2006-09-04 41 1 7 REPS 0 0 2006-09-04 The SPEAKER (Hon. David Hawker) took the chair at 12.30 pm and read prayers. 1 DELEGATION REPORTS 1 1 12.30pm SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 0 The SPEAKER —I present the report of the Australian Parliamentary Delegation to Malaysia from 10 to 17 April and Japan from 17 to 22 April 2006. The visit of the Australian parliamentary delegation to Malaysia and Japan was significant for a number of reasons. It has been some time since a delegation visited these countries and, in particular, the last official parliamentary delegation visit to Malaysia was in 1998. The relationships with both countries, for differing reasons, are enormously important to Australia and the visit provided the opportunity to enhance our already strong connections with each country. The delegation received a very warm welcome in both countries and was treated very generously by the parliaments in Malaysia and Japan. On behalf of the delegation, I would like to thank the host parliaments and their presiding officers for their hospitality and the very interesting nature of the programs they organised. The strength of Australia’s relationship with Malaysia is underpinned by the links developed as a result of the 250,000 Malaysians who are alumni of Australian educational institutions. Many of these are now in senior roles in Malaysia, creating a strong basis for mutual understanding and friendship. Trade and investment have now become an important element in the relationship, with Malaysia being Australia’s second largest trading partner in ASEAN and ninth largest trading partner overall. The delegation considers there are further opportunities for trade and investment to expand, particularly for Australian companies in Malaysia. Australia’s bilateral relationship with Japan is both longstanding and very strong. This delegation visit took place as part of the Australia-Japan Year of Exchange which commemorates the 1976 signing of the Basic Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation between our two countries. The basis for the relationship has been the very strong trading connection, with Japan being Australia’s largest trading partner for more than 40 years. The relationship has broadened and deepened and now encompasses defence and security relationships, cultural and people-to-people ties and a strong mutual interest in regional issues. Whilst in Japan, the delegation reiterated strongly the message which the Prime Minister has conveyed, that Australia has no greater friend in Asia than Japan. The delegation was able to explore a number of the regional issues which are foremost in the minds of the Japanese. In relation to both Malaysia and Japan, Australia is in various stages of negotiations to conclude free trade agreements. The delegation found there was considerable interest in, and support for, free trade agreements with Australia in both countries. The delegation urges the Australian government to pursue this interest to a successful conclusion as it will be to our mutual benefit to do so. The delegation also recommends that the opportunities for Malaysian parliamentarians and senior public servants to visit Australia continue and that there is further promotion to Australian businesses of trade and investment opportunities in Malaysia. Finally, the delegation had the opportunity in both Malaysia and Japan to recognise different aspects of the history of the Second World War. They were both the most moving experiences for the delegation during the visit. In Malaysia, the delegation visited the Sandakan Memorial Park in eastern Sabah, which was the location of a Japanese prisoner of war camp for Australian and British troops. As a result of the brutality of their treatment both in Sandakan and on forced marches into the interior of Borneo, only six of the Australian POWs survived to the end of the war. In Japan, the delegation visited Hiroshima, one of the two Japanese cities devastated by an atomic bomb towards the end of the war in the Pacific. The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and Memorial Monument of Hiroshima, which the delegation visited, provide a lasting reminder of the devastation which can be caused by nuclear weapons. The delegation recommends that Australian cities and local governments consider becoming involved in a Mayors for Peace program which has been promoted by Hiroshima city since 1982. I would like to thank my fellow delegation members for their support and company during the visit, and I particularly thank the deputy delegation leader, the member for Corio, Mr Gavan O’Connor. On behalf of the delegation I would also like to thank all of those who assisted with the visit, including officers of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and of the Parliamentary Library for their briefings. Thanks also to the High Commissioner in Malaysia, His Excellency Mr James Wise, and his staff, particularly Ms Clair Elias, for their assistance and the Ambassador to Japan, His Excellency Mr Murray McLean, and his staff, particularly Ms Catherine Wallace, for their assistance. Finally, I thank the delegation secretary, Mr David Elder, for his diligent support and assistance with the visit. 2 12:37:00 O’Connor, Gavan, MP WU5 Corio ALP 0 0 Mr GAVAN O’CONNOR —Mr Speaker, may I take the opportunity to endorse your remarks on the visit this year of the Australian Parliamentary Delegation to Malaysia and Japan. In my years in this parliament I have been on several delegations and, without any reflection on those delegations or their output, this was the best that I have been a part of. I congratulate you on leading a very successful delegation to two increasingly important countries in our region. Your leadership and diplomacy skills were to the fore throughout the time the delegation was away. I also congratulate other members of the delegation, from right across the political spectrum, who conducted themselves very professionally throughout the visit. The hallmark of this delegation’s visits was its unity and sense of purpose in advancing Australia’s interests in the region. In this parliament, members and senators come in for a lot of criticism for the partisan way in which political issues are often played out in both chambers. It certainly was not the case with this delegation from across the political spectrum. Egos were left at home, as were the partisan political divisions that often occur in this place. This was a focused delegation, and the feedback that I have received only reinforces that point of view. I would like to particularly thank the secretary to the delegation, David Elder, for the terrific organisational and other work that he did on our behalf. I also thank the Ambassador to Japan, Murray McLean, the High Commissioner to Malaysia, James Wise, and their staff for the excellent support that the delegation received while we were away from Australia. As Mr Speaker pointed out, both Malaysia and Japan are increasingly important to this nation and to the region. We were fortunate enough to hold discussions in both countries with a range of ministers, parliamentarians, business leaders and members of the community. This made it a very worthwhile exercise for the Australian delegation. A hallmark was the interchange between the delegation and parliamentarians in these countries. The open and frank discussions reinforced the impression that many in Asia have—that Australians speak their minds but in a way that appreciates the sensitivities of the nations involved. Malaysia is a multicultural society; it has significant Malay and Indian populations. We found a willingness on the part of the Malaysians to engage with us politically in the post-Mahathir era and to build on the enormous relationships that already exist in a commercial, cultural and personal sense, given that some one-quarter of a million Malaysians have been educated in Australia. Malaysia is an excellent springboard for Australia to conduct its relationships with the two emerging giants of Asia: China and India. Mr Speaker, your words also reflect the state of the relationship with Japan. There is no more important relationship in the region for Australia than the one with Japan. That was a message that we sent to Japan, and it was a message well received. Australia, China and Japan must come to grips with the significant issues in the region—the issues of Taiwan and North Korea and various commercial, economic and cultural issues are very important to Australia, Japan and Malaysia. These all got a very frank airing during our visit. As I have explained, the interaction with parliamentarians from Malaysia and Japan was a highlight. The visits to Sandakan and Hiroshima had an extraordinary impact on the delegation and on those who accompanied us. This was also an extraordinary experience for the spouses who accompanied us on the delegation. It was a delegation visit that demonstrated unity among the parliamentarians and their spouses. I was honoured to be a part of it. I thank you, Mr Speaker, for your generous leadership and for the opportunities provided to members of the Labor Party on that delegation to participate. 3 COMMITTEES 3 3 3 12:42:00 Smith, Anthony, MP 00APG Casey LP 1 0 Mr ANTHONY SMITH —On behalf of the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit I present the committee’s report entitled Report 407—review of Auditor-General’s reports tabled between 18 January and 18 April 2005. Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper. 00APG Smith, Anthony, MP Mr ANTHONY SMITH —The Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit, as prescribed by the Public Accounts and Audit Committee Act 1951, examines all reports of the Auditor-General, and reports the results of the committee’s deliberations to the parliament. This report details the findings of the committee’s detailed examination of five performance audits tabled in early 2005. These five reports were selected for further scrutiny from the 21 audit reports presented to the parliament between 12 January and 19 April 2005. The reviews undertaken by the committee covered a number of government agencies and included subjects such as customer service, regulatory functions and contract management. The committee has made recommendations within these reviews to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the agencies and to ensure that the Auditor-General’s recommendations are implemented. In conducting these reviews, the committee has remained aware of the themes it has previously stated it will pursue, including agencies’ financial management, accountability and reporting responsibilities under the Constitution and under the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997. We hope to see continued improvement in agencies’ understanding of and adherence to these responsibilities. As a result of our review of an audit into the investment of public funds, we believe there may be some benefit from a central register of information about investments being undertaken by government agencies. This would enable interested parties, including the parliament, to keep track of the investment of public moneys and could also facilitate further information sharing between agencies on investment practices. The review of the regulation of Commonwealth radiation and nuclear activities by the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency, ARPANSA, covered a number of issues including regulatory business processes, licensing, conflict of interest, cost recovery and the identification and enforcement of unlicensed activity. We have made several recommendations aimed at improving the standards and procedures for regulatory functions within the organisation including transparency in the formulation of national policies codes and standards and facilitating greater sharing of information on uniform national standards for licensing and compliance and for monitoring of radiation sources and nuclear facilities. In addition, we have emphasised the importance of the Department of Health and Ageing providing an adequate level of monitoring of and support to its portfolio agencies. This was in response to similar issues being raised in this audit as were previously examined for the regulation of non-prescription medicinal products by the Therapeutic Goods Administration, another agency within the Health and Ageing portfolio. Agencies such as ARPANSA and TGA have significant roles in terms of the health and safety of the Australian public. Centrelink has again been a focus of the committee’s activities, with two areas subject to review. The first was the Edge project. The software system which was to incorporate thousands of family tax benefit system rules in order to improve the accuracy of the assessment of customer entitlements was terminated before completion. The committee is disappointed that a system which appeared to hold such promise was developed but never fully implemented. The committee believes Centrelink should maintain its momentum to improve the systems in place overall to reduce the rate of errors in its data. The review also highlighted the impact that large numbers of rapid legislative changes have on program implementation by agencies such as Centrelink. The second Centrelink review examined a series of audit reports into Centrelink’s major individual customer feedback systems. The committee report has highlighted such issues as sample selection processes which may lead to bias and ultimately unreliable data, the reporting of such data without transparent reporting of all the source of the data and its limitations, the lack of comprehensive costings across all systems examined and the possible underparticipation of Centrelink’s more vulnerable customers in processes such as value creation workshops. The committee is concerned that, for Centrelink’s customers, their rights are less well understood than their obligations, and it would like to see this imbalance rectified by Centrelink over time. I acknowledge the valuable work of the Auditor-General and his staff at the Audit Office. Finally, I thank my colleagues on the committee of the 41st parliament for the work they have undertaken in completing this review of the Auditor-General’s reports. In particular, I acknowledge the work of Mr Bob Baldwin, who was chair of the committee at the time of these reviews, for initiating the review prior to his appointment as parliamentary secretary. I commend the report to the House. 5 12:47:00 Grierson, Sharon, MP 00AMP Newcastle ALP 0 0 Ms GRIERSON —I also endorse the comments that you made, Mr Speaker, and the member for Corio made regarding the delegation to Malaysia and Japan. In speaking to Report 407—review of Auditor-General’s reports tabled between 18 January and 18 April 2005 of the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit, it is always important to remember that holding government departments to account is a worthy task. It brings great benefits to the Australian people, and the work of the ANAO—the Audit Office—must be praised. It is independent and it certainly is rigorous. I also register my thanks to the secretariat. They have had a major load in catching up after an election, and I think we have done that well together. The report looks at five separate audit reports. They are an interesting group and they certainly are important. The first one was on the investment of public funds and Commonwealth debt management. It deals with over $20 billion of Australian funds: $20 billion held by the Australian Office of Financial Management and $6 billion held under authorities under the Financial Management and Accountability Act. So we are talking about a lot of money that is held in a one-year period, that is surplus when departments are managing their budgets and that needs to be invested. Unfortunately, there were shortcomings found by the Audit Office. There were shortcomings in compliance and in record keeping. The Audit Office also found that records were inaccurate and incomplete and that agencies were still lacking in sound governance and reporting processes. The committee followed up on that work and made several recommendations. Those recommendations went to having absolutely defined investment strategies and to making sure there was value for money. Those recommendations mean that government departments should have an investment strategy, a risk strategy and a report that goes to parliament that says what those strategies are, what the value and return is for those moneys, whether they are managed in house or by external agencies and what fee schedules apply. It is only correct, when we are talking about $26 billion of taxpayers’ money at the end of 2004, that it is managed properly, and I congratulate the committee on their recommendations. The section on regulation of Commonwealth radiation and nuclear activities by ARPANSA has absolute currency, and it is certainly one area on which we need to give the public great assurances. Most importantly, we followed up the Audit Office’s findings that things could be improved a great deal and recommendations were made that I am sure will do that, particularly when the Department of Health and Ageing take their responsibility more seriously in managing those processes and in supporting ARPANSA. It is important to mention that we have recommended that ARPANSA provide a quarterly report to the parliament on any licence breaches, including incidences of noncompliance. The Australian public would like to see those annually reported to parliament and not to read about them in the press. That does nobody any good. This requirement should include a short statement to the parliament even when no breaches have occurred. That would give us confidence that some rigour and professionalism exists in such an important agency. We also looked at Centrelink complaints procedures and the management of them. A third of Australians deal in their daily lives with Centrelink, so it is extremely important that if things are not going well people have a chance to say so. Unfortunately, the Audit Office found that there was no nationally mandated framework for complaints. It found there was no cultural approach; it was up to individual Centrelink programs and officers. It also found that there was no cost framework and that customers were not aware of their rights in making complaints or, if they were, that there was still some fear of retribution. It was a fear that they would be punished in some way—that their moneys would be diminished. Our recommendations went to reforming the system. Certainly it made sure again that there was a public report to this parliament on all the surveys that Centrelink run, what they find in them and how they respond to them. We did find that a lot of activity was happening but that there was not a lot of guided response. We also realised that there are very vulnerable people in our society, such as the mentally ill and the homeless, who are at times not even able to be accessed. We suggested that there have to be ways to put those people into focus groups to make sure that their needs are understood and responded to. The other report we looked at was The Edge Project, which is terribly important at this time when the government is considering some sort of identification card for people across the Centrelink and social security framework. We found that the IT project certainly failed in that case. (Time expired) 6 6 6 12:53:00 May, Margaret, MP 83B McPherson LP 1 0 Mrs MAY —On behalf of the Procedure Committee, I present the committee’s report entitled Learning from other parliaments: study program 2006, together with the minutes of proceedings and a supplementary CD. Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper. 83B May, Margaret, MP Mrs MAY —In April this year several members of the Procedure Committee participated in a study tour to a number of overseas parliaments. I thank the member for Charlton, who is in the chamber today, and the members for Chifley and Cowper for their enthusiastic participation, as well as the Chief Government Whip, the member for Macquarie, who joined us for part of the trip. I would also like to thank the Clerk for approving the participation of the secretary to the Procedure Committee, Ms Judy Middlebrook. The group visited Westminster, London; the Scottish parliament, Edinburgh; the National Assembly for Wales, which is located in Cardiff; the Isle of Man, to visit the Tynwald; and, finally, Paris, to visit the National Assembly. The title of this report, Learning from other parliaments, captures one of the main themes of the visit. We have a tendency, I think, to assume that our way of doing things is fine as it is—and, for the most part, it is. Our practices and procedures have worked well, but that does not mean our system is perfect. We can learn from the experience of other parliaments. In the time available today, I would like to focus on two issues that impressed me during the study tour: the petitioning process and making the parliament more interactive. These are two areas where I think we can be more innovative and enhance the way we operate. As part of its 1999 report It’s your House, the Procedure Committee examined the petition process. One of the concerns the committee had at that time was improving follow-up action once a petition had been lodged. People sign petitions believing that they are an important way of informing the government and the parliament of their views on a particular issue, and they expect that some action will eventuate. While numerically large petitions may get some publicity because of their size, most petitions are recorded in Hansard and there is no obvious follow-up action or response from government. Has the petition had any influence? It is impossible to say with any certainty. The Scottish parliament’s method of dealing with petitions appeared to us to be quite revolutionary. They have established a nine-member Public Petitions Committee that considers, firstly, whether the petition is admissible: is the subject or problem raised in the petition within the power of the Scottish parliament to address? If so, the committee then considers what action should be taken on the petition. Petitioners may be asked to appear before the committee at a public hearing, other individuals or organisations may be invited to give their views on the petition, and the committee writes to the relevant minister asking him or her to respond to the issues raised. In the Scottish experience, ministers respond very positively to invitations to discuss matters raised in the petition. We heard of a number of instances where the petitioning process in Scotland resulted in specific government action on the matters raised, and these are detailed in the report. While the Scottish model may not necessarily be an exact fit for the Australian system, there is much to commend the way it has reinvigorated this very traditional method of raising grievances. The second issue I would like to touch on briefly is that of encouraging a more interactive chamber. We have all heard the criticisms about debate in this place, that it too often consists of members reading overly long speeches to an all but empty chamber and then leaving at the end of their contribution. During our visit to the House of Commons the group was very surprised to learn that any member wanting to participate in a debate is expected to be present during the whole debate. A premature departure would not be conducive to the member getting the call on a future occasion. The length of speeches also has an impact on the extent to which debate is lively and interactive. The average length of a speech on legislation in Scotland, for example, is six minutes. In France speech times are allocated to a political group, which then allocates the time amongst its members. Members may have to share as little as 15 minutes. While I am not advocating either approach, I remind the House that the Procedure Committee in a previous report recommended that second reading speeches be reduced from 20 to 15 minutes, with the balance of the time available for questions and answers. Unfortunately, that recommendation was not accepted at the time. I would like to conclude with a word of thanks to all members and staff of the parliaments we visited who were so generous with their time and expertise. I am sure that the benefits of the visit will continue to be reflected in the work of the Procedure Committee during the remainder of this parliamentary term and into the future. I commend the report to the House. 7 12:57:00 Hoare, Kelly, MP 83Y Charlton ALP 0 0 Ms HOARE —I am pleased to be invited to speak today, with my good friend the member for McPherson, at the tabling of this report entitled Learning from other parliaments, which has arisen out of the study program embarked upon by the majority of members of the Procedure Committee during the Easter break this year. The idea of a Procedure Committee study tour evolved out of discussions towards the end of last year. The committee over the years has tried to pursue investigations into various issues relating to the procedures of our parliament. These have included petitions—the effectiveness or otherwise of them, whether we should have processes in place to enable electronic petitions and how and wether the issues raised in petitions should be acted upon or followed up; the benefits or not of electronic voting in the chamber; the scheduling of votes at a particular time during the day; whether we as members of this chamber have sufficient opportunity to fully scrutinise the legislation which comes before us;  and the involvement of members of parliament in the administration and resourcing of the parliament and its committees: should we have more involvement and how much involvement should we have? They have included the processes of question time—how can the government be made to respond appropriately and relevantly to questions and be held accountable for decisions made or policy areas pursued; the election processes for the Speaker—who should conduct the election of the Speaker and what should be the eligibility requirements of that person; and pursuing more opportunities for backbenchers to speak in the parliament. It was agreed amongst committee members that we would use our individual study leave entitlements to visit various parliaments and chambers in the United Kingdom and Europe. We thank the Clerk of the House of Representatives for approving the participation of the secretary, Judy Middlebrook, and we also thank her for the time, effort and diligence in her guidance and support to us in the program preparation and the conduct of the visit. If it were not for Judy, I doubt whether the study tour would have been as productive as it was or yielded so many opportunities. I understand Judy is recovering from an operation, and I take this opportunity to wish her a full and speedy recovery. We look forward to having her back with us in the Procedure Committee in the near future. The program we set ourselves was ambitious. As outlined in our key themes, we visited and studied the procedures of six chambers: the House of Commons and the House of Lords, from where our own bicameral system has evolved; the Scottish parliament, a relatively new parliament; the Tynwald, on the Isle of Man, which some would argue is the longest continuing running parliament in the world; the Welsh National Assembly, one of the most technologically advanced parliaments; and the French National Assembly. While we as a committee held fairly firm views on the major areas we would like to study, the program in each of the parliaments was put together by the staff of those parliaments, and I would like to thank those people for their effort and goodwill in providing fulfilling programs and also for their warm hospitality. During our visit we also discovered and learnt about things we did not know we needed to know, as is pointed out in the report. We learnt about different ways of being able to communicate with the public, within the chamber, throughout the public areas of the building and also out in our communities. We learnt about the use of technology, ranging from electronic voting to having computer technology within and out of the chamber and the use of information screens throughout the building. We also looked at ways in which we could endeavour to have a more interactive process in the chamber during debates to make that time more effective and relevant for those members participating. The study tour and this report provide a strong basis to pursue many of these issues relating to procedures in our own parliament as we continue to ensure that our procedures help to facilitate continuing good representation for our constituents and to ensure our democratic processes. Finally, I would like thank all of those who participated in the study tour: the chair, the member for McPherson, Margaret May, and her husband David; the member for Chifley, generally known as the father of procedures, Roger Price, and his wife Robyn; the member for Cowper, Luke Hartsuyker, and his wife Irene; the Chief Government Whip, Kerry Bartlett, and his wife Christine; and Judy Middlebrook, whom we all know. I thank you all for your goodwill, your good humour and your continuing friendship and in particular for extending that support and friendship to my daughter Naomi. I commend the report to the House. 