in Epping Ward, Georgina Valjak in North Rocks Ward, Martin Zaiter in Parramatta Ward, and Steven Issa in Rosehill Ward, congratulations on your election. To William Olive, Taj Mawass and Manning Jeffrey, congratulations for running incredibly close races across the board with many votes still to count. Up in the Tweed, congratulations to very, very hardworking councillors James Owen and Rhiannon Brinsmead on their outstanding results, with both having been re-elected. Their result is a testament to their incredible determination and hard work in delivering for the people of Tweed and giving them the best local representation that is available. Housing 4062 13:44 Senator BILYK HZB Tasmania What we saw this morning in this chamber is an absolute disgrace. The Greens need to hang their heads in shame. All they've done this morning is filibuster so that we couldn't bring on the vote on our housing bill. I find this really obnoxious of them. They've used their delaying tactics. They tried to confuse other senators with interjections and making statements and running to senators during the vote. They don't want the vote to be called on. We all know what's going on—they don't want the vote to be called on, because they don't want to be seen to be voting with the opposition, the Liberal-National opposition. And it's a disgrace because, while they get up and carry on about people not having homes to live in, they're the ones that have been delaying it, just like they did with our HAFF legislation. They're more worried about having a cause to promote themselves than they are about the people that they claim to represent, and I find that an absolute disgrace. They should be more than just embarrassed. I'll say this to you, the Greens party: if you are so concerned, bring on the vote. If you want to improve the housing situation in Australia, bring on the vote. Let's have the vote on it. You have got no idea about people living homeless. I doubt you even actually know where in Hobart—for those Hobart based senators—people are based who are living homeless. But, I tell you what, when I went down to Browns River in Kingston and I spoke to a family living in a tent through rain and hail the other day, do you know what they said to me? They said, 'We would never vote Greens again,' and I was pretty happy with that. That is what— (Time expired) Labor Government 4063 13:46 Senator McKIM JKM Tasmania We're approaching a year since the genocide in Gaza started. At least 40,000 people have been killed, although the true number is likely and tragically far higher. The Labor government in Australia has abjectly failed to stand up for peace, to stand up for justice and to stand up in the face of this humanitarian catastrophe. They've been slow, they've been passive, and they've been weak-willed in their response to a genocide. For nearly a year now, while Palestinians have faced unimaginable suffering, the horrors of genocide, Labor has been complicit. They speak about hoping for peace but have done nothing to stop the bloodshed. They use passive language, condemning violence but never condemning those responsible. From Labor's statements, you'd think those bombs were dropping themselves. They've refused to demand accountability from the State of Israel and its leaders for war crimes and have instead chosen to be complicit. When Labor MPs travelled to Israel, they rejected calls for an immediate ceasefire. Labor even expelled Senator Fatima Payman for voting in line with Labor's own platform to recognise the state of Palestine. For nearly a year, Labor have refused to impose sanctions on the State of Israel, they've enabled the export of weapons components and they've indeed failed to impose any accountability. Their cowardice is a stain on their party and a stain on our country. History will not forget Labor's betrayal of Palestinian people. Financial Security 4063 13:48 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory This morning, I hosted a group of people who have been victims of scams. They're among the hundreds of thousands of Australians who fall victim to scams every year. Scams are increasingly sophisticated, and Australians recognise that they are no longer things that just happen to other people. Scams cost Australians more than $2.47 billion last year alone. The government last week released exposure draft legislation designed to crack down on scams. It has been a long time coming, and it's a very welcome step. But scam victims, experts and advocates, like CHOICE, are telling me it doesn't go far enough. While the government's draft bill seeks to prevent and punish scams, it doesn't properly protect victims. This is because, while it sets up a framework and industry codes, it doesn't include a reimbursement model. I'm really concerned that that is because big vested interests are again driving this policy development. The banks don't want to be on the hook for reimbursing, but a reimbursement model would make an enormous difference. It is the most effective means of getting financial institutions to take this seriously and reduce scam losses. We've seen this in the UK, where they have brought in a strong reimbursement model with compensation capped at 85,000 pounds, or around A$166,000. In the UK, total scam losses have declined by four per cent. More importantly, 98 per cent of those impacted by scams have been fully refunded. Here in Australia, the big four repaid less than four per cent of the $558 million their customers lost to scams in 2022. This was at the same time as they were making a profit of some $32 billion. This problem is bad and it's getting worse, and Australians deserve better protection from their government. Myanmar 4063 13:50 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia As the nation gears up for the next federal election, I can't help but be filled with gratitude for the democratic processes that we freely enjoy here in Australia—freedoms that are not to be treated flippantly but are to be revered, upheld and fought for. I remember those of old who fought for the rights that we freely enjoy today, and I acknowledge those who today fight for democracy, with the hope of embracing democracy tomorrow—those courageous civilians in Myanmar. The Myanmar people have held steadfast in their struggle against the militant Tatmadaw for three years from the forceful overturning of the democratically elected Aung San Suu Kyi in February of 2021. We continue to champion their struggle against dictatorship, as hundreds of lives have been claimed, thousands have been unjustly arrested and many more are in dire need as a result of the ongoing oppression. Australia has maintained diplomatic ties with Myanmar for over 70 years. Over the decades, we have supported Myanmar's transition from military rule to a democracy, culminating in the short-lived election victory we saw three years ago. We commend the many young people who have taken to the front lines in the fight for democratic processes and remember every life lost in the ongoing battle. So I take this opportunity to express my continued support for the end of the violence and the restoration of the inherent human rights of the Myanmar people. My prayer is that, with continued efforts, Myanmar will see the fruits of its people's labour and the nation will return to the path of democracy and freedom. First Nations Australians: Welcome to Country 4064 13:52 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland This divisive welcome to country nonsense has been allowed to fester for far too long. Brisbane footy fans were left scratching their heads on Saturday after they were told welcomes to country had been performed for 250,000 years and weren't invented to cater to white people. If they're not to cater to white people, why are white people constantly subjected to them? These welcomes are based on lies that Australia is not our home. So many people tell me they are just over it. Welcomes to country are just racial antagonism disguised as reconciliation, imposed on children before they even get to school and also when they are in school. Placing their hands on the ground is indoctrination. Australia is home to all Australians, and we don't need or want to be welcomed to our own home. We have shed blood, sweat and tears to build and defend our home. We have as much right to live in our home as anyone else. If you hand over my home to someone else, I have nothing to fight for. If you hand over Australia, I will not defend it, and neither will my children. Being an elder doesn't obligate my respect. Respect is earned, not given away to racial exceptionalism. Being Aboriginal does not make someone exceptional. Being an Australian is what makes you exceptional. That's the identity we all share. In this spirit, I stand and turn my back on welcomes to country here in parliament and out in public. It's a shame that so many other political leaders are too gutless to follow the same principle, desperate not to lose votes to the radical left. I strongly encourage Australians to do the same. Stop being walked over and stand up for your home. Western Australia: Fossil Fuel Industry 4064 13:53 Senator STEELE-JOHN 250156 Western Australia I speak for the thousands of community members in WA and across the country who have contacted me about their opposition to Woodside's Browse expansion and their fears for the future of Scott Reef. Communities in my home state of WA have been protesting. They are protesting Woodside's plans from Cottesloe to Broome to Exmouth. Places like Scott Reef are critical areas of marine biodiversity that are especially vulnerable to warming temperatures. Now, this parliament has heard plenty about the direct impact that this project will have on the endangered blue whales, the sea turtles and thousands of other species. The consequences of Woodside's plans to drill would be devastating for the entire Scott Reef ecosystem. This is a tragedy that those in this parliament can prevent. Australians are begging their government to put the health of our oceans and the future of our planet back at the heart of decision-making. The government needs to act on behalf of the communities that they have sworn to represent, not the corporate political donors that prop up their election campaigns. Woodside's proposed Browse development is going to be one of the most harmful fossil fuel projects in Australian history—that is, if Labor gives it the green light. The WA Environmental Protection Authority has categorically rejected this project. I implore the Labor government: do not continue with business as usual. This audacity—saying you're acting on climate change while you're approving these things—must come to an end. (Time expired) Energy 4064 13:56 Senator VAN 283601 Victoria We all know Australia needs to replace our coal-fired energy production with cleaner, greener, firmed alternatives. Personally, I'd like to see this happen sooner rather than later. We have to remember that is the low-hanging fruit in our transition to a decarbonised economy. Unfortunately, our current approach to energy planning is driving a painfully slow pace, with only limited decarbonisation gains. The use of more transmission lines to provide more hosting capacity will only have a minor impact. It will not take the burden off the curtailment we are seeing currently, and it will cost tens of billions of dollars and take over 10 years to achieve. This is well past our 2030 targets. As the Australian Energy Regulator chair, Clare Savage, pointed out, it is vital that, before we build more network, we use more network—that is, we use it more efficiently. The technology to deliver clean, affordable and reliable power is within our grasp and often within our homes. Before burdening Australians with the cost of new infrastructure, like poles and wires, let's focus on doing more with what we have: smarter, localised solutions that can unlock the full potential of our existing assets and deliver cleaner energy faster without financial strain. These are a mixture of behind-the-meter systems such as your solar panels, your residential battery and your electric vehicle, if it has two-way vehicle-to-grid technology. These are all within our grasp. (Time expired) Qantas 4064 13:58 Senator SHELDON 168275 New South Wales It's been over four years since Qantas illegally sacked 1,700 ground handlers and over a year since the High Court decision, and Qantas has still not paid a cent in compensation. It's disgraceful that Qantas is too busy to reach a deal on compensation but has plenty of time to jack up the cost of the ticket change fees by 20 per cent, let alone the services they're not providing in regional Australia. The Transport Workers Union's High Court case was supported at every step by Labor. Contrast that with Senator McKenzie and her Qantas-supporting mates in the Liberal and National parties, who to this very day refuse to support those workers, who gave Qantas a $2.5 billion no-strings-attached handout during the case and who earlier this year voted against closing the very loophole Qantas abused to do the outsourcing. In fact, here is what Senator McKenzie had to say about her voting with Qantas to keep that loophole open: 'When you look at those industrial relations measures that were brought in, the government got the advice about the negative impact.' Senator McKenzie 207825 Stop protecting them. You love Alan Joyce. Senator SHELDON 168275 'In a globally competitive environment such as Qantas operates in, they need to have increases in productivity alongside wage increases so that businesses can stay profitable.' There you have it in her own words. The Liberals and Nationals need to let Qantas continue ripping off thousands of hardworking Australians to keep their profit margin up. Qantas made a profit last year of $2.47 billion. Senator McKenzie should spend less time covering for Qantas and more time working with Labor to fix the mess she left us all. Senator McKenzie 207825 The staff know, Sheldon, that you're all talk. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator McKenzie, I hope that wasn't a forerunner of question time. I don't want to see running commentary. Senator McKenzie 207825 He was maligning me. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator McKenzie, you're not in a debate with me. I don't want running commentary when other people are on their feet. We'll move to question time. QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE 4065 QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE Negative Gearing 4065 14:00 Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X South Australia My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. Yesterday, in response to a relatively direct question from Senator Faruqi, you refused to rule out changes to negative gearing under a future Labor government. Minister, will you take this opportunity to be clear and to rule out any future changes to negative gearing? 14:00 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia I do remember that answer yesterday, and I have to confess this to the Senate chamber, which probably didn't listen to all of the content after the first bit of, 'Why won't you negotiate with us?' which I thought really was such an interesting question to ask, given that the bill we are talking about has been before the parliament for 290 days. It is amazing how long the Australian Greens can work to not get a vote, because they're so worried about voting with Mr Dutton. That's what it is. Our housing policy is clear. It does not include the tax changes that you reference. It includes the bill before the chamber, and what I would say to you is that you should support the legislation. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Birmingham, first supplementary? 14:01 Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X South Australia I note that your policy on stage 3 tax cuts was clear as well, until it changed. In her 2015 book, Two Futures: Australia at a Critical Moment, the now Minister for Housing, Ms O'Neil, said, 'We need to wind back negative gearing,' and argued the case to do so. Minister, given the tricky words that you're choosing to use now and your refusal to rule out changes to negative gearing, can you rule them out now—or how can Australians believe Mr Albanese? (Time expired) 14:02 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia Let's just be clear what we're doing here: those opposite are voting with the Australian Greens to stop houses being built. That's what's happening. Those opposite are voting with the Australian Greens to stop houses being built. So, in an attempt to find something else to talk about, they bring up a scare campaign from many years ago. The Treasurer has made clear that we have no plans to change negative gearing arrangements. But what I would say to those opposite is: instead of talking about what we're not doing, why don't you talk about what we're doing? Why don't you allow us to bring on a vote on the bill? Why not, for a change, do something other than just vote no? You vote no, you vote no and you vote no, and the reason you do is that you don't have any positive plans for Australia. You're not about helping people; you're simply about obstructing. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Birmingham, second supplementary? 14:03 Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X South Australia Prior to the last election, the Prime Minister said in relation to the stage 3 tax cuts, 'My word is my bond,' and then he and all of you kept saying, 'Our policy is clear,' as you've just said about negative gearing. Minister, the government broke its word on stage 3 tax cuts, on superannuation changes, on industry-wide employer bargaining and on its promise not to touch franking credits. It's broken its word again and again. How can anybody believe you when you now won't make a crystal-clear statement on negative gearing? 14:04 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia So what happened on stage 3? Do we remember what happened on stage 3? Did Mr Dutton say he was going to oppose it? Did Mr Dutton say he was going to oppose it before, miraculously, they voted for it? Miraculously, they voted for it, and now they come in here having a go about tax cuts that they—eventually, reluctantly—voted for because they were the right thing to do. That really is a demonstration of how, frankly, pathetic the opposition is. They are now trying to whip up a fear campaign around tax cuts that they supported. If we want to talk about people not telling people the truth, tell us about the $315 billion worth of cuts that Senator Hume wants. (Time expired) Housing 4066 14:05 Senator WALSH 252157 Victoria My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. Can the minister please explain the Albanese Labor government's plans to boost housing supply, help first home buyers and ensure more Australians have a safe and secure home? 14:05 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia Thank you, Senator Walsh, for your question. I know how much you have worked for a more just Australia and a fairer Australia, and part of that is housing. Those of us on this side want every Australian to have a safe place to call home. That is why we are investing more—to build more homes, to support renters and to help people buy a home sooner. There is $32 billion worth of initiatives under our Homes for Australia Plan, and a key part of that plan is our landmark Help to Buy scheme. It's a straightforward scheme of shared equity to enable people to get into the housing market earlier than they would otherwise. That scheme was introduced into this parliament some 290 days ago, in November of 2023. It passed the House in February 2024, 200 days ago, but it hasn't passed this place. Why? Mr Dutton and Mr Bandt are working together—that's why it hasn't passed this place. The Liberals and the Greens have come together again to block housing policies, because Mr Dutton simply says no to everything. I mentioned yesterday that I thought the Liberal Party included in their values homeownership, but they are standing against homeownership. It appears that they don't want homeownership to be enabled for more people. They don't want homeownership for people who come from low- and middle-income backgrounds. What happened to the Liberal Party that they are standing with the Greens in the way of homeownership for more Australians? (Time expired) Honourable senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! May I invite those senators who insist upon continuing to interject and call out very loudly to put their names on the adjournment list tonight if they have so much to say? Otherwise, I remind you that this is question time and you will listen in respectful silence. Senator Walsh, a first supplementary? 14:08 Senator WALSH 252157 Victoria Can the minister please detail how the Albanese Labor government's housing reforms will ensure there is more social and affordable housing for those who need it? 14:08 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia Nine years of those opposite has meant that we don't have enough social and affordable housing in this country. In fact, those opposite didn't even have a housing minister for the majority of their time in government. But what we are doing is working to ensure there is more— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Minister Wong, please resume your seat. Senator McKenzie, I am not quite sure which bit of 'Order!' does not apply to you! Minister, please continue. Senator WONG 00AOU In the first round of funding under Labor's Housing Australia Future Fund and National Housing Accord plans we are delivering almost 14,000 new social and affordable houses. In fact, in our first term, we are delivering and supporting more social and affordable housing than those opposite did in nine years. Social and affordable housing is not only good for our economy; it is also the decent thing to do. It's the right thing to do. Unlike those opposite, we don't actually believe that homeownership and decent housing should not be enabled for more Australians. The approach of those opposite is that only some Australians should be entitled to homeownership. (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Walsh, second supplementary? 14:09 Senator WALSH 252157 Victoria Can the minister outline the obstacles standing in the way of more low- and middle-income Australians buying their own home? 14:09 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia There are 40,000 low- and middle-income Australians who have as their block to greater accessibility to homeownership the Greens and the coalition. The coalition and the Greens are standing in the way of homeownership for 40,000 low- and middle-income Australians— Senator McKenzie 207825 It's always the politics, Penny, isn't it? Senator WONG 00AOU I'll take the interjection from Senator McKenzie. We think it's a good thing to give more Australians—40,000 more Australians—the capacity to own their own homes. Only someone from the coalition could think that that was about politics. But let me talk briefly about the Greens. It's interesting that the Greens have consistently voted with the coalition to delay the Housing Australia Future Fund, voted with the coalition to block Build to Rent and voted with the coalition to block Help to Buy. We know also that the member for Griffith is supporting a campaign against 3,000 social or affordable inner homes in his electorate. So, really, who do you actually support? (Time expired) DISTINGUISHED VISITORS 4067 DISTINGUISHED VISITORS Maldives: Parliamentary Delegation 4067 14:10 The 112096 PRESIDENT (): I draw to the attention of honourable senators the presence in the gallery of a delegation from the government of the Maldives as part of the Canberra Fellowships Program. On behalf of all senators, I wish you a warm welcome to Australia and, in particular, to the Senate. Honourable senators: Hear, hear! QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE 4067 QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE Labor Government 4067 14:11 Senator HUME 266499 Victoria My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. Minister, the Leader of the Greens, Mr Bandt, was quoted yesterday listing three key demands of Labor in the event of a hung parliament. Mr Bandt said, 'In the scenario of a hung parliament, we would be pushing the next government to make big corporations pay their fair share of tax, wind back those tax breaks for wealthy property investors and deliver some relief to renters and stressed mortgage holders.' Minister, will you be upfront with all Australians and categorically rule out Labor doing deals with the Greens that result in big new taxes on Australian businesses, big new taxes on Australian homeowners and big new taxes on Australian workers? 14:12 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia I mean, really? In a week where the coalition and the Greens have teamed up to stop 40,000 homes for Australians, in a week where we've seen, even today, the juvenile tactics in this chamber to avoid getting to a vote and after we've seen, on housing, the member for Griffith lead you down a path which has him in lockstep with Peter Dutton, they're arm in arm wandering down—I don't know. What is one of the streets in Brisbane? That's what they're doing. Senator Watt 245759 Down the Queen Street Mall! Senator WONG 00AOU The Queen Street Mall—that's right. They're arm in arm down the Queen Street Mall, going: 'Yeah, mate. We're right. We're just going to vote no together on everything.' That's the Greens. In that week, you're going to ask me about working with the Greens? Well, have a look in the mirror. Honourable senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 I'm waiting for silence. Senator Hume, first supplementary? 14:13 Senator HUME 266499 Victoria Minister, you had multiple opportunities yesterday to do so, but I will ask you point-blank and I'm not interested in plans. Can you make a concrete commitment that Labor will not scrap or amend negative gearing in order to secure support for a minority government with the Greens? 14:13 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia I refer you to my earlier answer, Senator. What I'd say to you is this: we all watched Senator Hume on Insiders— Senator McKenzie 207825 The submission's already been through ERC. The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Wong, please resume your seat. Senator McKenzie, if you can't listen in respectful silence, please leave the chamber. Minister Wong, please continue. Senator WONG 00AOU We all watched Insiders when Senator Hume was— Senator WONG 00AOU Are you alright? I don't mind a bit, but let me just have a little bit of a go before you start, alright? How about that? We all watched as Senator Hume ducked and weaved on— Senator 00AOU See, she's doing it again! The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Wong, please resume your seat. Order! Senator Hume? Senator Hume 266499 A point of order on relevance. I specifically asked about negative gearing, not my performance on Insiders. Honourable senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! I am having some difficulty hearing the minister because of the interjections across the chamber. So, if you wish me to rule on a point of order, you need to listen in respectful silence. I do believe the minister is being relevant, but I will continue to listen very carefully—without interjections from those senators whose names I've called. Minister Wong. Senator WONG 00AOU We watched as Senator Hume ducked and weaved on the $315 billion worth of cuts that she was very keen to say they were going to deliver, but was very keen not to say what they would cut. What we know it would mean is cuts to Medicare, cuts to pensions, cuts to payments— The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Wong, please resume your seat. Senator Birmingham? Senator Birmingham H6X A point of order on direct relevance, President. With eight seconds left, perhaps the minister could at least even utter the words 'negative gearing' to turn to the question. The PRESIDENT 112096 Thank you, Senator Birmingham. I will draw the minister back to Senator Hume's question. Minister Wong. Senator WONG 00AOU I started by saying that we have no plans to change negative gearing—but I'll tell you what, mate, why don't you come clean on your $315 billion? Why don't you tell people about your plan to cut the pension— (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Hume, a second supplementary? 14:16 Senator HUME 266499 Victoria Minister, Mr Bandt said that he is only interested in governing with Labor. Can you make a concrete commitment that Mr Albanese will not appoint Mr Bandt or any other Greens as ministers under a Labor-Greens government? 14:16 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia We are campaigning for a Labor government—a Labor government that delivers housing reform. We are campaigning for a Labor government that delivers higher wages. We are campaigning for a Labor government which delivers the biggest increases in bulk-billing in decades. That's what we are campaigning for. You are waltzing down the Queen Street Mall with the Australian Greens— The 10000 Minister Wong, please resume your seat. Order on my left! Senator McGrath, I've called you a number of times this question time and I invite you—as I invited Senator McKenzie—if you can't remain silent, to leave the chamber. Minister Wong, please continue. Senator WONG 00AOU We are campaigning for a Labor government and Labor government policies. What we have witnessed this week is a continuation of the Greens political party's political decision to work with the extraordinarily negative Leader of the Opposition to team up to oppose everything. In that week, do you know what's happened? They're suddenly worried that they're actually a bit close to the Greens. So, instead of actually voting separately, they now think that asking questions is going to create the political difference. (Time expired) Environment 4068 14:17 Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U South Australia My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. At the last election, your government promised to fix Australia's broken environment laws. Why won't the Prime Minister work with the Greens to put in place environment laws that stop the destructive logging of our native forests and consider climate impacts in a way that would both tackle climate pollution and provide more certainty for the renewable energy industry? 14:18 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia I just was waiting to see if Senator Hanson-Young was going to call a quorum. I guess she doesn't mind being in the chamber if she gets to ask questions; she just minds being in the chamber when she might have the embarrassment of voting again with Mr Peter Dutton. That's what it's about. The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Wong, please resume your seat. Order! Order! Senator McKim, which part of 'Order!' does not apply to you? Senator Waters? Senator Waters 192970 President, on a point of order, Senator Wong needs to withdraw that reflection on my colleague—who's doing an excellent job, I might add. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Waters, I don't believe that was a reflection, and I'll ask Senator Wong to continue. Senator WONG 00AOU I'd make a few points about— Senator Henderson ZN4 Senator Wong, withdraw! Senator WONG 00AOU What am I withdrawing? The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Henderson, I'm the President of the Senate; you are not. I've called for order. Minister Wong, please continue. Senator WONG 00AOU As you know, Senator Henderson, I'm always happy to withdraw if asked, but I did point out that she called a quorum before so that she didn't have to vote, which was the truth. So I don't know if that's actually unparliamentary, but I'm always happy to withdraw if people want me to. Senator Henderson ZN4 Oh, good. Thank you. Senator WONG 00AOU Well, you know that. You know that. I think everyone knows that the current laws aren't working for business, and they certainly aren't working for the environment. We know that the minister has been engaged in discussions. It's regrettable that to date we haven't seen the coalition engage responsibly on this. What I would say to Senator Hanson-Young is that I think the Prime Minister has made clear his views on some of these policy matters, and that is the position of the government, and if you don't wish to be a responsible party in how you deal with these issues, then, yet again, what you will see is good Labor reform which is not able to proceed because the Greens are taking an extreme position and the coalition are taking the oppositional position, the negative position, that they always engage in. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Hanson-Young, first supplementary? 14:20 Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U South Australia The Prime Minister's arrogant, bulldozer approach to the Senate—this requires this parliament to be cooperative and collaborative. What is it about putting climate in our environment laws that triggers you so much? 14:21 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia Well, I suppose the response might be, Senator: why are you so frightened about voting? Why are you so frightened about voting on housing? Is it because a part of Senator Hanson-Young and her colleagues in the Senate know that the member for Griffith has led them up the garden path? In your heart of hearts, do you think 40,000 houses is not a bad thing for low-and middle-income Australians? Is that why you're getting so upset? The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator McKim? Senator McKim JKM The point of order, as I'm sure you would anticipate, is on direct relevance. This question was not about housing. It wasn't about the member for Griffith. It was about climate and our environment laws. I ask that you draw the minister to the question. The PRESIDENT 112096 I will draw the minister to Senator Hanson-Young's question. Senator WONG 00AOU There were some political statements in there. There were a number of political statements about the Prime Minister. And what I'd say to Senator Hanson-Young is: if this is a bulldozer, it's a pretty slow bulldozer. I mean, you've had 290 days to deal with the housing legislation and now you're complaining about being bulldozed. It defies belief—doesn't it?—the lengths to which you will go to try and justify voting with the coalition. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Hanson-Young, second supplementary? 14:23 Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U South Australia I find it extraordinary that this government does not want to talk about the environment, native forests or climate. Why does the Prime Minister choose to be berated by the Minerals Council and the BCA executives instead of working in this place to fix our environment laws to protect our forests from logging and to make sure we help the renewable energy industry with climate considerations? The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Senator McKim, I have called order, that applies to you. 14:23 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia Senator, I'm tempted to talk about who goes to which events and I'm tempted to talk about a shameful appearance by one of your members at a CFMEU rally with pictures of the Prime Minister. I think your judgement is sound, Senator Hanson-Young, and you would not have stood on that stage with those pictures. When it comes to the challenges on the environment—but also the overarching challenge, which is climate—we are serious about action on climate and on the environment, and we have taken action. We have taken action. We have ambitious targets, and we are committed to transitioning our economy. Unlike those opposite, we believe it is possible to have sensible environmental framework and continue economic growth. Unlike your party, we don't believe that we should be stopping economic growth. As always, it is up to Labor to chart the right course— (Time expired) Housing 4070 14:24 Senator PRATT I0T Western Australia My question is to the Minister representing the Treasurer, Senator Gallagher. The Albanese government wants every Australian to have a safe and secure home to live in. Labor wants more Australians to be able to buy their own home. We have a comprehensive $32 billion housing plan, which is about building more houses with the states and territories, supporting renters, getting more people into homeownership and making sure people can access social housing and homelessness services when they need them. Minister, why is it so important that we respond to the housing crisis from every angle? 14:25 Senator GALLAGHER ING Australian Capital Territory I thank Senator Pratt for that question. It's an important one, because a comprehensive approach to the challenges in the housing market is required, and that's what the Albanese government's plan addresses. Every day since we've come to government we've looked at how we can use every lever and opportunity available to us to ensure that we are pushing everything we can to build more housing in Australia. Social and affordable housing is a priority, because we care about and support Australians who have insecure housing or don't have a roof over their head and need to access those services. That's why we've signed that important National Housing Agreement, with extra funds going in there for state and territory services. Renters are a priority, because we know it's hard to get a rental and rent is often too high. We want renters to see a pathway to homeownership, and Help to Buy should be providing that pathway. Supply is the No. 1 housing challenge. We need more houses and we need them quickly. That's why we want to build 1.2 million houses by the end of the decade and it's why in our three budgets since coming to government we have invested in housing, after a decade of neglect from those opposite. They weren't interested in housing. They're interested now that they can come in and complain about it, but when they were in government they didn't do a single thing about driving supply in this country. We've got our Housing Australia Future Fund and the Help to Buy program that we'd like to get through the Senate. We've got our extra investments in First Nations housing—historic investments secured by former minister Burney and now being implemented by Minister McCarthy. We've increased rent assistance. We're working with the states and territories. We're putting more money into skills in the construction sector. And we'll continue to do this. It's a comprehensive plan that should be supported by this Senate. (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Pratt, first supplementary? 14:27 Senator PRATT I0T Western Australia The Albanese government's comprehensive housing plan has set an ambitious goal of building 1.2 million houses by the end of the decade. To do this we have to build more houses and remove barriers that prevent houses from being built. What policies has the government designed to support the construction of more houses? 14:28 Senator GALLAGHER ING Australian Capital Territory Thanks very much, Senator Pratt. Yes, the debate should be all about supply. We need to build more houses more quickly in this country, and every vote against a Labor housing bill is a vote against more housing for Australians. According to the Greens and their spokesperson on housing, housing supply isn't a problem in this country, as he said on Insiders. 'Australia has enough homes for people to live in,' said the member for Griffith on Insiders. But I would trust the experts over the blockers, including the Grattan Institute, who have said that the long-term solution to Australia's housing crisis is to build more houses. The Greens have blocked more housing for Australians at every step. They delayed the Housing Australia Future Fund. We're now trying to get Help to Buy through. I wonder whether it's because out there in the community they are against housing. We've got them blocking housing for Australians in Brisbane, in Sydney and even in Port Melbourne, where they're locally lobbying against housing. (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Pratt, second supplementary? 14:29 Senator PRATT I0T Western Australia Addressing housing supply has been a priority for the Albanese Labor government. Yesterday we saw the Prime Minister announce that Labor will deliver 13,700 new social and affordable homes under our first round of the Housing Australia Future Fund. Why is building more houses a priority? And are you aware of other ideas that pose a challenge for us to build more homes for Australians? 14:29 Senator GALLAGHER ING Australian Capital Territory I thank Senator Pratt for the supplementary question. We want more people to be able to get into the market sooner with a smaller deposit and lower repayments. That's why we can't believe why the opposition and the Greens are standing in the way of that, because that is what they're doing when they're teaming up, when they are holding hands on all these housing votes in the parliament. Instead, those opposite—and I'm sorry that we don't have the spokesperson for ransacking your super here today—want Australians to mortgage their future by raiding superannuation for housing. Expert after expert has said the same thing: super for housing will simply increase prices. It is not even just the experts. The opposition leader once said: 'It is not good policy. You don't want to fuel the prices.' The deputy opposition leader said, 'Young people need their super for retirement, not to try to take pressure of an urban housing bubble.' Senator Hume even said, 'Super for housing will bump up housing prices.' (Time expired) Gambling Advertising 4071 14:30 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Communications, Senator McAllister. This morning on Radio National, a woman who was referred to as 'Kate' shared the story of her brother, a 24-year-old man who tragically took his own life because he could not escape the predatory tactics of the gambling industry. She gave evidence to the Murphy inquiry, and she is asking the government to heed its findings and put in place a full ban on gambling advertising. She doesn't want other families to experience the awful loss that hers has. But, after a year of hearing nothing, she is asking: 'What is it going to take?' Minister, can you answer Kate's question and tell us: what is it going to take for the government to listen to the evidence and ban all gambling advertising? 14:31 Senator McALLISTER 121628 New South Wales Senator Pocock asks about the interview provided by a woman who was referred to as 'Kate' this morning. Can I start by really acknowledging the public contribution that this woman is making, her courage in telling her story publicly and the contribution that I understand that she made to the inquiry into gambling harms. I say to Senator Pocock that the government has made it clear that we are deeply concerned about gambling harms. It is one of the reasons that we have taken so many steps since election to deliver reforms to prevent online wagering harm. Indeed, I would assert that more reform has been undertaken in the last two years than was delivered in the preceding decade. Those reforms include: banning the use of credit cards for online gambling; introducing new evidence based taglines in wagering advertising; strengthening classification of gambling-like features in video games to protect children; establishing mandatory customer ID verification for online wagering; and, most importantly, launching the national self-exclusion register, BetStop, for problem gamblers. More than 28,000 Australians have now registered, and 40 per cent of those have opted for self-imposed lifetime bans. BetStop is the most effective harm-reduction initiative to date in terms of directly helping Australians who are experiencing harm, and I encourage anyone who is experiencing harm from online wagering to visit the website of www.betstop.gov.au. The senator asks about our model to reduce wagering ads, and we are consulting on this at the moment. We are focused on objectives to reducing exposure of children— (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Pocock, a first supplementary? 14:33 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory My question was about gambling advertising. This young man's family say that he was hounded to death by Sportsbet through an endless stream of advertising and direct inducements like bonus bets. This morning Kate said, 'I really feel that those inducements made him feel the only way out was to end his life.' Minister, if you are not going to talk about gambling advertising, and clearly you are not going for a full gambling ad ban, can you at least confirm to us that the government will ban online gambling inducements? 14:34 Senator McALLISTER 121628 New South Wales Well, as I started to indicate in my answer to your primary question, we are consulting on a proposed model to reduce wagering ads and we are focused on three outcomes: reducing the exposure of children to gambling ads, breaking the nexus of wagering and sport, and tackling the targeting and saturation of ads. The government continues to consult with stakeholders, and I would make the additional point that these reforms to wagering advertising will form just one part of the government's comprehensive response to the 31 recommendations made by the parliamentary inquiry. We understand that advertising reform is complex. Industry stakeholders and harm advocates, for different reasons, are putting their views forward, and we are considering multiple channels over which advertising is delivered—not just TV and radio, but digital platforms and social media where advertising targets vulnerable Australians. (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Pocock, second supplementary? 14:35 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory The government certainly make it more complex than the Murphy review recommended, which was a full ban on gambling advertising. The Prime Minister said he doesn't think gambling ads should be shown during G-rated programs. How about the following? LEGO Masters, Glee, The Simpsons, Young Sheldon, Bondi Vet, Home and Away—all of these programs are PG-rated; all of these programs are shown in family viewing times. Does your government think gambling ads should be shown during these programs? 14:36 Senator McALLISTER 121628 New South Wales As I've indicated, the government is consulting with stakeholders. It is complex; it is important that we hear views, that we avoid unintended consequences and that we take the time to get it right. I'm not in a position to confirm the outcome of those consultations. The minister will update the chamber and the parliament when those consultations are concluded, but it is obvious that meaningful action is required. The number of people betting on sports has doubled in the last five years. More than one-quarter of men aged 18 to 24 and one-third of men aged 25 to 34 now bet on sport, and 10 per cent of sports betters are classified as having a problem with gambling. Australians lose more than $25 billion in gambling every year. It's the highest per capita in the world. It is why we need to get the reforms right to deliver harm reduction and cultural change. Legal Aid 4072 14:37 Senator THORPE 280304 Victoria My question is for the Minister representing the Attorney-General, Senator Watt. A recent independent review recommended the government provide an extra $459 million a year to the legal assistance sector and $215 million of emergency funding for this year alone to ensure frontline services can keep up with urgent needs in the community. Two weeks ago, your government committed a pitiful $100 million a year after indexation to help these services meet increasing demand. This is less than one-quarter of what is needed, Minister. As more and more First Peoples, women, children and vulnerable people are left without help, why has the government chosen to choke frontline services of the funding they need? 14:38 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland With respect, Senator Thorpe, I'm not sure those figures that you're quoting are correct. I've said previously that our government—and, in particular, the Attorney-General, as someone who has spent a lot of his life working with community legal centres—is a very strong supporter of the community legal sector and has actually delivered far more funding than the figures you've quoted have referred to. The Prime Minister's significant announcement following National Cabinet last week demonstrates our government's commitment to access to justice. First ministers have signed a heads of agreement for a new National Access to Justice Partnership and the new $3.9 billion agreement includes an $800 million increase on current funding levels for the legal assistance sector plus a commitment to ongoing funding. Every part of the sector will benefit from this $800 million boost, which will be shared between community legal centres, women's legal services, legal aid commissions, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander legal services, and family violence prevention legal services. This is the biggest single Commonwealth investment in legal assistance ever and I congratulate the Attorney-General for his advocacy on this within government and, of course, congratulate the other ministers involved who've made this assistance happen. The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Watt, please resume your seat. Senator Thorpe? Senator Thorpe 280304 I have a point of order. It's not a congratulatory question for you to talk about the Attorney-General— The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe, that is a debating point. Please resume your seat. Minister Watt, please continue. Senator WATT 245759 The package the government has delivered will provide pay parity for the community legal sector so that lawyers and other workers in CLCs, ATSILSs, women's legal services and family violence prevention and legal services, who are mostly women, will no longer have to accept being paid up to 30 per cent less than their counterparts in legal aid commissions. This investment will mean that they can help more Australians and help more women safely leave and recover from violent relationships. By providing ongoing funding to the sector, we're helping to end the destructive uncertainty created by the former government, which left a decade of chronic underfunding in the legal assistance sector and a funding cliff. (Time expired) The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe, first supplementary? 14:40 Senator THORPE 280304 Victoria The National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services have described the insufficient announcement as a betrayal, saying it will mean only a fraction of people who need help will get it, including victims-survivors of domestic, family and sexual violence. The chair said that the announcement confirms the government thinks that is okay. Minister, do you think that is okay? 14:40 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland I certainly think it's a very good thing that this government, the Albanese Labor government, has invested another $800 million in the community legal sector beyond funding that was already in the budget, and certainly beyond anything we've seen from any government before. My understanding is that the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services, in particular, will be beneficiaries, as they should be, of the extra funding and of what it will do for pay parity, particularly for the women who work in those legal services. As I say, the $800 million that we have dedicated is in addition to current funding which is already being provided, so this does mean that all parts of the community sector involved in legal advice will receive more funding. That includes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services. They do terrific work, and they deserve the extra funding that they'll be receiving as a result of our government's decision. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe, second supplementary? 14:41 Senator THORPE 280304 Victoria All this government's spin is smoke and mirrors to deceive people and the sector, and you know it. Does your government recognise that, unless you increase funding for this sector, more vulnerable women and children will be turned back to violence, more kids will be lost to a lifetime of incarceration and more people will die in custody? Will your government accept responsibility for this? 14:42 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland Again, Senator Thorpe, with respect, I don't think it is accurate or fair, whether it be to the government or to the legal services concerned, to describe an extra $800 million investment by this government as 'smoke and mirrors'—quite the contrary. I actually think it's substantial extra investment that will go a long way to ensuring, firstly, that the clients of those legal services— Senator Thorpe 280304 I raise a point of order on relevance. The PRESIDENT 112096 The minister is being relevant, Senator Thorpe. Senator Thorpe 280304 I asked about taking responsibility for the women who will be turned away from domestic violence services and the children who will be incarcerated and the people who will die in custody. Do you take responsibility? The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe, I indicated that the minister is being relevant, and I will listen— The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe, you're not in a debate with me. I will continue to listen carefully to the minister's response. Senator Thorpe 280304 Tell that to the people out there begging for services. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe, order! Minister Watt, please continue. Senator WATT 245759 I think all of us are aware that, for some time, community legal services, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services, have been struggling with the level of demand for their services, particularly in the family violence space, and that's exactly one of the reasons why our government has taken the decision to provide another $800 million in funding to services like that. It's exactly about ensuring that legal services don't have to turn away anywhere near as many people as they have previously. They had to do that because of the gross underfunding that we inherited from the former government, and now we're fixing it. An extra $800 million is a significant extra investment. Housing 4073 14:44 Senator CICCONE 281503 Victoria My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Housing and Minister for Homelessness, my good friend Senator Farrell. Senator Watt 245759 I thought I was your good friend! Senator CICCONE 281503 You're also my good friend. In fact, all the senators here are good friends. I note the announcement of a record investment in Commonwealth rent assistance by the Albanese Labor government which will soon support thousands of people in my home state of Victoria. Minister, what will the increase in rent assistance mean for Australian renters, and what is standing in the way of making renting easier and fairer for these Australians? 14:44 Senator FARRELL I0N South Australia I thank Senator Ciccone for his question and the wonderful work he does in the housing space for the great state of Victoria. I commend the senator for his interest in this area and his advocacy in his home state. As the senator knows, too many Australians are struggling with high rent. Australians are doing it tough, and a lack of affordable housing is a very big part of that story. That's why the Albanese Labor government is helping nearly one million households around Australia with the cost of rent, by delivering yet another increase in the rate of Commonwealth rent assistance. This is the second year in a row that we have increased rent assistance, making it the first back-to-back increase in more than 30 years. For the thousands of renters in your home state of Victoria, Senator Ciccone, that means less of a pinch when the rent is due. But, right now, these Green senators up here are standing with the Liberals and the Nationals, opposing Labor's build-to-rent bill, which will build more affordable rental homes and make life easier for renters. The Liberals, the Nationals and the Greens have had a chance to improve the lives of renters, and yet they refuse. The Albanese Labor government is committed to delivering more affordable rentals right around the country. So I ask the Liberals, the Nationals and the Greens to work with us to do that right here and now. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Ciccone, first supplementary? 14:46 Senator CICCONE 281503 Victoria I thank the minister for that very comprehensive answer. One of the most common barriers faced by many people in my home state of Victoria when it comes to buying their own home is being able to put down a deposit. How is the Albanese government making it easier for renters to achieve the great Aussie dream of homeownership, and how realistic are alternative policies? 14:46 Senator FARRELL I0N South Australia Once again, I thank Senator Ciccone for his first supplementary question. Senator, you are right; one of the biggest challenges for a lot of Australians looking to buy a home is being able to put down a house deposit, particularly when they are already struggling to pay the rent. Through the Help to Buy scheme, the Albanese Labor government would help Australians slash the size of their deposit and their mortgage. We're ready to help Australians who otherwise wouldn't be able to purchase a home at all. The Liberals, the Nationals and the Greens have a chance to support Aussie homeownership, and, on behalf of every aspirational Australian, I hope, one day, they finally do. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Ciccone, second supplementary? 14:47 Senator CICCONE 281503 Victoria Thank you again, Minister. What could put these substantial increases in Commonwealth rent assistance at risk, and what is standing in the way of the government's aim to support low- and middle-income Australians into homeownership? 14:47 Senator FARRELL I0N South Australia I thank Senator Ciccone for his second supplementary question. If there's one thing that could put renters at risk, and one thing that would make it harder for Australians to get into a home, it's the Greens teaming up with the Liberals and the Nationals to block and delay. We went to the last election with a comprehensive Homes for Australia plan, a plan that will help make it easier to rent and easier to buy a home, because, unlike those opposite, we are serious about making the dream of homeownership a reality; we're serious about building the homes that Australians need. It's time for the Liberals, the Nationals and the Greens political parties to stop blocking and help us build right now. Visa Refusal or Cancellation 4074 14:48 Senator PATERSON 144138 Victoria My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Home Affairs, Senator Watt. The Australian reported yesterday that a Colombian man who was convicted of sexually offending against a teenager has been allowed to remain in Australia under the Albanese Labor government's direction 110. Minister, will the government immediately intervene to reverse the AAT's decision and cancel the offender's visa? 14:49 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland Thanks, Senator Paterson, for the question. I have no intention of announcing a minister's decision—especially when it's a different minister, not me—about a particular immigration matter, in the middle of question time. It would be highly inappropriate to do so. And that's clearly a decision to be made by Minister Burke. I'm not aware of whether he has made that decision yet, but of course he'll evaluate that. But it's an opportune time to remind the chamber of the absolutely disgraceful record of Mr Dutton as the home affairs minister on these matters. Opposition senators interjecting— Senator WATT 245759 I know you don't want to hear it. I know you don't want to hear it. But the problem when you raise this— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order. Minister Watt— Senator 245759 He definitely doesn't want to hear it. Opposition senators interjecting— Senator Paterson 144138 A point of order on direct relevance—the minister helpfully signposted that he had no intention of answering the substantive question and has now moved on to unrelated matters. I ask you to draw him back to the question or sit him down. Senator Wong 00AOU On the point of order, it has been the practice in this place for ministers to be clear about what their response is to the substantive and then to be permitted to make broader comments in relation to the subject matter. That still has been considered by presidents to be directly relevant. The PRESIDENT 112096 The minister is being relevant, but I will direct him to confine his remarks to government matters. Minister Watt, please continue. Senator WATT 245759 What I can say is that the minister, Minister Burke, has been very clear that he will use his powers to remove people from this country who shouldn't be here. We've also been clear that there have been issues with the AAT process that we have been addressing. But the bottom line is that anyone who is being considered by the AAT has already had their visa cancelled by the Department of Home Affairs. That stands in great contrast to the behaviour we saw from Mr Dutton as the home affairs minister. In May— Opposition senators interjecting— Senator WATT 245759 Oh, we're touchy! The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Watt, please resume your seat. Senator Paterson. The PRESIDENT 112096 I have a senator on his feet, Senator Ayres. I expect there to be silence. Senator Paterson. Senator Paterson 144138 On your ruling from just a moment ago, President, the minister is now openly defying your direction to confine his comments to government policy. The PRESIDENT 112096 The minister is being relevant to the question that you asked, and I will expect him to remain substantially on government policy, which is exactly what he was doing. Senator WATT 245759 I think we all know that Senator Paterson's chief job in the opposition is to protect the honour of Mr Dutton, and he's doing a very good job of that today. Unfortunately for Senator Paterson, the truth is that, while the Leader of the Opposition was the home affairs minister, two men convicted of being accessories to murder were released on his watch. And 102 convicted sex offenders, among them 64 child sex offenders, were released on Mr Dutton's watch. How come you never talk about that? How come you never talk about the fact that when Mr Dutton— Opposition senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Watt, I do remind you to confine your remarks to the government policy. Senator WATT 245759 Well, the government's policy is significantly different to what we saw from Mr Dutton, who, while he was the home affairs minister, released a man who was born in the UK in 1947 and was convicted in 2016 of being an accessory to the stabbing of an associate in a cannabis operation. You never want to talk about that, do you? But we— The PRESIDENT 112096 Thank you, Minister Watt. The time for answering has expired. Senator Birmingham H6X President, on a point of order, you were very clear in your instructions to the minister, who then wilfully disregarded your instructions and ignored them completely. The time has all but expired but for a second. But I would urge you to caution the minister to ensure that, in the remaining question, he is actually relevant to the question and adheres to the rulings that you are making. The PRESIDENT 112096 I believe that the minister was being relevant to the request that I gave him. He was using government policy and contrasting it with other policies. I'm not sure, Minister Watt, what you might say in one second, but you can give it a shot if you're so inclined, or I will move to—Senator Paterson, first supplementary? 14:53 Senator PATERSON 144138 Victoria The report also notes that another convicted child sex offender and a man who was part of a large-scale drug operation had their visas reinstated under direction 110, which puts ties to the community as a primary consideration in visa decisions. Minister, how many serious criminals have had their visas reinstated on Labor's watch under direction 110? 14:54 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland Thanks, Senator Paterson. As I've already said, the minister has made clear that he will use his powers to remove people from the country who shouldn't be here. And, again, anyone who's being considered by the AAT has already had their visa cancelled by the department. But I can tell you someone who knows a bit about releasing sex offenders from immigration detention— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order, Senator McKenzie! Minister Watt. Senator WATT 245759 and his name is Peter Dutton. The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Senator Cash! The PRESIDENT 112096 And Senator Ayres. Order! Senator Paterson. Senator Paterson 144138 President, you might be able to anticipate my point of order on direct relevance. This is a factual question: how many? The minister hasn't even entertained going to the substance of the question. He could take it on notice. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Paterson, I am reminded that the minister is not required to answer the question in the terms that you have indicated. I believe the minister is answering the question. I will continue to listen carefully and I'll draw him back to it if he strays from that. Senator McKenzie, Senator Cash and Senator Ayres, please no more interjections—seriously. Senator WATT 245759 As I say, that's the position of this government. Let's remember that when Peter Dutton was the home affairs minister he released a man who was born in the UK in 1945 and was convicted in 1986 of being an accessory to murder when a drug associate shot another man in what was described as a gangland execution. He released a man who was born in the UK in 1947— The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Watt, I will draw you back to Senator Paterson's question. Senator WATT 245759 Point of order, President. May I request— Opposition senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Order on my left! Senator Watt. Senator WATT 245759 May I request your consideration of your earlier point—that it was legitimate to contrast the opposition's record with the government's record. That's what I'm seeking to do. The PRESIDENT 112096 Minister Watt, I did indeed say it was fine to contrast, but I've yet to hear the contrast. Senator WATT 245759 We've amended the immigration law to ensure that the AAT has very clear directions about who can be released. The contrast is Mr Dutton, who released a man who was an accessory to the stabbing of an associate in a cannabis operation, who helped another man carry the victim's body to the boot of a car and dump it in a makeshift grave. That's your leader. The PRESIDENT 112096 Thank you, Minister Watt. Honourable senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! I did call for order. Senator Paterson, second supplementary? 14:57 Senator PATERSON 144138 Victoria Will the minister for home affairs and immigration immediately restore the stronger policies of the former coalition government which put ties to the community as a secondary rather than a primary consideration for visa decisions? 14:57 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland I'm surprised Senator Paterson wants to bring back the policies of the Leader of the Opposition, the former minister, such as releasing people with no electronic monitoring, curfews or other conditions and having no joint ABF or AFP operations. We're not going to take lessons from someone who releases hundreds of sex offenders. We're not going to take lessons. Housing 4076 14:57 Senator GHOSH 257613 Western Australia My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. I regularly hear from young Western Australians that they are struggling to save a deposit for their first home. At the 2022 election the Albanese Labor government promised to help more young Australians access affordable housing. How are the Albanese Labor government's housing reforms helping young people into homeownership faster? 14:58 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia Thank you, Senator Ghosh, for the question. We know the extent to which so many young Australians are worried about their capacity and opportunity to enter the housing market. We also know more young Australians do want to own their own home. We are committed as a government to ensuring that we enable more Australians to have safe and secure housing, including young Australians, because it is at the heart of the hopes of so many young Australians to have the homeownership that has been enjoyed by the generations who have gone before. That is why we have a comprehensive plan designed to build more homes, including for young Australians, because—unlike some of the comments we've heard in this place, from both the coalition and the Greens—we understand that bringing more houses into the housing supply is one of the ways in which you ensure that young Australians have an opportunity for home ownership. More homes mean more affordable homes. Instead of condemning young Australians to continued challenging, long queues for rental properties or increasingly having deposits out of reach, we want to see, and support, young Australians owning their own homes. That is why we announced yesterday that we will build almost 14,000 social and affordable homes across Australia, part of the largest investment in social and affordable housing in a decade. Of course, this goes alongside the largest increase to Commonwealth rent assistance in more than 30 years. And, of course, there is the shared-equity policy, which will help an additional 40,000 low- and middle-income Australians own their own homes. Young Australians, like early-career nurses and early childhood education workers and teachers, would all be able to buy a home through this program. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Ghosh, first supplementary? 15:00 Senator GHOSH 257613 Western Australia I note that Mr Dutton and the Liberals and Nationals want young people to mortgage their future in order to own a home. How will the Albanese Labor government's ambitious housing agenda bring homeownership back into reach for young Australians without sacrificing their hard-earned retirement savings? 15:00 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia We want more young people to be able to get into the housing market, and we want them to be able to get into the housing market sooner with a smaller deposit and lower repayments. What's wrong with that? It seems remarkable when you say it, but you've got so many people in this chamber from opposite ends of the political spectrum—from Mr Dutton and the National Party to the Greens—opposing this. Let me share some of the thoughts of some Australians about this. Christopher in Frankston says: 'A low-deposit shared-equity scheme would be perhaps the only option for someone in my situation. It would provide some security.' Anthony from Camperdown said: 'Without help, I can't see how I'm going to be able to get on the property ladder in a sustainable way. The government's new scheme is a breath of fresh air, and it gives first home buyers some hope.' This is— Honourable senators interjecting— Senator WONG 00AOU And they're making fun of it. It says something about it that you're making fun of young people who want to buy their own homes. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Ghosh, second supplementary? 15:01 Senator GHOSH 257613 Western Australia Like generations before them, young people today want the security of homeownership. I note that the Greens political party has joined forces with Mr Dutton and the coalition to stand in the way of meaningful support for young people. What are the obstacles preventing young people from entering the housing market, and how are the Albanese Labor government's policies delivering for young people? 15:02 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia The obstacles are there and there. That's where the obstacles— An opposition senator: Don't point. It's rude. Senator WONG 00AOU You might not like us pointing, but you do bear responsibility because you are working with the Australian Greens to prevent a scheme that will enable a plan that will enable more Australians to own their own homes. This is an unholy alliance between the Greens and the coalition. We know this country has a housing shortage. We need more homes. We need more homes more quickly in more parts of the country. Those opposite don't want that to happen. They seem to think that homeownership should be the preserve only of some. The Australian Greens seem to want to enable and empower Mr Dutton to prevent there being more homes in this country. With that, President, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. BUSINESS 4077 BUSINESS Rearrangement 4077 15:03 Senator WONG 00AOU South Australia I seek leave to move a motion relating to the consideration of the Help to Buy Bill 2023 and a related bill. The PRESIDENT 112096 Is leave granted? Leave is granted, Senator Wong. Senator WONG 00AOU I move the motion as circulated: That: (a) the questions on all remaining stages of the Help to Buy Bill 2023 and the Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023 be put immediately; (b) paragraph (a) operate as a limitation of debate under standing order 142; and (c) divisions may take place after 6.30 pm for the purposes of the bills only. The PRESIDENT 112096 The question is that the motion as moved by the minister be agreed to. A division having been called and the bells being rung— Senator Hanson BK6 I opposed the leave sought by the minister. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Hanson, I asked if leave was granted. I waited a few seconds. There was no— Honourable senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! I waited a few seconds, and then as I put the motion you responded, so I think you were too late. Senator Scarr, are you on a point of order? Senator Scarr 282997 It's the same point of order. With due respect, President, I was in close proximity to Senator Hanson. She did deny leave at the first opportunity. The PRESIDENT 112096 With the concurrence of the Senate—but I will reiterate, Senator Hanson, that the minister sought leave. The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Senator Davey, leave the chamber if you wish to be objectionable. I sought an answer. There was no answer forthcoming. I started to put the motion, and then I heard you say no. So, if you want to not grant leave, you need to respond in the timeframe that I've allowed. However, Senator Hanson, with the concurrence of the Senate, I am willing to withdraw the need for a division. Honourable senators interjecting— The PRESIDENT 112096 Yes, thank you. The division is cancelled. I'm going to put the question again. Minister Wong? Senator WONG 00AOU First, can I be clear that I didn't hear it either, which might have been because people were yelling. Senator WONG 00AOU No, Senator. We've just given you the courtesy of recommitting this and starting the procedure again, so it would be nice if some courtesy could be extended as well. Senator WONG 00AOU And I am saying to you that I did not hear you deny leave. So I will do it again. I seek leave to move a motion relating to consideration of the Help to Buy Bill 2023 and a related bill. Leave not granted. Senator WONG 00AOU Pursuant to contingent notice, I move: That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving a motion to provide for the consideration of a matter, namely a motion to allow a motion concerning the consideration of the Help to Buy Bill 2023 and a related bill to be moved and determined immediately. And I move: That the question be now put. The PRESIDENT 112096 The question is that the question be now put on the motion to suspend standing orders.    

The Senate divided. [15:11]
(The President—Senator Lines)

 19 AYES Ayres, T. Chisholm, A. Ciccone, R. Farrell, D. E. Gallagher, K. R. Green, N. L. Grogan, K. Lines, S. McAllister, J. R. O'Neill, D. M. Polley, H. Sheldon, A. V. Sterle, G. Stewart, J. N. A. Tyrrell, T. M. Urquhart, A. E. (Teller) Walsh, J. C. Watt, M. P. Wong, P. 41 NOES Allman-Payne, P. J. Antic, A. Askew, W. (Teller) Babet, R. Birmingham, S. J. Brockman, W. E. Cadell, R. Chandler, C. Colbeck, R. M. Cox, D. Davey, P. M. Duniam, J. R. Faruqi, M. Hanson, P. L. Hanson-Young, S. C. Henderson, S. M. Hodgins-May, S. Hughes, H. A. Hume, J. Kovacic, M. Lambie, J. Liddle, K. J. McGrath, J. McKim, N. J. McLachlan, A. L. O'Sullivan, M. A. Paterson, J. W. Pocock, B. Pocock, D. W. Rennick, G. Reynolds, L. K. Roberts, M. I. Ruston, A. Scarr, P. M. Sharma, D. N. Shoebridge, D. Smith, D. A. Steele-John, J. A. Thorpe, L. A. Waters, L. J. Whish-Wilson, P. S. 0 PAIRS

Question negatived.