10000 Causley, Ian (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. IR Causley)—The time allotted for statements on this report has expired. Does the member for McPherson wish to move a motion in connection with the report to enable it to be debated on a later occasion? Mrs MAY (McPherson) 13:02:00 —I move: That the House take note of the report. Question agreed to. 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —In accordance with sessional order 39, the debate is adjourned. The resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for a later hour this day. 9 MISCELLANEOUS 9 9 Mrs MAY (McPherson) 13:02:00 —I move: That the order of the day be referred to the Main Committee for debate. Question agreed to. 9 COMMITTEES 9 9 9 13:02:00 Washer, Dr Mal, MP 84F Moore LP 1 0 Dr WASHER —On behalf of the Standing Committee on Environment and Heritage I present the committee’s interim report on its inquiry into a sustainability charter, Review of green office procurement audit—review of Audit report No. 22 2005-2006. Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper. 84F Washer, Dr Mal, MP Dr WASHER —This report is entitled Review of green office procurement audit. It is a review of Audit report No. 22 2005-2006, which reported on the Auditor-General’s Cross-portfolio audit of green office procurement practices in Australian government agencies. The committee undertook this review as part of its inquiry into a national sustainability charter and is now tabling its conclusions as an interim report. The committee recognises that the procurement activities of Australian government agencies can have a significant effect on the environment. Agencies’ buildings and vehicles consume energy resulting in greenhouse gas emissions. They produce waste that sits in landfills and they consume scarce resources. It is crucial that the government does all it can to encourage and enable its agencies to tackle procurement in a manner that takes into account and minimises negative environmental impacts. Audit report No. 22 2005-2006 was tabled in the House in February this year. The committee was deeply concerned by the Auditor-General’s findings of significant shortcomings in the green procurement performance of Australian government agencies, and the apparent lack of a clear policy framework to drive better outcomes in agencies’ purchasing activities. Overall, agencies’ office building energy efficiencies met government expectations, but performance in government fleet vehicle emissions, reducing office waste and conserving water was variable and, in most cases, poor. In particular, the ANAO identified gaps in the application of whole-of-life-cycle costing and in the management of the environmental impacts of procurement decisions. This is occurring despite Australia’s 1992 National Strategy for Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD) and despite section 516A of the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, which requires Commonwealth agencies to report on their activities to support ESD principles. It is clear to the committee that existing strategies and requirements are not getting the job done. The committee was heartened to see that the Auditor-General was able to highlight a small number of success stories that can be used as a better practice guide to other agencies. However, overall, the current piecemeal approach to green procurement hinders the development of a cohesive and coordinated approach to sustainable government practices. In its Sustainable cities report tabled in September 2005, this committee highlighted the need for an overarching framework that provides for coordinated action to help drive Australia towards creating sustainable cities. The focus of the Sustainable cities report was of course much wider than green procurement. It examined a number of areas, including water, transport, energy, building design and planning. Three key recommendations to come out of the Sustainable cities report were: to establish an Australian sustainability charter that sets key national targets; for all new relevant government policy proposals and actions to be assessed against charter objectives; and to establish an independent National Sustainability Commission tasked to monitor the extent to which Commonwealth funds promote the agreed sustainability targets. The committee has not yet received a government response to its Sustainable cities report. However, the committee felt that an issue of this magnitude demands urgent action. In March this year, it commenced its inquiry into developing a national sustainability charter. The charter should be aspirational and provide appropriate environmental targets for the Australian community. The committee is inquiring into and will report on key elements of a sustainability charter, including the built environment, water, energy, transport and ecological footprints. The committee has not made any recommendations in the interim report being tabled today. However, what has become clear to the committee during this review is the void that exists when it comes to national leadership on green procurement practices and indeed wider environmental performance issues. Many of the shortcomings in current government environmental practice can be addressed within the context of developing and implementing a national sustainability charter. Action is being taken on a variety of environmental issues around Australia. The committee has come across initiatives that are working and others that have great potential. The three levels of government, industry, NGOs and the community are passionate about a sustainable future for Australia. What is lacking is an effective national framework to guide these efforts. The Commonwealth government now has a real opportunity to take a leadership role at the national level to work in partnership with state and territory governments to establish a national charter and set key targets that have the potential to shape the behaviour of government agencies and the Australian community. I commend this report to the House. 11 13:08:00 George, Jennie, MP JH5 Throsby ALP 0 0 Ms GEORGE —I take the opportunity today to make some further comments on the report Review of green office procurement audit, a report undertaken by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on the Environment and Heritage as part of its inquiry into establishing a national sustainability charter. The report covers the findings and recommendations made by the Australian National Audit Office in its cross-portfolio audit on the implementation, or at times lack thereof, of sustainable practices across 71 government agencies. That report was tabled in the House in February this year. As the chair of the committee has indicated, the audit report identified a number of significant shortcomings. Half of the agencies, for example, did not have any environmental performance targets. Critical to this failure, in the view of the ANAO, was the slow implementation of environmental management systems. The report notes that performance in managing motor vehicle emissions, reducing or recycling general office waste and conserving water has been variable across the 71 agencies, and in the majority of cases in the findings the outcomes were poor. The audit identified an absence of specific requirements in waste management and water conservation and identified shortcomings in agencies meeting the government’s stated objective that these agencies should be at the forefront of environmental purchasing practices. In all, the ANAO made 16 recommendations to improve performance in sustainable office practices. Its final recommendation to the department sought to strengthen the sustainability framework for Australian government operations. It recommends the department pursue a number of strategies to achieve best practice green office procurement in energy efficiency, water conservation, waste management and general practices by a suggested range of strategies such as updating or introducing targets and policies to reflect commitments in each area; developing a comprehensive website and communication strategy to achieve the targets; and, very importantly, better monitoring and reporting against performance targets and progress being made towards sustainability goals. It was clear from the ANAO report that the current piecemeal approach of this government to green procurement is hindering the development of a practical and coordinated approach to sustainable procurement practices across the breadth of government agencies. The department, in response to these recommendations, does propose to develop a strategic framework for public sector environmental performance. No such framework currently exists. The House of Representatives committee recognises that procurement activities of all levels of government can have a significant impact on environmental outcomes. It is crucial that governments at all levels encourage and require of their agencies procurement policies that take into account and minimise negative environmental impacts. The significant shortcomings identified by the Audit Office in its review of green office procurement highlight the need for comprehensive policy, targets and practical guidelines if government agencies themselves are to improve their environmental performance. The House of Representatives committee was chaired by my colleague Mal Washer, the member for Moore. The committee indicated quite clearly that many of the shortcomings that are identified in this report can and should be addressed within the context of our mission to develop a sustainability charter for Australia. We are indeed indebted to the ANAO for its comprehensive audit. The committee was concerned by the findings of significant shortcomings in the green procurement performance of this government and its agencies and the lack of a clear policy framework to drive better outcomes in the future. We trust the Minister for the Environment and Heritage and his department will very speedily rectify these obvious shortcomings. 10000 Causley, Ian (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. IR Causley)—The time allotted for statements on this report has expired. Does the member for Moore wish to move a motion in connection with the report to enable it to be debated on a future occasion? Dr WASHER (Moore) 13:12:00 —I move: That the House take note of the report. 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —In accordance with standing order 39, the debate is adjourned. The resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting. 12 BILLS R2609 12 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Katter. 12 13:13:00 Katter, Bob, MP HX4 Kennedy IND 0 0 Mr KATTER —In commending the Fuel Quality Standards (Renewable Content of Motor Vehicle Fuel) Amendment Bill 2006 to the House, I will put before the House some relevant facts. I start with the failure of the government’s current policy of moral suasion and some small incentivism. Since this policy was initiated by the government in 2002, Australian ethanol production has fallen from 75 million litres to only 23 million litres in 2005, a deplorable failure of government policy. Secondly, the great republic of the United States, through the Clean Air Act, are on nearly five per cent ethanol content in their fuel now. The act triggers the requirement for oxygenation of gasoline—which is what Americans call petrol—when it does not hit what they call the non-attainment ozone level. The three tiers of government in the United States have also passed into law the Energy Policy Act 2005, which legislates for 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol in gasoline by 2012, which is around five per cent. The bill I am presenting in the House today mirrors that United States act. The United States President, George W. Bush, in his State of the Union address on 31 January 2006, stated: Our goal is to make … ethanol … replace 75 percent of our oil imports from the Middle East by 2025. Thirdly, and overwhelmingly of the greatest importance: people are suffering and dying in Australia’s major cities from small particles of hydrocarbon material not chemically consumed in engine combustion and the release of carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which we refer to as aromatics, which are in petrol in many forms. Ethanol contains 30 per cent oxygen, providing a much better combustion and therefore fewer small particles are released, there is more power and a raised RON, enabling dramatic reduction of aromatics. I have provided for the House a quote from the State of the Union message and the United States legislation which we are mirroring in the House today. I move on to the Journal of the American Medical Association, the most distinguished medical journal in the world, which has a report that indicates a doubling of the amount of small particles in the air results in a doubling of lung cancer mortality. A similar article covers the same issue in New Scientist magazine. I have a quote from Dr Tom Beer, the leading air quality expert in Australia, with the CSIRO: ‘Mortality in Australia due to air pollution is higher than the road toll.’ The air pollution he is referring to is that coming out of our motor vehicles in exhaust fumes. It is a shocking reflection upon this government that nothing has been done to allay the misery and suffering that is occurring in our major cities—where seven of my grandchildren live, by the way, Mr Deputy Speaker. The Australian Medical Association has urged and pleaded with the government to introduce mandated ethanol. A statement has been made by Professor Carney of the University of Sydney, one of the leading experts in Australia along with Dr Jonathan Streeton. They have been the strongest and most passionate advocates to save people from suffering and dying. The fourth point I want to make is in relation to the graph released by ABARE and Geoscience Australia, which we all know as the Bureau of Mineral Resources, shows that Australia had been over 90 per cent self-sufficient in our petrol requirements up till about 2002. From now on there will be a dramatic drop in production in Australia. This graph shows that over the next five or six years we will drop down to about 27 per cent self-sufficiency in oil from our current 95 per cent. The country is running out of petrol and we are doing nothing about it. The price, I do not have to tell anyone in this House, is around $1.30 a litre. I put before the House four photographs of bowsers in Brazil, where petrol is selling at 68c a litre. (Time expired) Bill read a first time. 10000 Causley, Ian (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. IR Causley)—In accordance with standing order 41(d) the second reading will be made an order of the day for the next sitting. 13 PRIVATE MEMBERS’ BUSINESS 13 13 13:18:00 Garrett, Peter, MP HV4 Kingsford Smith ALP 0 0 Mr GARRETT —I move: That this House. notes that: microcredit is a particularly effective and sustainable means of eradicating poverty; microcredit borrowers, particularly women, generate income that allows them to feed, clothe, educate and care for the health of their children; to date 66.6 million people in the world have been reached with microcredit services; Goal 1 of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) seeks to eradicate poverty, while its 2015 target is to reduce by half the number of people living on less than $1 per day; if the new Microcredit Summit goal of having 175 million of the world’s poorest families receiving microcredit were reached by 2015, then nearly half the MDG target would be met; Australia spent $14.5 million on microcredit in the 2005-06 Aid Budget, which is 0.6% of the Aid Budget; and the USA, which funded microcredit longer than most donor countries, has established an international benchmark for microcredit spending, being 1.25% of the aid budget; urges the Australian Government to agree to support the new Microcredit Summit goal of having 175 million of the world’s poorest people receiving microcredit by 2015 as a means of achieving the MDG; and urges the Australian Government to increase the proportion of money it allocates to microcredit to 1.25% of the aid budget. This parliament, through the agenda set by the government, does not focus sufficient time or resources on the pressing issues of resolving and reducing global poverty, despite the fact that it remains one of the most important and critical issues of our time. And it is one of the glaring deficiencies of the government’s aid budget that the allocation for microcredit programs is so paltry. The government likes to emphasise the importance of trade reform in its aid budget, but its approach lacks balance. Despite recent increases in our aid budget, we still sit at the bottom of the league of equivalent countries in giving aid, and programs which can provide a direct means of enabling people to loosen the bindings of circumstance and conditions where poverty is the norm must be given priority. My colleague the shadow minister for overseas aid and Pacific island affairs will speak to these matters subsequently. Microfinance, or microcredit as it is also known, is the provision of small loans and other financial services to the very poor. As the report by poverty advocacy group RESULTS, released in December last year, noted, microcredit is considered the best tool we have to reduce poverty amongst the very poor. Recent estimates suggest that up to 1.2 billion people worldwide, which equates to around 250 million families, live on less than $US1 a day and are subsequently considered ‘very poor’. Consequently this motion concerns the need for the government to expand its commitment to microcredit and so provide additional numbers of impoverished people in our region and beyond with the means of breaking out of the very difficult situation they face. Microcredit has, since the 1970s, grown as a proven and constructive way of getting people started along the road to economic sufficiency. By making small loans, usually without security, to people to enable them to start up small businesses, opportunities are created—often taken up by women, who are powerful actors and agents for development—a circuit breaker emerges and the cycle of poverty can be broken and people’s lives improved as a result. Analysis by the World Bank has clearly shown that increased access to financial services does help to directly reduce poverty and explains why the provision of microcredit is considered such an important tool in the tool kit for action on poverty. This motion follows on from the highly successful United Nations International Year of Microcredit in 2005, which saw increased focus on this very practical way of addressing poverty in poor nations. This motion reflects the desire in this parliament and of many in the broader Australian community for the Australian government to effectively address the Millennium Development Goals and to make poverty history. One key means of doing just that is to substantially increase the support that is given through the aid budget for microcredit. The Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs and Trade is on the record as saying that he is all for microcredit and that he is optimistic we are going to see more support going into this area. It is time these words were turned into action by the Howard government. At this point in time microcredit takes up a tiny segment of the Australian aid budget, representing less than 1c of every aid dollar spent. We must do better. This motion calls on the government to expand the funding provision for microcredit from the current figure of 0.6 per cent of the aid budget to 1.25 per cent, an increase to around $25 million—not a large sum in comparison with the aid budget. Consistent with the millennium development goals of halving the number of people living on less than $1 a day by 2015, such a commitment would see Australia meeting the target identified by the microcredit summit of extending microcredit to 175 million of the world’s poorest people. It is estimated that it would reach nearly half of this millennium development goal. The United States, as noted in this motion, has established a benchmark of 1.25 per cent for microcredit. There is no reason why Australia should not do the same. This motion is about financial access for poor people. It is about providing people not with a handout but with a hand up. Access to microcredit enables self-sufficiency. It provides the means for people to produce income and to improve their health, their nutrition, their housing and their overall development. It works, as shown by the example of poverty reduction in Bangladesh, where microcredit programs have been well established for some time, and our aid program needs to respond now to this proven and practical means of addressing poverty. I commend the motion to the House. (Time expired) 10000 Causley, Ian (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. IR Causley)—Is the motion seconded? QK6 Sercombe, Bob, MP Mr Sercombe —I second the motion and reserve my right to speak. 15 13:23:00 Slipper, Peter, MP 0V5 Fisher LP 1 0 Mr SLIPPER —At the outset I would like to congratulate the member for Kingsford Smith on proposing the motion we are currently debating in the House. At first glance there are some who would suggest that microcredit could well be the saviour of the world’s poor. It is a concept whereby those living in poverty are given access to small amounts of money by way of a loan that it is hoped will give them the buying power they need to break out of their difficult existence. Historically the first loans under this scheme were made by university Professor Muhammad Yunus in Bangladesh in the mid-1970s, and the amounts amazingly were $27. Typical loans under Professor Yunus’s microcredit scheme were under $50, while the women’s group Activists for Social Alternatives, based in India, hands out initial loans for amounts as low as $2.70. Under the scheme developed by Professor Yunus through his Grameen Bank, initial small loans that were successfully paid back enabled the borrower to qualify for larger loans. In most schemes the creditors are sorted in groups of around five members. All members of the group suffer if one of their members fails to meet repayment obligations, and this acts as an effective motivator to keep up the determination to strive for success—in other words, people do not want to let down people who they are sorted with because, if they default, then everyone suffers. The key to this system is the initial small loans to the poor with the overarching belief that with careful management and hard work even a small amount of money loaned to those living in poverty can lead to improvements in the existence of the recipients. If one searches, it is possible to find anecdotes about the success of these schemes. One of Professor Yunus’s early successes was a woman who used one of the first $27 loans to start a bamboo furniture business, which was soon profitable enough to support her family. A microcredit scheme in China, for example, is where loans are afforded to buy chickens, pigs or goats which are bred to create new stock that are sold to repay the loans. The term of the loan varies according to the type of animal. Chickens, for example, breed and grow more quickly to a sellable size, while pigs and goats take longer to develop. So the loan terms have been set accordingly. In Bosnia, a village resident who had struggled to make ends meet by selling second-hand clothes was able to take out a loan for $325. She used it to buy clothing which she sold at market and as a result was able to repay her loan within 15 days. For us here in Australia, success stories with a microcredit industry should be a source of inspiration. If those suffering poverty can make a go of it, there really should be no excuse for us, living in one of the world’s most economically successful nations, to at least aim high. While the World Bank has recognised microcredit as having potential as an agent for development, there are shortcomings. A report from Bangladesh showed that loan recipients ‘tend to use their credit for the same limited range of small-scale activities’ and ‘they soon reach a modest ceiling on the amount they can earn. The reality is that in any given situation there is likely to be only a limited range of economically viable small-scale activities available to the modestly skilled poor and a limited demand for the product of any particular activity.’ It is also noted that microcredit is not a particularly effective generator of employment, which is needed for overall economic growth and stabilisation. There are also concerns that new business established as a result of a microcredit loan may actually create a sort of subsidised competition for existing businesses, thereby destabilising a local economy. One report noted that the Grameen Bank loan recipients had an extremely high rate of loan repayment: Repayment discipline is strict and subsequent loans to a group are dependent on repayment performance. Repayment rates average 97 per cent ... A comparison of the bank’s members with other poor households shows that the former have clearly benefited from the services provided. Having said that, the Australian government does support microcredit as a very effective tool for reducing poverty and increasing incomes—but, we stress, in the right settings. Experience has shown that a number of preconditions are needed for microcredit to be fully effective, and these include macroeconomic stability, appropriate financial regulatory systems and enterprise laws, protection of property rights, access by the poor to healthcare and education and key infrastructure such as roads and electricity. In addition to direct support from microcredit, the Australian aid program focuses on supporting these enabling conditions. So the Australian government through the AusAID program does recognise the importance of microcredit. In fact, we support it and we should look at further supporting it. (Time expired) 16 13:28:00 Sercombe, Bob, MP QK6 Maribyrnong ALP 0 0 Mr SERCOMBE —I join the member for Fisher in commending the member for Kingsford Smith for bringing on a discussion of this important matter. It is appropriate to discuss this issue, particularly at a time when matters relating to the quantum of developed countries overseas development assistance are very much on the agenda, and also the issue of the effectiveness and the priorities that that development assistance reflects. Increased levels of and more effective development assistance are vital not just because it is the right thing—the moral, ethical thing—for the developed world to do but because it is overwhelmingly in our interests as well. As the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, has remarked, you cannot have development without security but, equally, you cannot have security without development. In a world where many hundreds of millions of people live in grinding poverty, the question of global stability and global security is very much in the balance. It is in this context that issues such as microcredit are critically important—because, as the member for Fisher and the member for Kingsford Smith have already indicated, microcredit works. It works at very localised levels where individuals, families and communities with access to small amounts of credit are able to do things like sow crops, pay for their kids to go to school or capitalise microbusinesses—all things that are preconditions for sustainable reductions in poverty. Microcredit is critically important in those respects. But, as indicated by the member for Kingsford Smith, despite the comments of the member for Fisher, Australia really lags dramatically in this area. Only some $14½ million in the 2005-06 aid budget was committed for microcredit schemes. This represents about 0.6 per cent of Australia’s aid budget. That compares with the international benchmark set by the United States of 1.25 per cent, which is more than double Australia’s contribution in percentage terms as well as being dramatically larger in real and absolute terms. In a discussion paper that the member for Kingsford Smith and I were involved in launching earlier this year, Labor put forward a proposal for a Pacific development trust. Such a trust would engage the private commercial sector and non-government organisations along with governments—both the Australian government and Pacific island governments—in systematically addressing the question of access to credit in our more immediate Pacific neighbourhood. That is critically important. I am pleased to say that, since we have launched that paper—in fact, in June this year—an organisation called Microfinance Pasifika Network has been launched. That organisation is involved with not just advocacy but also the promotion of new technology for delivering credit, as well as innovation and best practice for addressing the unique needs of the Pacific region. A number of Australian commercial enterprises are involved in this network, in particular the Westpac Bank and the ANZ Bank. This network now desperately needs the engagement and commitment of the Australian government—from the very measly base that the Australian government has established in this area—to take things forward. In this context, I particularly want to commend the ANZ Bank, under the chairmanship of Bob Lyon, which has shown extraordinary innovation and capacity in terms of addressing the rural banking needs of many parts of our Pacific neighbourhood. It is a pity that the Australian government is not backing up what until now essentially has been a private sector enterprise in order to really start producing much better outcomes in our own Pacific region. Other speakers have referred to a more broad based Asian approach to this matter—for example, as with Bangladesh. In March this year, in Beijing, the Asia Microfinance Forum attracted nearly 300 participants. They heard of some very exciting and innovative ways in which not just financial benefits but also technological leading edge stuff can be delivered to developing countries. For example, they heard about a telecom company in the Philippines which has turned mobile phones into electronic wallets to handle remittances, donations, loan settlements, salary credits and bill payments via text messages. This is the sort of innovation that developing countries require and it needs to be translated much more actively into our more immediate Pacific region. However, there are areas where, as I have said earlier and as the member for Kingsford Smith has said, the Australian government is badly lagging. (Time expired) 17 13:34:00 Wood, Jason, MP E0F La Trobe LP 1 0 Mr WOOD —I thank the member for Kingsford Smith for bringing this important motion on microcredit to the House’s attention and I also congratulate the member for Maribyrnong for looking at this as not only a moral issue but also a security issue. The member for Kingsford Smith has raised several issues relevant to the achievements of the Millennium Development Goals. Specifically, he seeks support for the following two propositions: that the Australian government support the goal of 175 million people receiving microcredit by 2015; and that the Australian government increase microcredit funding to 1.25 per cent of the Australian aid budget. The MDGs are, of course, globally adopted targets for the reduction of extreme poverty. It is widely acknowledged that the continuing availability of microcredit to adequate levels underpins the achievement of these targets. The link between microcredit and MDG 1, which is eradicating hunger and poverty, is perhaps the strongest of all. A World Bank study has shown that microcredit has been responsible for 40 per cent of the entire reduction of moderate poverty in rural Bangladesh. But what is microcredit? Microcredit is a program of low-interest loans and other financial services, such as savings and insurance, to impoverished people who are unable to borrow through ordinary channels. These loans are usually made to women to enable them to expand or establish small businesses, such as waste recycling and animal husbandry. Microcredit projects supported by the Australian government through AusAID have helped tens of thousands of poor households in Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and Vietnam. For example, the Capital Aid for the Employment of the Poor, or CEP, project was established in Vietnam in 2001. Average loans provided by CEP are just over $200. These are provided to poor households in urban and rural Ho Chi Minh City. Significantly, 80 per cent of its clients are women. One of the many success stories of this project is Ms Nguyen Thi Hoang. Hoang applied for a $170 loan to buy a sewing machine. At the time Hoang and her brothers were peeling cashews for 34c per kilo. Hoang now earns about $2.50 a day making clothes and has become the family’s breadwinner. The year 2005 was the International Year of Microcredit. A national committee was established in Australia to increase awareness of microcredit and to lobby for an increase in funding. One of the three groups on that committee was RESULTS Australia, which operates out of Belgrave in my electorate. RESULTS Australia has been a strong advocate of microcredit for some time. Last month I met with Sue Packham and Emmanuelle Emile-Blake of RESULTS to discuss Australia’s progress towards the MDGs. They have met with me on a number of occasions, and I congratulate them on their hard work. Like the member for Kingsford Smith, RESULTS Australia has called for Australia to aim for microcredit to reach 175 million people by 2015 and for an increase in aid funding for microcredit to 1.25 per cent of total aid. This is a view I fully endorse, and I fully support the member for Kingsford Smith’s motion. Microcredit requires a tiny outlay and delivers enormous returns; 1.25 per cent still represents a very small proportion of Australia’s aid budget. If it takes 175 million people being reached by microcredit to achieve the MDGs then that must be the benchmark. However, Australia’s contribution to date should not be overlooked. In 2006-07 Australia will provide just under $3 billion worth of official development assistance. The current ratio of Australia’s aid to gross national income, GNI, for 2006-07 is around 0.3 per cent, which is above the international donor average and is keeping us on track to achieve the MDGs by 2015. However, I share the view that Australia’s aid should reach the internationally agreed target of 0.7 per cent of GNI by 2015. Ordinary Australians in my electorate are doing an amazing amount of work to reach these targets. For example, the Friends of Ermera focuses its efforts on the Ermera district in East Timor, and Peter Cole is organising his second Operation Sports Airlift to help children in Fiji. (Time expired) 19 13:39:00 Murphy, John, MP 83D Lowe ALP 0 0 Mr MURPHY —I congratulate the member for Kingsford Smith on this motion. It is appalling that poverty is an issue today, as it was decades ago. Sadly, tens of thousands of children continue to die from poverty related causes which are entirely preventable. We in this chamber have a duty to bring to the public consciousness the plight of men, women and children world wide and to find solutions. While Australia became a signatory to the UN Millennium Development Goals with epochal determination to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, many of my constituents in Lowe have questioned the quantum and nature of Australia’s foreign aid commitments. I have previously raised my concerns with the Minister for Foreign Affairs that too large an emphasis has been placed on governance programs, rather than on basic poverty reduction, in developing countries. This much was reflected in a recent survey by the US think tank the Centre for Global Development, which ranked Australia 15th out of 21 of the world’s richest countries for the proportion of national income dedicated to foreign aid. The size of Australia’s aid program, as well as that of many other developed countries, has led many to rightly question whether the laudable Millennium Development Goals are slowly slipping out of reach. It is difficult to remain optimistic when we know that tens of thousands of children are still dying from poverty related causes and billions have little or no access to basic health care and nutrition. To the minister’s credit, under the aid white paper we have seen a welcome increase in Australia’s aid program from 0.28 per cent of gross national income to 0.36 per cent by 2010. Nevertheless, the Labor Party believes Australia’s contributions should be greater. There is no logical reason why we cannot join, hand in hand, with the many other OECD countries that have committed 0.7 per cent of their gross national income to change the lives of the poorest and most vulnerable members of our global community. However, this is a debate for another day. Despite the current government’s increase in Australia’s aid budget, concerns still arise as to how this aid will be spent. There can be no doubt that the quality of aid contribution is just as important as aid volume. It is in this light that I wish to speak in glowing terms about microcredit financing. Microcredit promotes the use of small, collateral-free loans to help impoverished families set up small business ventures and to assist with self-employment. In some of the poorest villages in the world’s poorest countries, we have seen millions of families use these loans to build businesses and futures for their communities. Brett Kuhnell, from World Vision Australia, provided an example of this last year: a sandal maker in Burma who borrowed $40 developed a business which now hires eight locals to sell 80 pairs of sandals a day. Such examples are by no means unique. An eight-year World Bank study in Bangladesh found that 48 per cent of the poorest households with access to microcredit loans rose above the poverty line. In The End of Poverty, Jeffery D. Sachs said: At the most basic level, the key to ending extreme poverty is to enable the poorest of the poor to get their foot on the ladder of development. The ladder of development hovers overhead, and the poorest of the poor are stuck beneath it. They lack the minimum amount of capital necessary to get a foothold, and therefore need a boost up to the first rung. This is the very boost that microcredit provides, such is the potential for microcredit to empower the poor and facilitate a way for them to rebuild their own lives. We cannot allow the concept to expand at a snail’s pace. We must do all we can to broaden access to microcredit loans. Yet the pool of money available for microcredit lending is not large enough and must increase. That is why this motion is so important. As the member for Kingsford Smith said a moment ago, the Howard government must do everything it can to increase the proportion of money it allocates to microcredit to 1.25 per cent of the aid budget. While it would be a noble thing to increase Australia’s aid and microcredit budgets in their own rights, the Howard government would need not think it were doing so purely for altruistic reasons. There are common-sense arguments to suggest that achieving national security is not entirely possible without taking real action to eliminate poverty. While I do not suggest that poverty and terrorism are inexorably linked, the Howard government cannot continue to preoccupy itself with a narrow and one-dimensional approach to national security. We cannot deny that poverty, combined with the absence of education, has fuelled the capacity of terrorist organisations to recruit people to their cause. It cannot be denied that Australia’s fate is inexorably linked with the fate of the majority of the world’s people, including those in our region, who live in countries that are struggling with poverty. We cannot leave the door open for extremists to recruit from the poor and marginalised, no matter how remote this proposition may seem to some. In an era of economic prosperity, Australia cannot continue to ignore the growing disparity of wealth between rich and poor nations. It is in Australia’s interest to do more to fight global poverty. Fighting the scourge of global poverty is certainly not a panacea for the scourge of terrorism. However, it would be appalling in the extreme if, with the benefit of hindsight, we came to realise that the most effective antiterrorism strategy could have been a $40 loan to a man or woman who was simply looking to feed his or her family. (Time expired) 20 13:44:00 Barresi, Phillip, MP ZJ6 Deakin LP 1 0 Mr BARRESI —In the very short time I have to speak on this motion, I would like to say that history has shown microcredit to be an effective tool for reducing poverty and increasing incomes in the right settings. I would like to take this opportunity to highlight two organisations that have done considerable work in the area of microcredit. The first, World Vision, is located in my electorate and is headed up by the Reverend Tim Costello. The second is Opportunity International, and I have had a number of dealings with it over the years. Both organisations are amongst several hundred that are involved in extending microcredit facilities to people in impoverished nations. Microcredit organisations such as Opportunity International and World Vision provide microcredit— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! It being 1.45 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting. The member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed on a future day. 20 STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS 20 20 13:45:00 Albanese, Anthony, MP R36 Grayndler ALP 0 0 Mr ALBANESE —Tonight John Howard’s Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage is hosting a screening of An Inconvenient Truth, the movie about climate change narrated by Al Gore. Unfortunately for the Prime Minister, at a key point in the movie, Al Gore states: [Is America] going to be left behind as the rest of the world moves forward? There are only two advanced nations in the world that have not ratified Kyoto and we are one of them. The other is Australia. The inconvenient truth for John Howard is that he has isolated Australia from global action on climate change, increasing the risk of environmental and economic damage to Australia. He should listen to the businesses that are saying it will cost less if we take action now. The Howard government’s wait-and-see approach to climate change is unforgivable. Younger generations will record those climate sceptics who deny human contribution to climate change as being, at best, misguided. Those who acknowledge the problem of climate change but fail to take serious action will be judged far more severely. I hope that members and senators take the opportunity to see the movie tonight and to pressure the Howard government into changing its position, which has seen emissions rise by a disastrous 25.1 per cent between 1990 and 2004, when land use changes are excluded. Climate change is cutting water supplies to our cities and agriculture and Australia’s leading businesses are saying that ‘climate change is a major business risk and we need to act now’. There are independent reports and expert advice from CSIRO stating that, if strong action is not taken, Australia is under threat. (Time expired) 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I remind all honourable members that they should refer to other members by their seat or ministerial title. 21 21 13:47:00 Bartlett, Kerry, MP 0K6 Macquarie LP 1 0 Mr BARTLETT —On 20 August the Blue Mountains Vietnam Veterans and Associated Forces continued the tradition they began in 1985 by commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan with a march and memorial service for Vietnam veterans in Springwood. After local students and community groups marched with our local ex-service men and women through the streets of Springwood, a moving memorial service was held at the local cenotaph. In his address Vice Chief of the Australian Defence Force, Lieutenant General Ken Gillespie, encouraged each of us to continue taking part in these vital commemorations to demonstrate our pride and gratitude for those who have served, and those who continue to serve, our country. The Battle of Long Tan was perhaps the most groundbreaking conflict of the Vietnam War, where 18 Australians paid the highest price to defeat enemy forces against overwhelming odds. We thank our local ex-service organisations—in this instance the Blue Mountains Vietnam Veterans and Associated Forces in particular—for their tireless efforts in ensuring Australians are given opportunities such as these to honour the service of our past and present defence personnel. Perhaps one of the greatest legacies of our Vietnam veterans is the camaraderie they displayed on the battlefield that was so evident and inspiring in our commemorative march. Their mateship is truly an example of the Australian spirit that we cherish today. The federal government’s Saluting Their Service commemorations program provided a number of local organisations in Macquarie and around Australia with funding for their special anniversary commemorations. It is vital that we continue to support these selfless organisations. (Time expired) 21 21 13:48:00 Hall, Jill, MP 83N Shortland ALP 0 0 Ms HALL —I take this opportunity to congratulate the mighty Lakes United on an outstanding season. Yesterday Lakes capped a fantastic season with their victory in the Newcastle rugby league grand final. The game was close for the entire first half and a large part of the second half before Lakes were able to kick away to a comfortable 40-24 victory. Yesterday’s victory was Lakes’ first premiership since 2001. In addition to winning yesterday’s grand final, this year Lakes won the Super Sevens competition in Wagga, the Konami Pre-Season Cup and the major and minor Newcastle rugby league premierships. It is my understanding that it has been 20 years since any club has achieved this mammoth feat. Lakes United is a club with a proud history and I am very proud of the club’s achievements both on and off the field. I particularly congratulate Ian Bourke, who coached the team as well as playing in it, and captain and five-eighth, Paul Skovgaard, on his great effort in the grand final and on winning Man of the Match. I would also like to congratulate the Belmont Sporties Club for the role it played in the victory and the role it continues to play in supporting local sport. Congratulations, Lakes, and I hope that next year is as good as this year. You are great role models for the young people in Shortland. 22 22 13:49:00 Laming, Andrew, MP E0H Bowman LP 1 0 Mr LAMING —Today we are celebrating the cave-in by the Beattie government on access to Moreton Bay for fishermen and for recreational and commercial users. It was this weekend that the Beattie government, and in particular Deputy Premier Anna Bligh, agreed to fair representation on any advisory committee deciding the future of Moreton Bay zoning, to a complete review of the use of Moreton Bay, to a joint cabinet submission—not just one put up by Environment—to no pre-emptive decisions in this area and to making data publicly available. Those five simple concessions could not be made 31 days ago at the Cleveland Sands fishing forum; could not be made by the Minister for Environment, Local Government, Planning and Women, Desley Boyle, who only promised not to ban fishing; and, of course, could not be made until an eleventh-hour appeal to stop the convoy to Parliament House on Saturday. Well, the government finally caved in. This is a government that clearly has a capacity to listen but not to understand the views of local fishers and recreational users. What we have now is a Moreton Bay Access Alliance with a voice for local users and a future for the use of Moreton Bay. Through Bruce Alvey, Rod Henderson, local fishing groups, recreational users of the bay and Andrew Trim, a local Liberal candidate, fighting hard for those views, we can look forward to future generational use of Moreton Bay and not eleventh-hour capitulations by the Beattie government, which is failing to listen to the locals. 22 22 13:51:00 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 0 0 Mr FITZGIBBON —Australia and, indeed, the international wine industry suffered a great loss with the passing of Len Evans on 17 August. No-one did more than Len Evans to awaken traditionally beer-drinking Australians to the delights of wine consumption. No-one has done more to promote Australia’s now-famous wines in other countries. Born in England in 1930, Len declined a scholarship at Cambridge to become a professional golfer, a game he enjoyed until his passing. Living in Sydney during the 1950s, he became a writer of note, contributing to the Observer and to the script of the Mavis Bramston Show. He later contributed to many publications and books on wine. His love of wine began when he took a job as a glass-washer at the Ship Inn and developed extensively and rapidly when he became food and beverage manager at the Chevron Hilton. Soon after, Len was sharing his knowledge of, and passion for, wine through regular columns in the Bulletin. During the 1960s Len was employed by the then Wine Board as its first national promotions executive, and at around the same time he began his love affair with what we now know as the Hunter Valley wine country, where he established the world renowned Rothbury Estate and, later, Tower Estate. Len was, of course, one of the world’s most highly respected wine judges—an art he went to great lengths to share unselfishly with others. Len Evans AO, OBE was one of Australia’s great ambassadors and will be sadly missed by all those in the wine industry and beyond. On behalf of the House, I extend sympathy to his wife, Trish, and his children, Sally, Jodie and Toby. 23 23 13:52:00 Ticehurst, Kenneth, MP 00ANF Dobell LP 1 0 Mr TICEHURST —On 22 August the Australian Gas Alliance, a group representing residents of the valleys of Yarramalong and Dooralong in my electorate of Dobell, held a meeting which 400 people attended. The meeting was designed to stop Korea Coal from performing longwall mining under the valleys. In so doing, they would destroy the watertable and have a serious impact on Central Coast water supplies. At the meeting we called on the New South Wales Premier, Morris Iemma, to make a very firm statement that he will not allow such mining to be carried out. I also asked the New South Wales Minister for the Central Coast, Grant McBride, to come out and make a positive statement that he will not support coalmining and will pressure his state government to make sure that such mining is not allowed. Yesterday, we had a family day at Wyong Creek, which about 200 residents attended, also in support of the Australian Gas Alliance. I am having meetings with the Minister for the Environment and Heritage, Ian Campbell, so that we make sure that our valleys are not destroyed by this coalmining. Coalmining would benefit the state government, of course, by about $1 billion in royalties but, if allowed to occur, would absolutely ruin 50 per cent of the Central Coast water supply. 23 23 13:54:00 Corcoran, Ann, MP 009CW Isaacs ALP 0 0 Ms CORCORAN —I would like to recognise the Isaacs winners of this year’s federal sports awards. The awards recognise not only high achievers on the field but also those tireless people behind the scenes in administration, fundraising and the social life of our sporting clubs. Leonie Zapf is a life member of Carrum Bowls Club—she has been a member for 30 years and has coached at the club for 12 years. She is in her seventh year as club secretary and has been a Victorian Ladies Bowls Association delegate for over 15 years. Brett Wright from the Edithvale-Aspendale Football Club has been with the club since he was 13 years old. He continues his commitment to the club as a coach. Brett’s involvement with the Mornington Peninsula Football League spans 30 years. The ladies’ section of the Mordialloc Bowls Club was recognised in its entirety for consistent sporting achievements and charitable fundraising. Karl Krings and Geoff King from Keysborough Bowls Club were both winners—Geoff for his years of effort both as club president and in his current role of secretary, and Karl for his many outstanding performances for the club at the local and regional levels. Paul Bryan from Keysborough Football Club was recognised for almost 40 years of involvement with the club. I congratulate all of these winners and thank them for their contribution to the life of our local community. 23 23 13:55:00 Ciobo, Steven, MP 00AN0 Moncrieff LP 1 0 Mr CIOBO —Last Friday, 1 September, my wife and I had the privilege of attending the official opening of the Centenary Gold Coast Show. As one of Queensland’s longest-running regional shows, it was a fine tribute to the team, who invest thousands and thousands of hours of effort to successfully hold the Gold Coast Show. This year, the show was officially opened by the Queensland Governor, Her Excellency Ms Quentin Bryce AC. It was an excellent link to the very first show, which the then Queensland Governor officially opened. I would like to congratulate Mr Doug Riser and the Gold Coast Show Society president, Mr Gary Baildon, on a magnificent centenary show. I also convey my and the Gold Coast’s thanks to the many people who ensure this Gold Coast institution continues going from strength to strength. From sideshow alley through to the main arena entertainers and the many students and residents who enter the various competitions, it is clear this show is unique. I am delighted to be associated with it. I wish them strength and I am looking forward to another 100 successful shows. 24 24 13:56:00 King, Catherine, MP 00AMR Ballarat ALP 0 0 Ms KING —The Royal South Street competitions are currently underway in Ballarat. The Royal South Street Society has been conducting this annual eisteddfod for 126 years. Royal South Street is Australia’s foremost eisteddfod for promoting, fostering and encouraging participation and interest in the performing arts. Young performers from across the country compete in Ballarat in a wide variety of performing arts. From highland pipe bands, debating, modern vocal, speech and drama, dancing and callisthenics through to the famous Herald Sun Aria Awards, young people have the opportunity to demonstrate their craft and to improve through competition. Many of Australia’s top performers have competed at South Street over its 126-year history. On Friday evening I had the opportunity to hear the advanced stage bands compete. Bands from Xavier College, Ringwood Secondary College, Blackburn High School, Eltham High School, Christian College Geelong and Balwyn High School all went through their paces. The bands were of a terrific standard, performing complex pieces, in some instances to very complex arrangements. The evening particularly highlighted for me the importance of music in schools and the impact of passionate and dedicated music teachers. It was a most enjoyable evening and the strength of the competition is a credit to those schools. Volunteers spend hundreds of hours organising the competitions, gaining sponsors, adjudicating the performances, organising the performers and adjudicators and arranging equipment—not to mention attending the competitions, which start in February and finish in November, night after night. The president, Brian McInnis, has done a fantastic job and should be congratulated. (Time expired) 24 24 13:58:00 McArthur, Stewart, MP VH4 Corangamite LP 1 0 Mr McARTHUR —On Friday, 1 September, I attended the opening of the Bannockburn Community Centre. This outcome has been achieved after five years of careful planning by the Golden Plains Shire Council and local community groups. The $1.8 million building reflects the community’s desire to have the preschool, kindergarten and other health services at the one location. It is a very well constructed building and is a demonstration of the cooperation between the local, state and federal governments in providing facilities at the local level. The Golden Plains Shire and the architects are to be commended for the design and for their very effective use of taxpayers’ money. In moving a vote of thanks, Tracy Rowe commended all those previous generations of parents who had contributed to the planning and wished them well for the future with this wonderful community asset that will serve the people of Bannockburn—with its expanding population of young mothers—so well in the future by providing a first-class facility. 25 25 13:59:00 Georganas, Steve, MP DZY Hindmarsh ALP 0 0 Mr GEORGANAS —On Saturday night, 2 September, I was privileged to attend a fundraiser for the Rotary Club of Holdfast Bay. The aim of the evening was to raise funds for the eradication of landmines around the world. It was an absolute pleasure and honour for me to be there. In attendance as guest speaker was the member for Cowan, Graham Edwards, who knows only too well the effects of landmines. The Rotary Club of Holdfast Bay have been tremendous in raising funds over the years with this annual dinner. This year’s dinner was bigger than last year’s, and they are certainly raising funds for a very worthwhile cause. The effects of landmines on postwar communities cannot be underestimated. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! In accordance with standing order 43, the time for members’ statements has concluded. 