 15:13 Senator WATT 245759 Queensland Let's be very clear about what we just saw happen. What we saw happen was the Greens political party, who say they care about young people, who say they care about housing—look at them scurrying away from what they've just done, voting not just with Peter Dutton and the coalition but with Senator Pauline Hanson and One Nation. Senator Henderson ZN4 Point of order, I'd ask that the minister not reflect on any senator leaving the chamber please. The PRESIDENT 112096 The minister is not reflecting on any senator by name, Senator Henderson. I also, while I've got the attention of the Senate, call for order. Minister, please continue. Senator WATT 245759 I can understand why all sorts of people in the chamber are very embarrassed right now, because what we saw was an unbelievable alliance: not just the 'no-alition' of the Liberals and the Greens but throw in Senator Hanson and One Nation. We throw in Senator Babet and his great mate Clive Palmer. We have the extreme right of Australian politics and the extreme left of Australian politics pair up—and for what purpose? It's to stop young people being able to buy a home. That's what we just saw here. Labor are trying to deliver on our election promise to assist young renters with buying a home, and what we see is the Liberals, the Nationals, the Greens, One Nation and, of course, Clive Palmer's mate Senator Babet up the back there voting together to stop young people getting to buy a home. It was our election commitment that we took to the election. It was voted for. It was in the Greens' platform, and now they're running away from it, refusing to vote for it. I've heard all the Greens say over the last couple of days, 'Oh, we don't like this, because it only assists a very small percentage of the population with buying a home.' That is the Greens summed up in one sentence: letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. 'Just because we can't help 100 per cent of renters buy a home, we shouldn't allow some people to buy their own home.' The reality is that we've seen yet again the Greens team up with the coalition and a few other people as well to stop more homes being built and to stop more young people getting a chance to buy a home, and then they have the hide to run around the inner city of all our capital cities, pretending to be the people saying they want housing and they want young people getting their own homes. The only problem with that is that, if you look at what they do when they go back to their home districts, you see it's completely the opposite. Right now, not only are the Greens party here in Canberra voting against Labor legislation and not even letting it to be put to a vote, because they are so embarrassed about the fact that they are stopping new housing, they also, when they go back home, continue to campaign against new housing in their own electorates. We have, for example, the member for Griffith, now known as 'Young Setka', out in the suburb of Woolloongabba in his electorate in the inner city of Brisbane, saying on the one hand to everyone, 'We need more homes,' but he's out there campaigning right now with the Greens party in Queensland against almost 3,000 new social and affordable homes in the suburb of Woolloongabba. But it's also happening in the Greens-held seat of Brisbane, where the Greens member for Brisbane is opposing an apartment building in his inner-city electorate because its height 'would have a substantive impact on the views of existing nearby residents.' The Greens member for Brisbane says that views from existing apartment blocks are more important than new homes. Then he goes on. The Greens member for Brisbane is opposing a development that would turn an empty sand and gravel factory into 381 residential apartments, because there would be too many car parks. He's also concerned that the height of the buildings 'would impact the unique character of this heritage neighbourhood'. So more homes are great except when Labor wants to build them. The Greens member for Brisbane is opposing a build-to-rent project in his electorate that would create 349 new apartments. This site is currently an empty lot. It is 200 metres from a major train station and walking distance to the Brisbane CBD. In his letter opposing the development, the member claimed, 'Brisbane residents are fed up with developers claiming they are addressing the housing crisis by increasing supply,' because, God forbid, you wouldn't want to increase housing supply, would you? That would be terrible thing if you were a Greens member for Brisbane, a Liberal, a National, a One Nation member or a Clive Palmer puppet. All of those people are getting together to block more homes, led by people like the member for Brisbane. Probably my favourite one, though, is the Greens member for Ryan, who is campaigning against a plan to subdivide a chicken farm in the suburb of Mitchelton, a suburb I know well, to build 91 new homes. In December last year, the member wrote to the Brisbane City Council, complaining the project—this is a chicken farm—would 'diminish the natural character of the site,' because it's much more important to have a disused chicken farm than it is to have 91 new homes, which, on the other hand, the Greens say that they want to have. This is an absolutely disgraceful attack on young people and on people who want to buy their own home, and the guilty parties are right there before us. It's the Liberals and the Nationals, it's One Nation and, most of all, it is the Greens party. 15:19 Senator BIRMINGHAM H6X South Australia In terms of the vote just taken and the votes underway, we've seen that the Albanese government cannot even execute a strategy to have one of its own bills defeated. It certainly can't manage to get its bill passed, but it's now not even managing to find a strategy or a means to have its bill defeated either. It certainly can't manage to get its bill passed, but it's now not even managing to find a strategy or a means to have its bill defeated either. The Labor government has so lost control of the way in which its legislative agenda operates that it managed to convince just one non-Labor senator to vote with them. Senator Watt just tried to impugn the votes and the motives of the crossbench. He was a bit selective in which ones he chose to name. But the reality, Senator Watt, is that you only managed to convince one crossbencher to vote with you in that last division because you are failing to convince people of the merits of this policy. And, yes, you're failing in different directions in terms of the approaches, but none are convinced that the Albanese government's policies will make a jot of difference. If, of course, hot air and rhetoric were homes, the housing crisis in Australia would be solved thanks to Minister Watt, Minister Wong and the Albanese government, but hot air doesn't count, rhetoric doesn't count and Labor's plans don't count. After three Albanese government budgets, not a single extra home has been built. After lots of plans, lots of promises and billions of dollars committed, not a single home has been built. Life is certainly not better. The government comes in and brags about the extent to which they have increased Commonwealth rent assistance. They don't acknowledge the fact that they've had to do so because inflation has been so high under the Labor government and has been higher for longer under this government's plans. After these three Albanese Labor budgets, Australia's inflation rate remains far higher than that of comparable economies around the rest of the world. This very week, markets around the world are preparing for an expected rate cut in the United States, one of many economies where inflation is lower than in Australia and where interest rates are going down—but not under the Albanese Labor government. Inflation is staying higher, and interest rates are staying higher for longer as a result. That means that homeowners are feeling the pressure. They talk about the plans for a certain number of homes that might be built if everything goes according to plan, but what's happening today, right now, is that tens of thousands of Australian homeowners are falling behind in their mortgage payments and feeling the mortgage stress mounting up because of the failed economic policies of those opposite. We have been clear all along, from the moment the Labor Party announced this policy, that we thought it was a bad policy. The Commonwealth government shouldn't be in the business of co-owning people's homes. The Liberal and National parties, who stand for homeownership and have it as a core value and a core tenant of our beliefs, believe that Australians should own their own homes themselves and not have the Commonwealth government as co-owners in their homes. That's the core and fundamental difference for us. We want to make sure that housing and infrastructure plans match up with population plans and not have, as this government has seen, record population pressures come in, exacerbating the housing crisis and pressures that are there. We want to make sure that the construction industry is as competitive and efficient as possible and not pile on new layers of industrial relations laws, red tape, green tape, taxes and other things that are driving up the cost of housing. How do you think you are going to fix a housing crisis when it costs more to build a house and when it takes longer to build a house? This is the effect of Labor's policies. We believe you should get the fundamentals right and not say the solution is some pie-in-the-sky plan for the government to co-own your house with you and to spend billions of dollars on that approach. That is why we fundamentally oppose the games the government is playing. What we see here is that their tactics are failing to convince anybody, even from different perspectives, of the merits of their plans. After three Labor budgets, we're not seeing inflation fixed, we're not seeing interest rates going down and we're certainly not seeing more houses being built. 15:24 Senator FARUQI 250362 New South Wales Well, here we are: another day; another political stunt from the Labor Party. The Labor Party knows— Senator FARUQI 250362 You can laugh, but there are millions of people out there suffering because you won't act on the housing and rental crisis the way it needs to be acted on. You come in here and you don't have the numbers for anything because the Senate has decided that your bill will actually make things worse for 99.8 per cent of the 5½ million renters that live in this country. You come in here and try and bulldoze the will of the Senate. As we said yesterday, the Prime Minister wants us all to get out of his way, but we are not getting out of his way to pass a bill that will make things much worse and will increase housing prices. You come in here and try and spread misinformation and mistruths about the Greens and our policies. Well, we're not going to let you get away that easily. Read our Greens policies. They are very different to what your bill says. We are here to negotiate with the government. We have told you this for more than a year. Our door is open. But rather than trying to negotiate with the Greens to make things better for the millions of people who are suffering and struggling under the housing and rental crisis—the people for whom it's become impossible to put food on the table, to pay their bills, to go to the dentist and to visit a doctor; the young people who are one rent away from being evicted—rather than coming to the table with the Greens to negotiate something much better, which is capping rent and freezing rent increases, as well as phasing out the negative gearing and capital gains tax discounts which have turbocharged house prices for years and years now, and rather than talking to the Greens about a public developer, what you do is come in here and try and ram your bill through, throwing political stunts and tantrums. For what? To get this Mickey Mouse bill through, which might help 0.2 per cent of renters while making life harder for the 99.8 per cent of people renting in this country. We are not going to let you do that. We have just circulated a motion which asks you to delay this bill for a couple of months and come and talk to the Greens. All that is going to do is make things better. Under your current bill, millions of people will lose out. That is going to be the outcome of the bill that you're trying to ram through. Come to the table with the Greens. Stop these political shenanigans. Be serious about this. You have talked about the housing crisis as if it is a serious issue, and it is the most serious issue in this country. When we knock on doors every weekend, that is the first thing we hear about. People are so worried about their rents and about the unlimited increases in rents that landlords can now impose on them without any restrictions. Every single day, we are hearing about how people are struggling and suffering, but you are so stubborn that you somehow want to attack the Greens, whatever your reasons might be for that. Stop being like children. Come to the table. Stop throwing these tantrums every day. Talk to us. We are willing and ready to negotiate with you—what more do you want?—but you have completely disregarded any of the Greens asks that we have put on the table. The vast majority of people are saying they want a freeze on rent increases. Communities are telling us this. We are listening to them. That's why we are fighting in here, like people are fighting out there, to do something and act on this housing crisis as if it were a serious thing. The ball is in your court now. Come and talk to the Greens. We have two more months, if we get this motion through, but then— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 Thank you, Senator Faruqi. Senator Hanson. 15:29 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland When a vote goes down 19 to 41 and when you've got the whole crossbench and the coalition voting against this, it tells you something. It's an absolute dog of a bill, and this is why it's not going to work. This is, again, a pie-in-the-sky housing scheme. Listening to Senator Murray Watt, you'd think that it's about us denying the younger generation the opportunity to own a home. You have done that on your own with your economic policies that you've brought in here. You promised people a $275 cut in electricity bills, and it never happened. You made promises about the Voice, and that never happened. You've made so many promises in this country, including about climate change—and that is another dog of a bill. Let me explain this Help to Buy legislation to people. You want to put up another $5.2 billion to build housing in Australia, rather than looking at your high immigration levels. That's the whole problem. You can build these houses, but you've had an opportunity for the last two years to build houses, and not one house has been built. You've put $35 million plus into administrative costs, yet not one house has been built. That proves that you're incapable of following through and producing for the people of Australia. Apart from this $5.2 billion, your housing policy is going to cost $32 billion overall. That's what the government is putting out to build 1.2 million houses. But let me tell the people in the gallery and the people watching that, apart from high immigration, between 2022 and 2023, you brought in 737,000 people. The reason I mention this is that you haven't even got the people to build the houses. That's the joke about all this. Some 737,000 people were brought into this country between 2022 and 2023. Of those, off the top of my head, 51,605 had skills, and, of those, only 1,800 were construction workers. What has happened in this country—only because of my push for apprenticeship schemes; I put that to the parliament, and it was passed by the coalition government—is that 100,000 apprenticeships were taken up under my policy in Australia. We haven't followed that through. No-one has done anything about it since. You haven't pushed for more apprenticeships. You actually just want to bring in people from overseas, but we're not getting them. Another thing that you haven't addressed is foreign investment. On the last census night, approximately one million homes were vacant. A lot of these are foreign investment homes. Foreign investors aren't really allowed to buy established housing in Australia—they can only buy new properties—but no-one follows through and investigates this because you let it go under the radar. That's because state governments want to have all these foreign investors coming in because it drives up the cost of housing in Australia, and then the state governments make so much money out of stamp duty. This is what happens all the time. The public are scammed. The reason the cost of housing in Australia is so high is foreign investment. I have been opposing foreign investment in our housing stock in Australia, as well as in prime agricultural land—or any land, for that matter. I'm pleased to hear that, under Peter Dutton's leadership, the coalition is going to look at suspending it for two years. It should be for longer than that. It should be until we've addressed the housing market. Remember that a lot of deals are done behind the scenes. It could be the UN, the World Economic Forum or different ones that we sign deals and treaties with behind closed doors. That's the government. We here in the parliament have no idea what we've signed away. But isn't it quite interesting—do you know of Klaus Schwab? Have you heard of him? He's from the World Economic Forum. How often has he said, 'You will own nothing, yet you will be happy'? Do the public really trust the government so far as to go into part ownership with them in housing? Honestly, the only person that you can trust in owning your own house is yourself. That's why One Nation brought out the policy of allowing Australians to use their own superannuation to buy their own homes—not investment properties but their own homes. That was One Nation's policy, and it was taken up by the coalition. To be a member of parliament, you need to have vision, and you guys haven't got it. 15:34 Senator GALLAGHER ING Australian Capital Territory Nothing new I've heard in the suspension debate will convince anyone other than the blockers working together to stop a vote on the Help to Buy Bill, none of you. Senator Hanson, with all due respect, shared-equity schemes have worked and do work across Australia and have for a long time. The idea is that you help people into homeownership and then, down the track, they are able to buy out the other partner. It works. What it means is people don't have to save as long and as hard for deposits and other money before they can actually get into owning a home. Part of why we are having this debate is because we want the rest of the country to see the Greens political party, the National Party, the Liberal Party, One Nation and Clive Palmer all working together to make sure that we don't get a national shared-equity housing program up and running. These are the same people that delayed the Housing Australia Future Fund for almost a year and then have the nerve this week to come out and say, 'Well, it's taken too long to get these housing programs funded through the scheme that we actually delayed for more than a year in the chamber.' The hypocrisy is on show for everybody. We are pleased to be the ones arguing for more investment in housing, to get more people to own their own home but, at the same time, supporting renters; at the same time, pushing for more supply, working with state and territories. The approach the Albanese government has taken is one which comes at this housing challenge from every direction. We don't seek to make it someone else's responsibility or accept that only one program will help. We don't accept that ransacking your super will do anything other than inflate housing prices, and most of the opposition, I think, accept that. They accept that if people ransack their super, housing prices will be inflated, and it won't build one extra house. We have to come at this from a variety of ways. What we've seen today is this extraordinary procedural dance, the use of quorum to prevent a vote being taken and a filibuster that went for nine hours yesterday so that we didn't get to a vote, all because of the Greens political party and the opposition. They are uncomfortable that they are together, but they are still going to be together anyway because they want to wreck and stop a sensible housing program which the states and territories have agreed to. They have agreed through national cabinet that it is a proposal that they support. That's what's happening today. All this hand-wringing, sobbing and pain that everybody is feeling for everyone out there—excuse us for not taking it seriously. I mean, honestly, Senator Faruqi, your argument is that because it doesn't help enough people, we shouldn't do it. Senator Faruqi 250362 It was not! Senator GALLAGHER ING No, you had your policy with the shared-equity housing scheme; we remember. Now you come in here and say, 'Talk to us. We really want to help you. But it doesn't help enough people, so we will say no. But give us an extra two months for us to go and complain about the government doing nothing on housing,' which is what you do when you go out there and pretend that you're at the negotiating table. I mean, what a load of rubbish. This has been sitting here for 290 days. You said you oppose it. You said it's going to make the problem worse, and then you say, 'Come and talk to us, and, in two months time, we will work out whether we think it's the right thing to do.' Please, honestly. I mean, we are not suckers on this side; we get what's going on. Politics is being played. You're uncomfortable that you're helping Mr Dutton. You're very uncomfortable with that but you're making a habit of it. I mean, how many times this week have you voted with the opposition to frustrate Labor's housing program? Just how many times? We will add it up at the end of the week. We will add it up because that's what's going on here; you are enabling Mr Dutton and his team to frustrate a progressive housing agenda. That is what you are doing, and we will make you vote that way and show the rest of Australia that that's exactly what you're doing. 15:39 Senator RUSTON 243273 South Australia Instead of those opposite coming in here and spouting a whole heap of rhetoric, maybe we should actually have a look at what the problem before us is and why the coalition is not prepared to support this particular bill. And that is because it is a really bad bill. It does not do what those opposite profess it's going to do. I would draw to the attention of the minister who just made a contribution that, in relation to stoking demand, it probably would be worthwhile realising that the legislation that is currently before this place is a demand-side policy by your government, and, by the very nature of it being demand-side, your policy is likely to generate increased inflationary impact on the market as well. So you can't have it both ways. On the delay that is being put forward at the moment, I think you should probably take note that everybody in this chamber, apart from yourselves and one other, has seen that this bill is seriously flawed. It's seriously flawed for a number of reasons. First of all, there is no detail in this bill that can give anybody in Australia any comfort as to understanding the kinds of questions that they should reasonably be asking about this particular proposal that is before them. They don't know who they're able to borrow from. They don't know the rules around what happens in the changes of the threshold. They don't know what the rules are in terms of when you change how much you earn. If you increase your salary, then what happens to your investment—the one that you own with Mr Albanese and Ms O'Neil? As there are so many questions that are left unanswered by this bill, maybe you should use the time that you are being afforded now—if this motion that's been put forward by the party at the end of the chamber gets up—to answer some of these questions for Australians, because I think it is entirely reasonable that Australians expect to know what the details of legislation are when it's put in here. But, time and time and time again, you keep putting legislation in here, saying: 'Nothing to see here. Don't worry about it. We'll fix it later. Just trust us.' Well, guess what? We don't trust you. The other thing that is worth mentioning is that this particular shared-equity scheme is available in most states around Australia, and, in many instances, it is not fully subscribed. But what you've failed to tell the people is that you actually need enabling legislation in the states and territories. Has any of it been passed? I'd be very surprised. The minister might like to tell us how many pieces of legislation have been put through the parliaments of the states and territories to enable this to happen. The other thing is that we have got a situation where the thresholds that have been put in place are just not going to enable this to even work. We know what the average housing prices are in the capital cities around Australia. Then we've got a series of thresholds that have been built into this legislation that mean that, even if you wanted to access this particular scheme, you wouldn't be able to meet the thresholds, so you wouldn't be able to get access to it anyway. So don't come in here and complain about the fact that your policy, your legislation, isn't getting through. Why don't you come in here and actually do something about fixing the concerns that have been expressed, not just in this chamber but by many people and many organisations? Even the New South Wales Premier, who is of the same persuasion as the government, has indicated that he does not see how on earth you're going to be able to meet your housing targets. So, instead of coming in here and providing a piece of legislation that is simply destined to fail, why don't you use your time and your resources of the massive great departments that sit behind you and actually fix the problems with this legislation? Everybody wants to see Australians being able to get access to homeownership, but not by a dog of a piece of legislation like what you are proposing here. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 The time for the debate has expired. The PRESIDENT 112096 The question is that the motion to suspend standing orders as moved by Senator Wong be agreed to.    

The Senate divided. [15:48]
(The President—Senator Lines)

 21 AYES Ayres, T. Chisholm, A. Ciccone, R. Darmanin, L. Farrell, D. E. Gallagher, K. R. Ghosh, V. Green, N. L. Lambie, J. Lines, S. McAllister, J. R. O'Neill, D. M. Pocock, D. W. Polley, H. Sheldon, A. V. Smith, M. F. Sterle, G. Stewart, J. N. A. Urquhart, A. E. (Teller) Walsh, J. C. Wong, P. 38 NOES Allman-Payne, P. J. Antic, A. Askew, W. (Teller) Babet, R. Birmingham, S. J. Brockman, W. E. Cadell, R. Chandler, C. Colbeck, R. M. Cox, D. Davey, P. M. Duniam, J. R. Faruqi, M. Hanson, P. L. Hanson-Young, S. C. Henderson, S. M. Hodgins-May, S. Hughes, H. A. Hume, J. Kovacic, M. Liddle, K. J. McGrath, J. McKim, N. J. McLachlan, A. L. O'Sullivan, M. A. Paterson, J. W. Pocock, B. Reynolds, L. K. Roberts, M. I. Ruston, A. Scarr, P. M. Sharma, D. N. Shoebridge, D. Smith, D. A. Steele-John, J. A. Thorpe, L. A. Waters, L. J. Whish-Wilson, P. S. 0 PAIRS

Question negatived.

 QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS 4084 QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS Answers to Questions 4084 15:50 Senator BROCKMAN 30484 Western Australia I move: That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Opposition senators today. What a dysfunctional government we have on display here again today! Here we are, ticking down to four in the afternoon, almost a full hour after question time finished, and we have a government that cannot keep control of the legislative agenda. They can't run this chamber; how can they possibly run the country? Well, they've proven over the last two years that they cannot run the country. My goodness, gracious me! We have seen in here—and in the media—again today how the Greens tail is wagging this dog of a government. I'll remind the members of the government that the Greens have already said they don't want to have any agreement with us going into government, and we accept that. We wouldn't do a deal with the Greens to get government. But what did we hear from the current government when they were asked about that in question time today? We heard mealy-mouthed words. We heard obfuscation. We heard an unwillingness to decisively commit to things like negative gearing, because they know, in the back of their minds, they secretly want to do a deal with the Greens to retain power in this country. And they will do that deal. Everybody knows it; all of Australia knows that Labor will do that deal with the Greens to retain power, because that is all that matters to them, no matter how far it drags them to the Left. No matter how much the tail wags the dog, they will do that deal, and it will be to the enormous detriment of Australia, particularly to the detriment of my home state of Western Australia. We've seen it. We've seen it, Senator O'Sullivan, in the last few days. We've had Minister Plibersek say she's talking to the Greens about the Nature Positive Plan and putting forward climate triggers. Then the Prime Minister said: 'No, no, no. We couldn't possibly talk to the Greens about something like that.' And then Minister Plibersek goes back out and says, 'No, we are talking to the Greens about exactly that.' The chaos and dysfunction between the Labor Party and the Greens and between ministers within the Labor government have been starkly on display. And who's going to suffer? It will be all of Australia but particularly my home state of Western Australia. We saw it again in the disastrous decision on the McPhillamys mine by Minister Plibersek, a decision driven by ideology, not by good sense. She has refused to provide a statement of reasons. She has refused to justify her decision to shut down a project worth hundreds of millions of dollars to the local community in royalties, jobs and taxation revenue. What do we get from the government? Silence and an unwillingness to justify their ideologically driven decisions. That is why we know Labor will get into bed with the Greens, if they can, after the next election. We know and every Australian knows that Labor will get into bed with the Greens to retain government, no matter what they ask. The tail will keep wagging the dog. For this dog of a Labor government, the tail will keep wagging the dog if it is allowed to. There's one way the Australian people can prevent that—one way the Australian people can prevent the Greens tail wagging the Labor dog—and that is to ensure that a Peter Dutton led coalition government is elected to run Australia again. We need to see that. We see the fear of Peter Dutton on display on the other side every question time. Getting personal, the focus on the man not the policy—that's all you know. We know the fear campaigns that are coming from your side. We know how Labor operates. And the Australian people know how Labor operates. They know you'll get into bed with the Greens. They know you'll attack Peter Dutton at every opportunity. They know you'll go low. They know you'll be destructive and that you'll run the negative fear campaigns. But the Australian people have woken up to what a truly rotten government you are. 15:55 Senator WALSH 252157 Victoria Well, Senator Brockman talks about 'getting into bed with the Greens'. These are not words I would have chosen in taking note of answers from question time today, but those were the words chosen by Senator Brockman. So, exactly who has been getting into bed with the Greens today and all of this week? It is the coalition who has been uniting with the Greens today and uniting with the Greens all week. The coalition and the Greens have been on a unity ticket in the chamber today and in the parliament this week, and what this unity ticket is about really matters. It is about blocking access to affordable homes for Australians. That is what the coalition and the Greens have been uniting about in the chamber today and in the chamber this week. They are on a unity ticket to block access to affordable homes for Australians who need access to those homes. On this side of the chamber, our government want Australians to have a place to call home that they can afford. That's what we're talking about this week—the $32 billion pipeline that we have created of private and social affordable places for Australians to call home. On our side, we know that supplying more homes is what is going to get Australians into more homes and help them find that affordable home. But, yet again, the coalition and the Greens are uniting to block affordable homes for Australians, just as last year they delayed the Housing Australia Future Fund for six months. Can you believe that the coalition and the Greens wanted to block the construction of 30,000 social and affordable homes for Australians, including women and children fleeing domestic violence? This week we've been able to announce that we are investing, through the Housing Australia Future Fund, in the construction of 13,700 social and affordable homes. Imagine if this chamber had not united to block that bill for six months. Those homes would be on the ground faster for the people who need them, for the women and children who are fleeing domestic violence and need those homes, for the low-income Australians who need those homes. And now we're seeing that the old team is getting back together; the coalition and the Greens are getting back together and voting against access for 40,000 Australians who want to buy a home through the Help to Buy scheme. That is the legislation that is in front of the parliament. That is what we've been talking about today. This is a program to give people a leg-up to buy their first home with a two per cent deposit and smaller mortgage repayments. Who could hate that? Those opposite, the coalition, are teaming up with their new besties, the Greens, to vote against 40,000 actual people who could benefit from this scheme. The hint is in the name: help to buy. Why are you joining with the Greens to vote against the opportunity for 40,000 Australians to have Help to Buy? Only you can explain that. We expect you to vote against build-to-rent as well. This is a scheme to build more apartments for Australians to live in, to boost supply, because, again, on this side of the chamber we know that the answer to housing affordability is to build more homes. On that side, you do not have a single policy to build a single home in this country—not a single policy to build a single home in this country. All you have is a policy, courtesy of our colleague Senator Bragg, for people to raid their own super in order to push house prices up, making housing even less affordable, and then to retire on the age pension. What a vision you have for Australians! 16:00 Senator CHANDLER 264449 Tasmania I too rise to take note of answers provided in question time today. To paraphrase William Shakespeare, methinks the government doth protest too much. I'm not sure that's exactly my best iambic pentameter, but it is relevant to this debate this afternoon all the same, because those in this government are so tetchy whenever anyone starts talking about their cozy relationship with the Greens. They will come into this place and suggest that there's nothing to see here and that there's no way that they would ever entertain a power-sharing arrangement with the Greens in the minority parliament that it looks like we could be heading for. But Australians know better. Australians remember the dark days of Labor-Greens minority government between 2010 and 2013. Indeed, people in my home state of Tasmania know exactly what our state was like the last time at a state level Labor was in a governing relationship with the Greens. Unemployment goes through the roof when Labor governs with the Greens. That's no surprise, because in that situation the Greens use their leverage with their Labor counterparts to shut down industries that their inner-city voters want to see shut down, such as the forestry industry and the aquaculture industry—job-creating industries that contribute so much to our regional economies, particularly in my home state of Tasmania. The Greens want to see those industries shut down, and when they are in a power-sharing relationship with Labor, when they are in government with Labor, they are the first industries on the chopping block. The first element of the deal that Labor will strike with the Greens is to shut down these industries. It is a crying shame, and I don't ever want to see our country go back to a situation where this is occurring left, right and centre. I don't want to see a return to the bad old days of 2010, 2011 and 2012, at both the state and federal level—in Tasmania, at least—with Labor and the Greens working together to decimate our economy and destroy regional jobs. I don't think that there is any question in my mind that they didn't have the best interests of Australians at heart. I note that earlier today, during two-minute statements, almost all of the government contributions were insisting that there was nothing to see here and that there is no relationship with the Greens. Members of the government will come in here and insist on this time and time again, but I guarantee you that, after the next election, if there is minority government then it will be Labor doing a deal with the Greens to be able to continue to govern. It's frankly time that the government was more upfront with Australians about those intentions. As my colleague Senator Brockman said, we heard ministers trying not to address the question of what is going to happen after the next election in terms of the relationship between Labor and the Greens. It's time for the government to be upfront with Australians, but, realistically, can we expect them to be upfront with Australians? Can we expect them to not break a promise that they might make during an election campaign or indeed during this term of government? The reason I say that is that we saw during the last election many promises made by this government that have not been kept. They promised to reduce power bills by $275. They promised it numerous times during the election campaign and failed to mention it now because they know that they broke that promise to Australians. They promised that families would be better off. They promised that mortgages would be cheaper. But we know that interest rates have gone up on average every second month of this term of the government. There is no doubt that this government made many promises to Australians at the last election that they have since broken. Even if they promise to not get into bed with the Greens if we're in a minority parliament situation after the next election, I frankly don't think that they can be trusted to stick to that promise either. 16:05 Senator STEWART 299352 Victoria It is really quite laughable that, after we've just been in a division where the opposition have teamed up with the Greens and One Nation, they then come in here and accuse us of doing dirty deals with the Greens, when they have just blocked a vote coming to this chamber so their absolute hypocrisy is not on display. They have stopped a vote coming to this chamber so they don't have to reveal their dirty deal that they've done with the Greens to block our Help to Buy scheme. They are absolutely getting into bed with the Greens on this issue—absolutely. For them to come in here accusing us of that, they must not own a mirror amongst them. They must not own a mirror amongst them. It is an absolute joke—an absolute joke. The Greens have shown absolute hypocrisy during question time. We've been offered on this side of the chamber—we've been invited to the table with the Greens—to negotiate on our Help to Buy scheme. I'm just curious whether this is the same table where the member for Griffith is supporting the Queensland Greens to campaign against almost 3,000 social or affordable inner-city homes as part of the Woolloongabba priority development area. Is this the same table where the Greens member for Ryan is campaigning against a plan to subdivide a chicken farm—a chicken farm!—to build 91 new homes, on the basis that 'it would diminish the natural character of the site'? The Greens have supported more chickens into homes than they have Australians, on that basis. I don't know that I want to be at that table. I don't know that I want to be at that table, actually. I'm pretty confident that I want to support 40,000 low- and middle-income earners into social and affordable housing, because that's what the Help to Buy Bill does. You can support more chickens into homes; we'll support more Australians into homes. I don't know that I want to be at that table with the Greens, thank you very much. I'm really keen to get on the record what it is that the broader community is saying about Labor's Help to Buy scheme. It feels like we've got lots of experts in this chamber who have views about it. But what are people outside this chamber saying? The Grattan institute are saying: The government's Help to Buy Bill will establish a national shared-equity scheme that would help level the playing field when it comes to accessing home ownership. 'Level the playing field'—imagine that. The privilege of owning your own home, like many people in this place do, is being blocked by the very same people. You are the types of people in this place that have reached that goal of owning your own home and are now pulling up the ladder behind you. Absolute shame on you. Absolute shame on you, because that's what you are doing. You're ripping that dream out of Australians' hands—particularly for young people. That is what you are doing by blocking this bill. The Master Builders Association says: Help to Buy is a sensible policy approach that looks at lifting housing affordability pressures while not negatively impacting the investment market. The Housing Industry Association said: HIA has indicated our support from the outset, on the announcement of the scheme. Our support centres around this scheme being one of a range of measures that could assist first-home buyers and other people who may be struggling to secure a deposit on a home to get into homeownership. It is incredible that the opposition have teamed up with the Greens and One Nation to block this. That's exactly what they've done. For you and for your children after you, they're blocking that for your families. It is an absolute disgrace that we see that on display here. The Greens are more interested in building their own social media profile than they are on building homes. That's the hypocrisy that we have seen on display in this place. And, with the opposition and the Greens teaming up, they are giving the middle finger to every single person who wants to achieve the dream of homeownership in this country. Shame on you! 16:10 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia I also rise to take note of the answers given to questions by coalition senators. This being a Senate-only week, we do have slightly more people in the gallery than we normally do over here in the Senate. It is also broadcasting day. For those up in the gallery: when the lights are on, that means we're being broadcast around the nation. You might be wondering what this debate is about. We are taking note of the answers that were given in question time. There are three speeches apiece: three on that side and three on this side. We take turns in examining the answers that were given. What we're seeing here is a display by those opposite of obfuscation. They are coming in here and trying to deflect the reality of what is actually going on on that side of the chamber. Consider the absurdity of the suggestion that we are in bed with the Greens! The only party that has proven time and time and time again over decades to be in lock step with the Greens is, of course, the Australian Labor Party, and no-one is closer to the Australian Greens than the Prime Minister of this country. The Prime Minister has in recent times had an opportunity, when he's been asked about it by journalists, to rule out a power-sharing deal with the Greens if they were to be in minority government, which is what, at this point in time, the polls are saying will be the case. The Prime Minister will not rule it out. The only leader of a major party who has ever ruled that out absolutely—without any shadow of a doubt, without any weasel words and without any shrinking away from the substance of the question—is, of course, the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Dutton. He's the only one who has ruled out a deal with the Greens. Senator Birmingham asked a question of Senator Wong about what plans the government has in relation to negative gearing. We know that the Australian Greens have in their manifesto and in their election commitments—as they have done over many elections—said, in the words of Mr Bandt, 'We want to wind back those tax breaks for wealthy property investors.' It's just one of the crazy conditions that the Leader of the Greens has put on a power-sharing deal. If they're in a position where the Prime Minister wants to hold on to the power of leadership and keep the keys to the Lodge, he's going to have to do a deal with the Greens, and we know that they want to wind back negative gearing. So the question was put by Senator Birmingham to Senator Wong, representing the Prime Minister in this place: 'Will you rule it out?' Of course, we didn't get that. What we got was weasel words. You know that a politician is not able to fully tell you exactly what's going on when they say words like, 'It's not in our plans,' or 'We have no current plans for that.' The only way that you can actually definitively rule it out is to say, 'We will never do that,' or 'We won't do that.' But, no, they're saying, 'We have no plans.' What that means is that they have no plans until they do have plans—until their plans actually change. We know that following the election, with a secret power-sharing deal that's been done with the Greens, that's exactly what they will do. They will succumb to those needs and wants and—guess what?—their plans will change. If you want to see an impact on housing, that's one way to see downward pressure, particularly on rental properties and other investment properties, because we know that investors will have to walk away from that. They'll put the money into other areas because of these sorts of crazy deals. The Prime Minister and Senator Wong in this place had an opportunity today, and have had many opportunities, to rule out both a power-sharing deal and the implementation of negative gearing changes. This will send shudders right through the economy, and what is ahead of this nation if we see a Greens and Labor government is dangerous. Question agreed to. Environment 4088 16:15 Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U South Australia I indicate that I'll speak for three minutes, and then Senator Thorpe would like the remainder of my time. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 We actually have an extra minute, which I've been calculating. Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U Well, there you go! The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 So Senator Thorpe can have an extra minute. Senator HANSON-YOUNG I0U You get an extra minute. I move: That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Foreign Affairs (Senator Wong) to a question without notice I asked today relating to environment laws. I listened carefully to the responses to the questions that I asked Senator Wong today, and, despite my questions being clearly about Labor's promise to fix the country's broken environment laws and about the Prime Minister's attitude to the holes in the environment laws, Senator Wong couldn't even say the word 'environment' in her responses to my questions. It's so clear—it's becoming clearer and clearer—that this government has given up on the environment, on protecting nature and on doing what is right in terms of our climate. It's extremely disappointing, because here in this place we actually have a pathway through, between the Greens and the crossbench, to put in place environment laws that actually do something to protect nature and the climate. Of course, the government are being extremely bullish in their attitude—their way or the highway. The Prime Minister told the chamber yesterday to get out of his way. He is trying to bulldoze his way through. It's not good enough just to have the bulldozers in our native forests or in Australia's most precious spots in nature; he wants to bulldoze his way through this chamber. He doesn't like that the government doesn't have the numbers. They have 25 votes out of 76 in this place. You actually have to work with others to get things done. But what was most illuminating about this entire response from the Minister representing the Prime Minister is just how little they want to talk about the environment. They don't want to utter the word. They don't want the Australian people knowing that they've gone to water. They are more interested in going to have dinner with the BCA and the Minerals Council than they are in standing up for what they promised the Australian people: to fix the environment laws and to put in place stronger protections. They've gone to water. They're doing what Gina Rinehart wants, not what they promised the Australian people. Rather than rolling up their sleeves and working with the crossbench and the Greens to get something done, they're more interested in sitting down and breaking bread with the big mining industry and the big business lobby, and, of course, they're just poking fun at them. Question agreed to. Legal Aid 4088 16:19 Senator THORPE 280304 Victoria I move: That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations (Senator Watt) to a question without notice I asked today relating to funding for legal assistance services. Earlier today Minister Watt responded to my questions about the insufficient funding to legal assistance services by gaslighting me and saying that my numbers were wrong. They weren't. And then he went on to pat his government on the back for their unprecedented funding of the sector. Go check over your own numbers, Minister Watt, because, no matter how many ways you try to spin it, everyone knows that the funding is nowhere near what the sector called for or what your own independent review called for. No amount of gaslighting or smoke and mirrors will change this. You have chosen to underfund this sector. That is a fact. And now you're trying to gaslight everyone. This sort of behaviour is why no-one trusts the Labor government. This government is only focused on trying to create a good headline, not on what matters to communities. Legal services have called the funding a 'betrayal' and an 'insult'. When I tried to question the impact the grossly insufficient funding will have on deaths in custody, I didn't even get a response on this. Shame on you. Shame on you all, Labor. You wave the flag, you have your Indigenous minister and you pretend to be our friends while you stab us in the back, not even to get a response. It is not too late for your gammon government to do something about this right now. Tell your Prime Minister to do his job so that women fleeing domestic violence can go to a legal service and get help, because that's what you're stopping. You're stopping services to women in need. And, because they don't get these services, what happens? Their children get taken from them. Only under a Labor government have child removals been so bad—ever! So you have to do your job. Fund these legal services. Fund the Aboriginal legal services. You call them in when you want them, when you need to tick your little black box, but you won't put your money where your mouth is. You talk about women's safety when you don't even fund the very services that provide that safe option for them. Shame! Question agreed to. NOTICES 4089 NOTICES Presentation 4089 COMMITTEES 4090 COMMITTEES Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee 4090 Meeting 4090 16:23 Senator URQUHART 231199 Tasmania by leave—At the request of the Chair of the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, Senator Green, I move: That the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee be authorised to hold a public meeting and in camera hearing during the sitting of the Senate today, from 4.30 pm, to take evidence for the committee's inquiry into the Commission of Inquiry into Antisemitism at Australian Universities Bill 2024. Question agreed to. BUSINESS 4091 BUSINESS Leave of Absence 4091 16:23 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia by leave—I move: That leave of absence be granted to the following senators: (a) Senator Fawcett from 16 September to 8 October 2024, on account of parliamentary business; and (b) Senator Bragg for today, for personal reasons. Question agreed to. Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 I also wish to clarify, in respect of Senator McDonald's leave of absence agreed to yesterday, that the absence for yesterday and today is for personal reasons, and the leave of absence for Wednesday and Thursday is for parliamentary business. The PRESIDENT 112096 Thank you for the clarity. Leave of Absence 4091 16:24 Senator THORPE 280304 Victoria by leave—I move: That leave of absence be granted to Senator Thorpe from 12 August to 12 September 2024, for personal reasons. Question agreed to. NOTICES 4091 NOTICES Postponement 4091 COMMITTEES 4091 COMMITTEES Reporting Date 4091 16:25 The 112096 PRESIDENT (): Thank you, Clerk. Economics References Committee 4091 Reference 4091 16:25 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland I move: That the following matter be referred to the Economics References Committee for inquiry and report by the last sitting day in March 2025: The reasons for the collapse of wealth management companies, and the implications for the establishment of the Compensation Scheme of Last Resort (CSLR) and challenges to its ongoing sustainability, with particular reference to Dixon Advisory & Superannuation Services Pty Limited (Dixon Advisory) as an example, and: (a) the underlying cause of the collapse of wealth management companies such as Dixon Advisory, including the business model and influence of the sale of related party products, for example the US Master Residential Property Fund; (b) how the actions of directors of wealth management companies and related entities, senior management and the individual advisers contribute to the collapse of these companies; (c) the role of the financial services regulatory regime in the context of how matters involving the collapse of an investment product promoted by a vertically integrated business are assessed and how fault is attributed; (d) evaluation of the placement of wealth management companies into administration and the related insolvency issues, including with respect to the appropriateness of actions by directors and senior management and the transfer of advisers and clients to a related party entity for no consideration; (e) assessment of the period for which wealth management companies can remain a member of the Australian Financial Complaints Authority; (f) the role of Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), including providing consumer information to investors affected by corporate collapse and consideration of the most appropriate arrangements for future cases of insolvency; (g) ASIC's role investigating corporate collapse and the appropriateness of any regulatory intervention that may reduce scale of loss for consumers; (h) options for enforcement action, including litigation, that ASIC has available to it in relation to wealth management companies following collapse; (i) the implications of the collapse of wealth management companies on the establishment of the CSLR, including with respect to design considerations and the potential implications for future matters; and (j) any other related matters. 16:25 Senator CHISHOLM 39801 Queensland by leave—I move an amendment to the motion: Omit "Economics References Committee", substitute "Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services". 16:26 Senator DUNIAM 263418 Tasmania I seek leave to make a short statement. The PRESIDENT 112096 Leave is granted for one minute. Senator DUNIAM 263418 This motion highlights the government's poor implementation and maladministration of their Compensation Scheme of Last Resort. The government's failed on its promise to bring down costs for financial advisers. The ASIC and CSLR levies have skyrocketed. The government's reneged on covering the first 12 months of the scheme's costs, and little progress has been made in the 640 days since the government received the review's final report. The coalition supports a fairer and more sustainable compensation scheme of last resort. The proposed inquiry should focus on this and correcting errors in the government's design of the scheme and bringing the scheme's costs down. The PRESIDENT 112096 The question is that the amendment moved by Senator Chisholm to business of the Senate No. 2, standing in the name of Senator Hanson, be agreed to.    

The Senate divided. [16:31]
(The President—Senator Lines)

 29 AYES Askew, W. Bilyk, C. L. Cash, M. C. Chandler, C. Chisholm, A. Ciccone, R. Colbeck, R. M. Darmanin, L. Davey, P. M. Duniam, J. R. Farrell, D. E. Ghosh, V. Grogan, K. Kovacic, M. Lines, S. McAllister, J. R. McLachlan, A. L. O'Neill, D. M. O'Sullivan, M. A. Pratt, L. C. Ruston, A. Sharma, D. N. Sheldon, A. V. Smith, D. A. Smith, M. F. Sterle, G. Stewart, J. N. A. Urquhart, A. E. (Teller) Walsh, J. C. 19 NOES Allman-Payne, P. J. Babet, R. Cox, D. Faruqi, M. Hanson, P. L. Hanson-Young, S. C. Hodgins-May, S. Lambie, J. McKim, N. J. Pocock, B. Pocock, D. W. Rennick, G. Roberts, M. I. (Teller) Shoebridge, D. Steele-John, J. A. Thorpe, L. A. Tyrrell, T. M. Waters, L. J. Whish-Wilson, P. S. 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.
Original question, as amended, agreed to.

 Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee 4093 Reference 4093 16:33 Senator RENNICK 283596 Queensland I move: That the following matter be referred to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee for inquiry and report by 28 February 2025: The benefits of conducting a Federal Convention to examine the ambiguous roles between the state, territory and federal governments considering, but not limited to, the following issues: (a) the need to streamline the duplication of bureaucracies to save billions of dollars in bureaucratic waste and reduce unnecessary regulations; (b) the lack of accountability and transparency between the state, territory and federal governments; (c) the need for state and territory governments to raise their own revenue to reduce their reliance on Federal Government funding; (d) the need for Federal grants and goods and services tax allocations to state and territory governments to be much more transparent, efficient and effective; (e) the need for the implementation of a coordinated infrastructure funding facility to provide capital for sovereign infrastructure; and (f) any other related matters. The PRESIDENT 112096 The question is that business of the Senate No. 1 standing in the name of Senator Rennick be agreed to.    

The Senate divided. [16:35]
(The President—Senator Lines)

 6 AYES Babet, R. Hanson, P. L. Lambie, J. Pocock, D. W. Rennick, G. (Teller) Roberts, M. I. 39 NOES Allman-Payne, P. J. Askew, W. Bilyk, C. L. Cash, M. C. Chisholm, A. Ciccone, R. Colbeck, R. M. Cox, D. Darmanin, L. Duniam, J. R. Farrell, D. E. Faruqi, M. Ghosh, V. Grogan, K. Hanson-Young, S. C. Hodgins-May, S. Kovacic, M. Lines, S. McAllister, J. R. McKim, N. J. McLachlan, A. L. O'Neill, D. M. O'Sullivan, M. A. (Teller) Pocock, B. Pratt, L. C. Ruston, A. Sheldon, A. V. Shoebridge, D. Smith, D. A. Smith, M. F. Steele-John, J. A. Sterle, G. Stewart, J. N. A. Thorpe, L. A. Tyrrell, T. M. Urquhart, A. E. Walsh, J. C. Waters, L. J. Whish-Wilson, P. S. 0 PAIRS

Question negatived.

 DOCUMENTS 4093 DOCUMENTS Housing Australia Future Fund 4093 Order for the Production of Documents 4093 16:38 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia At the request of Senator Bragg, I move: That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Treasurer, by no later than midday on Tuesday, 24 September 2024, any correspondence, emails and communications between institutional investors and Housing Australia regarding disbursements from the Housing Australia Future Fund and the decision announced by the Government on 16 September 2024 on the first round of disbursements, between November 2022 and 16 September 2024. Question agreed to. BUSINESS 4094 BUSINESS Consideration of Legislation 4094 16:38 Senator CHISHOLM 39801 Queensland At the request of Senator Gallagher, I move: That the provisions of paragraphs (5) to (8) of standing order 111 not apply to the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024, allowing it to be considered during this period of sittings. Question agreed to. COMMITTEES 4094 COMMITTEES Public Works Joint Committee 4094 Reference 4094 16:39 Senator CHISHOLM 39801 Queensland At the request of Senator Gallagher, I move: That, in accordance with the provisions of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, the following proposed work be referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works for consideration and report as expeditiously as is practicable: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade—Proposed fit-out of new leased premises at 19 National Circuit, Barton ACT. I table a statement in relation to the work. Question agreed to. Adopting Artificial Intelligence (AI) Select Committee 4094 Reporting Date 4094 16:40 Senator URQUHART 231199 Tasmania At the request of Senator Sheldon, I move: That the time for the presentation of the report of the Select Committee on Adopting Artificial Intelligence be extended to 28 November 2024. 16:40 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory by leave—I move: Omit "28 November 2024", substitute "26 November 2024". Question agreed to. Original question, as amended, agreed to. DOCUMENTS 4094 DOCUMENTS Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water 4094 Order for the Production of Documents 4094 16:41 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia At the request of Senator Duniam, I move: That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for the Environment and Water, by no later than midday on Thursday, 19 September 2024, any document that provides a list of each of the 60 renewable energy projects which the Minister for the Environment and Water referred to in her question time answer in the House of Representatives on 11 September 2024. Question agreed to. Department of Education 4094 Order for the Production of Documents 4094 16:41 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia At the request of Senator Henderson, I move: That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Education, by no later than midday on 19 September 2024, the document or documents which include the following: (a) for each higher education provider (being publicly funded universities and private providers): (i) the new overseas student commencements in the years 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024, (ii) the indicative international student profiles as proposed for 2025, (iii) the number of onshore international students for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024, (iv) the total number of onshore (domestic and onshore international) students for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024, and (v) the onshore international proportion of enrolments for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024; and (b) the selected higher education statistics for 2023. Question agreed to. Department of Employment and Workplace Relations 4095 Order for the Production of Documents 4095 16:42 Senator O'SULLIVAN 283585 Western Australia At the request of Senator Henderson, I move: That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Skills and Training, by no later than midday on 19 September 2024, for each vocational and education training provider with a Commonwealth Register of Institutions and Courses for Overseas Students registration: (a) the new overseas student commencements for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024; (b) the indicative international student profiles as proposed for 2025; (c) the number of onshore international students for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024; (d) the total number of onshore (domestic and onshore international) students for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024; and (e) onshore international enrolments as a proportion of total onshore enrolments for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024. 16:42 Senator CHISHOLM 39801 Queensland by leave—I move: That the motion be amended to read as follows: That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Skills and Training, for each vocational and education training provider with a Commonwealth Register of Institutions and Courses for Overseas Students registration: (a) by no later than midday on 19 September 2024: (i) the new overseas student commencements for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024, and (ii) the indicative international student profiles as proposed for 2025; and (b) by no later than 5 pm on 23 September 2024: (i) the number of onshore international students for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024, (ii) the total number of onshore (domestic and onshore international) students for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024, and (iii) onshore international enrolments as a proportion of total onshore enrolments for 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024. Question agreed to. Original question, as amended, agreed to. MATTERS OF URGENCY 4095 MATTERS OF URGENCY Youth Justice 4095 16:43 The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Thorpe has submitted a proposal under standing order 75 today: Pursuant to standing order 75, I give notice that today I propose to move "That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency: The Federal Government must take national leadership to support children who are currently or at risk of coming into contact with the criminal legal system by applying a rights-based approach grounded in evidence and best practice." Is the consideration of the proposal supported? More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places— The PRESIDENT 112096 I believe that the proposal is supported. With the concurrence of the Senate, the clerks will set the clocks in line with informal arrangements made by the whips. 16:44 Senator THORPE 280304 Victoria I move: That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency: The Federal Government must take national leadership to support children who are currently or at risk of coming into contact with the criminal legal system by applying a rights-based approach grounded in evidence and best practice. Everyone in this country agrees that communities should be healthy, safe and cohesive and that children should have every opportunity to do well in life. Youth crime happens when kids don't have opportunities and support. Disadvantaged communities suffer the most, and right now people are struggling out there. Let's be very clear. Governments are responsible for this crisis. Governments have neglected communities and children. They've failed to make sure people have access to basic health and mental health services; safe, affordable housing; decent education; and youth support programs. Governments are failing to meet the basic needs of children and are denying them basic human rights. But when the most vulnerable children commit offences, politicians, both Labor and the coalition, don't respond by addressing the underlying issues that government neglect has created—for example, poverty, trauma and undiagnosed disability. Instead, they respond by shamelessly stoking community fears about children, black children in particular, and then promising to solve the issues with tough-on-crime approaches—oh, but you'll just need to vote for them first, right? Rather than take responsibility and follow evidence-based approaches, the major parties take advantage of people's fear and knowingly destroy the lives of children, all in the pursuit of their own political power. It's despicable. In prisons, children—we're talking about 10-year-olds here—are routinely subjected to isolation, abuse, sexual assault and the deprivation of food, sunlight and meaningful contact with other people. They are deprived of education, deprived of health and deprived of mental health care. Most of these kids have severe cognitive disabilities, and most are black kids. They aren't rehabilitated; they are deeply harmed. All that does is drive and worsen problems in communities. It entrenches the disadvantage and disconnect that children have experienced. It makes them more likely to offend in the future. Tough-on-crime approaches lock communities and children into an endless cycle of harm: offending, conflict and incarceration. We all lose. Who's looking after our children in this country? It's certainly not the government. This government needs to listen to the many, many First Nations advocates and leaders, as well as to experts like the National Children's Commissioner. You need to start telling the truth and showing some leadership on this issue. You need to drive an evidence-based, coordinated cross-portfolio national approach to youth justice that addresses the leading causes of criminalisation: poverty, lack of access to a safe home, health and mental health problems, lack of enough food to eat, lack of clothing and lack of access to education. Communities and children desperately need new solutions to these problems. We don't need more of the same; we need approaches that actually work. Let's be clear: the government is not doing what works. You're doing what is best for your next political campaign. You don't have the best interests of the children of this country in your approach. For the information of those who aren't aware, it is more cost effective and beneficial to communities to properly support these kids outside of prison. It costs $1 million for one year to hold a child in prison. Imagine what you could do in the community if, instead of funding for youth programs being cut right across this country, you had that kind of money. It's a shame on the Labor government and anyone else who wants to go tough on crime. (Time expired) 16:49 Senator LIDDLE 300644 South Australia When children come into contact with the criminal justice system, we've already failed them. That's a fact. If they are in the system, then the main consideration must be their own safety and that of others, and that they do the work that gives them the greatest chance of not coming back. Proven diversionary programs and safety mechanisms are one part of the solution, but so, too, is addressing how they got there. Senator Thorpe's motion calls for a UN based approach, which means both parents share responsibility for bringing up children and should always consider what is in the best interests of each child. If that's what Senator Thorpe means, then the coalition agrees. It should not be controversial for parents to share responsibility for bringing up a child where it is safe to do so. We can talk systems, fault and failures, but we also need to talk much more about parents and parenting. We should also talk more about Commonwealth, state, territory and local government programs that exist to support children and are supposed to provide a safety net for them. Where that safety net fails, we must be courageous about fixing the gaps, and that means ending funding for feel-good programs without clinical efficacy, evidence or outcomes. Children rely on us to demand service delivery excellence, because it is the best and most effective way to change lives, and quickly. To do anything else robs children of their future. Every one of Australia's five million children has the right to live and grow up healthy. Children have a right to be safe no matter where they are. There is no cultural, gender, economic or social excuse that is anywhere near plausible for violence. Children have a right to receive an education, but parents also have a responsibility to get them to school. Children have a right to be treated fairly and have a say about decisions affecting them. These concepts form the basis of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Australia is a signatory. One in six Australian children live in poverty. The number of children in contact with child protection systems continues to rise for all children, and again Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are overrepresented. Early intervention and prevention take time but can have great effect. There must be levers to drive change for parents and to improve parenting. So many children in the justice system have parents who know the confines of police cells and prisons all too well, so the focus needs to also be on them. For too many children, money comes from welfare, as it did for their parents, so the focus needs to engage them in work where that is possible. I'm talking about parents, whoever and wherever they are, who are locked in gambling, alcohol, drug and welfare addiction getting access to clinically proven services where they need them, not just yarning circles or a program they can't even access for seven months. To change the trajectory for children, you must also change the trajectory for parents for sustainable change. In this place, when you stand for nothing that demands anything different, nothing changes. Here's proof that announcement is not enough: what about the Albanese government spending $400 million on community safety in Central Australia but failing to intercept groups of young children making their way into town before they get into trouble? The night I was in Alice Springs, more than 500 windows were broken, but so much more than glass was shattered that night. Where are the taxpayer funded service providers whose job it is to divert those children, and where are the youth programs that exist to prevent them from getting into trouble in the first place? All levels of government should begin rejecting the paternalism, the narrative that does nothing for change. They all need good diversionary programs and safety mechanisms, not just for the community but for the children themselves. Our laws must consider the safety of every individual, family and community and their property, and that means an expectation of the need to protect everyone from harm. That's because one child in contact with the criminal justice system is one too many, and we can do so much more to intercept them before they get there, to safeguard them in custody and to make sure they do not return. If that's what Senator Thorpe means by a rights based approach, then the coalition agrees, and every senator in this place should too. 16:54 Senator PRATT I0T Western Australia The number of children coming into contact with the criminal justice system in Australia is indeed appalling. All levels of government can and must do more to prevent children and young people from coming into contact with the criminal justice system. As Senator Thorpe highlighted, and as I agree—and I thank her for the opportunity to debate this motion—all too often the reasons children come into contact with the criminal justice system arise from poverty and discrimination. We are, as a government, committed to working with the states and territories to reduce the overrepresentation of First Nations children in detention. In this context, I would like to push my own state government in Western Australia to go further. But, as a federal government, we're working on a number of policy actions, including the First Nations justice reinvestment program. We're establishing a national justice reinvestment unit, which will empower First Nations communities to identify local initiatives to improve justice outcomes and address the drivers of contact with the criminal justice system. In that context, I also think that we can and should do more within our social security system to support, and not disempower, families. The Attorney-General and the Minister for Indigenous Australians have announced some 20 communities that have been successful in obtaining a justice reinvestment grant, with more to be announced soon. I hope that those programs and commitments will include the kinds of health and mental health services and support that are determined by First Nations communities themselves to be what they need in their local community to support, in particular, children and young people who are grappling with these issues. We really do want this money to address the factors that increase First Nations people's risks when it comes to contact with the criminal justice system. It has to be about local solutions led by local communities, in terms of housing, education, employment, health and income. We also know that there are better justice outcomes when a young person receives early intervention and support in all these kinds of areas. Justice reinvestment can and should deliver this, but it will take work in our incredibly fragmented systems of government, where too often we see vulnerable children and vulnerable families caught in a trap of systems where state and Commonwealth support services or interventions are not connecting and are, frankly, passing the buck in terms of accountability. All too often we see families who might come into contact with the child protection system and who lose their social security payments, such as family payments and rent assistance, because their children have been taken into care. This in turn makes it incredibly difficult for those parents to ever be able to put a roof back over their children's heads and get on a path where they can restore their family unit and raise their own children. We have for too long really created false dislocations between state and Commonwealth systems when it comes to these issues. Justice reinvestment, however, is very much on the table, and I hope that we can start looking at these kinds of initiatives at a local level in terms of how we can get social security and child protection systems working better together. We can see a historic $99 million First Nations justice package in the October 2022 budget. (Time expired) 16:59 Senator SHOEBRIDGE 169119 New South Wales The youth justice system in this country is in crisis. It's racially biased and it intentionally harms the young people who are caught up in it as well as their communities. It costs billions of dollars that could instead be invested in positive outcomes for young people. I'm proud to say that last week the Senate supported the Greens' motion for a groundbreaking federal inquiry into Australia's youth justice system. Too many children, particularly First Nations children, are being locked up, their futures stolen. We've heard heartbreaking stories from across the country—of tragic deaths in Western Australian children's prisons; of overcrowded children's detention centres in the Northern Territory; of police cells in Queensland; and of places like the Ashley Youth Detention Centre in Tasmania, a youth jail that's still operating despite appalling abuses. It is clear that locking up kids is having devastating effects across this country. This Senate inquiry, by the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee, is looking into the big issues, like whether children's prisons are treating kids humanely and whether Australia is even close to living up to its international human rights obligations. The use of spit hoods, isolation and other torture-like tactics is unacceptable. For the first time, the need for strong, enforceable national standards to make sure every state and territory is living up to its obligations to protect kids will be the subject of a national inquiry. But here's the thing: this isn't just for politicians to solve; this inquiry needs to hear from experts and the community, especially people with lived experience. We need your voice. The inquiry is calling for public submissions, and the deadline is 10 October of this year. This is your chance to speak up, whether you're a parent, a teacher or someone with firsthand lived experience of the system. Make sure your voice is heard. 17:01 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory Productivity Commission data from earlier this year found that 56.8 per cent of children given detention, probation or parole had reoffended within a year. We know that punitive responses to children's and young people's crimes simply doesn't work. We have to address the underlying drivers of young people's criminal offending: poverty, instability at home, alcohol, mental health concerns and intergenerational trauma. We can't just continue to criminalise young people based on these underlying drivers that they simply don't have any control over. We know that from the age of 10 to 14 and into young adulthood young people's brains are still developing. They have poor impulse control and have more difficulty making good decisions. For young people with a history of trauma and an unstable or volatile home environment, this is all the more acute. Anyone with young people in their life knows that these are formative stages. Young people need guidance and support. They need to feel seen and loved, and, most importantly, they need to feel safe. What they don't need is to be locked up and forced into a continuous cycle of offending. We know there are evidence based early intervention programs that can support children and young people before they start offending, and there are diversion models that work. Young people's offending is often a symptom of our societal failure—the systemic and long-term underfunding of our frontline child protection and family violence services, a lack of access to mental health support and intervention and a social safety net that keeps families below the poverty line. We know that children in out-of-home care are significantly more likely to come into contact with the justice system. Here in Canberra First Nations children are 12.9 times more likely to be subject to a child protection order than non-Indigenous children are. This is the third-highest rate in Australia, and it is a real shame on Canberra, a population that voted yes in the referendum to do more listening and to ensure that we see First Nations' solutions listened to and implemented. That's not what I hear is happening with the current Labor-Greens government, despite all the rhetoric about the work they're doing in this space. We're letting these kids down. We have a responsibility to give every Australian child a safe and healthy childhood where they have the opportunity to grow and thrive. These tough-on-crime approaches are failing Aussie kids. It's time to recognise that and to do better. The federal government, of course, should be leading the way, pulling and pushing the states and territories along. 17:04 Senator PAYMAN 300707 Western Australia A 10-year-old cannot vote, cannot drive and cannot even work, yet they can be held criminally responsible and imprisoned. This is a total inconsistency in the way young people are held responsible for their actions. Last month, the Allan Labor government abandoned their promise to raise the age of criminal responsibility. At the then Andrews government's re-election in 2022, their key slogan was that they were 'doing what's right'. What is right about this? We are talking about a child who should be in the playground at recess, eating an LCM bar. Instead, the government wants to put them behind bars. As soon as that decision is made, as soon as that child is put into that system, they are placed in a cycle of self-destruction and dependency on the prison system. Life in prison becomes normal to them. Early intervention steering kids towards a productive, fulfilling life, not locking them up as soon as possible, is needed to keep these kids out of prison. We know that this issue is especially salient for our First Nations communities. The National Indigenous Times reported last year that Indigenous children were as much as 29 times as likely to be imprisoned as non-Indigenous kids. Not everyone is suffering, however. Private, often foreign, prison operators, some listed on the New York Stock Exchange, are raking in almost $10 billion in annual revenue as the government helps them recruit more lifelong clients to boost their profits and deliver bigger dividends for their shareholders. It's time the government took a decisive stand on whether they plan to do the right thing for our kids by raising the age or to continue to contribute to the destruction of lives and communities under current policies. Question agreed to. Western Australia: Fossil Fuel Industry 4099 17:06 The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 298839 The Senate will now consider the proposal from Senator McKim: Pursuant to standing order 75, I give notice that today the Australian Greens propose to move "That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency: Woodside's proposal to drill for gas right next to Scott Reef, releasing billions of tonnes of climate pollution out to 2070, would have unacceptable impacts on threatened wildlife such as the dusky sea snake, pygmy blue whale and green turtle and must be ruled out by the Federal Government." Is consideration of the proposal supported? More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 298839 With the concurrence of the Senate, the clerks will set the clock in line with the informal arrangements made by the whips. 17:06 Senator COX 296215 Western Australia At the request of Senator McKim, I move: That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency: Woodside's proposal to drill for gas right next to Scott Reef, releasing billions of tonnes of climate pollution out to 2070, would have unacceptable impacts on threatened wildlife such as the dusky sea snake, pygmy blue whale and green turtle and must be ruled out by the Federal Government. It is a crucial time for the climate and for those in this chamber that have been captured by Woodside and other donors in the gas cartels of Australia. The Greens bring this motion to the Senate today as a matter of urgency. Scott Reef and the group of atolls and reefs 300 kilometres off the Western Australian coast near Cape Leveque in the Timor Sea at the edge of the continental shelf are home to an abundance of marine life. They sit in the middle of a migratory route for pygmy blue whales, 28 other kinds of marine mammal and thousands of kinds of fish. As a proud saltwater woman and custodian of sea country and also a proud Western Australian and a Greens senator, I know that the ocean is an extension of our waterways. After the survival of two ice ages in Australia, the ancient lagoons and the small straits that were once a separation of the lands are now hundreds of metres below sea level. Places like this are precious in Western Australia, and we have spectacular places for diving and swimming. Salt water is, in fact, part of our healing and celebration of culture, which is now the Australian way. It's on every postcard; the beautiful blue oceans and the beaches are what we are famous for. Unfortunately for the reef, it sits on top of deposits of natural gas, and Woodside have eyed this off for their proposed Torosa field, part of the Browse project, one of the most damaging fossil fuel developments in Australia, which will pump out 1.6 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions over the next 47 years. It's now time to rule out the Browse project and preserve this area of ocean while at the same time preventing millions of tonnes of carbon from entering the atmosphere. The Minister for the Environment and Water has also listed the dusky sea snake as endangered, and this is why the government need to stop Woodside if they have any sense of value for the environment and for the health and wellbeing our communities, particularly on the Burrup Peninsula, where this gas will be produced for export. First Peoples from both sides of this transnational border, fishermen and tourist operators will all be impacted when our important places like the reef are destroyed. You will absolutely see the effects for up to 300 kilometres from that location. The economic base argument that we often hear is big marketing hysteria paid for and run by the gas lobbyists of this country. Gaslighting Australians about the gas shortage in the next decade is nothing short of misleading. Nearly 80 per cent of the gas in this country is exported, with the crumbs going to domestic markets because governments are too weak to stand up for Australians, especially in the west. We are paying premium prices while Woodside and the rest of the gas cartel bank their big profits. When governments fail to do their due diligence and fail in their election promises to strengthen the environment laws, they get a big fat zero for effort, particularly in Australia, where they preach about removing the green tape for their projects. Today I'm urging senators in this place, especially those from Western Australia, to vote for this motion at a time when WA, with the exposure that we have to wind and sun, could be a world leader in accelerating a just transition to renewable energy which will help protect our communities, the environment and especially our economy. Take some time to think about the air quality and the emissions of this project until 2070 and the impact that will have directly on the cultural heritage, the marine life, the destruction of this planet and the health and wellbeing of my constituents in Western Australia on the Burrup Peninsula. It is time to axe the Browse project and show the Australian public that this Labor government can actually keep election promises and do something to preserve and protect the environment. 17:11 Senator DUNIAM 263418 Tasmania I've never actually heard anyone describe what is being told to Australian people by analysts, by experts, about a gas shortage on the east coast of Australia as gaslighting anywhere. I just cannot believe that anyone would suggest that a problem, a crisis, we are facing is somehow gaslighting the Australian community. It does not matter how much gas is exported because it doesn't matter to the Greens; they will not allow any projects through. This argument that we don't want this project to occur because it's all for export purposes is a folly and a furphy. The Greens just don't want gas—full stop—and that brings us to the problem such an approach in policy would have for our country, would have for energy prices, would have for reliability and would have for things like fertiliser production, which then goes into food production, which is what stocks our shelves and keeps us sustained. This is where these arguments of these approaches go. If you listen to what was said, you could walk outside this chamber, like you could after any Greens contribution on any matter before the Senate, and look for the smouldering tree stumps and the dried-up creek beds and wonder how we managed to breathe every day. You would think that any project that comes before this government, or any government of any colour, is going to destroy the planet and that therefore we must stop it. There has to be balance in this debate. There has to be an approach where we look to the economic and social impacts and benefits of these projects alongside the environmental impacts. Nothing in the contribution made by Senator Cox that we've just heard talks about the years and years of environmental assessments and reports—hurdles and hoops to jump through—that the proponents of this project have gone through, all set out in law. Neither the process governed by the laws of this country nor the bureaucrats that actually administer these processes should be besmirched as being beholden to donors. There is this ridiculous argument that just because someone makes a donation to a political party our project gets up. It's easy to say. It's the kind of thing we say when talk about gambling reform. People like Duncan Turpie make donations to the Greens, but it only matters when its fossil fuel donations. It's an appalling approach to public policy. It's one that is shortsighted, and, of course, it results in very negative outcomes for our country, but it doesn't suit the arguments that they make. Do you know what? I agree with Minister Plibersek rarely, but, on this occasion, she ruled out the need to go and do the reviews that have been called for in relation to the project we're talking about. It was a swift decision, proving this government can make swift decisions. It doesn't always happen—in fact, it rarely happens—but, on this occasion, the minister did it because it was the right decision. As I said before, because of years and years of work, proper assessments and the science based work being done—something that is an inconvenient truth those who are proposing this matter of urgency choose to ignore—the project is safe to proceed. It isn't going to do all of the things that the Greens are telling us it will. Since 2018, these sorts of assessments have been occurring. I'll tell you what is alarming, though: you've got another example of the Australian Greens wanting to try and dictate how economic policy in this country should go. This is not purely environmental policy; this is economic and energy related policy that we're talking about here. Knocking a project on the head like this, which is exactly what is being asked for, will have implications beyond the environment. The argument is that, just because it's exported, it doesn't matter. Well, then, find us one that they support for domestic purposes. There isn't one. There is not a single gas project in this country, export or domestic use, that the Australian Greens would support, even if the science says, 'It is okay to go.' Human life has an impact on this planet, and we need to minimise that impact and manage it well. But we have an impact. We don't go and live in caves. We need energy to cook. We need to cool things down. We need energy to create fertiliser and to grow food. The Greens ignore those hard facts in their approach to policy. And the people who miss out are those who are paying more for energy and whose jobs are no longer secure because of policies like the ones we're pursuing here. That is why we totally and utterly oppose what is before us. It's because it is a disastrous policy that is being written by the Greens, which is what will happen under a Labor-Green government if they get into minority government. 17:16 Senator STERLE e68 Western Australia I listened intently to the contributions of my colleagues earlier and to the first contribution from the Greens senator Senator Cox. She said that she's representing her constituents in WA. Well, I have represented the constituents of WA for nearly 20 years. I am a member of a party that has 52 of the 59 seats in WA in the lower house, with the majority in the upper house, and the Greens have just one. I just want to get that on the record. So the Labor Party represents a hell of a lot. Senator Cox 296215 That means nothing. Senator STERLE e68 Senator Cox—through you, Chair—I listened respectfully to your contribution. I did not interrupt you once. Have some manners. Here we are again. Another stunt and yet another day where we get fanciful ideas from the Greens political party. Senator Cox 296215 My first point of order is that Senator Sterle should be addressing his comments through the chair. My second point of order is that I ask him to remove that comment about me. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 298839 Senator Sterle, it will assist the chamber if you withdraw. Senator STERLE e68 For you, Madam Acting Deputy President, oh, God almighty, yes, I withdraw. You've got a glass jaw. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 298839 Senator Sterle, please withdraw. Senator STERLE e68 I withdraw it. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 298839 Senator Sterle, please resume your seat. It's not assisting the chamber when there are additional comments made beyond what is asked. I'm not going to resume the debate until everybody does it in a respectful way. So, Senator Cox, Senator Sterle has withdrawn the second comment. Senator Sterle, please resume. Senator STERLE e68 The Greens claim to believe in transparency. Seriously, give me a break. Meanwhile, those opposite are always quick off the block when it comes to criticising, but, in reality, they're all show and no substance. Do you remember all those energy policies that that mob over there had for the nine years they were last in power? It was 22 at the last count, and they didn't land one. On their watch, 24 coal-fired power stations were scheduled to be closed and replaced with nothing. And who could forget the former Prime Minister's stunt when he walked into the House with a lump of coal? Then there is their latest fanciful stunt, the nuclear power plants scattered around the nation. Do you remember that one? You know how it goes: stunts to the left of us, stunts to the right. I mean, seriously! Let's not be distracted by the fanciful and the critical; let's get to the point. It's time for this chamber to do its job and focus on providing real solutions that address the very real problems facing Australians, both in the short and medium term and in the long term. In the short term, this government has acted to shore up electricity supply and stabilise prices. In the medium term, we have developed and adopted a strategy that will ensure gas supplies as the intermittent fuel source. Australian gas will also play an important role in the global energy transformation and in meeting our legislated climate goals. Remember them? And, in the long term, we are focused on transitioning our economy to be powered by renewables. We are doing all this while respecting the methodical approach that needs to be undertaken through the environmental approvals process. The approvals processes involved with this particular project commenced in late 2018 and are reaching their conclusion. That's six years ago. These are important processes that must not be thrown in the bin simply because the Greens political party are worried they may not get their own way. So let's focus on the facts. I quote: Should the Browse project go ahead, which would be subject to regulatory/environmental approvals: No drilling will occur on Scott Reef, in the North/South Scott Reef lagoons or the Scott Reef Channel. The proposed FPSOs (floating production storage and offloading facilities) would be located almost 8 km from the reef and nearly 30 km from the Sandy Islet nesting habitat. No physical contact (e.g. including discharges from drilling etc.) is predicted to occur with Scott Reef (above the 75 m contour). In fact, all proposed activities occur in waters more than 300 m deep. The North West Shelf has delivered trusted and reliable energy supply in WA for 40 years. I know that because back in 1982 I delivered the furniture to their first office. That's how long they've been up there. It is a major employer in and around Karratha and Dampier and has invested well over $300 million in social and community infrastructure in the region. This contribution is in addition to the corporate income tax paid at 30 per cent on taxable profits. This is on top of the $40 billion paid in royalties and excise by the North West Shelf project since the start of production in 1984. Colleagues, when you go into WA you see a sea of fluoro shirts. I would challenge the Greens senators to stand in Perth Airport and condemn the gas industry. I dare you. It's alright to make big statements while you're hiding here in Canberra. I tell you what: I am pro fluoro shirts, I am pro employers, I am pro jobs and I am pro gas as a transition. 17:22 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland This motion demonstrates the breathtaking hypocrisy of the Greens in a nutshell. This is the party which demands that wind turbines and solar panels be spread across the regional Australian landscape like a lethal cancer. But they refuse to acknowledge that, without natural gas, their precious renewables will never work. The Greens are deliberately ignorant of the laws of nature and celestial mechanics which dictate that the wind doesn't always blow in Australia and the sun does not always shine. These laws cannot be changed for the Greens amendment. These laws are immutable and beyond the power of human beings to change. When the sun isn't shining and the wind isn't blowing, you need something to generate energy other than the toxic solar panels and wind turbines polluting the Australian landscape. More specifically, we need natural gas. There's no getting around it. Even in South Australia, the state with the greatest renewables pollution, the gas is always on to provide a reliable back-up for these deficient renewables. That state's Labor government claimed 100 per cent of South Australia's energy was being generated by renewables for a period of time. Gas was being burned to make up the shortfall. So here we are in 2024 with Australia sitting on some of the richest gas reserves on the planet. We are now facing domestic shortages of natural gas to the point at which energy providers are talking about importing it. This is appalling. The world's largest exporter of natural gas is facing domestic gas shortages. Only in Australia, where the energy market has been interfered with so badly, could such a ridiculous situation come to pass. The Greens want to restrict our supply even more. They think the welfare of snakes, turtles and whales is more important than the welfare of the Australian people. They think anything and everything is more important than the Australian people, who pay their salaries, pay for their airline tickets and subsidise their precious renewables. They hate this country, which is why they try to cripple it by banning any new gas or coal developments and opposing the one proven emissions-free technology that can provide reliable energy—nuclear power. This robs the Australian people of the natural wealth that is their birthright and robs our nation of the energy security we must have for a prosperous future. Senator Sterle mentioned the North West Shelf, which I totally agree with. Just to put that into perspective, we are the largest gas exporter, and Senator Sterle mentioned a figure of $40 billion that we've got in royalties from our gases off the North West Shelf of Western Australia. Qatar is the next biggest exporter to Australia and they've made $26 billion a year out of their gas exports. The North West Shelf has been going for 40 years, so what did we make in that time? When you look at it, we've made only about $300 million. It was only last year's budget that brought in $2.4 billion. That's all we're making out of it. To make $40 billion over 40 years is pittance considering the resources that we have in this country. We are not getting paid properly for it and that's due to both the coalition and this Labor Party. In this country they're reluctant to go after the multinationals to pay their fair share of tax for the resources that belong to the Australian people. Renewables will not give us the power that we need because a lot of industries and manufacturing are shutting down. We have to have diversity of power. We need to have the gas supplied. South Australia would not run, it would be in blackout, if it weren't for the gas that props it up when they don't receive the wind and solar power that they need. Wind and solar supplies between only 18 and 32 per cent of the power on a daily basis. You have to have gas. You have to have it. We're not in a position—they talk about the batteries. It's not going to happen. Green hydrogen won't happen—it can't—because it costs about $15 a kilogram to actually produce it, and you can't run it on renewables. Queensland is in a position where we're going to lose our—we're producing the power only because of coal-fired power stations. You're living in a dream world with all these renewables because we can't keep this country going and keep the lights on for those people who dearly need it. And one day you'll end up with no power, no industry, no manufacturing and in poverty. That's where we are headed under this Greens-Labor government. 17:27 Senator HODGINS-MAY 310860 Victoria What a load of piffle from the members of the major political parties, arguing that this is backed by science. Come on! I am so relieved that there are no young people sitting up in the public gallery today to hear that sort of rot. They know it's not backed by science and they know bulldust when they hear it. Thank you to Senator Cox for talking about what a climate bomb of a project this would be—a tourism-wrecking project, a climate-wrecking project, a complete dismissal of First Nation interests. I could talk about the big donations that both of the major parties receive—the last time I checked, the Labor Party were takin more in big donations from the gas corporations than the Liberal Party—or I could talk about them not paying enough tax on the gas that the corporations are exporting, but I want to focus on the environmental impacts of this climate-wrecking proposal. Fossil fuel giant Woodside is planning to take another wrecking ball to our environment. Woodside wants to drill 50 additional wells at Browse, an area rich in critical biodiversity. Extracting the gas will create a void under the reef, causing it to sink into the ocean with devastating impacts. Sandy Islet, a low-set sandy cay within Scott Reef, provides critical nesting habitat for the Scott-Browse green turtle population. The Browse project is expected to cause subsidence at Sandy Islet. This sinking is likely to hasten any damage from rising sea levels, which will only be made worse by new fossil fuel projects like Browse. There is a very real chance that we will see Sandy Islet disappear beneath the waves in our lifetime, which would be a devastating blow for the ongoing survival of the green turtle population. Scott Reef provides critical foraging habitat along the migratory route for the blue pygmy whale as the species makes its biannual journey between Indonesia and southern Australia. Whales are especially vulnerable to noise impacts, and Browse would see gas wells be drilled inside the designated foraging habitat and more inlines piled into the sea bed. If Woodside proceeds with carbon dumping in addition to Browse, there will potentially be repeated seismic surveys in this crucial habitat for decades to come. While these two issues alone should sound alarms for the government, they almost pale into insignificance in comparison to the damage that could be done by a spill of condensate, the oil-like substance mixed in with the gas in the reservoir. The impacts from this type of spill are every bit as bad as those from an oil spill. Woodside's plans show that the area at risk of being impacted by a spill is massive, spreading almost 1,000 kilometres from Scott Reef and even reaching Indonesian waters. Woodside itself has admitted that the impacts from a spill could be catastrophic, with severe and potentially irreversible damage to Scott Reef. Woodside's Browse project is simply too dangerous to proceed. To quote our resources spokesperson, Senator Dorinda Cox: The Greens, Traditional Owners and community have shown their commitment and determination to fight these gas wrecking projects. First Nations people have protected lands and waterways for over 65,000 years. They will not be silenced. Now it's time for the minister to listen. Labor must put the environment before the interests of fossil fuel profits and profiteers. Labor must consider the future of the green turtle and pygmy blue whale populations. It must resist the urge to do a dirty deal with the coalition on our nature laws, and it must reject this environmentally catastrophic project and its unacceptable impacts. 17:31 Senator DAVID POCOCK 256136 Australian Capital Territory Australians want the extraordinary places and species that make this continent so unique to be protected and looked after. They want a government that makes decisions as if we are here for a long time—decisions that will protect the climate and environment that we're handing on to our children and future generations of Australians. They want a government that actually recognises that we're part of nature and that, if nature goes down, we're going down with her. Burrup Hub is an opportunity for the government to show young people that it cares enough to avoid doing damage to the world in which they will grow up. If approved, the Burrup Hub gas project would be the largest fossil fuel project in Australia. Let's just think about that for a moment. It's 2024. We're being warned about the climate that we are moving into. It is unprecedented territory for humans. Yet we have the Labor government not acting in line with the science, and then we have the coalition continuing with this mantra of more fossil fuels at any expense. We're talking about 6.1 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, roughly 13 times Australia's annual emissions. That's 30 times the total savings made by the safeguard mechanism that Labor love pointing to as their signature climate policy, and it poses unacceptable risks to the incredible Kimberley Coast and the more than 1,500 species that call it home, including many endangered species that we've heard about during this debate. This project would be nothing short of a gas led destruction of pristine ecosystems. And for what? We're not even getting a fair return on our gas. The major parties are happy just to ship this overseas: 'Don't worry about paying royalties or petroleum resource rent tax. Here's our gas for free. Ship it off and make record profits.' For what? What are we doing? This is total insanity. Around half of our gas is sold without royalties, and, last time I checked with Treasury, there was yet to be a single cent of petroleum resource rent tax paid on LNG exports. As a result, over the last four years, multinational companies made $149 billion exporting gas they got for free, with no royalties and no petroleum resource rent tax. We should all hang our heads in shame. It is outrageous. This is what state capture looks like. You don't have to look it up in the dictionary; just look at the major parties in Australia selling our futures away basically for nothing, for a few political donations, or because of a few threats of a campaign if they dare to tax gas companies and get a return on our gas. The Minister for the Environment and Water should be standing up and putting an end to the disastrous proposal before the next election. Australians deserve to know what Labor's position is on this. We've seen them kicking any hard thing beyond the next election. 'Small target' may have got you elected, but I don't think it's going to get you re-elected in a majority. Australians want to see some courage. They want to see you stand up for our future and stand up to the gas companies that have been totally dudding us. Not long after I was elected to the Senate, a Western Australian sent me a book in the mail: Trillion Dollar Baby: How Norway Beat the Oil Giants and Won a Lasting Fortune by Paul Cleary. It would be fascinating reading for any parliamentarian interested in what you could actually do with our resources, our wealth. It belongs to Australians, but we currently have major parties who not only are willing to approve fossil fuel projects in a climate crisis and sell our future away but are willing to give our gas away basically for free. We can do so much better than this. I would urge the major parties to have a think about what they're actually doing. Who are you here to represent, people or gas companies? (Time expired) The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT e5x The question before the chair is that the motion moved by Senator Cox, at the request of Senator McKim, be agreed to.    