25 MINISTERIAL ARRANGEMENTS 25 14:00:00 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 0 Mr HOWARD —I inform the House that the Minister for Foreign Affairs is absent. He is in East Timor today. During his absence, questions normally directed to him will be taken by the Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs, the Deputy Prime Minister. 25 CONDOLENCES 25 25 00:00:00 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 0 Mr HOWARD —I move: That this House record its deep regret at the death on 28 August, 2006 of the Honourable Donald Leslie Chipp, AO, former Federal Minister in the House of Representatives, the founder and former Leader of the Australian Democrats and Senator for Victoria and place on record its appreciation of his long and meritorious public service and tender its profound sympathy to his family in their bereavement. The Australian community has already had an opportunity, at a wonderful state funeral at St Paul’s Cathedral in Melbourne on Saturday, to pay a deserved tribute to the late Don Chipp. Don Chipp was the eldest of four boys, born into a working class family from Northcote, Victoria on 21 August 1925. He was educated at Northcote High School and at the age of 18 joined the RAAF, where he served for two years during World War II. Always a fierce competitor after the war, he became an accomplished sprinter, footballer—and he turned out three times for Fitzroy in the VFL—and cricketer. In that last mentioned capacity he claims to have been the last person ever to bat with Don Bradman in a cricket match. He played for Robert Menzies’ Prime Minister’s XI and is recorded as having been the non-striker when Don Bradman, aged 54, was dismissed for the last time, for four, in a game against the touring English side at Manuka Oval in February, 1963. He studied commerce at the University of Melbourne and went on to work as a management consultant. Before entering federal politics he served as a councillor for Kew City Council for six years, and he was chief executive officer of the Olympic Games Civic Committee and was chairman of Victoria’s first doorknock cancer appeal. As many will know, he entered federal parliament in a by-election as the Liberal member for the seat of Higginbotham. After a redistribution, he later became the member for Hotham, a seat he represented in the parliament until his resignation to contest a Senate position in the 1977 election. He was appointed Minister for the Navy in the Holt government—the beginning of many years service as a Liberal Party minister, serving in the Holt, Gorton and McMahon governments as well as briefly in the caretaker Fraser government late in 1975. He was Minister for Customs and Excise under John Gorton in 1969, a position he held until the defeat of the McMahon government in 1972. He was Deputy Leader of the House of Representatives from 1971 to 1972 and Leader of the House for a short time in 1972. In opposition, during the years of the Whitlam government, he was a member of the shadow ministry and was responsible for social security and welfare matters. As mentioned, he served briefly as a member of the caretaker Fraser government until the election on 13 December, 1975, and it is fair to say that his non-appointment to the Fraser government after the election of 13 December, 1975 was a very significant moment in his political life. In March of 1977 Don Chipp resigned from the Liberal Party to form and lead the Australian Democrats. He was elected as a senator for Victoria and he served from 1978 until his retirement from federal parliament in 1986, after 25 years of service. In 1992, Don Chipp was made an officer of the Order of Australia for his service to the Australian Parliament. It is likely that Don Chipp will best be remembered for his role in founding and leading the Australian Democrats. It was very difficult to typecast Don Chipp. His position on a number of issues was counterintuitive. It is fair to say, however, that he had a very strong commitment to a number of things, including an enduring commitment to the Australian environment. He did believe—and he acted this out in the last years of his public life and during his career in this parliament—very strongly that there was an important place in Australian public life for a third force. The validity of that proposition will continue to be the subject of debate. It is fair to say that in my lifetime two parties claiming that mantle have had a significant impact on Australian politics, in their different ways—namely, the Australian Democrats and the Democratic Labor Party, and probably the Democratic Labor Party greater than the other. In my view, Don Chipp’s most enduring quality was his relentless passion and his commitment to issues. What I admired most about Don Chipp was that he really did believe in something. He did not go into public life simply to be there, to be a participant—he was a true believer. As my former colleague and friend Andrew Peacock remarked after the state funeral on Saturday in Melbourne, he had not met anybody in public life who was more passionate and more committed to the issues in which he believed than Don Chipp, and I think that encapsulates the character of Don Chipp. I did not agree with many of the positions Don Chipp took, and I did agree with quite a lot that he took. He was a passionate opponent of compulsory unionism. He was a very strong defender of the Australian Constitution. On the other hand, he took some positions on foreign affairs and defence that I certainly did not share. But, whatever one thought of his views, you knew what they were. He put them with passion and he put them with conviction. He was a very decent, committed, passionate Australian and we will miss him. He made a great contribution to public life in this country. On behalf of the government, I offer my sincere sympathy to his wife, Idun, and to his children, Debbie, John, Greg, Melissa, Juliet and Laura. 26 14:08:00 Beazley, Kim, MP PE4 Brand ALP Leader of the Opposition 0 0 Mr BEAZLEY —I second the motion and support the remarks of the Prime Minister. The opposition joins the Prime Minister’s expression of condolence to the Chipp family on behalf of the Liberal Party and the government. We extend our deepest sympathy to Don’s wife, Idun, their daughters Juliet and Laura and his children from his first marriage, Greg, Melissa, Debbie and John. It is probably a shame for the memory of Don Chipp that there is no representative of the Australian Democrats in this House to analyse his life and his contribution. Suffice it to say that those of us who are not of his political party nevertheless recognise, in his passing from life, the passing of a very substantial Australian political figure. All political parties draw great comfort and strength from those who, in their lives and in their performance, become their party icons. We in the Australian Labor Party draw great strength from the memory of people like Ben Chifley and John Curtin. They are powerful influences on the lives of all those in the present parliamentary Labor Party, although of course none of us met them. The Democrats are able to draw similar sustenance from the life and example of Don Chipp. He was a figure of considerable substance in the Australian political scene. He was a figure of substance before he became Leader of the Australian Democrats. He had had a substantial career, both as a member of the House of Representatives for some 17 years and as a minister of state in the then Liberal government, and he made a major mark on Australian politics during that period. He was Minister for the Navy at a point when, generally speaking, it was a terminal career appointment. Most ministers of the Navy subsequently found themselves no longer ministers as they struggled with the consequences and the difficulties that were experienced in the Navy, particularly the issues associated with various royal commissions on the collision between the aircraft carrier Melbourne and the destroyer Voyager. Don Chipp survived those inquiries; nevertheless, they had their impact on him. In his book Don Chipp: the third man he wrote of the Voyager story. The whole Voyager story indicates how a parliamentary system can be abused for personal aggrandisement, revenge and pointscoring and to destroy reputations. It also shows how decisions not in the public interest can be made by politicians for expediency. One thing you can say about the life of Don Chipp was that he learned from every experience that he had in the parliament. His views were a work in progress. While he held those views very firmly, he changed as a result of the experiences he confronted when he was in public life. He listened to what people were saying to him. I suspect he will be best remembered, from his ministerial career point of view, for  his role as Minister for Customs. As Minister for Customs he pursued what might be described as a liberal agenda. It was probably one of the reasons why he ceased to be a minister in the Fraser government, which was elected in 1975. In a period of time when Australians were thinking through the social institutions which governed them, his position was that Australians ought to be in a position where, within reason, they could see, read and think anything they chose to. He was within the strand of tradition in Liberal politics that most associated with 19th century liberalism. Mungo McCullum wrote of him: He was an idealistic liberal. Nowadays that would be a contradiction in terms. He never lost his belief that idealism was the only real basis for politics in a civil society. To the end he played the game as he played his cricket—determined to win but always within both the rules and spirit of the code as he saw it. I recollect as a youngster visiting parliament, sitting in the chamber and watching him debate with his Labor counterparts. It cannot for one moment be said that at any point of time Don Chipp had a flirtation with the notion of being in any way, shape or form favourably disposed to my side of politics. He was a vehement advocate of the government’s position against us—vehement and annoying. I can recollect Jim Cairns, when he was Don Chipp’s trades spokesman counterpart, standing up in the Old Parliament House and being constantly heckled by Don Chipp to the point where Cairns was finally fed up with it. In personal debate, Jim was in many ways the most gentle of men but he leant across the table to Minister Chipp and said, ‘The honourable member knows nothing about this subject’—it was a trade matter they were discussing—‘as I have occasion to know, having had the dubious pleasure of marking his papers at Melbourne University.’ That would not have fazed Don Chipp for a minute. I suspect that when he experienced strong ideological disagreements with his colleagues confronting his liberalism with their conservatisim, he ultimately decided to go down the road of a third force. In his resignation speech in 1977, he said: I wonder whether the ordinary voter is not becoming sick and tired of the vested interests which unduly influence the present political patterns and yearn for the emergence of a third political force, representing middle-of-the-road politics which would owe allegiance to no outside pressure group. Perhaps it may be the right time to test that proposition. Michelle Grattan wrote of him: Passionate, intense, emotional; he never felt, or did, things by halves. His personality was multi-coloured. His reactions were sometimes exaggerated. Deeply angered by a pretty mild reference I made in an article when he was still in the Liberals, he didn’t speak to me for several years; then he gave me a leak on his resignation from the party. His face evolved from matinee idol to its famous wrinkled form, outward sign of a complex inner journey. He was a complex man. I could only know him, if you like, tangentially from those observations of him when I was a boy visiting parliament and then, ultimately, when I was a member of parliament in this chamber. I knew him briefly when I was a minister and he was the then Leader of the Democrats in the Senate. But you were conscious of a person with a powerful influence. He built a third party force in Australian politics based around centrist notions, that there was room between the very broadly based Labor and Liberal parties for another view of the world. It was a very challenging proposition. We pride ourselves in this place on being a broad church. I have heard the Prime Minister use that expression and I have used it myself. I have described our side of politics as ‘a broad church’, and I have heard the Prime Minister describe his side of politics as a broad church as well. That is the conventional way that we tend to view our political parties, and it would suggest that, aside from single issue concerns, there would not be much room for a centre party. Don Chipp challenged that notion and he challenged it successfully. It is very much to his credit that the political force that he created has lived on for at least 20 years from the time that he led it. That is considerable longevity and a demonstration that he created something beyond himself, not just of himself, and that he touched a note of some value and sensitivity in Australian politics. As I said at the outset, we express our deepest condolences to members of his family. They can be proud of their husband and father. The Democrats can be proud of the man who founded and led them. They can draw sustenance from his memory and sustenance from his example. 28 14:17:00 Vaile, Mark, MP SU5 Lyne NATS Minister for Trade 1 0 Mr VAILE —It gives me pleasure, on behalf of my colleagues in the National Party, to support the condolence motion moved by the Prime Minister on the passing of the Hon. Don Chipp. One of the hardest tasks in Australian politics would be to create a new political organisation out of nothing. Don Chipp will be remembered as one of the few politicians in our history who was ever been able to achieve that, and he did it very well. At first he did not even have a name for his new party. Some of the suggestions he got from well-meaning supporters included the Dinkum Democrats, the People for Sanity Party and the Practical Idealists of Australia. Chipp was an idealist, but he had been in the parliament for many years—in fact, since 1960—and he had served five years as a minister. He hoped that the name that he chose for his new party would be spoken of in parliament and recorded in its history books, as it has been. So his steering committee avoided the cute and quirky and called the new party the Australian Democrats. Don Chipp had what he described as a ‘boisterous dislike’ of the National Party but he had a healthy respect for its leaders. He made that very clear on a number of occasions. In one of his books, he recalled a joint party meeting in 1967 when he was the Minister for the Navy. The Prime Minister at the time was Harold Holt and the leader of the then Country Party was Black Jack McEwen. At the time, the coalition backbench was becoming increasingly critical of the government. Menzies would not have tolerated it for a second, but Holt was unwilling or unable to control his backbenchers. Chipp remembered that McEwen got more and more angry, not just at the backbenchers but at Holt for allowing the abuse to continue. According to Chipp, McEwen leapt to his feet—I cannot repeat everything of what McEwen said—and said in part: ‘Okay, if you want leadership, I’ll give you’—blank—‘leadership. This is what the government has decided and that is what we are going to do.’ Chipp recalled that it had a remarkable effect and there was no more abuse. I am sure that Don Chipp remembered McEwen’s easy command of the coalition party at the time, when he wrote about the qualities needed by the Leader of the Democrats. He said that the leader had to: ... command the character to manage and contain the egos of fellow Democrat senators, all of whom are sensitive, highly intelligent, caring and generally prickly personalities. It is not an easy call. And he was right. It is a task that Don Chipp achieved from 1977 until his retirement in 1986. He later despaired of his party’s future, but its possible fate will not affect his place in Australian political history. Don Chipp will be remembered for having made a significant personal contribution to Australian politics and as a person who was devoted to his beliefs and who was very passionate about prosecuting those beliefs and arguing on behalf of them. I join the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition in offering my condolences to his wife, Idun, and his six children. 29 14:21:00 Macklin, Jenny, MP PG6 Jagajaga ALP 0 0 Ms MACKLIN —Don Chipp, as others have said, was a fierce competitor both in politics and in sport, but he combined that with a fierce care for people. So many people have described him as a larrikin who will certainly be remembered for his way with words. Apart from his very well-known quote of ‘keeping the bastards honest’, many Australians will remember Don Chipp for some of his other ones, and I will repeat some of the more famous of those. He claimed that wowsers did not like sex because, ‘They’re no good at it.’ He took his pro-monarchist position to a new level by declaring that he ‘fancied the Queen’. EZ5 Abbott, Tony, MP Mr Abbott interjecting— PG6 Macklin, Jenny, MP Ms MACKLIN —Obviously agreed to by the Leader of the House. It was that larrikin spirit that gave him the courage to stand by his convictions and encouraged many Australians to vote for him. He was certainly an uncompromising and ambitious character. When he left the Fraser government he described it as ‘too right wing’. But he did not become an Independent or retire from politics; he founded a new political party. That was an extraordinary response from a man who was dropped from the ministry and was frustrated with the state of party politics in the parliament, which he saw as becoming ‘increasingly farcical as a place of real debate’. He gave voice to his frustration and seemingly predicted the birth of the Democrats in his 1977 resignation speech to parliament, in which he said: The parties seem to polarise on almost every issue, sometimes seemingly just for the sake of it, and I wonder whether the ordinary voter is not becoming sick and tired of the vested interests which unduly influence the present political parties and yearns for the emergence of a third political force. Whilst I do not agree with what he said, the electorate success that followed for the Australian Democrats was certainly a major achievement for which Don Chipp will be remembered. Geoffrey Barker summed it up well in the Australian Financial Review, writing after Don Chipp’s death: It takes a rare combination of ego, energy and outrage to impose a new centrist third party on a mature two-party political system. Although Don Chipp said, ‘I do not feel alarmed now at the power of my personal ego,’ a lot of his motivation was to change things for the good of others. He was particularly passionate about the environment, and cited a 25 per cent cut in overseas aid as one of the reasons he was leaving the Liberal Party. As customs and excise minister he changed Australian censorship laws, refusing to ban the Little Red Schoolbook and lifting bans on other works, not necessarily because he agreed with what they said but because he disagreed with censorship. Don Chipp’s stance identified him as a small ‘l’ Liberal and certainly made him some enemies among conservatives. He was even accused of ‘radically subverting Australia’. Don Chipp did not confine his efforts of ‘keeping the bastards honest’ only to those of the Liberal or Labor persuasion. His commitment to honesty extended to the media. Michelle Grattan wrote a terrific story in the Age about Don Chipp’s ruse to forestall press criticism when, despite his reforming approach, he felt he had to cut a sex scene out of the Swedish movie Like Night and Day. He wrote a press release explicitly describing the offending scene, and then he called a press conference and challenged the press gallery—in his words, ‘Now let’s see if you bastards have got the guts to print it.’ Even the bravest so-called bastard published only a toned down version and did not criticise Chipp’s censorship of the film. He certainly was not afraid of attacking either the Liberal or Labor parties, or in recent times even the Australian Democrats. He regretted his own strong support of Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War in the 1960s and he later became equally strong in his opposition to it. Don Chipp not only wanted to hold others accountable; he applied those high standards to himself. He certainly had a lot of friends in politics despite being described by Paul Kelly as ‘a constantly infuriated paradox who radicalised with age’. In Don Chipp’s typical larrikin fashion, he criticised Australians for political apathy, a theme which he revisited many times during his career. There is no question that he cared much for his family and the Australians he called the underdogs. He said upon leaving the parliament in 1986: All I want to be remembered for by my wife and loved ones is that he was a good, old honest bastard and he gave it his best shot. When asked by the Australian in 2004 about his most treasured possession, Don Chipp referred the question back to his family and came back with the answer: ‘The capacity to love, the capacity to be loved. Is that too corny?’ No, it is not corny and I am sure his family knew that he loved them. We send our condolences to them for their loss and for Australia’s loss. Mr ABBOTT (Warringah —Leader of the House) 14:27:00 —I move: That the debate be adjourned. Question agreed to, honourable members standing in their places. 31 MISCELLANEOUS 31 31 Mr ABBOTT (Warringah —Leader of the House) 14:27:00 —by leave—I move: That the resumption of debate on the Prime Minster’s motion of condolence in connection with the death of the Honourable Donald Leslie Chipp, AO be referred to the Main Committee. Question agreed to. 31 14:28:00 Questions Without Notice 31 31 14:28:00 Beazley, Kim, MP PE4 Brand ALP 0 Mr BEAZLEY —My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to a story in today’s Sydney Morning Herald regarding ABC Tissues, where foreign temporary workers do not speak enough English to read safety signs and are not trained to perform basic tasks. Is the Prime Minister aware that an Australian worker on the site remarked: We’d see people on the roof, 20 metres in the air, and you couldn’t even yell at them to get ... down. Is the Prime Minister also aware that an unskilled foreign worker tried to fit a power tool plug into a socket by stripping the cord and inserting naked wires straight into the socket? Does the Prime Minister think these are acceptable work practices and why has he allowed foreign workers with little or no English to do these jobs at all? 31 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —I am aware of the story in the Sydney Morning Herald but I am not in a position to verify the accuracy of the various claims made. Obviously if those claims are true they are alarming, and the practice should be condemned by everybody. I can inform the House that the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs issued a Hunan industrial company which is contracted to erect a tissue paper machine at ABC Tissues in Sydney with a notice of intention to apply sanctions on a number of grounds, including failing to pay the minimum salary level, comply with immigration laws, comply with workplace relations laws, ensure necessary licensing of workers, notify DIMA of relevant changes of circumstances and deduct tax instalments. On 16 August, the department sent a notice of intention to ABC Tissues on the grounds that two 457 visa holders were not carrying out the duties of the nominated positions. Their response was received on 1 September and is being reviewed by the department. Referrals on these matters have also been made to a number of New South Wales government agencies, the Office of Workplace Services and the Australian Taxation Office. These agencies have the authority to sanction within the terms of their own legislation. Subject to the determination of these other agencies, the department may take further action as appropriate. I think it is worth informing the House, whilst generally talking on the issue of 457 visas, that as of January 2006 the largest single user of these visas was the New South Wales department of health, and state governments are actively involved in the process through their role in regional certifying bodies. Most recently, the Western Australian government wrote to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs seeking an urgent skilled labour agreement to allow it to sponsor temporary skilled meatworkers to enter Western Australia to meet an urgent unmet demand in abattoirs in that state. This government is happy to work with Western Australia to ensure that those visitors can work to full capacity for the benefit of the whole community. This government supports—as do the eight state and territory Labor governments—the 457 system. We do, however, unconditionally condemn breaches. Any breaches will be severely dealt with and heavily prosecuted. 32 32 14:32:00 Vasta, Ross, MP E0D Bonner LP 1 Mr VASTA —My question is addressed to the Treasurer. Would the Treasurer inform the House of benefits to Australians from tax reform? What remains to be done to cut taxes, and what threats are evident? 32 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr COSTELLO —I thank the honourable member for Bonner for his question. When the government reformed the tax system in 2000 and introduced the GST, it was to replace wholesale sales tax and nine inefficient state taxes. Since its introduction, the GST has delivered to the states, cumulatively, $187 billion in GST revenue. No state has done better than the state of Queensland, where the member for Bonner comes from. Over the next four years, the GST is expected to deliver to the states, over and above what they were guaranteed, $12½ billion. That is over and above what they were guaranteed, which was a rising base anyway—$12½ billion. Unfortunately, whilst we now have an agreement from the states to abolish eight of those taxes, the states still refuse to abolish stamp duty on business conveyances. As far as the Commonwealth is concerned, the GST is designed to replace nine state taxes, and the Commonwealth will insist in the interests of taxpayers that nine state taxes are abolished. At the same time that the states have had massive windfalls in GST revenue, in some states they have been actually increasing stamp duties on conveyancing, as they did in Queensland on 1 July 2006. Listen to this: in June 2000, stamp duty on the median house in Brisbane was $3,859. In June 2006, stamp duty on the median house price was $10,347. Even worse, in the highest stamp duty taxed state in Australia, Victoria, in June 2000, stamp duty on the median house was $8,009. In June 2006—this is the median house—it was $16,806. So you would get your first home owners grant and it would cover about half of your stamp duty bill in Victoria. You would get your first home owners grant and it would cover about 70 per cent of your stamp duty bill in the state of Queensland. I noticed on the weekend that the Queensland coalition leader has announced a policy to reduce stamp duty and eventually eliminate it. It is about time that state governments were held accountable for the stamp duty windfall. It is about time that the buyers of homes got a fair go. It is about time that the Labor governments, which have been swimming in GST revenue, did something about their stamp duties. This policy is to be commended as an indication on behalf of the state coalition, on behalf of the Queensland people, to deal with stamp duty duties, which have not been cut, nor have they been indexed, but they have become extremely high and are punishing homebuyers in Australia. 32 32 14:36:00 Macklin, Jenny, MP PG6 Jagajaga ALP 0 Ms MACKLIN —My question is to the Prime Minister. I again refer the Prime Minister to the ABC Tissues case, where the Chinese workers do not speak enough English to understand safety instructions. Prime Minister, isn’t it the case that the government’s 457 visa scheme, which has seen a 66 per cent increase in temporary skilled migrants since 2003-04, has no specific English-speaking requirements at all? How does the Prime Minister justify this blatant hypocrisy, when he himself wrote in the Daily Telegraph on the weekend: Simple tasks like securing a job ... would be so much harder in Australia without a working knowledge of English. 33 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —Without looking at the details of the 457 visas, I can neither confirm nor deny what has been put to me. But nothing in that alters our support for the scheme— DYW Burke, Tony, MP Mr Burke interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Watson is warned! ZD4 Howard, John, MP Mr HOWARD —and of course nothing alters the absolute essentiality for people who come here who do not speak English. I take this opportunity of making the point—which is not what the Deputy Leader of the Opposition was inferring in her question—that I am not suggesting for moment that everybody who comes to this country should be able to speak the English language when they arrive. I have never suggested that. What I have suggested is that, if people come to this country with an imperfect knowledge of English, they have a heavy obligation to learn it and to learn it as soon as possible, because it is a passport to success. PG6 Macklin, Jenny, MP Ms Macklin interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Deputy Leader of the Opposition has asked her question. ZD4 Howard, John, MP Mr HOWARD —It is a passport to success in this country, and I am grateful that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition has asked me that question so I have the opportunity of repeating what I said last week: that one of the essential passports to achievement in this country is to learn the English language. Whether or not you can speak the English language when you come here is beside the point. It is the speed with which you learn it and your commitment to learning it that are important, and I stand by everything I said last week. 33 33 14:38:00 Ticehurst, Kenneth, MP 00ANF Dobell LP 1 Mr TICEHURST —My question is addressed to the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. Would the minister advise the House of jobs growth since the government changed the workplace relations laws at the end of March? How have these policies boosted jobs growth, and are there any threats to jobs? 33 Andrews, Kevin, MP HK5 Menzies LP Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service 1 Mr ANDREWS —I thank the member for Dobell for his question. I note in answering it that the unemployment rate in Dobell is almost half of what it was in 1996, when it stood at the disastrous level of 11.6 per cent when the Labor Party left government. Since the introduction of Work Choices we have seen record jobs growth in Australia. A total of 159,000 jobs have been created in Australia from March to July this year. This certainly destroys the claim made by the Labor movement that Work Choices would be a green light for slashing jobs. Indeed, just the opposite has occurred in Australia. In March this year the Secretary of the ACTU, Mr Combet, was asked by John Laws on radio: You don’t agree that these changes would provide any sort of jobs growth? Mr Combet replied: Oh, I can’t see it. I ask him to take off the blinkers and look at the 159,000 jobs that have been created in Australia in the last few months. And let us put this in context: that is double the number of jobs created in Australia for the same period of last year. If one takes a 20-year average, if you look at the last 20 years, average job growth in Australia over those same months was just 51,000 jobs. So here we have a trebling of the 20-year average jobs growth from March through to July. Why is this? Partly it is because Australian employers have been freed of one of the monkeys on their back in the past—Labor’s unfair dismissal laws. Creating workplace arrangement which suit the needs of both employers and employees and simplifying the workplace relations system—all of these things—have made it easier for employers to create jobs in Australia. We have seen massive jobs growth in the last few months. But, on top of that, wages have also continued to grow. Indeed the June 2006 quarter data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics indicates an annual growth rate in wages of 4.1 per cent. So not only has there not been a slashing of jobs as predicted by the labour movement and not only has there not been a driving down of wages as predicted by the labour movement but in fact there has been a massive creation of jobs and a growth in wages in this country, so much so that the unemployment rate has reached a 30-year low of 4.8 per cent and wages are up. Against this empirical data which is now available for people to assess Work Choices, we still have the Leader of the Opposition running around Australia and saying that he will rip up these laws. What would that do? That would disadvantage hundreds of thousands of Australian workers and their families who have already benefited from these changes over the last few months. If you take one sector of industry alone in Australia, the mining and resources sector, it has been estimated that simply the policy of abolishing Australian workplace agreements would cost $6.4 billion in lost productivity, and of course jobs and wages would equally be at jeopardy under that system. There is only one description for what the Leader of the Opposition wants to do in Australia, and that is economic vandalism. It would kill productivity in Australia and it would place in jeopardy the economic security of hundreds of thousands of Australians. 34 34 14:42:00 Macklin, Jenny, MP PG6 Jagajaga ALP 0 Ms MACKLIN —My question is to the Prime Minister. I again refer the Prime Minister to ABC Tissues, which has allegedly breached its immigration and workplace obligations by importing unskilled Chinese workers who do not speak enough English to understand safety instructions. Does the Prime Minister recall telling this House on 20 June this year in relation to continued breaches by ABC Tissues: All allegations are fully investigated and ... appropriate sanctions are applied ... there has been a full, prompt and, I believe, to date, unarguably an effective investigation in relation to these allegations. Does the Prime Minister have confidence in his temporary work visas scheme when in fact another 21 visas have apparently just been granted for this site where there are serious concerns of exploitation and mistreatment? 34 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —The answer to the question is as I indicated in answer to the Leader of the Opposition. The department is taking action in relation to alleged breaches. What the Deputy Leader of the Opposition is asking the House to accept is that a total scheme is completely discredited because one or two companies try to rort it. We are investigating the claims. When the results of that investigation are known, further information will be made available or further action will be taken. But do I still support the scheme? Yes. So do the eight state and territory Labor leaders. They all support it, and they are up to their armpits in using it. 35 35 14:44:00 Neville, Paul, MP KV5 Hinkler NATS 1 Mr NEVILLE —My question is addressed to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade. Would the Deputy Prime Minister, in his capacity as Minister for Trade, update the House on the latest good news in Australia’s export performance? In particular, how are manufacturers performing, including those in my electorate of Hinkler? 35 Vaile, Mark, MP SU5 Lyne NATS Minister for Trade 1 Mr VAILE —I thank the member for Hinkler for his question. The member for Hinkler represents a part of the north coast of Queensland that is an exporting engine room of Queensland. One of the industries up there which is a home-grown manufacturing industry is Jabiru Aircraft. They export right across the world to about 31 countries. The member for Hinkler is a great supporter of that industry. In answer to the member’s question, Australia’s manufactured exports increased in value terms by 12 per cent in 2005-06 to a record $39.5 billion. Figures released by the ABS on Friday show that in volume terms manufactured exports rose by 6.4 per cent. So they rose in value terms and in volume terms in the last financial year. Some of the manufactured exports to rise in the last financial year in dollar terms are quite significant. Aluminium, for example, is up by 28 per cent to a record $4.8 billion. Motor vehicles, where exports increased by 14 per cent, are up to a record $3.1 billion. Medicines rose 18 per cent to a record $3 billion. They are all very important sectors in the Australian manufacturing industry base that are generating with that growth many jobs for Australians. The outlook for manufactured exports and the manufacturing industry is positive. The Australian Industry Group August survey shows that manufacturing activity is continuing to grow, partly driven by the increase in exports and the expectation of an increase in exports in that sector. The government have continued to support the manufacturing industries in Australia and particularly their competitiveness in the international marketplace. For example, we removed the three per cent tariff on imported inputs, where there are no domestically produced substitutes, to make the outputs, the manufactured products, more competitive in the international marketplace. We should never forget that in the tax reforms we introduced a number of years ago, under A New Tax System, we removed $3 billion worth of taxes off the back of Australian exports. It is good to recognise that in the current political debate in Queensland another coalition is offering to further enhance the competitiveness and the cost structure of business by offering to phase out and remove stamp duty for that sector in Queensland. It would be a good thing if every state in Australia followed suit to work with the federal government to increase the competitiveness and the viability of businesses, particularly manufacturing businesses. The coalition will continue to encourage business to help strengthen its base in the domestic economy and be more competitive on the international stage. 35 35 14:48:00 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP 0 Ms GILLARD —My question is to the Prime Minister. Is the Prime Minister aware that his Treasurer said yesterday: ... I would actually like to see us very carefully examine the possibility of offering Medibank to the public, particularly to policy holders. Is the Prime Minister aware that this statement directly contradicts the statement made by his Minister for Finance and Administration on 26 April, when he said in relation to a special share deal for Medibank Private policy holders: Absolutely, no ... Given that the government’s two most senior economic ministers have contradicted each other on the sale of Medibank Private, will the Prime Minister now end this incompetence and confusion and tell the three million Medibank Private policy holders whether Medibank Private will be floated with a preferential share deal for members? 36 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —Can I just say to the member for Lalor, who is trying to establish that my Treasurer and my finance minister have been incompetent, that they are fellows who have presided over a golden age of economic growth in Australia. To say that they are incompetent—you really should take a reality check. That is what the member for Lalor should do. But it is worse. I think the member for Lalor has misrepresented the position. CT4 Costello, Peter, MP Mr Costello —I think she has! ZD4 Howard, John, MP Mr HOWARD —The Treasurer tells me that she has, and I tell you what: I believe what the Treasurer tells me. I really do. If I had to choose between the member for Lalor and the Treasurer I know who I would choose. Let me make it very clear: I thought that yesterday both the Treasurer and the finance minister talked a lot of sense about Medibank Private—so much so that when I was asked a question about it on Brisbane radio this morning I said that I agreed with them. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms Gillard interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Lalor has asked her question. ZD4 Howard, John, MP Mr HOWARD —I think the idea of the Australian public being able to buy shares in a privatised Medibank Private would be a good thing. I think it would aid competition and I think people would be interested in it. If there could be a margin for the members of Medibank Private in the arrangement, I think that would be a good thing too. That is all I have to say at the moment, but if I find out anything more about whether the member for Lalor has misled the House you will understand my returning to the dispatch box. 36 36 14:51:00 Baker, Mark, MP DYK Braddon LP 1 Mr BAKER —My question is addressed to the Minister for Health and Ageing. Would the minister update the House on how the government’s Strengthening Medicare package has led to the 10th consecutive increase in the rate of bulk-billing across Australia, particularly in my electorate of Braddon? 36 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 Mr ABBOTT —I thank the member for Braddon for his question. It is nice to get a question in this chamber, because one does not get too many questions from the shadow minister. The member for Braddon is locally known as ‘the member for Medicare’, given that the GP bulk-billing rates in the electorate of Braddon have increased by no fewer than 25 percentage points since December 2003. Then of course there are all the other good things he is doing for the health of his electorate, such as the $7.75 million aged care facility that he has just announced at Circular Head, in his electorate. I can inform the House that, in the June quarter, the GP bulk-billing rate in this country increased to 76.6 per cent. This is the 10th consecutive quarter of higher GP bulk-billing rates. The bulk-billing rate has now increased by 10.1 percentage points since December 2003. The overall bulk-billing rate—that is to say, GPs and specialists—now stands at 72.3 per cent compared—and I say this to the member for Grayndler—with just 71.1 per cent in March 1996. Bulk-billing is not the be all and end all of Medicare, but it is important. It should be widely available, particularly for children and pensioners, and that is just what is happening thanks to the policies of the Howard government. The bulk-billing rate for children was 83.8 per cent in the June quarter. It is at an all-time high. The bulk-billing rate in country areas, 71.3 per cent in the June quarter, is also at a new record high. In February 2004 the member for Lalor said that Medicare was ‘haemorrhaging’. It was ‘losing blood’, she said. ‘It is dying,’ she said. I can advise her that, since then, the bulk-billing rate in her electorate has increased by over 10 percentage points to 80.5 per cent. Thanks to the policies of this government, Medicare is stronger than ever and the Howard government is most definitely the best friend that Medicare has ever had. 37 37 14:54:00 Smith, Stephen, MP 5V5 Perth ALP 0 Mr STEPHEN SMITH —My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to the Australian workplace agreement currently offered by Medibank Private to its customer service and sales staff. Prime Minister, isn’t it the case that the Medibank Private AWA scraps evening penalty rates, removes overtime rates, removes roster protections, does not provide for a pay increase during the three-year life of the agreement and provides for a performance bonus entirely at management’s discretion? Prime Minister, is it the government’s plan to offer AWAs like this to make Medibank Private’s bottom line more attractive for sale? 37 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —I do not know what is in the Medibank Private agreement, but I will find out. If the track record of the member for Perth on these matters to date is any guide, what he has implied will not actually tally with the real facts. 37 37 14:55:00 Lindsay, Peter, MP HK6 Herbert LP 1 Mr LINDSAY —My question is addressed to the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. Would the minister inform the House of the commitments given to the banana industry in the wake of Cyclone Larry and, Minister, would you assure the House that these commitments have been fully kept? 37 McGauran, Peter, MP XH4 Gippsland NATS Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry 1 Mr McGAURAN —I thank the honourable member for Herbert for his question. The honourable member for Herbert well knows how devastating— Opposition members interjecting— 8K6 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP Mr Fitzgibbon —Put your hand on your heart and pledge loyalty! 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The minister has the call. The minister will be heard. XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —The member for Herbert well knows the devastation of Cyclone Larry to northern Queensland communities— 8K6 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP Mr Fitzgibbon —Pledge loyalty! 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Hunter! XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —and the northern banana industry. He knows that the government’s commitment was that our strict quarantine requirements would not be compromised— 8K6 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP Mr Fitzgibbon interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Hunter is warned! XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —to meet any domestic shortfall. That commitment has been met in full by the government. Trading on people’s suffering and misery is the lowest act of a politician, and the Leader of the Opposition and the Premier have been doing exactly that over the last couple of days. Even as late as this morning at his doorstop, he was telling hard-pressed and fearful banana growers of north Queensland and their associated industry that they would suffer further loss because of the government reneging on its promise. They have made allegations of broken promises, of increased competition and quarantine laxness—all of it untrue. Let us not beat about the bush: Labor were peddling lies and the evidence of that is that there is no question on the bananas today. We are halfway through question time and there is not a single question from Labor—and I am hopeful there might be some. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr Swan interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Lilley! XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —This is my challenge to the Labor Party: ask some of these banana questions. No, you have gone out there, you have distorted the truth, you have reaped what political— WU5 O’Connor, Gavan, MP Mr Gavan O’Connor interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Corio! XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —opportunities you could, and now you will stay silent. You do not have the courage of your convictions and the simple fact is that the commitment was met. The best adjudicator of this is the Banana Growers Council itself. The banana council believes ‘the frozen banana importation is not a breach of the Prime Minister’s commitment given to growers at Innisfail after Cyclone Larry’. R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr Albanese interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Grayndler is warned! XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —We have had this mock outrage from the Labor Party. Guess who started importing pulped and diced bananas? The Labor Party, of course. For many years Australia has imported processed banana product, so I thought I would check some facts—something those opposite chose not to do. Between 1993 and 1996, the amount of processed bananas that the Labor Party allowed into the country was 140 tonnes. They are complaining about the 11 tonnes of processed bananas but they let in 140 tonnes from countries such as Vietnam, Fiji, Tonga, Taiwan, Sri Lanka and the like. WU5 O’Connor, Gavan, MP Mr Gavan O’Connor —Why don’t you tell the truth? 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Corio is warned! XH4 McGauran, Peter, MP Mr McGAURAN —And the member for Corio, the departing agriculture spokesman, interjects. Even in a radio interview today he was saying that this pulped and processed banana would be used in restaurants—completely false. This is another distortion of the truth. It is quite obvious that the Labor Party is as lacking in political morality and honesty as it is lacking in policy. 38 38 14:59:00 Beazley, Kim, MP PE4 Brand ALP 0 Mr BEAZLEY —My question is to the Prime Minister and follows that extraordinary answer that we have just been given. Has the Prime Minister seen the exchange between a journalist and Mr Eddie Hatchman, a Queensland banana grower and a member of the industry’s biosecurity group, in connection with the importation of whole bananas from Vietnam? Journalist: Do you feel betrayed by the Prime Minister? Eddie Hatchman: Yes, because we haven’t been informed of any risk analysis. We haven’t been informed of anything whatsoever. Why has the Prime Minister breached the trust of Queensland banana growers, who are still trying to rebuild their farms and their lives after Cyclone Larry? 38 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —The answer to the first part of the question is no, I have not. The answer to the second part of the question—have I breached their trust, or have I gone back on a promise?—is no. In support of that denial, I refer to no better authority than the Australia Banana Growers Council. It said: The large volume of frozen banana brought into Australia from Vietnam has taken the Australian Banana Growers’ Council by surprise but it does not believe this is a breach of the commitment given by the Prime Minister regarding fresh green banana imports. Quite frankly, I know it is election time in Queensland. In response to the cyclone in Far North Queensland, the federal government to date has poured—as it should have, and I support the expenditure to the hard-pressed people of Far North Queensland of every single dollar I am about to quote—$249 million of assistance into that community, and the amount contributed, so I am advised, by the Queensland government falls short of $100 million. I do not criticise the Queensland government and, up until yesterday when this banana thing cropped up, I had worked in total bipartisan harmony with the Queensland Premier, Mr Beattie. At no stage had either of the governments tried to make any political capital out of this. With every announcement I was about to make, I rang the Queensland Premier to talk about it. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr Swan interjecting— ZD4 Howard, John, MP Mr HOWARD —He approached me; we agreed; we visited Innisfail together. I would not have offered a zephyr of criticism of the Queensland government, but we get the last week of an election campaign and he cannot help himself. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr Swan —The bananas have made him do it! 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Lilley is warned! ZD4 Howard, John, MP Mr HOWARD —He grabs hold of this piece of absolute nonsense. He knows I have kept my promise, and he ought to be ashamed of himself. 39 39 15:02:00 Laming, Andrew, MP E0H Bowman LP 1 Mr LAMING —My question is to the Minister for Defence. Would the Minister for Defence inform the House how the Australian Defence Force is contributing to the fight against terrorism in Iraq? Minister, have there been any recent encouraging developments? 39 Nelson, Dr Brendan, MP RW5 Bradfield LP Minister for Defence 1 Dr NELSON —I thank the member for Bowman for his question and also for introducing me to families in his electorate of Bowman recently, who, through their sons, are making very practical and real contributions to the global war against terror. Across Iraq today there are 1,350 Australian Defence Force personnel who are working to secure freedom for Iraq, to see that Iraqis have the same rights and freedoms that we in Australia too often take for granted and which have been hard fought for by serving and previous generations of Australian Defence Force personnel. During my meeting with Prime Minister al-Maliki last week when I was in Iraq, he thanked Australia at some length for the contribution that it is making to see that Iraqis have these freedoms. For him, along with Zebari, the foreign minister, and also General Obeidi, with whom I also met, one of the constant themes was the role that is being played by al-Qaeda in Iraq to foment violence, and sectarian violence in particular, across the country. We should be under no illusions. For example, Osama bin Laden in December 2004 said, ‘The third world war is raging in Iraq.’ In his letter to Zarqawi dated 9 July 2005, al-Zawahari said of Iraq, ‘It is the place for the greatest battle.’ In his address to Congress in Washington on 27 July, the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nuri al-Maliki, said: Trust that Iraq will be the grave of terrorism and of terrorists for the good of all humanity. We have seen in the last couple of days the arrest of al-Saeedi. Iraq’s National Security Adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, said of this: Al-Saeedi carried out al-Qaeda’s policies in Iraq, and the orders of the slain al-Zarqawi to incite sectarian violence in the country through attempting to start a civil war between Shiite and Sunnis. All of us would remember the horrendous bombing of the Askariya shrine in Samarra back in February, which triggered much of the sectarian violence we have since seen in Iraq. We need to understand, as Australians, that the struggle in Iraq and Afghanistan and in other places of the world is a struggle to which Australians are committed because we are standing against those who are completely committed to a new world order, which has hijacked the name of Islam to build a violent political utopia. Every Australian should be proud of what is being done by the Australian Defence Force in Iraq. Prime Minister Maliki said to me, ‘You, Australia, were with us from the start.’ I said, ‘We will be there to see the job through and to see that Iraqis have the rights and freedoms that they deserve and that the world is free of terrorism.’ 40 40 15:06:00 Beazley, Kim, MP PE4 Brand ALP 0 Mr BEAZLEY —My question is to the Prime Minister. Does the Prime Minister agree with the Reserve Bank Governor’s recent comments that the Howard government’s claims on interest rates at the last election were ‘incorrect and not plausible’? 40 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —Let me answer that question this way: what we said in the last election campaign was both believable and plausible. What we said was that interest rates under a coalition government would always be lower than under a Labor government. If you look at the record, you will see that they undoubtedly would be. In 13 years of Labor government—and I do thank the Leader of the Opposition for this question—housing interest rates averaged 12.75 per cent. In 10½ years of coalition government, they have averaged 7.25 per cent. They peaked at 17 per cent for housing under the former Labor government, they went to 21 per cent for small business and they went to 23 per cent for bill rates for farmers. It is plausible, credible and entirely accurate to say that interest rates under a coalition government will always be lower than under a Labor government. 40 40 15:07:00 Randall, Don, MP PK6 Canning LP 1 Mr RANDALL —My question is addressed to the Minister for Education, Science and Training. Is the minister aware of Associate Professor Tony Taylor’s critique of the Australian history summit in the Australian of 23 August 2006? What is the government’s response to the summit’s communique? Are there any alternative views? 40 Bishop, Julie, MP 83P Curtin LP Minister for Education, Science and Training and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women’s Issues 1 Ms JULIE BISHOP —I thank the member for Canning for his question. I know that, as a former teacher, he would be interested in the Australian government’s push to restore Australian history to its rightful place in our schools. I am pleased to report to the House that on 17 August a history summit was held here in Parliament House. Twenty-three leading historians, educators and commentators looked at issues such as what Australian history is being taught in Australian schools, how it is being taught, what could or should be taught and why. I am aware of Associate Professor Tony Taylor’s critique, and a very fine summary of the Australian history summit it was. At the end of the day, we had a unanimous communique from the participants, who recommended to the Australian government that Australian history be a discrete, stand-alone subject, be compulsory for years 9 and 10 and be planned and taught sequentially through primary and secondary school. They also recommended that we work with state and territory governments to produce a model curriculum for Australian history. I have now established a working party to focus on the establishment of a model curriculum. I was asked about alternative views. Fortunately, because of the pressure of the overwhelming public support for the federal government’s push to have Australian history restored to a discrete place in our school curriculum, a number of state governments have buckled and come on board and are now supporting the Australian government’s push for Australian history to be a stand-alone subject. As for other views, I was rather surprised to read that the West Australian Labor education minister has decided that you do not need to learn history, that all you have to do is google it. The headline in the West Australian of 22 August read ‘Don’t learn it, just Google it: Ravlich’. The article said: Education Minister Ljiljanna Ravlich says it is not important for students to know key historical dates, saying they can find the information using the internet search engine Google. …         …         … Questioned about a straw poll by The West Australian which revealed a lack of knowledge of key events in Australian history, she said: “You can ask many students a range of questions about the internal workings of a computer and chances are they wouldn’t know anything about that.” I have no idea what she was talking about, but it seems that the Leader of the Opposition did. The next day, the Leader of the Opposition supported this position. The headline in the West Australian read ‘Google OK, says history fan Beazley’. The article reported: Kim Beazley has backed State Education Minister Ljiljanna Ravlich’s claim that students do not need to learn significant historical dates because they can find them on the internet using Google, saying yesterday that “she was on to something”. Mr Beazley said that he loved Ms Ravlich’s “Generation-X” comments, in which she also likened a lack of knowledge about Australian history to not knowing the internal workings of a computer. 