The Senate divided. [17:40]
(The Acting Deputy President—Senator Polley)

 13 AYES Allman-Payne, P. J. Cox, D. Faruqi, M. Hanson-Young, S. C. Hodgins-May, S. McKim, N. J. (Teller) Pocock, B. Pocock, D. W. Shoebridge, D. Steele-John, J. A. Thorpe, L. A. Waters, L. J. Whish-Wilson, P. S. 26 NOES Askew, W. (Teller) Ayres, T. Babet, R. Bilyk, C. L. Chisholm, A. Darmanin, L. Duniam, J. R. Farrell, D. E. Ghosh, V. Green, N. L. Grogan, K. Hanson, P. L. Hughes, H. A. McAllister, J. R. O'Neill, D. M. Polley, H. Pratt, L. C. Roberts, M. I. Ruston, A. Sharma, D. N. Sheldon, A. V. Smith, M. F. Sterle, G. Stewart, J. N. A. Urquhart, A. E. Walsh, J. C. 0 PAIRS

Question negatived.

 COMMITTEES 4104 COMMITTEES Economics References Committee 4104 Reference 4104 17:42 Senator DUNIAM 263418 Tasmania I request that the Senate recommit the vote on the government's amendment to business of the Senate notice of motion No. 2, standing in the name of Senator Pauline Hanson. The reason I'm making the request—to provide an explanation to the Senate—is an error on my own part, which from time to time happens, which meant that the Senate voted— Honourable senators interjecting— Senator DUNIAM 263418 It's on Hansard forever now. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT e5x Order! Would you like to repeat that? You're guilty or something? I couldn't hear. Senator DUNIAM 263418 I apologise to the Senate, but I would seek the indulgence of the Senate to have that vote recommitted. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT e5x Is leave granted? 17:43 Senator URQUHART 231199 Tasmania I was going to ask Senator Duniam for an explanation, but, given that he's so graciously given it—he can do it again if he'd like—we will be happy to give leave. The PRESIDENT 112096 Earlier, Senator Duniam indicated that the opposition wished to recommit business of the Senate No. 2 because a mistake was made. That motion, as some of you may recall, had an amendment. That amendment is what we're dealing with first; it was the amendment put by Senator Chisholm. So the question is that the amendment put by Senator Chisholm to business of the Senate No. 2, standing in the name of Senator Hanson, be agreed to.    

The Senate divided. [17:48]
(The President—Senator Lines)

 15 AYES Ayres, T. Chisholm, A. Darmanin, L. Farrell, D. E. Ghosh, V. Green, N. L. Grogan, K. Lines, S. McAllister, J. R. O'Neill, D. M. Pratt, L. C. Sheldon, A. V. Smith, M. F. Urquhart, A. E. (Teller) Walsh, J. C. 37 NOES Allman-Payne, P. J. Antic, A. Askew, W. (Teller) Babet, R. Brockman, W. E. Cadell, R. Cash, M. C. Chandler, C. Colbeck, R. M. Cox, D. Davey, P. M. Duniam, J. R. Faruqi, M. Hanson, P. L. Hanson-Young, S. C. Hodgins-May, S. Hughes, H. A. Kovacic, M. Lambie, J. Liddle, K. J. McGrath, J. McKim, N. J. McLachlan, A. L. O'Sullivan, M. A. Paterson, J. W. Pocock, B. Pocock, D. W. Rennick, G. Reynolds, L. K. Roberts, M. I. Ruston, A. Sharma, D. N. Shoebridge, D. Smith, D. A. Steele-John, J. A. Waters, L. J. Whish-Wilson, P. S. 0 PAIRS

Question negatived.

 17:50 The PRESIDENT 112096 I now intend to put the question on business of the Senate No. 2, standing in the name of Senator Hanson. Question agreed to. DOCUMENTS 4105 DOCUMENTS Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force 4105 17:51 Senator SHOEBRIDGE 169119 New South Wales I seek leave of the Senate to table the document that was the subject of the debate this morning, being the full and unedited copy of the 20-year review of the Office of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force report, the document that was the subject of the very untidy and non-transparent response from the government. Leave not granted. The PRESIDENT 112096 That's right. Senator Lambie 250026 You've got to be kidding. The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Senator Shoebridge 169119 We've got it here, though. The 10000 Senator Shoebridge, you're not in a debate with me. Resume your seat. Senator Lambie 250026 He has laid out the public list. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Lambie, come to order. You are not in a debate with me. Senator Lambie 250026 I don't need to be. What is wrong with this? The PRESIDENT 112096 Leave was sought. I sought leave. Leave was not granted. Senator Lambie 250026 This is politically incorrect, I can tell you right now. This is disgusting. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Lambie, come to order or leave the chamber. Senator Ayres. 17:52 Senator AYRES 16913 New South Wales I seek leave to make a short statement. Leave not granted. Senator Ayres 16913 Yes, it is on this. You might learn something, Senator Shoebridge. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Ayres, equally, resume your seat. Senator Shoebridge 169119 You're hiding it. The PRESIDENT 112096 Senator Shoebridge, resume your seat. The PRESIDENT 112096 Order! Order—both of you! You are out of order. NBN Co Limited 4106 17:53 Senator SHARMA 274506 New South Wales I move: That the Senate take note of the document. The NBN Co annual report 2024 raises a number of concerns. You need to go to page 150 to get to the financials in the annual report, but what you find when you do is that free cash flow continues to deteriorate. There's a negative free cash flow of $1.386 billion in financial year 2024—a deterioration of some $250 million since financial year 2023, or some 22 per cent. The NBN Co explains that through expenditure on high capital expenses and fibre upgrades, but what we've also seen is a flatlining number of users in NBN services and satellite, or so-called Sky Muster, where we've seen a decline in numbers of about 20,000 users over the past two years. In so-called brownfield sites, we've seen a decline of about 100,000 over the past two years. And so-called fixed wireless is largely flat. What we have seen is a deterioration of the free cash flow position, declining customer numbers for satellite and brownfield, and fixed wireless not growing. The NBN's financial state is of serious concern, and I urge senators to look closely at this report. I seek leave to continue my remarks later. Leave granted; debate adjourned. Consideration 4106 COMMITTEES 4106 COMMITTEES Economics Legislation Committee 4106 Corrigenda to Report 4106 17:55 Senator URQUHART 231199 Tasmania At the request of the Chair of the Economics Legislation Committee, Senator Walsh, I present a corrigendum to the committee's report on annual reports, tabled 30 April 2024. DOCUMENTS 4106 DOCUMENTS Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts, Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, National Disability Insurance Scheme 4106 Order for the Production of Documents 4106 17:55 Senator AYRES 16913 New South Wales I table documents relating to orders for the production of documents concerning fire ant eradication and the Macquarie Island modernisation project and analysis relating to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. COMMITTEES 4107 COMMITTEES Energy Planning and Regulation in Australia Select Committee 4107 Membership 4107 17:56 The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT e5x The President has received a letter nominating senators to be members of a committee. 17:56 Senator AYRES 16913 New South Wales by leave—I move: That Senators Canavan and Duniam be appointed as members of the Select Committee on Energy Planning and Regulation in Australia, and Senators Antic, Askew, Birmingham, Bragg, Brockman, Cadell, Cash, Chandler, Colbeck, Davey, Fawcett, Henderson, Hughes, Hume, Kovacic, Liddle, McDonald, McGrath, McKenzie, McLachlan, Nampijinpa Price, O'Sullivan, Paterson, Reynolds, Ruston, Scarr, Sharma and Dean Smith be appointed as participating members. Question agreed to. BILLS 4107 BILLS Help to Buy Bill 2023, Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023 4107