84G Wilkie, Kim, MP Mr Wilkie interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Swan is warned! 83P Bishop, Julie, MP Ms JULIE BISHOP —I would caution the Leader of the Opposition about too heavy a reliance on Google. I looked up an Australian history time line on Google and it leaves out the arrival of the Duyfken to our northern shores, it leaves out the arrival of Captain Cook on our eastern shores, it leaves out the outbreak of the First World War and it leaves out the outbreak of the Second World War. It leaves out any mention of Curtin, it leaves out any mention of Menzies and there is no mention of 1975. I would caution the Leader of the Opposition— IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr Snowdon interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Lingiari is warned! The minister will be heard. 83P Bishop, Julie, MP Ms JULIE BISHOP —I do caution the Leader of the Opposition about relying on Google. This morning I looked up ‘Kim Beazley’ on Google. The first article was ‘Kim Beazley—toothless in trouble’ and the second was ‘Kim Beazley completely loses the plot’. I would not have thought that this was the kind of history that the Leader of the Opposition would be promoting for our students. We would support learning, not googling. I know the Leader of the Opposition was committed to the ‘noodle nation’ education policy. Please spare us from a ‘Google nation’ education policy in the next election. No ‘Google nation’, please. 41 41 15:13:00 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP 0 Mr SWAN —My question is to the Treasurer. I ask whether he recalls claiming credit for a fall in interest rates of 0.25 per cent on 2 December 1998. He said: This is one of those days when it’s all come together for Australians. This morning we had an interest cut ... It didn’t happen by chance ... And you’re seeing the fruits of those tough but right economic decisions ... If the Treasurer is prepared to claim credit when interest rates fall, why won’t he accept responsibility now that they have increased a total of seven times since April 2002? 42 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr COSTELLO —Interest rates today are substantially lower than they were when the government was elected in 1996. Today the standard variable mortgage interest rate is 7.8 per cent but, as the Reserve Bank says, you can get rates lower than that. The standard variable mortgage interest rate when the government was elected was 10½ per cent. It was at 17 per cent. The Leader of the Opposition was going to draw the line under the Keating policy in a widely advertised speech in North Queensland leaked out to the newspapers. Here was going to be the final repudiation of the Keating high interest rate policy. One problem: when he got to actually read the speech, he could not pronounce the word ‘Keating’ and he left it out as a consequence. The Australian Labor Party is complicit in the economic failures of Paul Keating and the government in which he was Treasurer. The Australian Labor Party never had the wit to actually balance the budget. In 1998 we passed a very significant milestone. In 1998 we got the Australian budget back into balance, something that had evaded Keating, something that had evaded the then Minister for Finance, who has run up something like $60 billion of accumulated deficits. Where would Australia be today if this government had not decided to balance the budget and to repay Labor debt? Australia is much stronger as a consequence, and let it never be forgotten that the Labor Party fought and opposed us every step of the way. 42 42 15:16:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 1 Mr HARTSUYKER —My question is addressed to the Minister for Workforce Participation. Would the minister advise the House how the government plans to assist the unemployed to move to areas where it is easier to find jobs? 42 Stone, Dr Sharman, MP EM6 Murray LP Minister for Workforce Participation 1 Dr STONE —I thank the member for Cowper for his question. Of course, the member for Cowper, like many on this side, is concerned that everybody has the chance to get a job in these times. We have the lowest unemployment—on average a 30-year low right across the nation—but there are still some patches where unemployment is higher. So we as a government are determined to assist all Australians, especially people in areas of lower employment, to move across to parts where the economy is particularly booming, like over in the west and in northern Australia. We have therefore instigated a very special pilot that is going to assist people—in the first instance, from places like Coffs Harbour and Shoalhaven—to move across to areas like Broome, Kalgoorlie, Perth, Darwin and Karratha. Job Network members will be especially commissioned to do the actual supporting and recruitment, through videoconferencing and phone hook-up, so that people do not have to go a long way just on the chance that they might succeed with a job. They will also be supported with the upskilling that is necessary. Finally, there will be $4,000 to $5,000 in travel support which will cover not only the costs of the air or other fares but also the costs to help set up in the new location. Sadly, the opposition has little interest in the Aussie job seeker striving to become financially independent. The shadow spokesperson, Senator Wong, has said, yes, there might be a workforce participation policy coming along—but we have not seen one yet. There was a time when Labor did talk about mobility assistance. It was a policy many years ago. Let me quote to you exactly what it was about. In particular it said: ... immediate minor assistance is a one-off payment available to unemployed job seekers who find a job but are unable to take it up because of the costs involved; for example, to buy special equipment or pay union fees. The good news is that in this country being able to afford to pay the unions is no longer a barrier to finding a job. This government is making sure that all job seekers are helped, even if they are now living in a place where there is some higher unemployment. We will support men and women to go to those places where the booming economy has work waiting, from the most skilled end through to a job where people can be trained when they get that job. This is a great initiative, and I strongly recommend that the opposition get behind this because it is about giving all Australians a fair go. 43 43 15:19:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP 0 Mr TANNER —My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to the statements by the government’s backbench communications committee chairman regarding the proposed further sale of Telstra shares: ‘I think sweeteners are fair enough provided you don’t suck people in.’ I also refer to comments by business commentator Terry McCrann that: ... the government is quite deliberately setting out to artificially entice you to invest. It is doing so by giving you an unsustainable supercharged dividend income. I also refer to statements—by Citibank, Moody’s, and Standard and Poor’s—that Telstra’s dividend level is unsustainable. Isn’t the government’s ‘buy now, pay later but get the full dividend anyway’ share offer calculated to mislead small investors and expose them to longer term losses exactly like those suffered by hundreds of thousands of T2 investors? 43 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —The answer is no. 43 43 15:20:00 Vale, Danna, MP VK6 Hughes LP 1 Mrs VALE —My question is directed to the Minister for Human Services. Would the minister advise the House how people on welfare benefits are being assisted to find work? What practical steps is the government taking to ensure that long-term welfare recipients are getting meaningful assistance? Are there any other examples of the successful implementation of welfare reform? 43 Hockey, Joe, MP DK6 North Sydney LP Minister for Human Services 1 Mr HOCKEY —That is a good question from the member for Hughes. Before question time, the member for Hughes let me know that the unemployment rate in her electorate has now dropped to 2.9 per cent—a 2.9 per cent unemployment rate in her electorate. There are a whole lot of factors that help to create low unemployment. The first factor is that we need to provide jobs and make sure the jobs are out there. The best way to get that is through a strong economy, and this government has helped to deliver a strong economy. Then we need to have workplace changes. Through Work Choices, which has now been in place for 162 days, we have more jobs and higher wages. We are doing our job in Human Services. Since Welfare to Work was introduced on 1 July this year, Centrelink has referred over 100,000 people to the Job Network. That also includes referral to the Disability Employment Network. In addition, over 25,000 Australians have had a job capacity assessment, where they have been evaluated for their capacity to work. In many of those cases they have been provided with rehabilitation services so that they can prepare for entry into work. That is just a reminder of how important Welfare to Work is. It is all about the fact that Australia is running out of workers. There is a pool of around 2.7 million Australians of working age who are on welfare payments and whom we need to access in order to address the labour shortage in Australia. I was very interested in an article I saw this morning in the Australian. Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr HOCKEY —I am intrigued by the interjections by the Left here, because I am about to quote one of their fellows. In the Australian today, I read an article titled ‘US moves from welfare to work’. It begins: In one of the greatest political and economic success stories of the past decade— YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr Tanner interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Melbourne! DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr HOCKEY —You should listen to this— It goes on to say: It was 10 years ago last week that then president Bill Clinton passed into law a bill requiring people to find a job or lose their benefits after five years. That goes a lot further than what this government is doing. The article continues: Critics warned that the 1996 law would be catastrophic for single parents and their children. According to the article, one Democratic senator predicted that the US would leave children begging for money and begging for food. In fact, since those laws were introduced in the US 10 years ago, 1.6 million fewer children live in poverty in the United States as a result of welfare to work measures in the United States. As I say, our policies do not go as far as the policies in the US. But when you have a strong economy, when you have workplace change and when you are helping those most disadvantaged in the community to get into work, the recipe is success for Australia. 44 44 15:24:00 Ellis, Kate, MP DZU Adelaide ALP 0 Ms KATE ELLIS —My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to the Prime Minister’s statement in 1999, at the time of T2, that Telstra shares were ‘an extremely good deal’ at $7.40. Now that the government is selling over two billion more shares at less than half this price, does it still regard Telstra shares as ‘an extremely good deal’, particularly for those who bought them for $7.40? 44 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr HOWARD —My understanding is that, between the making of that statement and now, there has been a change in the law which says that you cannot give financial advice without having a licence. As somebody who regards himself as a supporter of the rule of law and a sworn officer of a very honourable court in this country—and also a member of this parliament—I respect that law. In those circumstances, I am not going to offer a view, but what I will say is that I have followed reaction to the announcement I made in Hobart last Friday week. I know those who sit opposite—I do not include the member for Adelaide in this, but I am thinking rather of the spokesman on these matters on the front bench of the Labor Party—were sort of hoping and praying that certain things would happen. They have not happened, and aren’t they disappointed! On that note, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. 44 Questions to the Speaker 44 44 15:26:00 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP 0 Ms GILLARD —Mr Speaker, I have a question to you. It relates to a ruling you made on 16 August about the nature of offensive words in this place, when you relied on a ruling made in 1955 by the then Chair of the Senate, the Deputy President, Senator Wood. I have written to the Clerk of the Senate for advice about this matter, and particularly the Senator Wood ruling on which you relied. I have received a reply dated 30 August, a copy of which has been supplied to your office. In summary— SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The standing orders relating to questions to you do not give the opportunity for an interrogation. They are not allowed to be questions that seek an opinion. They are consistent with the other rules relating to questions. The member has other means by which she can pursue this matter, and I ask that you rule her question out of order. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I thank the member for O’Connor. He raises a valid point of order. I am listening carefully to the Manager of Opposition Business. As she would be aware, questions to the chair are normally to be related to administrative matters; others have been allowed. I am listening carefully, but I would ask her to come to her question. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Certainly, Mr Speaker. The advice obtained from the Clerk of the Senate says, in very brief summary, that the 1955 ruling on which you have relied has not been relied on in the Senate for at least 25 years and, secondly, that in the view of the Clerk of the Senate it does not add any level of clarity to the decision which must be made by the chair. Mr Speaker, it would seem a very odd result indeed to me that we would rely in the House on a ‘Senate reasoned interpretation’, as it is referred to by the Clerk, for practice down here when that same reasoned interpretation— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I would ask the member to come to her question. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —has not been relied on in the Senate for 25 years. I ask you, in view of this advice from the Clerk of the Senate, to reconsider your ruling of 16 August and to issue some clarifying remarks during the course of this week. 45 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 The SPEAKER —I thank the Manager of Opposition Business and note the comments that she has raised. I will say two things. First of all, there was not a ruling, as she referred to it. I think it was an explanation, if she looks carefully at the current House of Representatives Practice. On all these matters it is up to the chair to make a decision. That is precisely the course that I have followed and that is precisely the course I will continue to follow. 45 45 15:29:00 Murphy, John, MP 83D Lowe ALP 0 Mr MURPHY —Mr Speaker, as someone who has an abiding interest in the Notice Paper I am wondering if you can report to the House why today’s printed version does not list all those unanswered questions prior to today. Could you arrange for tomorrow’s Notice Paper to list those questions? 45 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 The SPEAKER —I thank the member for Lowe. I understand there has been a mistake made. They should have been listed in the hard copy of the Notice Paper. I understand they are on the electronic version already, but I am assured they will also be listed in the hard copy tomorrow. 45 PETITIONS 10000 The Clerk The Clerk —Petitions have been lodged for presentation as follows and copies will be referred to the appropriate ministers: ET4 83K 5V5 Mr Bevis Ms Roxon Mr Stephen Smith 95 45 To the Honourable Speaker of the House and Members of the House assembled in Parliament: The petition of certain citizens of Australia draws the attention of the House to the fact that Australian employees are worse off as a result of the Howard Government’s changes to the industrial relations system. The petitioners call upon the Howard Government to adopt a plan to produce a fair industrial relations system based on fairness and the fundamental principles of minimum standards, wages and conditions; safety nets; an independent umpire; the right to associate; and the right to collectively bargain. The petitioners therefore ask the House to ensure that the Howard Government delivers: Proper rights for Australian workers who are unfairly dismissed. A strong safety net of minimum awards and conditions. An independent umpire to ensure fair wages and conditions, and to settle disputes. The right for employees to bargain collectively for decent wages and conditions. The right for workers to reject individual contracts which cut pay and conditions, and undermine collective bargaining and union representation. The right to join a union and be represented by a union. 40 ET4 Mr Bevis Mr Bevis (from 40 citizens) 15 83K Ms Roxon Ms Roxon (from 15 citizens) 40 5V5 Mr Stephen Smith Mr Stephen Smith (from 40 citizens) 83V CK6 Dr Emerson Mr Hardgrave 729 46 To the Honourable The Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives Assembled in Parliament: The petition of certain citizens and residents of Australia draws to the attention of the House that: Witnesses, including an investigative journalist and a veteran military doctor have revealed that Falun Gong practitioners are being held in at least 36 concentration camps in China where they are routinely subject to the forced removals of their organs which are then sold for transplants. The bodies are quickly cremated to destroy all evidence. YOUR PETITIONERS THEREFORE REQUEST THE HOUSE TO INITIATE A RESOLUTION TO: Call for the Australian Government to fully support the International Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (CIPFG), and demand that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) immediately open the doors of all concentration camps, forced labour camps, hospitals, prisons and detention centres throughout the People’s Republic of China in order to allow independent teams to investigate the charges of illegal detention, torture and live organ removal for transplants. Demand that the CCP regime release all detained Falun Gong practitioners immediately. 60 83V Dr Emerson Dr Emerson (from 60 citizens) 669 CK6 Mr Hardgrave Mr Hardgrave (from 669 citizens) 83R Mr Edwards 1318 46 To the Honourable the Speaker and the Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. This petition of citizens of Australia calls on the Parliament to urge Government members to: Table all environmental evidence and other studies supporting the proposal to build a nuclear reactor in Western Australia; Identify which bodies in Western Australia have been consulted over such a proposal; Advise on what consultation has taken place with the community in Western Australia over the proposal; Identify all the sites in Western Australia under consideration for the construction of this nuclear reactor; and Advise what safeguards will be put in place to prevent terrorist attacks against nuclear facilities in Western Australia. 1318 83R Mr Edwards Mr Edwards (from 1,318 citizens) 83N Ms Hall 23 46 To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. We the undersigned request that the Government take action to improve our health system by reintroducing the Commonwealth Dental Scheme. The axing of the Commonwealth Dental Scheme was a direct result of a Howard Government decision and has caused great hardship to many local residents on low incomes particularly the elderly and those with young children. Your petitioners therefore respectfully request that the House do everything in their power to reintroduce the Commonwealth Dental Scheme as a matter of urgency. 23 83N Ms Hall Ms Hall (from 23 citizens) 83N Ms Hall 32 47 To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. Request that the House take immediate action to guarantee the replacement of General Practitioners in the Shortland electorate which includes Lake Macquarie and the northern part of the Central Coast. Dr Gurcharan Singh Thind who has been practising for more than 20 years in the Lake Macquarie area and has surgeries in Blacksmiths and Marks Point, is retiring on 31 January 2006. Dr Thind’s replacement is proving to be extremely difficult due to the failure of the Government to issue provider numbers. Your petitioners therefore respectfully request that the House do everything in their power to ensure that the greatest effort is made, as soon as possible, to issue provider numbers for proposed replacements of General Practitioners in the Shortland electorate. 32 83N Ms Hall Ms Hall (from 32 citizens) 83N Ms Hall 48 47 To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. Request that the House take immediate action to address the chronic shortage of doctors in the Lake Macquarie and Hunter areas. Your petitioners therefore respectfully request that the House do everything in their power to ensure that the greatest effort is made, as soon as possible, to address the chronic shortage of doctors in the Lake Macquarie and Hunter areas. 48 83N Ms Hall Ms Hall (from 48 citizens) 83N Ms Hall 47 47 To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. We the undersigned call on the Federal Government to preserve the basic rights of Australian workers, including a preservation of a basic minimum wage and award conditions and the retention of the Industrial Relations Commission. Australian workers should be protected against unfair dismissal and also have the right to reject AWA individual contracts and negotiate collectively with their employer. Your petitioners therefore respectfully request that the House encourage employers to provide fair working conditions for their employees. 47 83N Ms Hall Ms Hall (from 47 citizens) 83N Ms Hall 147 47 To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. The petition of certain citizens of Australia draws to the attention of the House that free mammograms are not accessible by breast cancer survivors despite the increased risk of breast cancer. Access to free mammograms is also being denied to women over 70 years of age in some parts of Australia. Your petitioners therefore ask the House to ensure that mammograms are free to all women in Australia regardless of age or medical history. 147 83N Ms Hall Ms Hall (from 147 citizens) 83O Mrs Hull 339 47 To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament. The petition of the electors from very concerned Citizens of New South Wales draws to the attention of the House, that growers and individuals in the communities who are affected, support AWB and acknowledge that it has been very effective marketer of wheat. Furthermore growers express total support for the policy of Single Desk wheat sales and the continuing role of AWB as national pool manager and manager of bulk wheat exports through the Single Desk. Your petitioners therefore request the House to continue to support the policy of Single Desk wheat sales and AWB’s role in the management of the national pool and management of bulk wheat exports through the Single Desk. 339 83O Mrs Hull Mrs Hull (from 339 citizens) PG6 Ms Macklin 112 48 To the Honourable the Speaker and members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament: This petition of concerned residents of Australia draws the attention of the House to the issue of environmental damage resulting from the production of Greenhouse Gasses. Continued deterioration of the environment will be destructive to weather patterns and lead to catastrophic economic and social damage around the world. Your petitioners therefore request the House immediately support the Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change (Kyoto Protocol Ratification) Bill 2005 which requires the Australian Government to ratify the Kyoto Protocol and help preserve the environment for present and future generations of Australians. 112 PG6 Ms Macklin Ms Macklin (from 112 citizens) PG6 Ms Macklin 43 48 Petition to the Hon. the Speaker and members of the House of Representatives assembled in the Parliament to protest the stance taken by the Government in recent days regarding the current situation in the Middle-East. This petition of certain citizens of Australia wishes the House to recognise that the evacuation of Australians from Lebanon, though vitally important and expeditiously achieved, is not the only concern of many in the community. We feel the Australian Government should be vocal in its condemnation of any party or state in the Middle-East that breaches international law. Further, we request the House: Support the call by the Secretary-General of the United Nations and the Prime Minister of Lebanon for an immediate ceasefire in the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah forces Join the international community in condemning the attacks on civilians in both Israel and Lebanon, and in particular in condemning the disproportional force which is being used by Israel against civilians and infrastructure in Lebanon, already a poor and fragile democracy Be vocal in its support of all United Nations resolutions which relate to the Middle-East Take a non-partisan stance in relation to the Middle-East, and in particular, not support the U.S. Administration’s condoning and active support of Israeli aggression toward Lebanon Support direct negotiations between all the parties involved, directly or indirectly, in the conflict in Lebanon, Israel and Gaza Acknowledge that people will almost inevitably respond with violence to attacks and to the fear of attacks on them, and that therefore the cycle of attacks on Palestinian people as well as on Lebanese and Israelis can only be stopped by a political, rather than a military, solution. 43 PG6 Ms Macklin Ms Macklin (from 43 citizens) 83D Mr Murphy 4584 48 To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in parliament: The petition of certain residents of the State of New South Wales draws to the attention of the House a treatment available for some types of Breast Cancer. Some breast cancers test positive for a growth factor or protein called HER2, which tells breast cancer cells how to grow. A drug called HERCEPTIN stops HER2 from working, so the breast cancer cells stop growing. This means HERCEPTIN would help greatly in increasing breast cancer survival rates and reduce the risk of breast cancer recurrence. However, HERCEPTIN is not listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) for all stages of breast cancer. As a result, the cost of HERCEPTIN is too prohibitive, meaning women either do not use this treatment, or they suffer tremendous financial hardships on top of their cancer struggle. Your petitioners therefore humbly pray the House to ensure the drug HERCEPTIN is immediately placed on the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme or subsidised when approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration, for use by women at any stage of breast cancer who test positive to HER2. 4584 83D Mr Murphy Mr Murphy (from 4,584 citizens) 00AN3 Mr Brendan O’Connor 800 49 To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in parliament: The petition of certain residents of the State of Victoria draws to the attention of the House that: Independent Colleges of Australia Pty Ltd (ICA) was, until recently, wholly owned subsidiary of ABC Learning Ltd, public listed company with shareholders. There continues to be two directors common to the Board of Directors of each company. ICA has been granted access to land in Caroline Springs, Victoria by Delfin Lend Lease Pty Ltd for the purpose of establishing and operating primary education facility. ICA was denied public funding for similar venture in Springfield, Queensland on the grounds that its intentions were to provide primary education for profit. Your petitioners therefore request the House to reject any application for public funding on the assessment that Independent Colleges of Australia Pty Ltd will be operating a for-profit school. 800 00AN3 Mr Brendan O’Connor Mr Brendan O’Connor (from 800 citizens) 83K Ms Roxon 40 49 To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in parliament: The petition of certain residents of the state of Victoria draws to the attention of the House the grossly unfair Work Choices Legislation. The legislation makes it easier for workers to be sacked with no safeguards from unfair dismissal, strips award conditions and removes the independent umpire, the ARIC, from the setting of the minimum wage. Your petitioners therefore request the House to repeal the Work Choices Legislation. 40 83K Ms Roxon Ms Roxon (from 40 citizens) 5V5 Mr Stephen Smith 25 49 To the Honourable Speaker of the House and Members of the House assembled in Parliament: The petition of certain citizens of Australia draws the attention of the House to the fact that the Howard Government has consistently refused to guarantee that no individual Australian employee will be worse off as a result of the Government’s proposed changes to the minimum wage. The petitioners also draw the attention of the House to the fact that the Howard Government has opposed every minimum wage rise since it came to office in 1996, and if the Government had had its own way, Australian workers would be $44 a week or $2300 a year worse off. The petitioners therefore ask the House to ensure that the Government: Guarantees that no individual Australian employee will be worse off under proposed changes to the industrial relation system. Allows the National Minimum Wage to continue to be set annually by the independent umpire, the Australian Industrial Relations Commission. 25 5V5 Mr Stephen Smith Mr Stephen Smith (from 25 citizens) TK6 Dr Southcott 137 49 To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament: The petition of certain residents of Flagstaff Hill and surrounding areas of the state of South Australia draws the attention of the House that we the residents are unable to connect to ADSL Broadband Internet despite our local exchange being enabled. Your petitioners therefore request the House to inform Telstra of this and ask that they appropriately enable us to be connected to ADSL Broadband Internet. 137 TK6 Dr Southcott Dr Southcott (from 137 citizens) Petitions received. 49 PRIVATE MEMBERS’ BUSINESS 49 49 15:33:00 Baird, Bruce, MP MP6 Cook LP 1 0 Mr BAIRD —I move: That the House: notes the serious discrimination that exists in Iran towards Baha’is, Assyrians, Chaldeans and Serbo Mandaeans; calls on Iran to recognise the legitimate rights of minorities involving their access to university training and enrolment in professions; and requests the United Nations Human Rights Commission to undertake dialogue with Iran over their continued human rights concerns in that country. Some two years ago I visited Iran as part of the Trade Subcommittee’s visit to look at trade and investment opportunities in Iran. I must say that we were all particularly impressed. It is a wonderful country with very friendly people, and we certainly appreciated the facilitation by the ambassador here in Canberra. There is no doubt, however, that the government remains seriously concerned by the human rights situation in Iran. Iran must do more to promote and protect the human rights of its people. We have urged them to do so and will continue to urge them to do so. The government is in particular concerned by the ongoing harassment, intimidation and persecution of religious and ethnic groups. These include groups that are not recognised under the Iranian constitution as official religions. Three religions are recognised: Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians are the only ones that are allowed to pursue their faith. Even with those groups there are particular concerns. Think of the case of Hamid Pourmand, who was a serving colonel in the Iranian army. He was arrested five months ago under the laws of the Islamic revolution which prohibit non-Muslims from holding officer rank. He was charged with deceiving the armed forces by not declaring he was a convert from Islam to Christianity. This was in spite of the fact that he had in his possession a series of documents indicating that his military superiors had acknowledged years ago that he was a Christian. The verdict was the court did not accept these documents. He had to return to his home town to face charges of apostasy and proselytism before an Islamic court. The sentence automatically discharged him from the army, cutting off his regular income and eliminating nearly 20 years of military pension. The verdict also required his family to vacate their home in military lodgings within a few days, and Pourmand’s wife and two children face destitution as a result. He is a Christian, which is one of the groups that is allowed to practise their religion. So what of those who are not allowed to practise their religion? We have outlined those groups in the motion today. In Iran today, ethnic and religious minorities are systematically discriminated against in relation to their economic, social and cultural rights. Iran is a signatory to various international treaties in this area and is party to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the international Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. This latter convention requires the immediate prohibition of discrimination against minorities and explicitly requires free choice of employment, housing and education, equal access to social services and equal participation in cultural activities. There is no doubt that Iran is failing to comply with these international obligations. In fact, half of the Iranian population are from minority groups. There is an array of discriminatory laws and practices, including the confiscation of land and property; banning from state employment; restrictions on social, cultural, linguistic and religious freedoms; blatantly unfair criminal trials before revolutionary courts; the use of the death penalty, even on minors; restrictions on movements; and the denial of various other civil rights. In July 2004 the UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing reported on the critical situation facing Iran’s minorities in this area. He observed in his preliminary findings that minorities in Iran were subject to discrimination in the distribution of state resources such as housing provision. Access to water and sanitation is distinctly worse in the areas of the country where these minorities reside. Followers of unrecognised religions such as Baha’i, Ahl-e Haqq and Mandaean are forbidden from practising their beliefs. There is particular discrimination against Baha’is, and that discrimination is a particularly alarming example of the attitude towards minorities in Iran. The Baha’i community has told of increases in oppression and state condoned cruelty since the change of government. There have been reports of attacks by unidentified assailants, vandalism, destruction of holy sites and government confiscation of property. At least 32 Baha’i are known to have been detained since the election of the current president. We call on the government of Iran to allow religious freedom in this state. 10000 Adams, Dick (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DGH Adams)—Is the motion seconded? 4V5 Moylan, Judi, MP Mrs Moylan —I second the motion. 51 15:38:00 Vamvakinou, Maria, MP 00AMT Calwell ALP 0 0 Ms VAMVAKINOU —I would like to join my colleague the member for Cook in speaking to this motion on the violation of human rights in Iran. Iran is often, and is currently, in the international spotlight given the intense international pressure it continues to face over its nuclear enrichment program. But today I want to draw attention to Iran’s record on human rights, which continues to be of grave concern, especially its treatment of ethnic and religious minority groups, women and those whom the state labels as political dissidents. Cases of regular human rights abuses in Iran are well documented and have been for some time. Many examples exist of ethnic and religious minorities facing institutionalised discrimination and persecution in Iran. Though the Iranian government may insist otherwise, it is evident that such persecution is both government sanctioned and official government policy. Iran has the largest Baha’i community found anywhere in the world, yet Baha’ism is omitted from the list of recognised religions in Iran’s constitution. Baha’ism is seen by the Iranian authorities as a deviant and misguided sect, and Baha’is are regularly subject to harassment and discrimination carried out by the state either in the name of stamping out heresy and religious deviancy or under the auspices that Baha’is serve as Israel’s proxy force in Iran. Since 1983, Baha’i assemblies have been banned in Iran, and participation in Baha’i activities remains liable to prosecution. Over the last two years there has been an increase in Baha’i property and land confiscations by the state and an increase in the number of Baha’i leaders who have been arrested and detained without charge. In addition, for Iran’s Baha’i community, institutionalised discrimination has seen a ban on access to higher education, the denial of inheritance rights, the withholding of business and property licences and continuing discrimination in the workplace—measures that are designed to slowly strangle the Baha’i community in Iran. Christians are also subject to discrimination and state persecution in Iran. They include members of the Protestant church and the Assyro-Chaldean and Armenian Orthodox churches. Whilst the Assyrian community in Iran has some autonomy in determining its own internal state of affairs, Assyrian Iranians face discrimination in institutions that exist outside their communities’ control, especially at the lower levels of public courts. Other minorities that face differing degrees of discrimination and/or active persecution in Iran include Sunni Muslims, who make up Iran’s largest religious minority. Most Kurds and Turkmen are Sunni Muslims. Sunni Kurds have seen their aspirations for greater autonomy and respect for their rights to religious freedom denied, and clashes between the Iranian military and the armed Kurdish insurgency have often resulted in the deaths of innocent civilians and the razing of Kurdish villages. In Iran, political opposition to the state is still outlawed and political opposition groups are often met with force or intimidation. Severe restrictions on freedom of expression and opinion still exist. Instances of torture and ill-treatment in detention are still rife, and the Iranian authorities are still able to act with relative impunity, given the absence of both an independent media in Iran and the mechanisms necessary to monitor and investigate human rights abuses. The rights of women are of particular concern to me. Disturbing cases continue to emerge of female victims of sexual abuse and rape who have been sentenced to death for the crime of sexual promiscuity, and just in June of this year hundreds of women’s rights activists were violently assaulted by Iranian police during a peaceful demonstration on the streets of Tehran. The key obstacle to human rights in Iran remains its clerical elite, whose authority still overrides Iran’s national law, including the human rights protections contained in Iran’s constitution. Iran’s repeated failure to meet basic human rights standards remains its greatest failing as a member of the international community, and this failure only exacerbates the international scrutiny that Iran currently faces. Human rights law establishes a universal standard intended to protect the lives and welfare of ordinary people. Unlike so much of international law, human rights law effectively bypasses the nation-state and speaks directly to the people, regardless of where they may live. Like anyone else, Iranians have an inalienable right to demand the protections promised to them under international law. 52 15:43:00 Moylan, Judi, MP 4V5 Pearce LP 1 0 Mrs MOYLAN —I thank my colleague the member for Cook for moving this motion and giving me as well as the member for Calwell an opportunity to express some concerns. I had the opportunity to meet with representatives of the Baha’i community in my electorate not so long ago. I think it is of great concern, as the member for Cook said, that certain religions are officially allowed to be practised in Iran but that even for those people practising religion is a very risky business. For those who are not followers of approved religions the risks are of course much higher. The discrimination against the Baha’is is a particularly alarming example of concerning attitudes toward minorities in Iran. The Baha’i community has told us of increases in oppression and state condoned cruelty since the change of government took place. Reports included attacks by unidentified assailants, vandalism and destruction of holy sites and the government confiscation of property, and these are in addition to the Baha’is being denied equal rights to work and basic standards of living. They are even unable to access employment benefits or pensions. The concerns are great, and the Australian government remains seriously concerned by the rising rate of human rights abuses taking place in Iran. Iran is a great and ancient nation, so I am sure it must be of concern to many of the people there as well. The Australian government continues to urge Iran to do more to promote and protect the human rights of its people. There is particular concern about the ongoing harassment, intimidation and persecution of all religious and ethnic groups, including groups not recognised under the Iranian constitution. Australia has a strong track record of standing up for the rights of persecuted groups in Iran and it remains active in making representations to Iran on a range of human rights issues as well as on individual cases of concern. In December 2005 Australia cosponsored a UN General Assembly resolution on the human rights situation in Iran. The resolution expressed serious concern at the continuing discrimination in Iran against ethnic and religious minorities recognised or otherwise under the Iranian constitution. Further, the cosponsored resolution made specific mention of human rights violations against the followers of the Baha’i faith, including the denial of freedom of religion, destruction of sites of religious importance and the suspension of social, educational and community related activities. In line with the United Nations General Assembly resolution 60/171, Australia calls on Iran to eliminate in law and in practice all forms of discrimination based on religious, ethnic or linguistic grounds. Iran’s treatment of minority groups has been highlighted as unsatisfactory by successive UN reports. A recent report of the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief indicated that Iranian authorities were stepping up their persecution of the Baha’i community, hence the visit to my electorate by Baha’i representatives in Australia, and I am sure they have visited many other members of parliament with their concerns for their families and friends who remain in Iran. In 2005 the UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing concluded that land confiscation by the Iranian government disproportionately impacted on the land and property of minorities. I would also like to support the words of the member for Calwell in relation to women. I think there remain particular concerns for the plight of women in Iran. We call on the Iranian government to make some important changes to ensure that the rights of all people, particularly those of different ethnicity and different religions, be respected. 53 15:48:00 Ferguson, Laurie, MP 8T4 Reid ALP 0 0 Mr LAURIE FERGUSON —In the very week that the IAEA has exposed the realities of more highly enriched uranium in Iran—and I stress the IAEA, not the United States administration—we deal with another aspect of the Iranian regime. I join with other speakers in expressing concern about oppression of religious minorities in the country. The main focus, because of their activity in Australia, is the situation for the Baha’is. In my electorate, the Holroyd Group is extremely active in raising these issues and, more broadly, in supporting a number of United Nations conventions. Similarly, the Mandaeans have been closely associated with me regarding a significant number of refugee claims over the years. That situation, as one of the earlier speakers noted, is probably less exposed than it should be because of the closure of alternative media in the country. There was a bit of a widening out under President Khatami, but more recently various measures have been used to restrict any alternative views in the country. It stems back to the realities of the revolution, when they attempted to establish a theocratic state. When you start with that premise and that decision, there is a large probability that you will end up where we are. The forms of repression in the country are very diverse, not only on the religion front. A 16-year-old girl was executed this year for having sexual intercourse. Whether it was because the judge lied about her age is not really the question at hand. If she was 18 or 19 it would still be serious, but it was particularly driven home because of her age. The situation regarding the Baha’is is that which is most driven home. This year Dhabihu’llah Mahrami died after 10 years of incarceration in the city of Yazd. He had been forced to undertake hard labour for that period after his death sentence was overcome by international pressure, and very big questions have been asked about his death, allegedly around Israeli spying claims, which I think have very little substance. As well as this, on a broader front, human rights have been assaulted. Baha’is, as other speakers have indicated, are restricted in their work rights and refused entry to university. There has been evidence in the last year or so of increased surveillance of the community, and they are not recognised as a religion in the state. Amnesty International have been highly critical. They know that 66 Baha’is have been arrested since the beginning of 2005, and those numbers continue to rise. But these issues are not only with regard to the Baha’is. The Mandaeans, as we said, are also subject to great harassment. There is loss of property, discrimination and persecution for people converting to these religions. It is also the ethnic minorities. The Kurdish Democratic Party, which attempted to accomplish change through democratic means rather than through armed insurrection, have had the misfortune of trying to negotiate with the Iranian authorities. On two occasions in Europe—once in Vienna and once in West Germany; not in Iran—when they sought negotiations with the Iranian authorities, they were gunned down. So that is the kind of credibility that this regime has. I have very close contact with Turkic peoples, and on Saturday night, along with the Attorney-General, I attended the Turkish National Day celebrations. Amongst the minorities represented there were the Turkmen from Iran, who number many millions. Earlier this year, in the city of Shiraz, demonstrations involving an estimated one million people were severely repressed by the government. There was bashing of demonstrators and attempts to put down any proposition to have a local say with regard to language used in schools or in the media. There has been no consultation about getting a local governor who might have some connections with this very significant minority group. So it is a very diverse front of discrimination and victimisation of minorities. The UN Special Rapporteur on the Freedom of Religion or Belief, Asma Jahangir, said in March that she had received a copy of a letter—and I alluded to this earlier—from the chairman of the command headquarters of the armed forces in Iran asking for increased surveillance of the minority group. Human Rights Watch has talked about the arrest of people for teaching English to underprivileged children. Baha’is who were teaching English and other subjects to people in Shiraz have been arrested and jailed.(Time expired) 54 15:53:00 Henry, Stuart, MP E0L Hasluck LP 1 0 Mr HENRY —As Australians living in a democratic country with basic fundamental rights such as freedom of speech, the right to protest and practise our religious beliefs freely, without fear of reprisal, the concept of persecution for practising a faith that promotes peace, tolerance and harmony is a foreign concept. Unfortunately, this is not the case, and many people practising the Baha’i faith in Iran have undergone torture, abuse and humiliation, simply because they choose to practise this faith that they believe in, which differs from that of the undemocratic government of Iran. I had the opportunity earlier this year to meet with some members of the local spiritual association of the Baha’is of Swan, which forms part of my electorate of Hasluck. This local spiritual association comprises 150 practising members, and their horrific stories of torture and unimaginable atrocities left me compelled to rise today and support this private member’s motion that has been moved by the honourable member for Cook. The basic fundamental principles of the Baha’i faith are abandonment of all forms of prejudice, equal rights and opportunities for both men and women, universal education, encouragement of high moral standards in personal life, and the responsibility of each person to search independently for the truth. These basic principles are hardly a justifiable excuse to persecute and intimidate those who continue to practise this faith against the will of the Iranian government. Within Iran there are over 300,000 members of the Baha’i faith, which constitutes the largest religious minority within the country. The members of the Baha’i have never attempted to challenge the authority of the government, and they continue to remain uninvolved in politics and the political system, yet the Iranian government refuses to recognise the legitimacy of this faith and continues to deny them basic fundamental rights. Since the present Iranian regime came to power in 1979, their main aim has been to repress the faith and prevent it from developing further. In 1993, the United Nations Human Rights Commission uncovered a memorandum that had been written in 1991 by the Iranian Supreme Revolutionary Cultural Council and signed by the Supreme Leader. It detailed specific and direct methods for dealing with the faith in order that ‘their progress and development be blocked’. Based on this secret memorandum, which was presumably not meant to be released to the outside world, the Baha’i youth practising in Iran have been prevented from attaining higher education for up to 25 years. Since the revolution in 1979, Baha’is have been prevented from gaining employment and pensions and have lost the right to inherit property. Historical sites of great importance to the faith have been destroyed beyond repair, and cemeteries and holy places relevant to Baha’is have been seized and have not been returned. One of the most disturbing stories that came from my meeting with the local Baha’i members was the possibility of the revival of the Hojjatieh Society. Originally founded in 1953 to eradicate the Baha’i faith, there are now serious concerns that this organisation has been revived by the government of Iran. The increasing persecution that is being committed against the Baha’i faith has escalated since the present regime came to power, which has seen more than 200 Baha’is unnecessarily killed, hundreds imprisoned for no apparent reason and businesses closed, confiscated and destroyed. Basic fundamental rights that all humans should be entitled to have been removed from Baha’i believers, and the persecution appears to be continuing to escalate. The United Nations General Assembly continues to adopt annual resolutions that condemn the human rights abuses that occur throughout Iran, but it has no apparent effect on the attitude of the Iran government. By raising this issue on the world stage and speaking out against the atrocities that are presently occurring, the Baha’i faith in Iran has been able to continue as a religious organisation. In doing so, their believers are taking unimaginable risks and literally taking their lives into their own hands—something that the majority of Australians have never had to contend with. Australia has always prided itself on the fact that we are a tolerant nation and welcome beliefs, faiths and religious practices that differ from Christianity. As part of the international community, we have, at the very least, a moral obligation to raise this worsening situation, and I urge in the strongest possible terms the United Nations Human Rights Commission to increase their dealings with Iran over these well-publicised concerns that exist regarding Iran’s human rights situation. Every human has the right to practise a faith of their choosing and should not be persecuted for doing so, as appears to be occurring in Iran. I call on Iran to stop this unjust persecution of all minorities. 56 15:58:00 Livermore, Kirsten, MP 83A Capricornia ALP 0 0 Ms LIVERMORE —I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak to this motion condemning the ongoing abuse of human rights in Iran, and I thank the member for Cook for bringing it before the House. Although the motion refers to a number of religious and ethnic groups within Iran, I particularly wanted to participate in this debate because I know that it is important to the Baha’i community in my electorate that these matters are brought to the attention of the Australian government. Representatives and supporters of the Baha’i community in Central Queensland have been to see me twice this year to express their concerns about the treatment of their fellow Baha’is in Iran. At least one local family that I spoke to has its own experience of the discrimination and persecution that Baha’is suffer in that country. In part, the motion calls on Iran to recognise the legitimate rights of minorities involving their access to university training and enrolment in professions. In Iran today those rights are seriously proscribed for a number of minority groups and explicitly prohibited for Baha’is. For example, a 2001 Ministry of Justice report stated that Baha’is must be excluded or expelled from universities once their identity becomes known. Furthermore, Baha’is are banned from government employment. This was the experience of the Rockhampton family that I referred to earlier. The mother of the family graduated in law from Tehran University and had embarked on a career in a government department prior to the revolution of 1979 that brought the Islamic government to power. Along with thousands of other Baha’is at that time she was sacked from her job, and life in Iran became increasingly difficult. She has described for me, and I have tried to imagine, a life without basic rights and with absolutely no protection for either your person or your property from the law. There is no freedom for Baha’is to practise their faith in Iran. Baha’is can have their property confiscated and they are subject to arbitrary harassment and arrest. According to the US State Department’s International religious freedom report of 2005, Iranian law allows for Baha’is to be killed with impunity. In those circumstances the family could see no future for themselves in Iran and in the mid-1980s they made the difficult and dangerous decision to flee the country. By any measure they have made a success of their life in Australia but, as they have explained to me, no-one chooses to leave their home and, of course, their fears for friends and family still in Iran are ever present. Those fears for the safety and welfare of Baha’is in Iran are real and well-founded. They are fears shared by governments and human rights agencies around the world. The persecution of and denial of rights to the Baha’i community in Iran have been going on since the 1979 revolution. There are indications, however, that we are seeing a renewed effort by the government to victimise the group. In March this year the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief drew attention to a confidential letter addressed to the Ministry of Information, the revolutionary guard and the police force calling on them to identify persons who adhere to the Baha’i faith and to monitor their activities. This is no doubt an ominous development for the 300,000 or so Baha’is living in Iran. The special rapporteur voiced her concern that the information gained as a result of such monitoring will be used as a basis for the increased persecution of and discrimination against members of the Baha’i community. As we have heard from other speakers in this debate, this is just one of many such abuses of human rights by the government of Iran. As members of the House might be aware, it was only a couple of weeks ago that Australian viewers of the Four Corners program were appalled by the shocking story of Atefah Sahaaleh, the 16-year-old girl who was executed for a so-called crime against chastity. This teenage girl, a victim of abuse and rape, was sentenced to death even though, as a signatory to the International Convention on Human Rights, Iran cannot execute a person under the age of 18. As the member for Reid pointed out in his contribution, that is not really the point anyway. The technicality about her age is only one of the shocking aspects of this case. By supporting this motion the parliament joins with the international community in condemning these breaches of human rights in Iran. The Australian government must continue to strongly support international efforts to eliminate discrimination and human rights abuses in all their forms within that country. 