Help to Buy Bill 2023

Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023

Second Reading 4107 17:57 Senator McKIM JKM Tasmania I have 10 seconds left and in that 10 seconds I foreshadow that I will be moving the second reading amendment standing in my name, as circulated in the chamber. 17:58 Senator ROBERTS 266524 Queensland The Help to Buy Bill 2023 is a bill that won't help anyone. Right now, Queenslanders are sleeping under bridges and on riverbanks. In one of the world's richest states, working families with children are living in cars. Where do they toilet or shower? It's inhuman. Rents are skyrocketing—if a rental can be found. House prices are reaching record highs. This is a housing crisis, one of the worst we've faced. It's an inhuman catastrophe. The Albanese Labor government wants to look like it's doing something. Enter the Help to Buy Bill. Under this plan the government wants to own a significant part of your house. If it's an existing place, the government wants to own 30 per cent; if it's a new place, 40 per cent—with the government paying for part of it with low-income earners. While a 40 per cent subsidy might sound attractive, it's fatally flawed. If the government just borrows more money for this plan then one thing is going to happen. When you give people 40 per cent more money to buy a house, house prices are going to go up. The Bills Digest notes: In 2022, the Productivity Commission concluded that—unless it is well-targeted … assistance to prospective home buyers presents too great a risk of increasing housing demand and, consequently, house prices. The government's own Productivity Commission warned them this plan would increase house prices. Even the Labor government recognises this. That's why they've severely limited the number of places available under the scheme—so that house prices aren't drastically increased. There's a contradiction right there. If the government is only opening limited spaces so there's no impact on house prices, then it's an admission the scheme will not help many people. The problem of increasing house prices is one of too much demand for the amount of supply. This bill will only increase the amount of demand and increase house prices. In the absence of more supply, we need to decrease demand, not increase it. As Dr Cameron Murray from Fresh Economic Thinking accurately said: If you want people to have cheap housing, give them cheap housing. You can go and do all the financial tricks in the world but at the end of the day if they've paid that price, someone's paying the price. This bill's core concept and premise is flawed and possibly a lie. We can't subsidise our way out of a house price problem. Looking at the bill's details—or lack of details—we see the problem is worse. Firstly, let's look at profit and loss and renovations. One of the most concerning questions is how the government will treat profits and losses and renovations. To these questions, this bill has no answers. How much of the profits will the government take if you sell your house? We don't know. How much of the loss will taxpayers pay if house prices go down or the homebuyer defaults on their mortgage? Australian house prices have aggressively and consistently risen for 30 years. What if they fall? The bill is silent on how this would be handled. Would taxpayers be forced to pay for the entire loss on someone's mortgage? The government basically acts as a mortgagor, second to the bank. Does this mean the bank gets first call to recoup all their losses and the taxpayer simply has to cop the loss on whatever is left over? We don't know. If someone improves the value of the house with renovations, does the government take 40 per cent of the improved value while doing nothing? We don't know. Imagine tearing up carpets, swinging hammers and sanding with bare hands for six months or a year, and the government takes 40 per cent of the profits from that hard work of yours. That's entirely possible under the bill as currently drafted. Under the government's Help to Buy Bill, Australians could become slaves in their own homes. We cannot wait for this bill to be passed and a minister to make a decision later down the track. These matters must be clarified and explained in the bill. Homebuyers and taxpayers deserve to know what the risk is here. Secondly, let's look at some criteria. The eligibility criteria are clunky and don't cater for differences between states. The maximum income is set at $90,000 for singles and $120,000 for couples. This is despite the average house price and the required mortgage varying hugely between states and between towns. In Darwin, the average house price is $504,000. In Sydney, it's $1.2 million, more than double, yet the same income thresholds apply. The price thresholds are not available in the bill, and it appears the government has not yet published thresholds. When it comes to the housing crisis, one size doesn't fit all, yet that's exactly what this bill tries to do. We're just meant to pass the bill as a blank cheque and trust that the bureaucrats and the minister will get it right down the road—maybe. Thirdly, let's look at the constitutional basis. This bill is completely outside the federal government's power. Some reviewers have said that Help to Buy is built on a 'complex constitutional foundation'. That may be the understatement of the year. Put very simply, under the Constitution, this is not the federal government's job. To make this bill legal, there are a huge number of constitutional headaches, state government agreements and transfers of powers. Federal parliament simply shouldn't be dealing with this. It's outside of the powers granted to us under the Constitution. Confirming this bill's complexity, the government has tabled a late amendment to the bill attempting to clarify a set of constitutional issues. The House of Representatives passed this bill way back in February and then immediately introduced it to the Senate, seven months ago, yet we're only now seeing this amendment dealing with core issues. What is going on? Concerningly, the government appears to have given up on getting the constitutional issues correct. The bill's supplementary explanatory memorandum, at 1.34, explains that if any of this bill is unconstitutional—if it's unconstitutional!—the minister will have the power to use executive decree to amend the primary legislation. This is absurd. This is an extraordinary power to give a minister. Fancy putting a bill into the parliament like this. The late amendment and this insane backup power confirm the constitutional headache this bill is and that we should not pass it. Under our Constitution's foundation, competitive federalism, it's the responsibility of the state governments to come up with their own programs. This fosters innovation and competition policy and makes sure we find the best way to do something—and it ensures accountability. The federal government charging in and taking over areas for which it has no constitutional responsibility won't fix these issues. It will make it worse. Fourthly, let's look at superannuation. Instead of the government owning your home, One Nation says, 'You should own your own home'—a groundbreaking concept! We propose that Australians should be able to use a portion of super towards their home. Owning a home is one of the best predictors of whether people will be able to have a comfortable retirement. The purpose of super is a comfortable retirement. So why shouldn't people be able to use some of it towards a house? Under One Nation's policy, it would be your own super account that owns 40 per cent of your home, not the government. If you sell your home, the profits go back into your super so that your retirement is still protected, using the money you've saved instead of the inflationary, endless money pit that the government uses to borrow. The risk of this increasing house prices is far reduced. After all, it's your money. Fifthly, let's look at housing policies. Unlike the government, One Nation has a full set of policies to properly address both supply and demand and get Australians owning their own home. Currently, there is both too much demand and too little supply in housing, and both are putting pressure on housing. To fix the housing crisis, we need to address the core issues: demand and supply. Yet this so-called Help to Buy bill does nothing to fix it. Look at demand. There's a demand side issue that no-one except One Nation is willing to acknowledge. No. 1 in demand is immigration. The Albanese government's outrageously high, record high, and increasing immigration intake is fuelling huge demand on rent and house prices. Prior to COVID, the number of temporary visa holders in the country was around 2.3 million people. As of the end of 24 July, that number is now 2.8 million, more than 10 per cent of our population. These are hard numbers and facts, yet the government has continued to lie, claiming, 'We're just catching up on immigration.' Oh, really? We haven't just caught up; we've blown the record out of the water. We're nearly half a million people above the record. Using the average household size of 2½ people implies a need for more than 200,000 houses just to cater for new arrivals. Last year, the Albanese government promised to crack down on the level of immigration, yet there were 335 net arrivals in the first seven months of 2024—that's 15,000 people higher than the same time last year, which was a record, so we're getting a new record. This is a huge reason why we're in a housing crisis, with rents skyrocketing and house prices reaching new records, yet the government won't say a word about it. The person responsible for this immigration program, Minister Clare O'Neil, has now been appointed Labor's Minister for Housing. What a joke! One Nation's proposal is practical, common sense based on real-world data. Simply return the number of temporary visa holders in the country to pre-COVID levels, and that would immediately free up 200,000 houses. From there, immigration would be capped at the level for which Australia can build housing and infrastructure to cater for new arrivals. In the middle of a housing catastrophe, we must put Australians in houses first before we allow more new arrivals into our country. Under demand: foreign ownership. To reduce demand and open up more supply, One Nation would ban foreign ownership of residential property. Australians are banned from buying a house in China, yet China is the largest foreign buyer of real estate in Australia. A single real estate agent in Sydney sold $135 million in property to Chinese buyers in just six months. New Zealand and Canada, similar countries to ours, recently banned foreign ownership of housing. It's simple, clear and practical—putting Australians first. Until we get Australian citizens out of tents and cars and into houses, we shouldn't be letting foreigners buy residential property. Under our proposal, foreign owners would have to sell to an Australian buyer. If the foreign owners failed to sell in two years, the house would be subject to government auctions open to first home buyers only in the first round and to other Australians in the second round. All this is possible and can be done; it just takes truthful politicians with the guts and political will to put Australians first. Another demand is about people's mortgage scheme. One Nation would ditch Labor's half-baked housing schemes, including Help to Buy and the Housing Australia Future Fund. We would replace them—the bureaucrats—with a new program called the people's mortgage scheme. We would offer government issued mortgages at five per cent interest fixed for 25 years—no variable, changing interest rates, cheaper than current mortgages from a bank and with minimal risk to the taxpayer thanks to the long-term fixed nature. Forget the government owning your home under Help to Buy; One Nation will make sure the government helps you own your own home in full. Many first home buyers can't get a loan because of HECS debts, so that raises another point. Under the people's mortgage scheme, first home buyers can roll their HECS debt into the mortgage to pay it off. That will give them access to a mortgage that they can't get anywhere else and let them start paying for their house early. I now go to the supply side. All these policies must go hand in hand with huge improvements to the supply of housing. We need to build more houses, so look at construction codes and undersupply. Builders are currently drowning in a sea of red tape. Every single new home must be built to an NDIS silver-level standard. Construction consultants estimate that this requirement alone adds $50,000 to the cost of a new dwelling. We should make efforts to take care of our severely disabled, yet we cannot increase the cost of every new home by $50,000 while we're in an affordability crisis. The National Construction Code must be simplified so the tradies can get on with the job. We want them to spend more time swinging a hammer rather than flipping through paperwork. Next I go to supply and materials. One Nation would apply a three-year holiday for GST charged on building materials. We need more houses built. Government shouldn't be standing in the way of someone building their first house, because they want to make GST on the transaction. And we need to open up our timber supplies. Australia has a huge continent and abundant timber reserves. Despite this, we're in the unbelievable situation of needing to import timber from countries with environmental standards below ours. A sustainable timber industry is Australia's prime renewable resource; it literally just grows back every year. One Nation supports our timber industry so we have the supplies to build houses sourced right here in our country. In conclusion, the housing crisis—the housing catastrophe—continues to rage on and Australians are suffering. Unfortunately, the Albanese Labor government and the Greens are more interested in looking good rather than doing good. The Help to Buy Bill 2023 will not help Australians realise the great Australian dream of owning their own home. Labor's plan could end up with Australians being slaves to the government in their own home. One Nation cannot support this bill without key details of its operation clarified and without action on the other, far more important elements of housing supply and demand. One Nation believes Australians should own their own home. We have the solutions and the guts to make the great Australian dream an Australian reality. 18:12 Senator HANSON BK6 Queensland Klaus Schwab tells us, 'You will own nothing and be happy.' He is with the World Economic Forum. I wonder why he says that. 'You'll own nothing and you'll be happy.' This Labor legislation—the Help to Buy Bill 2023 and the Help to Buy (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2023—offers a real glimpse of this hideous future and how socialism will be imposed in Australia disguised as a helping hand by a benevolent government. So much for the great Australian dream, which has now been reduced to only partly owning your own home. The economic security, peace of mind and sanctity of homeownership are things that this Labor government and their Marxist confederates in the Greens would happily deny to the Australian people. Labor cannot be trusted on housing. Two years ago, it promised to fix the housing crisis. Labor promised $32 billion of taxpayers' money to build 1.2 million new homes by 2030. In two years, not a single home has been built. How could there be when there is virtually no-one left able to build them? For all the millions of people Labor has brought to Australia—more than the entire population of Adelaide—only 51,000 were still workers and only 1,800 were qualified tradies. That was in the 2022-23 figures. Of 730,000 people brought in, only approximately 51,600 were skilled workers and, of that, only 1,800 were qualified tradies. So where is the investment in the Australian tradies? Where was Labor's support for One Nation's apprenticeship scheme? There wasn't any. There hasn't been any. During the 2½ years you've been in office, you've done absolutely nothing about it. It is no wonder there are no new homes being built. I hate to tell the Australian people, but they will not be built very soon either. Labor's signature policy is the so-called Housing Australia Future Fund, borrowing and investing $10 billion and building 30,000 affordable homes in five years from the returns—that is, if they get returns. It works out at less than $84,000 per home, about $400,000 less than what a new home actually costs to build these days. Again, not a single home has been built. Labor make announcements as if announcements alone fix the housing crisis. Labor make these announcements while ignoring their own policies that drive the housing crisis. The worst of these is record immigration. Two years ago, Australia already had a shortfall of at least 650,000 homes. Labor has since allowed more than 1½ million people to come to Australia, all of them needing homes that could be occupied by an Australian already living and working here, let alone allowing in the refugees or releasing those held as illegals in the detention centres, who also require housing. It does not make any sense at all but, then again, neither does this Labor government. This is the same government that moved the former Minister for Home Affairs into the Housing portfolio—putting a fox in charge of the henhouse. She and the former immigration minister were hopeless in their portfolios, so for her to go to the Housing portfolio is ridiculous. The housing crisis is primarily an issue of supply and demand. High immigration increases demand when we should be reducing it. Lack of new housing restricts supply when we should be increasing it. High demand and low supply drive up house prices and rents. Labor is not building homes to address low housing supply. Labor is not lowering immigration to reduce housing demand. Labor is making this housing crisis worse. No number of worthless, empty Labor announcements will make the truth go away. The Greens are even worse when it comes to housing. They want the state to own it all—all of it—and Australians to own none of it. It is straight out of the Marxist playbook. Their call for a rent freeze will, without any doubt, force landlords out of the market and reduce the availability of rental properties even further. Their call to get rid of capital gains discounts and negative gearing will suppress property investment and also reduce the availability of rental properties. The Greens do not understand that we must incentivise property investment to increase rental availability and reduce rental prices. We have to kick Labor and the Greens out if we are going to have a chance to fix this housing crisis. We have to implement One Nation's housing policy. One Nation will lower immigration to reduce housing demand. One Nation will ban foreign ownership of residential property to increase housing supply for Australians. New Zealand and Canada have done it, and even the coalition here has adopted this part of our policy. One Nation will relax restrictions on renting spare rooms and granny flats to improve housing availability, and One Nation will enable superannuation funds to invest some of an individual's super as equity in the individual's home to improve housing affordability. Under this policy, Australians will own everything and be truly happy. They will be happy not because some crackpot socialist tells them they will be but because they will be secure in their own homes. One Nation will always stand against the encroachment of socialism being propagated by Labor and the Greens. We will stand against this useless legislation, which does nothing to address the causes of the housing crisis and does everything to impose socialism on Australia. One Nation will fight for Australians. As my colleague Senator Malcolm Roberts indicated about the NDIS—and this is what I've been told—when new builds come into play, you will have to build them as NDIS friendly. I can back this up because I went to one of those companies that build these demountable houses. I said, 'Is this what you've got available?' and they said, 'Yes, but now we have to take it down because the building codes have all changed and we actually have to build bigger doorways and comply with a certain element of building now.' So what we're doing now is adding to the cost of a new build for people to have these requirements in the housing market which they will never properly need. We have to be realistic about it because that cost is going to be an extra $50,000 or $60,000 per build in Australia. Australians cannot afford it. It needs to be addressed if that is truly the case. Just because there are some people in this country—and my heart goes out to them—who are disabled for whatever reason, you do not impose on the rest of the country that they have to build a house for their own special needs or the special needs of someone else who might visit or, one day, might buy it. The fact is we are imposing these restrictions on people. Another thing that needs to be addressed with housing is—apart from the foreign investment that we have, which is driving up demand and driving up the price of houses and so the banks loan more money to the Australian people so they make more money out of interest repayments—that we also have to have a good look at the GST that people pay on new houses, which is somewhere between, on a new build, 40 and 45 per cent. That's how much it costs when building a new house. That is just over the top. No wonder Australians can't afford it. The cost of housing in relation to a person's wage in this country is just out of the realm. So for Labor to sit there and have the same old rhetoric, especially from Senator Ayres, is pathetic. It's just laughable the way he sits there and says, 'You are against the youth owning a home.' Because they can't answer your questions with decent logic, they say, 'Let's go and blame the other side.' That's because I voted against this stupid dog of a bill which won't work and I don't want to see taxpayers' money wasted or see a socialist government having ownership in their homes. That is exactly what they are doing—'You'll own nothing and be happy because the government is going to own your home.' Honestly, people: think about it. On what renovations you do and what you put in that house do you think that the government is going to back you up? Their policies change all the time. Whoever is in government, you can't rely on this mob whatsoever. Whoever is in government here, if you think that that is going to see you through to the end of the day and you will have pure ownership of your own property, think twice about it. I wouldn't trust them as far as I could bloody kick them, this bloody mob here. I think they are absolutely useless and hopeless in their policy. That's why no-one voted for them today. They were sitting next to the crossbench by themselves with one crossbencher that actually supports them on this policy, because we can all see through it. It's actually a dog of a bill. It hasn't been well thought out. They haven't done any of that. They abuse and throw snide remarks across the chamber as if none of us care about the youth. Guess what? I have four people out there who would dearly love to own their own homes. Are you saying I don't care about them, that I don't care about my nieces and nephews and the people who are with me? No. I am looking after their best interests, unlike you. You make these false promises and offer the world, but you can't back it up. That's the problem with this Labor government. You are only chasing votes and you'll throw the money where you think it's going to do best to encourage these people to back you all the way. For two years you've had the money there and you haven't built one home. Why? I ask through the chair. I ask the question of Senator Ayres. Why has not one house been built but $35 million has been spent on administration fees? That tells you that bureaucrats are running it. They wouldn't have a clue about policy. They are not grassroots. They don't understand what the hell is happening out there. They don't understand that people dearly want to own their own homes. The fact is that the real issue here is the high immigration of people that they bring into this country—1½ million in this country. That's the problem, because they all have to have a house or somewhere to live. You keep bringing them out. The damage has been done. You can say now that you're going to reduce the numbers, but it's too damned late. That's another ruse by you and your government—to say you're going to reduce the numbers—and it's not going to make a damned bit of difference. So now you're going to throw more money at it. That's all you do—make these false promises, like reducing electricity by $275 a year. Well, tell the poor people out there who've got increased electricity prices. What's that done for them? Absolutely nothing. I've never seen such a hopeless government, with ministers that are so incompetent, as this government is. Absolutely hopeless! You have not put thought into it. To be a member of parliament, you have to have a vision for the future. You shouldn't lie to the Australian people. You shouldn't give them false promises that you can't see through, because you are purely buying their vote. That's all you're doing now and up until the next election; you're just trying to get the confidence of the people by saying, 'We're going to do this,' and 'We're going to give you that.' You've given them absolutely nothing but false hope, false lies—that's all this government has done. And you're going to continue down that path. But I am proud of the people in this chamber—the coalition, the crossbench and the Greens—who have not backed your policy. We may disagree on certain parts of this policy, but the whole fact is that we have seen through this. To the people who are watching this, all the people in the chamber, up in the gallery: you must understand that most of this whole chamber has voted against this bill because it is not right for the Australian people; it is all based on lies and false promises that they will never deliver to the Australian people, and it's a waste of taxpayers' dollars. When you show some real strength in this country by knocking back the immigration numbers that are coming into this country and taking up the housing that belongs to Australians; when you work with the councils and state governments to release more land for the building of homes; when you put money into some of these council areas or into these smaller communities so that they can actually have the water supply and sewerage infrastructure they need, because they're the ones who are struggling and can't provide the infrastructure that they need to open up land for more housing; when you put out more apprenticeship schemes to encourage Australians to get up off their backsides and start working, instead of paying them the welfare payment for doing nothing, then we might be able to address the real problems that are affecting Australians. It's about getting workers, here, in Australia, working to provide the housing and the infrastructure. And, of course, your forestry—that's another thing. You're shutting down the plantations to build your wind turbines. We're not going to have the timber that we need, that we rely on to build the housing as well. You are so far behind the eight ball. You're absolutely hopeless. I will not support this bill, based on the fact that it's a dog of a bill; it won't do anything. And it's not because I don't care about the Australian people. It's because you haven't got it right. 18:27 Senator RENNICK 283596 Queensland This bill, the Help to Buy Bill 2023, epitomises everything that's been wrong with government policy over the last 40 years, and that is, effectively, governments have privatised all the public assets and now they want to nationalise all the private assets. The whole point of government is to build infrastructure that provides essential services and have that infrastructure generating recurring revenue to pay for the recurring costs of schools and hospitals. But we are now going to risk $10 billion of taxpayers' money to build 30,000 houses over five years, or 6,000 houses a year. When you have an immigration rate of over half a million people a year, how hard would it have been to just lower the immigration rate by 10,000 or 15,000 people? There's your problem solved; you don't even need to look at putting $10 billion on the line. But I do want to talk on a couple of other things when it comes to the cost of housing. In particular—and it is going to be one of the policies that I put forward—we need to abolish the CGT discount of 50 per cent on shares and houses. That costs the budget $20 billion a year, and it would fund, for 10 million workers, a tax cut from 30 cents to 20 cents between $45,000 and $65,000. I don't agree with abolishing negative gearing, because people do lose money in the genuine remit of trying to generate income, and you've got to have that nexus between incurring an expense and trying to produce assessable income. One of the things that I won't have in this debate—and I disagree with One Nation on this—is that somehow we need to encourage more property investment in this country. We have way too much money invested in passive property and rental property. I'm not against owning a second rental home as a bit of a security. By all means, own your own home and one other rental property. But we have some people here who own numerous rental properties. If you've got a couple of million dollars laying around, or $4 million or $5 million, go and build a factory and create some jobs. We need to develop our secondary industries in this country. Our economy is basically houses and holes. We can't continue to rely just on the mining sector, and we can't continue to rely just on the housing sector. It is a Ponzi scheme. It basically started in 1985 when Paul Keating introduced CGT into the economy and left houses out. Apart from destroying our live pub sector—Sydney used to be the source of many great rock bands, and it has now turned into a housing conglomerate; all people ever talk about is housing—it inflated the price of houses. In 1985, the four major banks had $8 billion in foreign debt; by 2008, they had $800 billion in foreign debt. Most of that money was lent against housing, and it pushed the price of houses up from four to five times earnings to 12 to 13 times earnings. That in itself then pushed two parents back to work. It meant that we needed child care. It meant we had both parents running around picking kids up, dropping them off et cetera. We had no-one manning the tuckshops at schools. The second part of that was in 1996, in the late nineties. Howard, on the back of the Ralph review—I think it was that, or the Wallace review; I get confused between those two—basically introduced the 50 per cent CGT discount on assets. He didn't abolish indexation; it's still there, but, of course, most people now use the 50 per cent CGT discount. That again inflated houses way above the rate of wage growth in this country. It's one of the reasons why people struggle to get into the housing market: the tax on active income on a wage is so much higher than it is if you make a capital gain on property. We need to level the playing field here. If you earn $100,000, you should pay the same rate of tax or the same amount of tax, no matter how you earn it. But we have a distortion in this country where people who actually get out of bed, put their nose to the grindstone and actively engage in being productive pay twice the rate of tax as passive investors, and that is completely unsustainable. That is something that I'm looking forward to looking at when we have this review of the tax system in the Economic References Committee. We'll look at this because this is something that has to be dealt with. The other thing that is leading to housing unaffordability is the fact that 12 per cent of people's income is taken from them and given to someone they've never met. When I say '12 per cent of someone's income', that's 12 per cent of their gross income. For many low-income earners, it's 100 per cent of their savings if not more. For many people who earn less than the cost of living or just on the edge of the cost of living, that 12 per cent of their gross wage is the difference between them earning take-home pay above the cost of living and earning that below the cost of living. That is another reason for the People First policy—we're going to actually lift the tax-free threshold from $18,000 to $40,000 because I think it's completely wrong in this country that people pay income tax below the cost of living. We want to encourage people to get out of bed and put their nose to the grindstone. If these people are getting out of bed and putting their nose to the grindstone rather than sitting at home smoking dope all day, then that's a good thing. The last thing we want to do is to see these people struggle. The best way to encourage them is to give them hope, give them incentive, and there is no better incentive than to own your own home. If you think you can afford a home—I feel sorry for people in the major capitals today, especially Sydney and Melbourne, where the average house price or the median house price is about $1 million. Young children today have just totally lost all hope in ever owning their own home. It's interesting—I'll tell a personal story. I didn't buy my own house until I was in my mid-30s. Ironically, I met my wife there. That's where I first met my wife, at my housewarming. People often say, 'What comes first, the chicken or the egg?' I say, 'It's neither; it's the nest.' If you've got a good house over your head, you will settle down and start to work hard. Suddenly, you won't go out at five o'clock anymore as you do when you're single in your 20s. If you do have a girlfriend, you don't want to go around and sit on the couch with your two mates with empty pizza boxes strewn all over the floor. It is much better to own your own house. I can tell you from personal experience. Senator RENNICK 283596 Senator Hanson-Young, you know that's true. So we have to look at making superannuation accessible. Senator Hanson-Young I0U We've all been there, Senator Rennick. Senator RENNICK 283596 Yes, I know. That's true. We have to look at making superannuation accessible. One of the criticisms we hear about letting people access their super is that it will push up house prices. It's true there will be more money to buy houses, but the point is that superannuation, by default, if it's not pushing up house prices, is pushing up the price of shares and therefore making it harder. If you're not on the stock exchange, for example, where most of the money in superannuation is invested, you find it much harder to access capital. So, as for that argument that somehow letting superannuation buy your house is going to push up house prices, I'll turn it around and say that superannuation has been pushing up the stock market for years, making it easier for the big end of town to access cheap capital while small businesses find it harder to access cheap capital. So we've got to think about that. The other thing I disagree with is that we need more investment in property in Australia. I recommend that everyone listen to a great speech given a few weeks ago by a bloke by the name of Matt Barrie. It's called 'Put another Aussie on the barbie'. As he said, Australia has the second-highest rate of supply of housing in the world. We build more houses per capita than most other countries. While I accept there are problems with council regulation and all that, as there always are lots of problems with regulation, I think the idea that we need to be building more and more houses while we ignore (1) building essential infrastructure that provides essential services and (2) building more manufacturing and developing a manufacturing industry where we add value to our minerals is totally wrong. I think we have too big a housing sector in this country, and it is brought about in part by immigration. Because 30 per cent of Australians aren't born here, you have a massive diversion of resources, and the two big diversions of resources are houses and holes—effectively, mining and housing. That's killing our middle sector, which is manufacturing, and the capacity for people to compete even in our essential services. I will just refer to one interesting thing from 'Put another Aussie on the barbie': there is a crane index, and Sydney, I think, has the highest number of cranes in the world. Sydney has more cranes than New York, Boston, Toronto, Washington, Chicago, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver, Portland, Honolulu, San Francisco, Seattle and Calgary combined. So we do not have a problem with building houses in this country. What we have is a problem where we are totally focused on building houses and we aren't focused on rewarding the people who actually get out of bed and put their noses to the grindstone. Rather than spending more taxpayer money on building houses when you only have to lower immigration by 10,000 to achieve the same result, we need to lower income tax so that hardworking Australians have more money in their pockets and can save up faster, own their own houses and actually learn to settle down and have a sense of purpose in their lives. 18:38 Senator AYRES 16913 New South Wales My notes say that I should thank senators for their contribution to the debate on the Help to Buy Bill 2023 and the Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023. What we are seeing in the chamber this evening is a full expression of the lack of a sense of focus on the interests of real Australians from the Greens party, members of the crossbench and the Liberal and National parties. We just heard from Senator Rennick, Mr Dutton's preferred candidate for the Queensland Senate ticket. He sits on the crossbench now, but, in an expression of Mr Dutton's political extremism, Senator Rennick was his preferred candidate on the Queensland Liberal National Party ticket. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 Senator Rennick, a point of order? Senator Rennick 283596 Yes, on relevance to the topic here. This has got nothing to do with housing. It's a personal smear that's got nothing to do with the topic, and it would be nice for Senator Ayres, once in his life, to stop attacking personalities and stick to the issue and the substance of the bill. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 I understand the substance of your point of order. It's late in the evening. Senator Ayres, I ask you to reflect and to restrain yourself. Senator AYRES 16913 What I will point out is that that contribution is not very far away from the Greens political party contribution. It makes as much sense. It goes to the same issues—a sort of extremism of Left and Right that joins together, as always, in a position that frustrates the ambitions of ordinary Australians. There isn't much difference between the contributions of Senator McKim in this place or Mr Chandler-Mather in the House of Representatives and what Senator Rennick just said. It's the same strange, weird economics that drives the position. The problem is that if this bill is frustrated in the Senate, who loses? Well, 40,000 ordinary Australians lose—low- and middle-income Australians; nurses, teachers, tradies, truckies, early childhood education workers, care workers, disability workers. Forty thousand Australians will miss out on the opportunity for the government to support them to own a home. There are all sorts of wild things being said in the debate about the government's broader agenda in housing. But, at its heart, this proposition is a modest proposition that would support 40,000 Australians putting a roof over their head and giving their partner and their children some security. It would give them security and certainty to build equity over time and, despite all of the things that have been said here, for most of them it will give them 100 per cent ownership of their own home. The silliness of this debate—the fake conviviality; the pats on the back between the Greens political party, the extreme right and Peter Dutton's Liberal-National party; the glee with which they approach this most juvenile of political victories—creates the problem that the 40,000 people who miss out are nurses, teachers et cetera. They're people that these senators will never meet. They're people who will miss out in suburban Australia and in regional towns. They will miss out. If you're trying to get on the ladder and could have benefited from this scheme—if you're a nurse or a teacher or you work in the police force or the fire brigade and you can't get a home; if you're working your guts out and this shared-equity scheme would have supported you—then I will be really clear: blame the Greens political party, the Liberal and National parties and the extreme right of Australian politics, who are all in this together and who make as much sense as each other. They focus on the partisan interest rather than the Australian interest, because that's all they care about. This is juvenile student politics. If you want to participate in student politics, that's a good thing. There are plenty of mature age students out there. Enrol in a course and go hang out. What has been advanced in here in terms of opposition to this bill is not serious. It's not serious; it's not real. But who suffers? Ordinary Australians do. When you listen to some of the speeches in opposition to this bill—and, again, I'll focus on Senator Rennick because my memory only reaches that far back. Senator Rennick said that he wants Australians to jump out of bed, get their nose to the grindstone and work harder. Well, I think Australians do work hard. The Albanese government thinks Australians do work hard. The truth is that there are nearly a million more Australians in work because of this government. Australians are working more hours. There are more hours of work available to people. They are earning more and, because of our tax cuts, keeping more of what they earn, but they need support. We're on their side. So, if you're in one of those low- and middle-income occupations, in the community sector, in the caring professions, in the police, in the fire brigade, and you cannot get the equity together to purchase a home, the Albanese government's Help to Buy scheme is there to support you. If the Help to Buy scheme is voted against tonight and tomorrow, the reason that it's not available for you is that Mr Dutton, Mr Littleproud, Mr Bandt and Mr Chandler-Mather all decided you weren't worth it. What was more important was their opportunity to run the crassest, lowest form of political argument. What Mr Dutton has tried to do is to eke out incremental political victories by trying to make Australians lose. If you lose in the battle to buy a new home, it's a victory for Mr Chandler-Mather and Senator McKim—and it's a victory for Mr Dutton. They love failure because that's their political message. The bitterness and venality of that approach and lack of interest in ordinary Australians is all they have. Senator Ruston 243273 Tell us about the bill. Senator AYRES 16913 I'll tell you about the bill, Senator Ruston. The bill would mean that 40,000 Australians would have the government supporting them in a shared-equity approach that you know would make a difference. Senator AYRES 16913 Of course, Senator Ruston says that she wants to own her own home—good. Australians should own their own homes. They should. But some of us need support. While the government is working hard in the long term with the property sector to build more homes against the opposition largely from our opponents in the Greens political party, who haven't seen a housing development that they support, 40,000 people would get an opportunity to be supported by the government to get shared equity. A set of consequential amendments sit with the bill, which will provide Housing Australia with the powers to administer the Help to Buy scheme on behalf of the Commonwealth. Something was made of this during the debate about what those amendments mean. They would mean they seek to support the concurrent operation of Commonwealth and state and territory laws. They will enable the states to preserve the operation of their laws while also providing key protections for the Commonwealth to ensure the effective operation of Help to Buy. That approach of working together with the states, rather than what the Morrison government did, which was never meet with the states and then blame-shift to the states, is in complete contradistinction to what the Albanese government is doing here in partnership with the states. Once the bill is passed, as I said, 40,000 low- and middle-income Australian households will be able to access homeownership with smaller mortgages, lower deposits and more-affordable repayments. How could any person oppose a nurse who can't get the capital together but could, with the government's support, be able to purchase their own home and have smaller repayments? Why on earth would anybody stand in the way of that? But you are, because of venal, partisan self-interest. Help to Buy will help ordinary people get into and stay in their own homes. We support them. The Liberal and National parties can't wait to undermine their opportunity to get into ordinary housing. The bills represent just a small part of what is a $32 billion agenda in housing. It is the biggest agenda from any government in living memory. It is an ambitious housing agenda that will make a difference. It will make a difference for ordinary people who want to buy homes and need more housing supply. The government is putting its shoulder behind the wheel and not engaging in Trotskyite student politics like those that Senator McKim engages in. He engages in Trotskyite student politics instead of action. What we have done for renters, who Senator McKim pretends to be interested in, is the biggest jump in Commonwealth rental support that there has ever been. The dishonest campaign about this from Senator McKim and his colleagues in the Greens will go on and on and on, but I tell you what: a meme or a social media post has never built a single home, helped a person buy a home or helped a person to get more affordable rent. What the government's broader approach will do is to mean more homes are built, more homes are funded through the states and more homes are available for low- and middle-income earners. Of course, this will never trouble any of the people in here, who—without making assumptions about where people's personal circumstances are—all have secure homes. But it's going to make a big difference. These bills—focusing on the narrow circumstances of what these bills would achieve—would mean that 40,000 people's lives would be changed, and that's not good enough for you. You'd rather have zero than 40,000 people's lives changed for the better. All sorts of claims have been made—claims that it would have an inflationary impact. This is something in common between Senator McKim and Senator Bragg, It's just nonsense. It is not supported by any sensible economic analysis. The idea that this number of homes would have that kind of impact is wrong. All it would do is mean that low- and middle-income earners get a decent shake out of the housing system. I'm proud of these pieces of legislation. I urge senators to actually think about the faces behind the scheme—the people. If you can go down to the supermarket and look in the faces of nurses and teachers who can't afford homes, you've got less concern for the interests of ordinary Australians than I thought you did. I urge the Senate to support the bills. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 I alert senators that we've passed the time for divisions, but I put the question on the second reading amendment standing in the name of Senator Faruqi. Question negatived. 18:54 Senator WATERS 192970 Queensland by leave—I ask that the Australian Greens' support for that second reading amendment in Senator Faruqi's name be recorded. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 It will be noted. 18:54 Senator McKIM JKM Tasmania I move the second reading amendment standing in my name: Omit all words after "That", substitute: (a) further consideration of the bills be postponed until Tuesday, 26 November 2024; and (b) on Tuesday, 26 November 2024: (i) the bills be called on prior to the first order of government business, (ii) the questions on all remaining stages of the bills be put at 1 pm, (iii) divisions may take place between 1.30 pm and 2 pm until consideration of the bills has concluded, and (iv) paragraph (b)(ii) operate as a limitation of debate under standing order 142. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT 287062 I put the question on the second reading amendment standing in the name of Senator McKim. A division is required. That is deferred until tomorrow. Debate adjourned. NOTICES 4116 NOTICES Presentation 4116 BUSINESS 4116 BUSINESS Rearrangement 4116 18:55 Senator AYRES 16913 New South Wales I move: That the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024 be called on immediately. Question agreed to. BILLS 4117 BILLS Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024 4117

Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024

Second Reading 4117 18:55 Senator RUSTON 243273 South Australia I rise to speak on the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024. I want to state at the outset that, whilst the coalition will be supporting this bill, I will be moving a substantive amendment at the appropriate time to give further choice and control to Australian families. From the government's perspective, paid parental leave has been quite a tortuous path. Those of us with any history or background in this whatsoever remember the incisive criticism of the then Labor opposition in relation to the former coalition government's generous Paid Parental Leave scheme—a scheme that the Australian people voted on in 2010 and 2013 and that the Labor Party vehemently opposed. The coalition's landmark policy was essentially wage replacement paid parental leave, which included superannuation. But, despite the very unprincipled position that the Labor Party adopted in relation to paid parental leave in the past, we have sought to be much more constructive as the opposition. Where the government has put forward sensible ideas, we have supported them. Indeed, we have supported a range of measures in relation to paid parental leave. The changes contained in this bill essentially seek to extend superannuation contributions to paid parental leave. As I have already touched on, the Albanese government is 14 years late on this reform—but, I suppose, better late than never. The coalition has long supported the economic security of women and families. We delivered the landmark funding of $5.5 billion through our two women's budget statements; key amendments to paid parental leave legislation while in government, which included introducing special circumstances, which allow a person to meet the work test if they've been impacted by family and domestic violence or a natural disaster or a severe medical condition; allowing JobKeeper and COVID-19 disaster payments to count towards the work test for paid parental leave to prove a genuine connection to the workplace; and indexation of the income threshold for the first time since the scheme was introduced. In March 2022, as part of the women's budget statement, the coalition underlined its commitment to PPL by announcing enhanced paid parental leave. Enhanced paid parental leave would have seen an investment of $346.1 million over five years to expand PPL, giving working families full choice and control over how they used the 20 weeks of taxpayer funded paid parental leave. Under these measures, the coalition sought to expand the scheme by combining the existing two weeks of dad and partner pay with the 18 weeks paid parental pay to create a single payment; making the 20-week payment fully flexible for eligible working parents so they can share the entitlement between them as much or as little as works for their specific circumstances within two years of their child's birth or adoption; and broadening the income test to allow a household income eligibility test of $350,000 per annum, providing an additional 2,200 families with access to the PPL scheme. The changes announced by the coalition in March 2022 sought to reduce the complexity of PPL and increase support to new families while ensuring the scheme continued to support the health and wellbeing of birth mothers. It was pleasing to see the government adopt the sensible measures of the former coalition government following the election. The Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024 will add superannuation contributions to the Commonwealth funded Paid Parental Leave scheme. The bill also makes minor technical amendments to the Fair Work Act 2009 relating to unpaid parental leave. The key measures in schedule 1 will establish a paid parental leave superannuation contribution entitlement as part of the scheme; provide for the calculation of the amount of the PPLSC and the manner in which this amount is to be paid; create mechanisms for the Commissioner of Taxation to correct under- and overpayments of the scheme; provide an avenue for recipients to seek a review of PPLSC decisions made by the commissioner; and give the commissioner new compliance and enforcement powers to assist with the administration of the scheme. Schedule 2 of the bill contains a minor technical amendment to the unpaid parental leave provisions of the Fair Work Act 2009, to clarify the entitlement to keeping-in-touch days, and amendments to the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 and the Taxation Administration Act 1953 that are consequential to the paid parental leave superannuation contribution related amendments in schedule 1 to this bill. It is estimated that 180,000 families would benefit from the changes in this bill when the PPL scheme reaches 26 weeks by 2026. The maximum a family would receive in superannuation contributions would be $3,000, based on a superannuation guarantee rate of 12 per cent. From 1 July 2025, for both born and adopted children, parents eligible for the Commonwealth's PPL scheme will receive an additional 12 per cent of their paid parental leave as a contribution direct to their superannuation fund. The contribution will match the superannuation guarantee rate of the year the PPL is taken, as at 1 July of that year. The contribution is to be made by the ATO after the conclusion of each financial year, with an additional interest component to address any foregone fund earnings that may have occurred had the payment been made on a regular basis. In recognition that it has never been more expensive to raise a family, and in line with the coalition's commitment to support the choices of Australians, the coalition will seek to amend the legislation to introduce more flexibility into the Commonwealth's Paid Parental Leave scheme. Under the coalition's amendment, Australian parents eligible for government funded paid parental leave will be able to choose to receive superannuation on the government funded paid parental leave payment; receive 26 weeks of paid parental leave from 1 July 2025, increasing to 28 weeks from 1 July 2026; or receive a one-off payment equal to the value of the superannuation amount, to help with the costs associated with the arrival of a newborn or adopted child. The amendment seeks to do two things. It seeks to provide parents of a newborn or adopted child with an additional two options: they can choose to take the additional superannuation contributions on PPL payments as outlined in this bill, or they can choose one of the two additional options. Firstly, they could elect to take an additional two weeks of PPL so that, at each stage over the next two years, they could elect to take an additional two weeks more than they would otherwise have been entitled to. Secondly, they could take a one-off payment. We think parents are in the best possible position to determine, in their own circumstances, what it is that they need. For many Australians, one of the primary purposes of paid parental leave is to provide them with the financial flexibility they need at a special and beautiful time of their lives—the arrival of a newborn or adopted child. Providing parents with the option of taking those two extra weeks leave is something that we think the government should absolutely support. Every parent knows that spending time with their new arrival is worth far more than the financial benefit. Finally, we know how difficult it is, generally, for families, with the cost-of-living crisis they are facing, so providing them with an additional option of being able to take the equivalent amount to the PPL superannuation as a lump sum is a worthwhile amendment. Anyone in this place and anyone watching this who has a child, many of whom, I suspect, have never had the benefit of PPL, know that it's an extraordinarily difficult time financially, so providing these additional options for parents is treating them with the respect they deserve. On that, we hope the government will see that it is a good idea and will support it. While the coalition will be supporting this bill, our amendments that will be moved offer further choice and control to the Australian families taking paid parental leave. 19:03 Senator WATERS 192970 Queensland I rise to speak to the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024. Today has been a long time coming. The Greens are so glad to finally see Labor get on board with our longstanding policy to pay superannuation on paid parental leave. Unions and stakeholders have long called for super on PPL, and the Greens have lobbied Labor consistently on this subject for over a decade. We heard consistent significant evidence at multiple previous Senate inquiries. Paying super on PPL was a key recommendation of the government's own Women's Economic Equality Taskforce in 2023. Paying super on PPL was a recommendation of the 2016 Senate inquiry into economic security for women, which I participated in. Earlier this year, when its last PPL bill was before the Senate, I moved an amendment for the government to pay super on PPL. At that stage Labor voted against it, despite having, at the time, already announced its intention to pay super on PPL. So, after all of those many false starts, we are so pleased finally—after almost a decade—that this bill will pay superannuation on paid parental leave. However, once again, it is delay upon delay. This bill won't start paying super on PPL until 1 July 2025. Why, as with other meagre but positive improvements for women in previous PPL bills, are you making women wait? After waiting this long for super on PPL, women should not have to wait until after the federal election for it to kick in. I don't see nuclear subs waiting for their money. I don't see coalmining companies having to wait for their fossil fuel subsidies or property investors having to wait for their public purse perks. But, unfortunately, women once again are being asked to wait by this government. Currently, paid parental leave is the only leave entitlement that is paid without superannuation. It's also the leave that's predominantly taken by women. Make that make sense, other than it being discrimination against women. So I'm pleased we're removing this last vestige. The gender pay gap leads to a gap in retirement income, with women retiring into poverty, often after a lifetime of care and underpaid work. This means that women retire with significantly less super savings than men, with the gender retirement gap currently sitting at about 23 per cent, according to the Association of Superannuation Funds. One in three women retire with no super at all, according to the Super Members Council. This has significant consequences for women's financial security in retirement. I hope we all know that, sadly, women over 55 are the fastest-growing cohort of those at risk of homelessness. Paying super on PPL is one important measure that will improve retirement income for women. On that, the opposition's suggestion to allow women to raid their super are certainly not going to help and would instead contribute to more poverty in retirement. But there are plenty more levers that the government could pull to close the gender retirement gap. One of them is to approve the affordability and accessibility of early childhood education and care so that women can stay in the workforce if they choose to after they have kids. This means making early childhood education and care free so that more parents can access it. It also includes properly valuing our early childhood educators, who deserve the 25 per cent pay rise that they asked for, not just the 15 per cent that the government has committed to. Another measure the government could take that would have immediate benefits for women's retirement security is to improve the low income super tax offset, or LISTO. This was originally designed to make the super tax system fairer for low-income earners, and it currently refunds the 15 per cent tax on superannuation contributions up to a maximum of $500 for workers earning up to $37,000 per year. But those settings and that eligibility no longer reflect the cohort that they were designed to represent. Tax scales have changed. Inflation has increased. LISTO is no longer doing the job that it is supposed to do. The government could realign the LISTO eligibility and increase the offset through minor adjustments which would make the super tax setting significantly fairer for low-income earners, the majority of whom are women, the majority of whom work in lower paid jobs or on a part-time basis. Nonetheless, we're really pleased that the government is getting on with legislating paying superannuation on paid parental leave. But you can and must do more to make the Paid Parental Leave scheme itself fairer. We'd like to see that happen immediately. Australia has fallen behind other countries in the rate of paid parental leave. In fact, our paid parental leave rate is one of the lowest in the OECD. Continuing to pay parental leave at minimum wages forces difficult decisions about who can afford to take leave and for how long. For some people, the full-time minimum wage is an increase on their previous earnings, but for many parents the minimum wage is well below their normal wage. As many stakeholders have pointed out over many PPL inquiries, continuing to pay parental leave at the minimum wage is not an effective incentive to induce more fathers to take parental leave. The Greens support full wage replacement, including incentivising employers to top up the government scheme to replacement wage. Last year, the government's own Women's Economic Equality Taskforce recommended expanding paid parental leave to 52 weeks, paying superannuation on PPL and eventually paying PPL at replacement wage. The Greens will continue to push Labor to actually implement the WEET's advice. We were glad to support the package of legislation earlier this year to increase PPL to 26 weeks by 2026. However, parents should not have been asked to wait two more years to get to the 26 weeks that's accepted as an international minimum standard—again, making women wait for the small good thing that they deserve to have now. There's no reason to delay the implementation of good policy. This bill presents a critical opportunity to move towards best practice. It could have included an immediate increase to 26 weeks of paid leave. It could have included and should have included a pathway to 52 weeks of paid leave by 2030 in line with international best practice. Women deserve fairer paid parental leave. It improves their economic security, reduces the gender pay gap and increases the likelihood of mothers returning to work. Paying super on PPL is a good but small step in the right direction. We're pleased that, after a decade of advocating it, this small but important change will finally be made. 19:11 Senator DARMANIN 301128 Victoria Let me begin by outlining this dark reality. Women in Australia are retiring with significantly less superannuation compared to their male counterparts. On average, women retire with about 25 per cent less. In addition to this, on average, women live four years longer, so they need to make their money stretch further. As a result, right now women are far more likely to experience poverty in retirement in their old age. That is a fact, and it's a fact that reflects a deep-rooted inequality in our society of women's value in this country. This isn't just a number; it's a reflection of one of the many systemic inequities that have persisted for too long. Addressing these inequities is multilayered and will take many interventions, and the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024 is one of them. It is an important piece in solving the gender inequality puzzle and another vital step towards closing the gender pay gap in retirement. Retiring with less means facing increased risks of poverty and financial insecurity in what should be the golden years of one's life. It means that, after a lifetime of work both paid and unpaid, women are more likely to struggle to afford basic necessities, medical care and even housing. It's a reality that denies the dignity and peace of mind every person deserves after decades of contributing to our society. Universal superannuation is a vital part of a system designed to give Australians a decent standard of living in retirement, yet for too many women this promise is yet to be fulfilled. Throughout my career I have fought for the principle that every Australian should be able to retire with dignity, security and peace of mind. The Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024 is designed to help fulfil this promise. By ensuring that superannuation is paid on government funded paid parental leave, we are treating this entitlement just like any other government workplace entitlement that attracts superannuation. My union, the Australian Services Union, has been at the forefront of this reform for many years. In 2017, the ASU released the landmark Not so super, for women report, shining a light on the systemic bias within the superannuation system against women. This report laid bare the heartbreaking reality that many working women face that the very system designed to secure their future is systematically skewed against them. The ASU's report did more than just highlight a problem; it called for the reform I am so very proud to be speaking on tonight. It also sparked a campaign that demanded that superannuation be earned on every dollar earned, including extending superannuation to paid parental leave. Workers from around the country have taken on this cause with gusto. They have lobbied governments tirelessly and negotiated paid superannuation on parental leave into workplace agreements. They have even achieved the inclusion of superannuation payments on unpaid parental leave in agreements. I want to take a moment to acknowledge the significant contributions of the ASU women who have been pivotal in advancing this cause. Adele Walsh, Ann Edmonds, Kate Cotter, Debbie McDonald, Lindy Henderson, Julie Douglas, Maggie L'Estrange, Sarah Cleggett, Imogen Sturni and Jenny Thomas have been relentless advocates for this change. Their dedication deserves our deepest gratitude. Their work exemplifies the power of collective action and the change that can be achieved when we fight for what is right. To Julia Fox and Lori-Anne Sharp, along with Emeline Gaske: this bill is also the fruits of your labour. I could not talk about the trailblazers who built the foundations for paying super on paid parental leave without, of course, talking about former senator Linda White, my dear friend. Linda championed this reform for over a decade. She put the issue of women's unequal superannuation outcomes on the national agenda. This legislation is also a testament to Linda's unwavering persistence and her commitment to making life fairer for working women. Though her time in this parliament was much too brief, her impact is lasting. Her legacy is everywhere—in the fights we have won, in the progress we continue to make and certainly in this reform. Linda's work endures, and her vision of a fairer system for all is closer to reality because of her efforts. The inequality in the gender superannuation gap is linked to two major factors: the gender pay gap and the career interruptions that are caused when people, predominantly women, take time out of work to raise children. Firstly, on the gender pay gap, superannuation contributions are a direct percentage of someone's wage, so the gender cap is a key contributor to women's superannuation balances remaining lower than those of men. Australia has one of the most gender segregated workforces in the world, where women predominate in lower paid sectors. Therefore, it is a big problem for our country and a simple proposition: when you earn less, the percentage that goes into your superannuation account balance is also less. I am proud to be part of a government that is actively working to close the gender pay gap, and I note that the current pay gap under this government is now at its lowest on record at 11.5 per cent. This is a huge step, but there is still much more to do. We've implemented measures to raise wages in female dominated sectors like aged care and early childhood, ensuring fairer pay for the invaluable work done in these industries. But addressing the gender superannuation gap requires more than just closing the gender wage gap; it also requires systemic changes to address the other drivers of the superannuation gap for women, which some have described as the care penalty. One-third of our gender pay gap can also be attributed to the time women spend caring for family and the resultant interruptions in full-time employment that this creates—one-third. That is significant. Women with children face an average 55 per cent drop in earnings in the first five years of their parenthood journey, while fathers' incomes remain largely unchanged. A 55 per cent pay drop in five years following becoming a parent is a massive penalty. This is referred to as the motherhood or care penalty, a reality where women, who make up 99.6 per cent of the recipients of paid parental leave, are financially punished for taking time out of the workforce to raise children. When women take time off to care for children, they are not just losing immediate wages; they are missing out on crucial superannuation contributions. This creates a cumulative disadvantage that grows over time, exacerbating the gap in retirement savings. Let me touch on the miracle of compound interest as it was first described to me. Compounding is the investment returns generated on the returns you've already earned. The earlier and the longer you add to your balance, the greater the benefit of compounding you will realise. For younger women, compounding interest is not so miraculous if you are in lower-paid work, you have children and you take time off work to care for them. Recent data from the Australian Taxation Office puts the gender super gap between 22 per cent and 32 per cent. We cannot in good conscience allow women to be penalised with financial insecurity in retirement simply because they take on the essential role of caregiving. Carers who take the government provided Paid Parental Leave scheme, overwhelmingly working mothers, are currently punished for this choice by losing out on essential super contributions and the compounding benefits that follow. That is why the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill is so crucial. So what is the Albanese government's commitment to rectifying this inequality as part of the multilayered approach? By investing $1.1 billion over the forward estimates, we are ensuring that superannuation will be paid on the government funded Paid Parental Leave from July 2025. This reform will benefit over 180,000 families across the country. For parents receiving Paid Parental Leave from July 2025 onwards an additional 12 per cent will be paid directly into their superannuation accounts. This is on top of the significant improvements since taking office. From 1 July 2023, we made changes to give more families access to the payment, made it more flexible to support parents in their transition back to work and made it easier for parents to share care by creating a single payment accessible by both parents. From 1 July this year, we're delivering the largest expansion to Paid Parental Leave since Labor established it in 2011. By expanding the scheme to a full six months by 2026, families will receive an extra six weeks of paid leave following the birth or adoption of a child. From July 2026, families will receive up to $3,000 in superannuation contributions per birth. These measures demonstrate our commitment to supporting families and ensuring that both parents have the opportunity to care for their children without sacrificing their financial future. I want to talk about the second reading amendment moved by the member for Deakin. Earlier this year, the coalition seemed to support this critical legislation; however, now they seem to be backing away. It is unfortunately not surprising that we hear this given their history of attempting to dismantle the superannuation system and use super as an easy policy fix for their whim of the day. The coalition has spent years working against the very framework that aims to provide Australians with a secure retirement, and today is no different. The proposal that was outlined earlier by Senator Ruston was a so-called choice between cash payments and superannuation contributions on Paid Parental Leave. The very core of superannuation is that it is deferred savings—you put money aside now so that you can retire with some money later. It's for retirement. It's not for now. It's not to kick the can down the road—'I'll take it now and then, sorry, there's nothing left when I retire.' This ridiculous proposition underlines a fundamental disagreement that those opposite have when it comes to understanding and respecting the essential role that superannuation and paid parental leave play in achieving financial security for women and the nature of superannuation being deferred savings for retirement. Further, this proposition suggests to me that those opposite think the miracle of compound interest is only suitable for some, not childbearing women or young, low-income families just starting out. The proposition to allow parents a so-called choice to forego superannuation contributions, encouraging them to cash out their superannuation, completely misses the mark on what this bill aims to achieve. The purpose of this legislation is to put in place another strategy to close the gender pay gap in retirement, to ensure that government Paid Parental Leave is treated as a standard workplace entitlement, attracting superannuation contributions. Women have the right to retire with the same level of financial security as men. Ensuring superannuation is paid during parental leave is crucial to this goal. The coalition's proposed amendments would ultimately disadvantage parents at retirement, leaving them worse off. This indicates a failure to recognise the long-term impact on women's retirement savings when they take time out of the workforce to raise children or that there is a need to close the gender pay gap at all. Promoting the option to raid your super balance now undermines the fundamental purpose of superannuation to provide a safety net for you in retirement. For those fresh into the workforce, starting a family or perhaps looking towards the end of their careers, the superannuation you earn over the course of your career will determine what your life looks like in retirement. Starting a family should be an exciting time, not a moment forcing you to make an awful choice, one that may sentence you to a future of financial uncertainty. The Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill is a critical step in the right direction. It acknowledges the essential work done by parents and ensures that taking time out to care for a child does not come at the cost of your future security. This is more than a policy. This is about dignity, respect, and a fair go for everyone. It's about ensuring that every Australian can retire with the security and peace of mind they deserve. 19:25 Senator GREEN 259819 Queensland I, too, seek to make a contribution on this incredibly significant bill, the Paid Parental Leave Amendment (Adding Superannuation for a More Secure Retirement) Bill 2024. I acknowledge the contribution from Senator Duniam about the valuable work of the ASU and particularly of our friend and colleague Senator White. The campaign for super on PPL has been longstanding, and it is really pleasing and historic that we have now reached this point and that we have a Labor government prepared to deliver superannuation on paid parental leave. I want to add to the contribution of my colleague by reiterating the support that this scheme and this proposal has from stakeholders across the country. We know that many groups have come out in support of the proposal to pay super on paid parental leave. Of course, we've seen that support from the unions, the ASU in particular, and the ACTU. It's worth mentioning that other groups have come out to support this proposal, including the National Foundation for Australian Women, the Australian Institute of Family Studies, the Diversity Council of Australia, KPMG and the Business Council of Australia. We know that this is an important step forward for women's economic security. These peak bodies have made it clear that reform is both wanted and needed. When listening to the research and the data that these stakeholders are providing, it's clear that this amendment to the legislation will be essential for improving gender equality and women's retirement savings. I also want to take this opportunity to object in the strongest possible terms to the proposal being put forward by the Liberal and National parties. The coalition has come out proposing amendments to this legislation and tried to frame this about choice. But this proposal from the Liberal and National parties to not support superannuation on paid parental leave is a false choice for Australian women. They have completely missed the point about what this legislation is trying to address. It's about creating a strong parental leave system that is empowering and that increases the super that women will be able to receive in retirement. It's about making sure that women don't retire poor, and yet the proposal from those opposite misses that point completely. The proposal that the government has put forward is about acknowledging the role of care within our country and how important it is to the economic security of women in our country. We know that, under this government, we've made incredible inroads when it comes to the gender pay gap and that super on paid parental leave is the unfinished business of that work. That's why we seek to make these changes. The proposal put forward by the Liberal and National parties does none of that work, and it never would. It's not surprising that, after a decade of turning their back on the project of women's economic security, they hardly touched paid parental leave when they were in government, and now they're putting forward a scheme or proposal that would undermine the very principles of super on paid parental leave. But this is what they do. During COVID, the Liberals encouraged people to raid their super, against the advice of economists. They've encouraged women fleeing domestic violence to raid their super to escape violence. It's absolutely shocking. Now they're encouraging people to raid their super for a housing deposit. Whenever you hear a scheme or proposal from Liberals that has to do with super, they cannot be trusted. A party that seeks to make super voluntary should never be trusted when it comes to super. That's why the Albanese Labor government is putting forward this incredibly important scheme for women's economic security. We seek to make sure that women do not retire poor. We seek to make sure that care, women's work and the process of having a family are valued in our country. That's what our legislation seeks to do. What those opposite are seeking to do is the complete opposite: to devalue the work of women, make sure that women retire poorer and turn their back on the idea that, somehow, working women and working families don't deserve a secure retirement. Women see this. They see through you. They see what you are doing— Debate interrupted. ADJOURNMENT 4122 ADJOURNMENT Housing 4122 19:30 Senator POLLEY e5x Tasmania Tonight I want to talk about the extraordinary behaviour today in this chamber—a chamber that is supposed to debate legislation and then vote on it. But what did we see today? Manoeuvring between the Greens—they're leaving the chamber now—and the Liberals and Nationals, to vote so that we didn't have to have a vote. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT 283585 Senator Polley, please be seated. You know that you're not meant to reflect on whether someone is in the chamber or not. Continue. Senator POLLEY e5x We saw the extraordinary behaviour today of the Liberals and the Greens, standing together, making sure that we didn't have a vote today on important legislation. We have the Greens, who come into this chamber regularly espousing how they're the only people who have a conscience and want to do something for people who are renting, to get people into affordable housing. And what did they do today? They teamed up with the Liberals and the Nationals to ensure that there was no vote on this very important legislation. The Australian people see them for who they really are. They're political opportunists. They say one thing in this chamber and then they do something very different when they go back. It's all about their social media grabs. The relationship between Mr Dutton and his team and the Greens is getting ever closer. It is extraordinary, when there are so many people who can't put a roof over their heads, that some 40,000 families and individuals, who were going to benefit from this legislation, will not be able to have that opportunity to have a secure home to raise their families and to be able to contribute to our community. That is appalling—absolutely appalling! Honourable senators interjecting— Senator POLLEY e5x To those who are interjecting now: I welcome your interjections, because all they do is reinforce that what you're doing you know in your heart is the wrong thing to do. It is the season now for those on the opposition benches who will oppose everything leading into the next election, but your record for the last 2½ years is of voting no on everything. You talk about the cost-of-living crisis. And what do you do? You vote against every measure. Then we saw the extraordinary behaviour in question time today, where you wanted to start your scare campaign about things that were never ever on our agenda at the last election nor will be going forward into the next election. Then you want to talk about tax cuts. The Australian people got the tax cuts that they deserve, not the ones that you were going to bring in. But then again, between when we changed them and brought about fairness to these— Honourable senators interjecting— Senator POLLEY e5x 'Fairness'—I know it's a word that those opposite don't understand or have a commitment to, but the Australian people want their federal government to be fair. We were fair when it came to the tax cuts, to ensure those people who deserved a pay rise—low-income workers—got their tax cut, but we also gave them pay rises. What we see in this chamber, and what was very evident today, was that those opposite, along with their Green friends, will do and say anything to get a political edge. So, to the Greens, who have been unable to commit to the 13,700 new social and affordable homes across Australia: they won't be built; they're not going to be built, unless you change your minds and you actually vote for this legislation. Unfortunately, those opposite are only interested in political pointscoring, just as we see that the Greens, continuously, are all about their social media grabs and trying to actually keep their constituency. But what we saw on display today was just gutlessness from both those in the opposition and the Greens. If you don't support the legislation then vote against it, but don't play political games creating votes to stop us having a vote. If you really don't believe in it, have the guts to vote against it. But I suspect your cosy arrangements with the Greens will continue for some time because you see some political advantage. You don't care about those people who can't afford a home. You don't want to help people get into social housing. This— (Time expired) Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide 4123 19:35 Senator McLACHLAN 287062 South Australia I wish to provide the Senate with some early reflections on the findings of the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide. These are early reflections. Members would know that I'm a proud legatee of Legacy. Legacy has dedicated itself to supporting veterans' families for over a hundred years. I joined them after a short sojourn in the shadow of the Hindu Kush myself, and that time reinforced the importance of family to veterans, veterans communities and those currently serving. Legacy has issued an open letter calling for the implementation of all the recommendations, especially recommendation 122, which seeks to create a new statutory authority to supervise the implementation of the remaining recommendations. I wish to associate myself with that open letter and its calls to action not only as a legatee but also as a veteran. I also wish to put on the record my congratulations to Senator Lambie and my acknowledgement that she fought very hard for this royal commission and did so on behalf of families. She should be rightly acknowledged for her great work. This royal commission report is the 58th report in a sequence and the 892nd recommendation. It represents or lays out before us an utter failure of Defence to implement change. It's a national shame. In fact, the commissioners had so little confidence in Defence being able to implement their own recommendations that they recommended a statutory authority to oversee it. That's a tombstone, a totem to the failure of Defence. Here are some things I am considering. This parliament should seriously consider a national apology to veterans and the defence community. When we're dealing with veterans entitlements, we should think about reversing the burden of proof so that, when you apply or make a claim, the process is not so truncated that it adds to the trauma. It's something I've fought for and continue to fight for for the paramedics in South Australia. We need to find ways to ensure cultural change in Defence. That may mean changing the way we deliver leadership training. Senator Lambie has indicated that perhaps ADFA and its place in the defence establishment should be reviewed. I am open to that suggestion. We should also think about the allocation of honours and awards to senior defence officers. They can't keep receiving honours simply for their service whilst a national shame is occurring in the background. It is a scar on our body politic. I want to thank all those that are currently serving and that have served. My thoughts and prayers are with the families of those who were hurt as a consequence of Defence neglect. I'm very sorry. I thank the commissioners for their diligence and incredible work. It must have been quite a burden to listen to the evidence from the families in pain. We have a moral obligation to care for veterans and their families in need. Now is the time to steel ourselves and work hard to build a better future for those in our defence forces, for those that are currently serving and those serving in the future. Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2024 4124 19:39 Senator TYRRELL 300639 Tasmania Were you that kid who found a creative way around it when you heard the word 'no'? I know I was, and I expect many of you were too. I was mostly good at sticking to the rules, but there was always a line I was willing to step over—and that line for me was staying up late on a Friday night, sneaking up the hallway and peering through the door just to watch a little bit more TV. The more I was told I could not stay up past my bedtime, the more I was determined to do it. Pushing the boundaries is something kids are great at. Senator Scarr 282997 You rebel! Senator TYRRELL 300639 I've got a cause now, though! This is why I know teens are going to push any boundaries the government tries to set when it comes to banning social media. I know there were good intentions behind this ban. I agree there are huge issues around the kinds of content children and teens have been able to access online, and how social media platforms can impact their mental health. I think we're all on the same page in thinking that children under 10 probably shouldn't be posting content of themselves to social media platforms. The issue we're not talking about enough is that age verification will rely on social media platforms complying with Australia's rules. They will have to set up processes within sign-up systems to check you are the age you say you are. Given how we're going with trying to get Meta to pay for news content in Australia, I'd say the chances of Facebook or Instagram checking ages are pretty slim. But how do we actually put something in place to stop kids using social media? The answer to this question is identification, but we already squirm about how much information we are required to share with government agencies. Are we really going to entrust our valuable information to the internet? I've heard debates in this place from all sides about the importance of privacy and securing data online, and I agree it's very important. After sharing my personal information, I don't want to be scammed when the organisation I shared it with is hacked. Optus, Medibank, Latitude: it hasn't been that long since these data breaches resulted in millions of people's data being shared online. But here we're talking about encouraging our kids to hand over their ID to social media giants. Anyone who has spent any time with a teenager knows they will find a way around any ban you give them. They will find new ways to connect on social media or new platforms to use that get around the ban. Any kid that knows anything about tech will sign up for a VPN and get around the system in five minutes. In trying to keep kids safe, we will create other problems. Social media is a lifeline for many kids living in remote areas or those who can't leave their home. Going online is the way they access the world. Banning social media cuts legal access to these kids, so we'll be forcing them to find other means to communicate with their friends. But whether this ban on social media applies to kids aged 16 or under 14, whichever age the government decides on, that really is a decision for parents. Educating kids about the good, the bad and everything in between online is really a parent's job. It's up to us to talk to them about the kinds of things that are appropriate on the internet—and the things that are not. I did this with my own kids, and I still do now. I put my hand up. I set them up with social media accounts when they wanted them, even when they weren't old enough. The deal was they had to be open and honest with me about what was going on, what they were doing, and to talk to me about anything that that didn't feel quite right. It's the same situation as when parents choose to give their kids alcohol at a year 12 party. It's a way for them to experience alcohol and to understand the consequences, but in a safe environment. I treated social media in the same way for my kids. This proposed social media ban is really just a vote grab. There are no real thoughts on how it can be enforced, but it's a great headline leading into an election. If this was really about kids, we'd give them the tools they need to help them make their own decisions about what is happening online. Instead, I feel like we're just going to end up pushing them towards further problems. If age verification isn't the answer, then what is? Let me go back to my earlier point about basic parenting: if you've given your child a device, turn on the parental controls, talk to them about what is okay and what isn't and keep that conversation going on forever. Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide, Great Barrier Reef 4125 19:44 Senator GREEN 259819 Queensland Before I begin my contribution, I want to acknowledge the Deputy President's contribution on the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide. It's an important report and it will take some time to go through those recommendations. You acknowledged Senator Lambie, but I think it's also important to acknowledge the member for Solomon, Mr Luke Gosling, and the member for Herbert, Mr Phil Thompson, who together with Senator Lambie urged the government at the time to take that step—and now we've seen that report. Speaking of Townsville, I was there recently to mark 20 years since the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Zoning Plan came into effect. Twenty years ago an important reform was implemented, and it was one that was contentious and hard fought at the time. Credit where credit is due: it was actually a Liberal government who brought in the zoning plan 20 years ago. They stared down the hard right in their own party—Senator Joyce at the time had some very strong views—but they did what was right. They consulted with the community, and now we can see that those reforms are paying off. The 2003 zoning reforms increased the size of protected areas from five per cent to 33 per cent, and by sustaining these zones over the past 20 years we've seen huge improvements in the reef's health. The reef authority states that no-take zones have contributed significantly to the population of popular species, such as coral trout, because of their role as reproductive sanctuaries. Research shows that fish are larger and can produce more offspring, which yields a greater supply of baby fish to the surrounding fishing areas—and don't our recreational fishers in Queensland love that! The research also shows that reefs in no-take zones are better able to tolerate and recover faster from bleaching events, cyclones and COTS outbreaks. Reflecting on the introduction of the zoning plan reminds us that the tangible benefits of science based policy reform may not be immediate but that we need to be courageous, because bold action now can mean a better future for the reef. As our government works to protect the reef, we know that improving the quality of water that runs into the reef is a key part of building that resilience. A few weeks ago I was joined by the Minister for the Environment and Water in North Queensland, and we announced the new Clearer Water for a Healthy Reef program. This is $192 million to improve the quality of water flowing into the reef. It will target hotspots across the reef catchments, ensuring that funding goes exactly where it's needed. This is, of course, in addition to the investment of the $200 million Landscape Repair Program announced last year, which will help improve habitat for endangered turtles, birds and fish while improving land management methods in reef catchments. These are programs where we are working together with farmers, scientists and traditional owners across our catchments to improve the quality of water running into the reef, and they're backed up by real investment from our government. I couldn't mention the reef without mentioning the Great Barrier Reef outlook report 2024, which was released a few weeks ago. To sum up the outlook report, it's very clear that we are at a pivotal time for the Great Barrier Reef. The action we take right now will determine its future, which is fundamental to this effort in building the reef's resilience to adapt to climate change. There is, of course, the importance of the natural resilience of coral reefs. We know that they have the ability to adapt and survive but only if they are given time to do that. As the world warms, there are fewer windows of recovery between extreme weather events, which is why we must do absolutely everything we can to protect the reef. The reef is my home, and it supports thousands of jobs in the regional communities I represent. I just wish that the members of the Liberal National Party that represent those communities would stand up for the reef as well, because, unlike the Liberal government that brought in those reforms 20 years ago, Mr Peter Dutton is afraid to stare down the hard-right extremists in the Liberal-National coalition who say that protecting the reef is not something they should do. It's disappointing to communities in Queensland that we have a Liberal-National opposition prepared to talk about repealing reef regulations and reducing the protections we have for the reef—and, of course, going down the path of nuclear power, which will not lead to lower emissions or cheaper power but will put the reef at real risk in the future. We know that the Labor government is protecting the Great Barrier Reef, but the Liberal-National coalition will never do that. Housing 4125 19:49 Senator CADELL 300134 New South Wales There has been a lot of debate today about housing. We've been talking about housing funding, purchase and demand. But what we're really talking about when we get to this is the relative advantage of different purchases, because we're only talking about one side of the housing equation, not supply. Acting Deputy President Hughes, you know that, when I first came down here and was looking for somewhere to stay, we got into a bidding war with each other on a property we didn't know we were bidding against each other on. That's what it gets down to on the purchase side. But let's talk about the supply side. In this chamber, in state government chambers and in local government chambers around Australia, 'property developer' are evil words. People don't accept donations from them. They don't have meetings with them. But, if we are to get the supply side right, this country is dependent on those that develop properties, those that develop land, those that build housing. Until we get the supply side right, we will never get this housing problem right in Australia. We simply need to build more dwellings. We need to develop more land to put more people. That is the bottom line. And no government will be putting their money in this. It will be private investors. It will be mums and dads. It will be small businesses. It will be big investors and big property developers across Australia that do this. By not having them in the conversation, we do a disservice. I do note that in New South Wales, the Premier, Chris Minns—he's a Labor premier; I'll give him his credit—is actually taking on some of these NIMBYs in some of the planning zones in the inner city on public ways, where there are transport lines and stuff like that. That is a good thing. But we need it to be bigger and better. The independent planning assessments and councils everywhere are fearful of what will happen if they approve dwellings, land development and subdivisions, but they shouldn't be. What they are doing is depriving young families of houses. They are depriving mums and dads of getting a better house. They are depriving people of what we're trying to do here today—affordable housing. They are driving up the prices by not approving these things. We can all take a laugh at Senator Faruqi here whenever anyone brings up the development at Port Macquarie. She created more dwellings for people. That is a good thing. I will meet with developers; I will talk to developers because they are the answer to this. I asked my office to look through the Hunter at what might be around there that we hadn't seen, and they came to one called Kings Hill development of the urban release area. There are 3,500 lots just 50 kilometres from me in the Port Stephens Council area. That would allow 10,000 residents to move in, in the next 10 years. It's been held up for 12 years. Let me talk about the funding aspects of this. It has received $1.5 million from the HAFF, which we approved going there. But they sent $660,000 in Commonwealth grants from a local housing plan to redo it, which has stopped it. They've put $1.5 million in to allow development to happen, but $660,000 of a local housing plan has taken it from 3,500 lots down to 700 lots, making it unviable. This is what we get—a developer that comes to a place, to correctly zoned land, and goes through the approval process for 3,500 lots. They do it right. They put in their money—they have so far put $50 million into this project to put these houses there—and it doesn't go ahead. What is the cost? We still have to house people. We still have to put them somewhere. We just have to put them somewhere else because these people say, 'Not in my backyard.' So does Medowie get it? Does Wallalong get it? There's a claim we're going to infill some ex-housing commission places in Raymond Terrace. I know Raymond Terrace. The housing commission places were built cheaply. There is no drainage. There are no sump pits. So a developer is going to buy two or three lots, do a DA and see a bill for $150,000 or $200,000 or $300,000 for drainage and say, 'No, I can't do it.' So we need to get more people involved in allowing these projects to happen. If things like Kings Hill don't go ahead, which has the local Worimi people's approval, which has the right zoning—3½ thousand homes. What will happen to the missile development zone and the aerospace centre in Williamtown that was announced the other day if we can't put people there? If you can't put people near their jobs, if you can't put people near growth, if you can't give people hope, anything we pass in this house about who funds it is just giving comparative advantage in a worse market. We are creating more costs for people by not opening up supply. We have to stop demonising the people that can help housing supply in Australia. We have to get them in the tent. We have to get people like Kings Hill development out there building houses so we can all have somewhere to live. (Time expired) Aged Care 4126 19:54 Senator KOVACIC 306168 New South Wales Every single one of us at some point in our lives will interact with the aged-care system. Whether it be for ourselves, our parents or our partners, aged care will inevitably impact all of us. For this reason, Australians deserve to know exactly what reforms the Albanese Labor government is proposing with our aged-care system. Our population is ageing rapidly, with more than half of aged-care homes across the country already operating at a loss. The way aged care is delivered and supported clearly needs to change. We must ensure our aged-care system is sustainable and world class and, most importantly, provides dignity to old Australians. The former coalition government initiated a royal commission that laid the groundwork for a better system. This week, the coalition has continued that commitment by agreeing to work with the government on key reforms to be introduced into this parliament. The shadow minister for health and aged care, Senator Ruston, is fighting hard to get a fairer deal for older Australians and their families, and I want to highlight what has been achieved through negotiations so far: first, the coalition ensured that grandfathering arrangements are in place so no Australian already in the aged-care system will pay more than they do today; second, we introduced lifetime caps on contributions, giving families certainty about the maximum they'll ever have to pay; we also negotiated a lower taper rate to slow down the rate at which contributions increase; and we secured a critical assurance that the federal government, not the consumer, will continue to be the majority funder of aged care. The coalition have long understood that rural and regional aged-care homes face unique challenges in our country. These communities need more support, and so far the Albanese government is failing to provide that support. That's why the coalition has fought for additional funding to help aged-care providers in the bush, providers that are struggling to keep their doors open. We must ensure that aged care in rural Australia is not left behind. The reforms proposed by this government are a step forward, but they must be thoroughly scrutinised. To be clear, this is Labor's package of reforms, and it hasn't been a co-designed process. That is why the committee process is critical. Submissions to the aged-care inquiry are now open and can be lodged on the community affairs committee website. If you, your family or your loved ones have ever engaged in the aged-care system—or are anyone in this country who has an interest—that is who we need to hear from. We must ensure that these reforms are treated with the transparency and accountability that our aged-care system deserves and that our older Australians deserve. We owe it to our older Australians to get this right. But we also owe it to young Australians, to ensure that they are not left with an unfair tax burden of an inefficient aged-care system at the same time they are struggling to buy and own their own homes. This is our chance to build an aged-care system that not only meets the challenges of today but stands the test of time for future generations. Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 4127 19:58 Senator ANTIC 269375 South Australia We hear the term 'Orwellian' a lot these days, perhaps so often that it has lost its meaning. But Labor's Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 is truly, truly deserving of the term. The bill seeks to penalise those who promote so-called misinformation and disinformation online. Obviously, how one defines misinformation is critical. The bill essentially creates the possibility that anything the establishment considers harmful, false, misleading or deceptive is either mis- or disinformation, depending on how intentional it is, which, of course, is also a highly subjective matter. It's worthwhile casting our minds back to the COVID period to recall that, in those days, misinformation and disinformation essentially meant any claim that contradicted the government's often spurious health advice. Those claims were perilously verified against the Therapeutic Goods Association's advice or the advice of the various health departments. Examples included saying lockdowns were illogical, masks didn't work or that the vaccines carried dangerous side effects and didn't prevent transmission and so on. All of these statements turned out to be true. It wasn't difficult to know that. Thanks to a freedom of information request from my office last year, we know that the Department of Home Affairs paid a foreign company more than $1 million to monitor COVID-19 posts online and then alert the various social media companies of the controversial material. Home Affairs hired a London based company to monitor social media posts during COVID and then notify the department, who then required social media companies to either remove or minimise the reach of these posts. As many as 4,000 social media posts were secretly censored during the height of the COVID pandemic. Many of them contained factual information and reasonable arguments rather than misinformation. Examples of targeted posts included claims that COVID-19 was released or escaped from a Wuhan lab in China, that the vaccine didn't prevent infection or transmission and that lockdowns were ineffective. These are no longer controversial statements, or at least they shouldn't be. Misinformation, disinformation and harm are all crucial concepts in this bill. There are many avenues I could take in discussing this, but, to focus on one, the bill would make the following an offence: harm to public health in Australia, including to the efficacy of preventive health measures in Australia—and we saw how that played out in recent years—and vilification of a group in Australian society distinguished by race, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity. The question is: Who defines this? The government? The courts? The bill provides an easy platform for governments to silence political opponents and those who hold inconvenient but true beliefs. Why should Australians trust that the regulatory authority ACMA's powers wouldn't be politicised? If this legislation had been operative during COVID, people could have been fined hundreds of thousands of dollars for posting true statements online. Furthermore, the content that is excluded from the penalties includes professional news content. Professional news content means the traditional news outlets: newspapers, six o'clock news, radio and so on. The bill appears to be effectively aimed fairly and squarely at alternative internet platforms that defy the government approved narrative. Is this all about Twitter, X? Why is the establishment so against X? Why is this government so against Elon Musk? Trust in our institutions and corporates like the mainstream media is in freefall. Social media presents challenges regarding free speech—that's not in doubt—and there are criminal matters which should never be promoted by algorithms, but the discussion that must be had is the desire to balance individual liberties with the stability of society. As usual, this government's approach is heavy handed and rushed. Orwell said, 'If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they don't want to hear.' I'm certainly going to keep saying what I believe to be true and what I believe Australians of good faith wish to hear expressed in their parliament. This bill must be defeated for the good of our nation. Western Australian African Communities Awards 4128 20:02 Senator DEAN SMITH 241710 Western Australia Africa is big, bright and warm in spirit and generosity, and so it was at the Organisation of African Communities in Western Australia 2024 award night celebrations. I want to express my gratitude to the Organisation of African Communities in Western Australia for the invitation to attend their 6th annual Western Australian African Communities Awards last Saturday. Special thanks, of course, go to Dr Casty, who is the leader of the Organisation of African Communities in WA and a leader that is warmly embraced and held in very high regard in the African community and beyond in many other communities in Western Australia. I'm very proud to have a long-running association and to support the Organisation of African Communities in Western Australia. This awards night was part of celebrating the important work that they do in our community in Western Australia. It was inspiring to hear many of the stories of talented members across the community leading in areas like youth leadership, women's advocacy, sports and excellence in innovation. One of the finalists for the innovation category was Ms Joan Gregory, who founded Alpha Carers Australia. Alpha Carers is a leading healthcare provider known for its compassionate and culturally sensitive care. I also want to congratulate Naomi Cyrus, who won the women in leadership award. Naomi's leadership extends beyond her community work. She plays an active role in the multicultural advisory council, where she helps shape discussions that impact multicultural communities across Western Australia. Her passion for mentoring and uplifting others has made her a cherished figure, inspiring countless women to reach their full potential. It was a night of celebration and it was important to recognise and honour the tremendous success African communities have had in Western Australia. Its president, Dr Casty, had this to say: Our community has always been rich in talent, diversity and the drive to make a difference. The stories of our award recipients tonight reflect the incredible journeys of growth and transformation that have touched lives far beyond their own. Their achievements remind us of the potential that lies within each of us to inspire, to influence and to create meaningful change. She goes on to say: As we celebrate these moments of triumph, let us also take this opportunity to reflect on the importance of unity, mentorship and giving back to the community. Together we are not only stronger but also capable of achieving greatness in ways that will continue to uplift future generations. Once again, I thank all of my friends and the African community in Western Australia for their support, for the great work they do to make Western Australia great place to live and for bringing some of that brightness, that boldness, that warmth, and that spirit and generosity from Africa to Western Australia. Queensland: Community Events 4128 20:05 Senator SCARR 282997 Queensland I congratulate Senator Smith on his remarks. It is wonderful to hear that Western Australia has a wonderful African diaspora, as we have in my home state of Queensland. I do note that there will be some very significant football competitions coming up. There will be national competitions—in the Australian Congolese community, held in Darwin, and in the Burundian community, which is going to be held, I think, in Adelaide. I give my best wishes to members of the Queensland Congolese team and their coach Kado—my good friend—and also to the Burundian team for their national competition. Thank you very much for everything that you all do. I would like to congratulate everyone involved in the 49th PNG Independence Day celebrations in my home state of Queensland. There are too many wantoks to thank. I have a list of wantoks to thank. I will take it out of the bilum that was presented to me at the Independence Day celebrations. Thank you for that. I would like to congratulate Lynette Wessel, the President of the PNG Federation of Queensland Inc. Lynette does a terrific job year after year as president of the federation. Thank you so much, Lynette, for everything you do. I also would like to thank Maureen Mopio-Jane, the vice president of the association, who is a very accomplished journalist in her own right. I recommend to senators that they be interviewed by Maureen on radio 4EB if they get the opportunity. She is a wonderful lady. Thank you, Maureen. I would also like to acknowledge the presence of the consul general, Mr Reatau Rau. I look forward to working with you, Consul General. I thank all the volunteers and all the performers for putting on such a wonderful event. It was open to the whole community. Thousands of people attended. It was absolutely terrific. As I said on the day, next year is the 50th anniversary of the independence of the Independent State of Papua New Guinea. I think the biggest party and the biggest celebration outside PNG should be in my home state of Queensland because we have such a wonderful PNG diaspora. As members in this chamber would know, I lived and worked in Papua New Guinea between 1999 and 2001. It was an absolute privilege to do so. It was very difficult to leave at the end of that time because the bond with my PNG wantoks was so strong, so thank you for everything you do. I would now like to congratulate the Federation of Sri Lankan Organisations of Queensland Inc for a wonderful Sri Lanka Day event held just this last weekend. I give my heartfelt congratulations and pay tribute to president Dr Jay Weerawardena and his team, and it is a team. In the booklet handed out on the day, there was the event organising committee and—I will count them—24 members are listed on that organising committee. They did such a wonderful job bringing together a great event. The patron of the Federation of Sri Lankan Organisations of Queensland, Mr Anton Swan, who served for many years as honorary consul in Queensland, was in attendance. I want to specifically recognise his contribution to multiculturalism in my home state of Queensland. He's an outstanding example of the very best of Australian values. I also want to congratulate the members of the Sri Lankan community who received community service awards, including Dharme Rathnayake, who unfortunately, sadly, passed away last year. Dharme, with his wife, Amara, played a leading role in preserving and nurturing Sri Lankan cultural heritage in my home state of Queensland. I want to pay tribute to another winner of a community service award, Mrs Kanthi Wijesoma, who has been heavily involved in community radio across Australia, was integral in setting up a language school and a women's association, and has been an outstanding leader in the Queensland Sri Lankan community. Thank you so much for your contribution. Lastly, I want to pay tribute to Mr Lal Mendis, who, very sadly, passed away last year. Lal was a driving force behind the Sri Lanka Sports Association. He was also instrumental and a driving force behind successfully establishing the first Sri Lanka Day Multicultural Food and Cultural Festival in 2021. I give my congratulations to his family for the contribution he made, These people were all great members of the Sri Lankan community in my home state of Queensland. Each and every one of them represents the very best of Australian values. I want to congratulate the Tamil Association of Queensland. This association has been in existence since 1986, nearly four decades, and has been a pillar of strength for the Tamil community. Just last Sunday, we had an inaugural event celebrating the formation of Femisphere. Femisphere, set up by the Tamil Association of Queensland, is an initiative whereby women's issues within the Tamil community can be ventilated and considered, including health issues, domestic violence issues and legal issues. Issues specific to women can be considered and ventilated amongst women in the community, and expert advice can be received. Women can receive assistance and share their concerns. It's just a wonderful initiative. I want to congratulate the president of the Tamil Association of Queensland, Karthick Elangovan, for his leadership of the Tamil Association of Queensland and for getting this initiative off the ground. It's a wonderful initiative. I want to congratulate all the members of the subcommittee of Femisphere: Mrs Preethi Singh Sudarsan, convenor; Ms Shreemathi Narayanan, deputy convenor; Mrs Uma Agnal Anton, assistant treasurer; and Mrs Sangeetha Rajeswaran, public relations officer. We heard some outstanding and thoughtful speeches from some of the convenors during the day. They made a great contribution. Lastly, I want to recognise some special members of the Tamil community in Queensland who were recognised during the event. These outstanding women provide great leadership in the Tamil Association of Queensland and the community. It was so fitting that they received their certificates of recognition on the day because they're really the inspiration for the next generation. That was one of the points I made. One of the great things about this initiative is that it's going to inspire the next generation of women and girls coming through, and that's a great thing. I want to give a special call-out and place on the Hansard record the contribution made by Chitra Yogi Srikhanta. I want to read the reason Mrs Chitra was given the award: In recognition of the outstanding dedication, creativity and skill in the art of Bharatanatyam dance and an inspiration to the wider community… The Nadananjali School of Dance was Established in 1993. Over the past three decades, Mrs. Chitra has nurtured hundreds of students, imbuing in them the same love, discipline and dedication, and dedication to Bharatanatyam that has been the hallmark of her own journey. The other certificate of recognition was given to Mrs Sulotchana Devi Viveganantham in recognition of her outstanding dedication, unwavering support and inspiration to the wider community since the 1970s. She was one of the founding members of the Tamil Association of Queensland, which was established in 1986. Mrs Devi has held key positions: vice-president, secretary and treasurer. She's played a pioneering role in Tamil 4EB radio, which is our multilingual community radio station in Queensland; Hindu Ahlaya Sangam; Brisbane Tamil School, which is a language school; and other organisations. Mrs Devi and her husband actually opened the first Indian grocery store, KK Brothers, in Chelmer in my home state of Queensland. It was a wonderful event to recognise these two outstanding women who are part of the Tamil Association and have been the inspiration, in many respects, for the next generation of women coming through that community. Congratulations to the Tamil Association of Queensland. Each and every one of you represents the very best of Australian values. United States of America: Presidential Election 4130 20:15 Senator BABET 300706 Victoria The question the world is asking about the US election is not whether Trump's going to win but whether Trump is even going to live to contest it. We have now seen two attempts on President Trump's life in just eight weeks. While Kamala Harris is dodging interviews, President Trump is dodging bullets—and I wonder why. It should be clear to everyone by now that, while Donald Trump is in the assassins' crosshairs, he is not the ultimate target; you are. Trump and other people like him are just in the way. The progressive left, with their love of globalism, big government, censorship and their rejection of objective truth, will stop at nothing in their pursuit of power. That much should now be clear. President Trump stands between free people and the globalist tyrants who control the world from the shadows. And now one can be in no doubt as to how far these shadowy figures will go in order to remove Trump permanently in order to push and continue their agenda of destroying free speech, national sovereignty and the free world. What have the radical left done? They've repeatedly described Trump as a 'threat to democracy', a madman who will plunge America and the free world into a dystopian nightmare. It's as if they've been attempting to provoke someone into killing him deliberately. The media have been just as bad, if not worse. They paint Trump as a cross between Hitler and Mussolini, constantly spewing lie and hatred towards the man. And so, eight weeks after Thomas Matthew Crooks fired off a volley of shots at President Donald J Trump, striking the President, a second shooter has tried to assassinate the Republican leader at his home in Mar-a-Lago. Two assassination attempts in two months, and the leftists at our own ABC didn't even bother to make it the main story on their website on that day. That Trump can be targeted and the ABC don't consider it to be worth more than a small news brief on their home page tells you everything you need to know about the radical left. The left, in reality, are not after Donald Trump; they are after free citizens. Trump is just an obstacle in their way. That's why they have lied about him, impeached him, indicted him, shot at him and now attempted to kill him for a second time. Trump's belief in freedom of speech angers the authoritarians. Trump's belief in free enterprise annoys the technocrats. Trump's belief in national sovereignty frustrates the globalists and the progressive left, who reject the nation-state in their pursuit of a borderless, dystopian world controlled from Brussels. They hate Trump because they cannot own him. They cannot control him. Trump does not need the trappings of office. The White House is a step down from Mar-a-Lago. Trump doesn't need the fame, the accolades or the money. If Trump is not President, he is still a highly successful businessman. If Kamala, on the other hand, is not president, who is she? A screeching, cackling banshee—that's what she is. So Trump cannot be owned, manipulated or managed; that's why they fear him. He is the embodiment of those who cannot be controlled, and control is what the progressive left crave. When Trump dodged a bullet from Thomas Crooks's gun a couple of months ago, we all dodged a bullet. When Trump was saved from a sniper's rifle just a few days ago, all freedom-loving people were saved. Call it luck, call it providence, one thing is clear: if President Trump is killed, the world will be a very different place. Who will dare stand for freedom and liberty against the vast state power which has been arrayed against the little guy? A Trump victory in November is the free world's best hope of maintaining its freedom. We know it, and they know it. What we don't know is whether Trump will be able to live long enough to win that election. The Left have tried everything to stop Trump, from conspiracies about Russian collusion to a dozen court cases, prosecuting the most spurious of charges imaginable—all to no effect. Within hours of this second kill attempt, the Democrats and their supporters were saying that Donald Trump was exactly like Mussolini and exactly like Hitler, a fascist, an authoritarian weasel. This was live on MSNBC on legacy media. Disgusting, vile, hateful. There are 40-something days until the US presidential election, and, in my opinion, the far Left have murder on their minds. So many of these people have publicly called for the President's death and expressed sadness that the first assassin's bullet didn't do more damage. If they kill Trump, they kill us all. A Trump victory is important not just for the United States but for all of us in the Anglosphere. America is our closest and most important ally. If America falls, we all fall with them. Even now the enemies of the free world are crouched, ready to pounce at the first sign of weakness. They are agitating. Without a strong America, we will not have a strong Australia. And so Trump's promise to make America great again is a promise to make Australia great again as well. A strong America means the age of prosperity will continue. A strong America is a guarantee of continued freedom and liberty. Trump in the White House means less likelihood of World War III, and a higher chance of peace in the Middle East. As long as Donald Trump survives to 'fight, fight, fight' another day, so does freedom, and so too does the West. Long live liberty, and God bless Donald Trump. Energy 4131 20:22 Senator ROBERTS 266524 Queensland Electrification is an essential part of the Albanese government's net zero strategy. Electrification consists of taking every device that consumes energy and making it electric: petrol cars replaced with electric cars; gas cooktops replaced with electric ones; gas hot-water systems ripped out and replaced with electric; barbecues only electric—which is no fun at all. Everyday Australians pay the cost. To me, it's unwise to put all our eggs in the electricity basket when we are reimagining our electricity grid to rely entirely on weather-dependent generation. To the government, of course, such heresy is mere 'disinformation'. I'm sure Minister Bowen is champing at the bit to declare any online critics of net zero are threatening the environment, leading to a ban on 'disinformation'. The truth is that electrification is something we must debate. There are real risks to the public, and the price tag is astronomical. So let's start with safety. Following a Daily Telegraph story on the weekend, the internet is reporting that China has banned electric vehicles from underground car parks. The inference is that the ban was from the government, when in fact the Telegraph made clear the ban was from car-park owners and from apartments above the car parks. It's businesses acting to protect themselves and their customers. Local news reports that property owners were spurred into action after 11 intense battery fires in Hangzhou. The reports have revived fears in China that the new low-carbon-dioxide technology is more trouble than it's worth. Definitely—yes, it is. One viral social media post involved a Hangzhou car showroom catching fire after a display car spontaneously combusted. It was a brand-new vehicle. There was no issue of faulty maintenance or handling. As the Telegraph correctly reported, the science is clear: … when EV batteries do overheat, they're susceptible to something called thermal runaway." That's when physical damage— or a manufacturing fault— triggers a chemical chain reaction within the battery. It can be a short circuit. It can be a puncture. Or an external heat. Such damage can lead to a high-temperature fire or toxic gas explosion. "About 95 per cent of battery fires are classed as ignition fires, which produce jet-like directional flames. The other 5 per cent involve a vapour cloud explosion … That was written by Edith Cowan University academic Muhammad Azhar. Recently, five cars were destroyed when a damaged battery fell from an EV parked at Sydney airport. A Tesla went up in flames on the road after contacting debris that fell from a truck near Goulburn. No ways have been developed of smothering a lithium-ion fire. The safest place for an EV is in the open air, where any fire can be contained until it burns out without destroying the property of others in the process. Secondly, when it comes to electrification, the elephant in the room is cost. The process consists of rebuilding the national electricity grid, generation and transmission. Energex and Powerlink have identified emerging limitations in the electricity networks supplying the Brisbane CBD. The power grids in Brisbane and across Australia were not built for our modern population density and certainly weren't built to take the full load of energy that's now required to electrify houses, cars and businesses. They note corrective action is required to avoid network overload and to avoid load shedding—known as 'brownout'—which is when the power is selectively switched off to houses and businesses to prevent a wider blackout. Smart meters will make brownouts easier, providing the ability for power companies to remotely turn off air-conditioners and power to living areas, leaving the kitchen circuit functioning to keep the fridge on. New houses are being built with that circuit arrangement. It's control. The cost to rewire the grid to convey solar, wind and pumped hydro from the point of generation to the cities and then rewire the city and suburban grid for the higher electricity demand has not been costed. I have asked the minister repeatedly in the last few weeks for those costings, and it is clear that none exist. Let me help the government. Visual Capitalist consultancy has done independent costings showing that the cost of rewiring the grid and adding firming—back-up batteries and pumped hydro—is about 30 per cent of the overall electrification cost, or $300 billion, on the consensus figure of Australia's $1 trillion cost—which I think is about half of it. In the electrification agenda, cost concerns relate to the national building code. The idea is to avoid having to rewire at least parts of the grid through lowering household electricity usage to make room for charging EVs in the existing power grid. The targeted production is 50 per cent less power—half of what you're using. Remember that Australians are already using 10 per cent less power than five years ago. The Australian Building Codes Board has a rating system called NatHERS which rates housing standards from one star to 10 stars. The current code requires seven stars. The code includes a measure of whole-of-house energy efficiency, which rates your home compliance with a net zero ideology, including heating and cooling, hot water systems, lighting, pool and spa pumps, cooking and even plug-in appliances. Our Big Brother is poking their nose into every aspect of your home in the name of saving the environment. The actual building code component of the building code calls for the sealing of homes to prevent outside air coming in. This creates issues with condensation, meaning mould, which other aspects of the code may alleviate—may. Clearly nobody involved in this new code has lived in a Queenslander-style home that relies on airflow to keep the house cool. The new ideology-driven code will add $50,000 to the cost of construction of a new home, partially offset through lower electricity costs. The reduction in electricity costs will not be a lot because your energy bill is composed mainly of a fee for poles and wires, margin fees and admin fees, not electricity usage. As I have explained, the poles and wires charge is going higher than Elon Musk's spaceship. The cost of the new code to everyday Australians will be massive. We have 11 million homes in Australia and, so far, only recently-built inner-city apartments meet the code. A quick calculation: $50,000 per home times 10 million homes is a $500 billion theoretical cost. Not all homes will be done. Many will just be bulldozed and replaced with tiny apartments to house Labor's new arrivals. Economies of scale may result. Yet the actual cost of building upgrades is expected to be 15 per cent of the transition cost. With a transition cost of $1 trillion, that's building upgrades costing $150 billion. On the more likely $2 trillion transition cost, building upgrades will cost $300 billion. That's money everyday Australians will have to pay or will lose when they sell a non-compliant property for a reduced price. In all the time I have heard net zero debated, the shocking cost of converting buildings has never been mentioned And wait; there's more! Converting transport—trucks, shipping and aviation—is not mentioned. It's another seven per cent—$70 billion. Eight per cent of the cost is made up of hydrogen development, carbon dioxide scrubbing and industry conversion costs. Add another $80 billion. The cost of new generation to replace affordable and reliable coal power with weather-dependent solar and wind fairytale power is the remaining 40 per cent, or $400 billion. Remember, we already have this coal generation. Electrification requires us to shut down the generation we already have and build it over again in solar and wind. The problem climate change carpetbaggers are now running into is simply this: the best places for these things have been taken. New installations are going further out, requiring higher transmission costs and higher maintenance costs. Residents are starting to see the environmental damage caused to our native forests and animals and to farmland. The resistance has started. Let's not forget that wind and solar last for, at best, 15 years and then have to be replaced again and again and again. This means that every single industrial wind and solar installation will need to be replaced at least once before 2060, and more likely twice. The replacement process will be never-ending. Every 15 years the whole lot gets replaced again and again and again. The transmission network will require constant maintenance. An additional 10,000 kilometres of poles and wires having been added, the extra maintenance costs will remain in electricity bills forever. The truth is that the public will never finish paying for net zero electrification. The good people over at Visual Capitalist have given calculating the cost of net zero a fair crack based on data from the US National Public Utilities Council. Their total cost to electrify Western countries before 2060 is US$110 trillion—insane. Australia's share of that is currently estimated at $1 trillion; however, looking through the US data, which is more advanced than ours, suggests that a cost as high as $2 trillion is much more likely. The costings I've presented tonight are not firm. I hope they encourage the government to come clean with the costings they have to allow for an open, mature debate—one which asks: is it time to walk away and try something else, like emission-free coal, for example? For a fraction of this money, we can simply retrofit coal plants with new technology that captures carbon dioxide and converts it to useful products like fertiliser—or stop collecting it, because carbon dioxide is beneficial. For some reason, the government doesn't want to talk about new coal plants. Hm. I wonder where that list of ALP donations is again. I suggest journalists go looking. This energy fairytale is going to cost so much money it's never going to happen. Australia can't afford it. How can Australians who are struggling with the cost of living under Labor afford trillions for electrification? The further we get into this, the more stupid and dishonest the idea looks. Ideology-driven bureaucrats, politicians, academics and journalists have put us on a path to ruin. Climate change carpetbaggers will be this country's death. The rorting, the boondoggles and the waste of taxpayer money are just getting started. One Nation will end the net zero electrification scam and make Australia affordable again. Net zero is a scam, and One Nation is the only party that will stop it. Taxation 4133 20:32 Senator RENNICK 283596 Queensland I rise tonight to announce the policies of the People First Party with regard to taxation. I will note the People First Party is the only party to have such a comprehensive taxation policy, and I'm more than willing to share it with the two major parties if they would like to take any of my ideas, which I suggest they do. One great thing about being Independent is that I can sit back here and watch you guys play the Punch and Judy show, but we really need to be providing vision and hope for the people of Australia. We just aren't getting that at the moment. The first policy that I want to introduce is effectively lifting the tax-free threshold to $40,000. It is completely wrong to tax people who earn less than the cost of living—and I'll be honest and say that $40,000 is probably not quite at the cost of living, but I can't afford any more than $40,000 at the moment. We should not be taxing people if they earn less than the cost of living. It is completely wrong. We want to reward these people. I believe in reward for effort. The words in our national anthem are 'wealth for toil'; they're not 'wealth for foreign debt or watching your asset prices increase because we've got a rapid population increase'. The second thing I want to do is change the way superannuation is taxed in this country. For some bizarre reason, superannuation is taxed on your balance and not on income. That is completely perverse, because all other legal structures, trusts and companies and your own individual selves are taxed on how much income they earn. I will give you an example of how you can have distortion in the market. If you have $2.8 million in superannuation and you earn five per cent, under the proposed superannuation scheme you will only pay 15c on the dollar by earning $140,000, but, if you only earn three per cent over $3 million, you would earn, say, $90,000, and you would pay 30c. We don't want to see those sorts of perverse outcomes. The proposal would be that your first $25,000 in super would be tax free. There would be no limit on how much money you can put in or take out or how old you are or all these other things. Basically, if you decide you want to put money into a superannuation account and split your income, that is up to you. However, we are not going to make it super generous like the system we have now, where we had multimillionaires put a heap of money in under the Costello rules of the early 2000s. Dick Smith is one of them, and he openly admits he should be paying more tax on super. We have to have an equitable super system. The beauty of the system is that, if you are a young person, you can put all your savings into super and effectively split your income so you can earn another $25,000 tax free to help you save quicker for your house. Not many people will understand this, but it is very important. The next thing I want to do is lift the rate of withholding tax on profits sent offshore. I will give you one example. Ireland has a 10 per cent withholding tax—or we have a 10 per cent withholding tax on royalties sent to Ireland. Ireland has a company tax rate of 12½c, so 12½c plus 10c is 22½c. It is in the interests of many multinational properties to transfer much of their profits to Ireland because they will get a 30c tax deduction for it here and they will only pay 22½c to send it to Ireland. As I was saying to a couple of politicians this morning, Pfizer, for example, sent over $1 billion of their 2023 profit over to Ireland. I am not sure why Pfizer even has factories in Ireland, but 7½c out of a billion dollars is $75 million for the sake of a couple of accounting journals. It really is that simple: you just do a couple of accounting journals and justify the arms-length provisions. For some reason, the tax office thinks it is okay that Pfizer have an operating profit ratio of seven per cent here in Australia when their worldwide operating profit is 40 per cent. The next step I take will be to tighten offshore profit leakage to make sure we have an operating profit ratio test. As I just said, Pfizer and Facebook—Meta—have worldwide operating profits of about 40 per cent but their operating profit ratio in Australia is only seven per cent. Why is the tax office allowing these multinationals to send so much money overseas when it is clearly in breach of the arms-length transaction rules? I will quote other countries such as Germany and the UK. There is a five per cent withholding tax on sending royalties to those countries. Germany has a company tax rate of 15c, and 15c plus 5c is 20c. You see, there is a 10 per cent arbitrage there if you want to transfer profits offshore. We need to stop the leakage. It is much better to retain earnings in this country from earnings derived in this country than to let earnings go offshore and then have to borrow money from offshore back into Australia. The other thing we need to do is fix up our franking credits in this country. Franking credits are a dog's breakfast. There are only a handful of countries in the world that actually refund franking credits. The whole imputation scheme is very complicated and very inefficient. When Paul Keating originally introduced the imputation credit scheme, that was probably fair enough; we didn't want double taxation. But Peter Costello came along in 2000 and started refunding franking credits. In the year 2000 there was about $500 billion in superannuation; I think there was a little bit less than that. Today there is $3½ trillion in superannuation. Superannuation is forecast to grow to $10 trillion by 2050—I am not quite sure what you will invest in—and is forecast to be about 200 per cent of GDP. The problem with that is that you are effectively going to end up with superannuation funds owning most of the ASX, so companies will pay 30c tax to Canberra, the superannuation fund will then do their tax return and Canberra will then repay 15c back to the superannuation fund. Effectively, our real company tax now, because so much is refunded in franking credits, is actually below 15c. We are effectively eroding our company tax base. Many people talk about the big oil companies not paying enough tax et cetera. We need to stop the erosion of our company tax base. What I'm proposing is a 25 per cent company tax but a 15 per cent rebate. Effectively, for small investors, there will be a $10,000 refund, but, above $10,000 in franking credits, basically all you're going to get is a 15 per cent non-refundable rebate so that your effective rate of tax is 10c. If we don't have that, we are going to erode our company tax base down to zero. It's a little bit complicated, but it's got to be done. The other thing we need to do is abolish the 50 per cent CGT discount. As I discussed earlier today and posted yesterday, that concession costs the tax act $20 billion. Since that was introduced in the late nineties, asset prices have rapidly increased. So we need to look at using that money by abolishing that. Bring back cost indexation—I need to stress that. You can still index your cost base by the rate of inflation. That is what we used to do when I first became an accountant back in 1991. My first job ever was to go through and index the cost base. In a period of inflation, that will actually benefit you if you hold your asset for more than six or seven years anyway, because your cost base will grow by 50 per cent. That policy will encourage people to take a long-term view on their investing. So we need to look at that. What I would then do with that $20 billion is to cut the income tax rate from 30c to 20c between $45,000 and $65,000, because I believe in reward for effort and wealth for toil, and I think our income tax rates in this country are way too high. Yet again, we need to flatten our tax structure, lower the rate of tax on those people that get out of bed and put their noses to the grindstone, and reward effort. There are a number of loopholes in the tax act that I want to get rid of as well, and I'll discuss them very briefly. Section 128F of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 allows interest paid offshore to foreign banks to be tax free. People in Australia have to pay tax on their savings. I don't see why foreign banks don't have to pay tax on the interest income they earn. I also want to get rid of the CGT exemption for foreigners who own less than 10 per cent of a non-real asset. They should also pay CGT, and that includes water rights. Can you believe it? Foreigners can buy water rights and not have to pay CGT on that. That is not a good thing, so we need to remove that as well. There's another thing in the tax act where big Australian multinationals can go offshore and buy companies offshore and, because they buy a permanent establishment offshore, the income earned offshore is not assessable here, but they can use the interest on what they borrowed in Australia as an expense against Australian income. That lacks symmetry, and Australian taxpayers shouldn't have to be subsidising Australian multinationals to expand offshore. I look forward to pushing these policies over the next six to eight months. Senate adjourned at 20:42