10000 Adams, Dick (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DGH Adams)—Order! The time allotted for this debate has expired. The debate is therefore adjourned and will be made an order of the day for the next sitting. 57 57 16:04:00 Georganas, Steve, MP DZY Hindmarsh ALP 0 0 Mr GEORGANAS —I move: That this House condemn the Federal Government for: failing to adequately fund healthcare in Australia; its role in causing the current doctor and nurse shortage in Australia; and failing to adequately address this shortage. The health of the nation is expensive, but everyone from economists through to the public know that it is more cost effective to get your health system right and keep people living and working healthily rather than making the odd saving and letting things deteriorate. For the national economy to be healthy we need to adequately invest in our own health. This means money being put where it is strategically needed; it means managing the nation’s health system and ensuring the supply of the health workforce. The federal government’s record in this regard, though, is not one that most Australians would applaud. The 2006-07 federal budget gave us a double whammy. While health expenditure decreases as a proportion of government spending overall, it also fails keep up with health inflation. So the federal budget is actually decreasing this government’s investment in health and leaving us with a shrunken share of health funding which is, in itself, of decreasing value. This means poorer health outcomes for Australians. What the budget did advance was the agenda of the Council of Australian Governments. Sixty-two per cent of the total health budget concerns measures driven by COAG. This is somewhat ironic. The last time the government and the states negotiated hospital funding, the federal government ripped $1 billion off the table. But we have seen the states step in and take over the national health agenda. COAG measures of late largely stem from the report of the Productivity Commission that was released in January 2006 which identified a health system with serious and substantial shortcomings. Areas within which the federal government’s game has been found lacking are: improving preventative health care, increasing the number of training places and retaining more of those currently employed and those who will re-enter the workforce. There has been a widespread and long-term acknowledgement of shortages in workforce supply, especially in the fields of general practice, medical specialty areas, dentistry and nursing. Naturally there are many and varied factors that have brought this to be. As in many industries, and in Australia’s population as a whole, the health industry’s workforce is ageing. It is estimated that one quarter of the existing nursing profession will retire in the next 15 years. Ageing doctors are tending to work fewer hours and I am sure many suspend their careers for family reasons. Health industry professionals are facing increasing workplace demands and, in cases, poor professional and financial rewards are resulting in more and more qualified professionals opting out to make alternative careers for themselves, which increases the pressures on those who remain within the industry. Poor planning and insufficient investment are also playing their part. Take the nursing profession: the current estimate is a shortfall of 31,000 in nursing. That is increasing every year but over one-third of qualified applicants for university nursing places are being turned away, refused entry to the profession and refused a role in sustaining and strengthening the overall health workforce. And while these hopeful Australians are turned away by the federal government’s failure to adequately support its own health system, this same government bends over backwards to bring 2,500 nurses into Australia on temporary work visas in 2005-06 alone. The lack of planning and investment is also evident in the medical profession. With national shortages of GPs, the government’s bureaucratic bungling has caused a queue of 1,200 doctors waiting for Medicare provider numbers. And while this remains unaddressed, the government again pulls out its 457 visa card. The number of doctors recruited from overseas last year included 980 general medical practitioners, and the overall number has risen in the last 10 years by some 30-plus per cent so that now some 25 per cent of the medical workforce comprises doctors trained overseas. Still, shortages remain and this government’s failure to adequately plan, invest in and support its own health industry remains evident. The Productivity Commission identified these shortcomings and flagged the necessity for broad health policy and health funding reforms. As no-one else is prepared to, we have witnessed COAG drive the health agenda in this country. We have seen state governments driving the higher education sector to increase numbers in certain health professions, not the federal government which is responsible. We have a federal government which has put down its pen, lent back in its chair and effectively encouraged the states to gather around the desk and perform the federal government’s own job and advance the national health workforce agenda. If the government says, as it does, that dental health is not their thing, not their fault and someone else’s problem, then how can the minister’s own call in recent months for the federal government to take over hospitals be greeted with anything but mirth? 10000 Adams, Dick (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DGH Adams)—Is the motion seconded? 58 16:09:00 Anderson, John, MP 4K4 Gwydir NATS 1 0 Mr ANDERSON —I second the motion. It will hardly surprise you that my opening remarks will indicate that, whilst I do not pretend there is never a need for increased effort in the area of health—expectations continue to rise, technologies tend to expand and people’s expectations that society will be able to help them access these new technologies and capabilities, even in quite advanced years, increase—in reality we manage health care at a federal level quite well. I think the government deserves much commendation for the efforts it has made and indeed I firmly rebuke the former speaker, the member for Hindmarsh, for his implication that somehow the states are simple, pure and clean. The member behind me comes from Queensland. 00AMX Johnson, Michael, MP Mr Johnson —Absolutely! 4K4 Anderson, John, MP Mr ANDERSON —I think we have seen some pretty clear evidence of bungling in the administration of health in that state, including the registration of medical practitioners whom, it would have been revealed with something as simple as a Google search, should never have been employed to work in this country’s health systems. In terms of funding, I am almost inclined to think that one of the things that we ought to be prepared to do in this country is display a little proportion and balance. Whilst, as I have acknowledged, you can always do better, the reality is that, so I am told, we spend more on health in this country than the GDP of 65 per cent of the nations on earth, and we ought to always recognise that we indeed have probably as good as the best, if not the best, health care available to any of the peoples on earth, notwithstanding the fact that administratively, as we have seen in places like Queensland, it sometimes goes seriously wrong. I would not excuse any mistakes made by the Commonwealth in that regard either. Nonetheless, I think we have done quite well. We come to the thrust of this debate, and in many ways it must, by definition, centre on what is acknowledged as quite a serious shortage of doctors, specialists, nurses and allied healthcare workers in this country. The reality is that if we are short of them now, 10 years into government, given the training time involved, particularly in specialities, where must the blame lie? On those who, frankly, were in government before us. I would hear, if they were here, the collective groans of those who might be present on the other side, but it is a reality and I would like to focus briefly on what has happened in rural and regional Australia. When we got into government it was estimated that we were somewhere between 600 and 900 short in country Australia of a reasonable number of GPs, and something like 900 to 1,100 specialists short. They are extraordinary figures. The then health minister, Dr Michael Wooldridge, and I undertook a country tour. We went to the base hospital in Tamworth, a big regional centre, and to Gunnedah, a mid-size country town chronically short of doctors at that stage—disgracefully short of doctors. Those doctors there were doing a Herculean task but working against the odds, and exhausted. We went to Mudgee, a reasonably well-provided mid-size town; Moree, a substantial town with some particular health needs with its high Indigenous population; and Ashford, a small one-doctor country town. What emerged from that was something very interesting indeed, and that is that the chronic shortage of doctors and nurses we had in country areas was related to the fact that for decades—and this is why I say the previous speaker needs to have a look at the record of the Labor Party in office—we had not been training anything like a sufficient number of country kids in medicine and health care. We had known for a long time—the department of health had all the research it needed to formulate right policies and the ministers of the day should have been responding—the reality that if you want enough country doctors, nurses and healthcare specialists you have to train enough country kids. In fact, the intake of country kids had got down to four or five per cent. At one of our great medical schools, country intake was down to two per cent. Via a range of mechanisms we got that back up to somewhere around 25 to 30 per cent. I meet country kids everywhere who are going to study medicine or who are well through with a RRMA scholarship. I meet others who have benefited from the Flynn scholarships. The point that I draw from this is that we have, since very early days in this government, been addressing a problem that predated us and even now it needs to be recognised that those doctors are only just beginning to graduate. The vastly increased supply of doctors that we will have for those areas of need is only now starting to emerge because we had to correct a very longstanding policy shortfall that predated this government. Let me conclude by just referring to the amount of money being spent. Since we came to government, annual spending on health and aged care has more than doubled from $19 billion in 1995-96 to an expected $48 billion in 2006-07. I think that is clear evidence of a real financial commitment and a very strongly increasing medical expenditure on the part of the federal government in this country. 60 16:15:00 Hayes, Chris, MP ECV Werriwa ALP 0 0 Mr HAYES —I congratulate the member for Hindmarsh for bringing this motion to the attention of the House. I could not agree more with his sentiments—perhaps taking a slightly different view than the member for Gwydir on this subject. Electorates like my own are currently paying the price for the cuts to doctor training that were introduced in 1996, the year that this government took office. Werriwa currently has a ratio of population to full-time equivalent GPs of 1,700 to one—that is, 1,700 people for every full-time equivalent GP. This is in contrast to the Department of Health and Ageing recommended acceptable levels: a ratio of around 1,200 to one. Recently, the shadow minister for health, Julia Gillard, visited my electorate with me at Carnes Hill. We were presented with a petition from over 1,000 residents from that one suburb calling for more doctor training. Since that time, I have been receiving many petitions in my office dealing with the same subject. I would like to take the opportunity to thank Graham Conroy for his efforts in collecting those signatures. As a resident of that area and someone who is particularly concerned about the state of health and the provision of GPs—like the concerns of many other people in Carnes Hill—he has made it his task to go out and have this discussion within his suburb. Constituents in my electorate are paying the price of GP training places that were reduced to 400 when this government took office—and it put that in as a first-order priority after the 1996 election. Nearly half the households in my electorate—and, I assume, in many other growing and younger electorates—contain couples and dependent children. These families are now concerned that they will not have access to medical care when they need it and when their kids need it. What is worse, the cuts to the health programs keep coming under this government. In the last budget alone, the government decided that that it would slash the More Doctors for Outer Metropolitan Areas program by $1.5 million. This program has already assisted two doctors relocating to my electorate of Werriwa. But, instead of using it to encourage more doctors to relocate to the outer metropolitan areas of Sydney, this government has decided to cut the program. It is clear that health simply is not the priority of the Howard government. This government will say that the problems it faces in health care are all the fault of state governments. The member for Gwydir is no different. That is precisely what he was trying to argue in his contribution to this debate. The blame game is not what the residents of my electorate want to hear. They want to know that, when they need it, they will have access to health care and that their family will have access to proper health care when it is needed. They want to know that, when they are sick or when their kids are sick, there will be someone available to help them. I welcome the fact that the University of Western Sydney will have its medical school up and running very shortly and will be training students in the outer metropolitan areas of Sydney. I am confident that the school will produce excellent doctors, as the staff who are involved with the school—people like Professor Neville Yeomans, the head of the school, and Dr Andrew McDonald, the assistant professor, who is also head of paediatrics at Campbelltown Hospital—are highly dedicated and will work hard to produce their best efforts when producing doctors for our area, for outer metropolitan Sydney. But they know that this will not resolve our immediate problem. They will not be able to produce doctors for a number of years. Add to that the fact that a recent survey from the medical profession reports that many GPs are saying now that doctors should specialise rather than go into general practice, and that obviously paints a very grim picture for health care provided by our system. The government boasts that it is spending record amounts on health, yet the budget document says otherwise. It is cutting the PBS. It will only fund bulk-billing initiatives for a further two years. It is wasting money on advertising to prop up private health insurers, and additional funding for medical research that is promised now appears in the budget to be conditional on the sale of Medibank Private. What is worse for people in my electorate is cutting the More Doctors for Outer Metropolitan Areas program. This is a disgrace, and it reflects the attitude that is being exhibited by this government. 61 16:20:00 Johnson, Michael, MP 00AMX Ryan LP 1 0 Mr JOHNSON —I am pleased to speak on this motion in the parliament today. At the outset, I want to bid a very warm welcome to the people of Queensland and of course to all the residents of the wonderful western suburbs in the Ryan electorate. I am pleased to speak in the parliament about an issue, health care and health policy, which is very important to my constituents. In general, it is a very important issue for the people of Queensland, particularly as they go to a state election. We all know in Queensland that health care, the management of health, is one of the top two or three issues in Queensland. Indeed, it might even be ranked as the top issue for the people of Queensland. We know that managing health care is very challenging. It is very important to each and every Australian. Indeed, health care is literally a question of life and death for many Australians. We need a very significant minister to lead this area. In the case of the Howard government here in Canberra, we do have that with Tony Abbott. I am not quite sure whether the opposition spokesperson, the member for Lalor, would have the same capacities and talents as Mr Abbott. Let us see whether there is any guidance from the last election. The shadow spokesperson came up with a healthcare policy called Medicare Gold, if I recollect accurately. Thank goodness the people of Australia emphatically rejected that, because it would have taken us to the cusp of bankruptcy. It was very Whitlamesque in its nature. In this parliament, the Howard government has the great responsibility of the health management of the nation. Since the Howard government came to office in 1996, annual spending on health care and aged care has more than doubled from $19 billion in 1995-96 to $48 billion in 2006-07. In 2006-07 the Australian government expenditure on health and aged care will be 22 per cent of total Australian government expenditure, compared with 15 per cent under the previous government in 1995-96—an enormous amount of taxpayers’ money, which reflects the significance of this area for the government. In 2006-07, the Medicare Benefits Scheme will be $11.2 billion of the $48 billion. Supporting the states’ and territories’ hospital systems will be some $8.8 billion. Subsidising prescription medicine will be $7.1 billion. Assisting Australians with the cost of private health insurance will be some $3.3 billion. It is 2006 and I am still not quite sure whether the opposition supports the private health insurance scheme. I would be very interested to know that, because of course previously they rejected that policy. There is $3.7 billion in veterans’ health care, and in the aged in community care sector some $7.8 billion is spent. It is a lot of taxpayers’ money, reflecting the Howard government’s priorities in the healthcare area. As the Minister for Health and Ageing says, clearly the Howard government is the best friend Medicare could ever have, and clearly the Howard government is the best friend that everyday Ryan residents using the Medicare system could ever hope to have as well. I want to draw the House’s attention to the PBS. The PBS is the mechanism by which the Australian government ensures that as many Australians as possible can benefit from costly medicines and drugs that would be out of reach for most Australians. Some 2½ thousand different brands’ items are listed on the PBS. In 1995-96 the PBS expenditure was $2.5 billion. In 2006-07, PBS expenditure will be in excess of $7 billion. This represents almost a tripling of nominal expenditure. We all know that the opposition clearly and without any capacity at all has a go at the government for its Medicare take-up. I want to refer to my electorate of Ryan, where the bulk-billing rate has gone up from 52 per cent to 56 per cent. I know that the opposition quite often has a go at the government in this area, but that reflects that this area of the health portfolio is no longer fertile ground for them. In Queensland it is up some 12.5 points to 74 per cent, as the minister for health referred to in question time today. I think it is very important for members of the government to continuously remind the electorate. As a Queensland based federal member I am going to continue to remind Queenslanders that it is time for them to give the Beattie government a real kick. (Time expired) 62 16:25:00 Jenkins, Harry, MP HH4 Scullin ALP 0 0 Mr JENKINS —I support the motion moved by the member for Hindmarsh and congratulate him on bringing this important area of public policy up for discussion today in private members’ business. Those that have spoken on behalf of the government have tended to look at the figures and resources that they claim are being put into health and claim that the adequacy is just on the basis of quantum. I think the real problem is that you need to analyse where these funds are going, the misdirection of funds and the fact that, in toto, these funds do not effectively look at the long-term best interests of the Australian healthcare system. If we continue to have a system that is based on secondary and tertiary health care and do not really look at the role of primary health care, the role of general practice, the role of community health centres and at what is happening in the day-to-day lives of people, we are going to completely miss the point. The member for Werriwa talked about the outer western suburbs of Sydney; I will talk about the outer northern suburbs of Melbourne, where the population growth is great. One municipality that I represent is having eight new residents a day moving in. That is at least two households a day. When you look at some of the new suburbs you see that there are no general practitioners or neighbourly family medicos living in those areas because the needs are being outstripped by the growth. These are the problems that we confront. The member for Werriwa indicated that the ideal ratio of population and general practice is 1,200 to one. In the electorate of Scullin the actual ratio is about 1,500 to one, and the shortage is getting even more stressful because of the population growth and the ageing of the health workforce. General practitioners are ageing and they are not being replaced. A number of the programs that the Howard government has had in place have missed the mark. The outer northern suburbs of Melbourne have fallen through the cracks. It is all right to talk about regional Australia—meaning rural regional Australia—but in the regions of our major cities there is no direct assistance in combating the types of shortages and disproportionate ratios that are seen in electorates like Scullin. The shortage of nurses is chronic. It is a shortfall of something like 31,000 nationally and it is growing every year. There are plenty of statistics that show that the average age of nurses is increasing. There are not enough new nurses coming on stream to replace those that are leaving the profession, so we need to look at the ways in which we can assist people to get into training and make it more attractive for trained nurses to be retained in the workforce. The government at one stage, in the run-up to an election, indicated that they would lessen the HECS burden for those who go into nursing. What have we seen? What has been the outcome? Of course it is the reverse. The HECS burden for a nursing course is nearly 40 per cent more than the minimum HECS contribution. This is despite the government indicating that they would assist and understand that this is a burden on a special skills shortage in the Australian population. The other thing that we need to look at is the amount of work that is done in outer urban areas—areas that might be seen as being on the wrong side of the Yarra. Traditionally one of the workforce issues in Australia has been that we cannot get medicos spread across the metropolis as we would like. It has always been places like the northern and western suburbs of Melbourne and the western suburbs of Sydney that have had these shortfalls. But the general practitioners that actually operate in, say, places like the Northern Division of General Practice in Melbourne consult something like 5.7 locally per head of population; nationally that ratio is 4.7. So it is not as if they are not doing the work and putting in the effort. But why should general practitioners in electorates like Scullin have to work harder? We need to address these shortages. These shortages exist because not enough people are going into university courses to meet the shortfalls. Members of the government say that the number of places has opened up but it is still behind the eight ball. We need to have concrete ideas that will see that these types of workforce shortages are addressed. It is in the long-term benefit of our health system that general practitioners can play their important role in primary health care throughout Australia.  64 16:30:00 Mirabella, Sophie, MP 00AMU Indi LP 1 0 Mrs MIRABELLA —I am pleased to be speaking on this motion today about the health system in Australia because there is a very good story to tell. It is unfortunate that it is left to the member for Hindmarsh to do the heavy lifting for the Labor Party in moving this motion because it seems that the opposition spokeswoman on health has clearly lost interest in the health portfolio and rarely uses question time to raise matters on health policy. The former Leader of the Opposition claimed that the 2004 election was: ... a referendum about the future of Medicare. It’s a referendum about the future of health care in this country. Judging by the result it is pretty clear that the Australian people feel that their health system is in very good hands with the coalition government. The honourable member for Hindmarsh has accused the government of failing to adequately fund the health care system and failing to address workforce shortages. This claim—at a time when 22 per cent of total government expenditure is pumped into the health system—is patently absurd. A decade ago the Labor government spent $6 billion on Medicare benefits. Today the figure is $10.4 billion. It is little wonder that the oft-quoted catchcry of the Minister for Health and Ageing is gaining traction because all the evidence backs up the fact that the Howard government is the best friend that Medicare has ever had. We have overseen the single greatest health care policy to complement the existing Medicare system with the institution of the Medicare safety net. It is a scheme that the Labor Party wants to abolish even though it is greatly assisting thousands of people in my electorate with their out-of-pocket costs for out-of-hospital treatment, something the Labor Party chooses to ignore. We have substantially increased bulk-billing rates, including in my electorate where bulk-billing rates have been traditionally low. We keep the popular and very useful 30 per cent private health insurance rebate while Labor continues to send out confusing messages about its future. We know of Labor’s deep-seated hatred of the private health insurance rebate. It stems back to 2000 when it was claimed by the former Leader of the Opposition, Mr Latham, that the current Leader of the Opposition was going to: ... make some major policy announcements. For instance, he is going to scrap Howard’s rotten private health insurance rebate. It is also suggested that the member for Jagajaga ‘despises the rebate and wants to pole-axe it’. The private health insurance rebate was even extended and improved for older Australians at the last election. So much for Labor’s supposed concern at improving health care in this country. All they do is whinge and complain but never offer any detailed policy alternatives. We can only look at their recent history and the albatross hanging around their collective necks in health care.  10000 Causley, Ian (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. IR Causley)—Order! The time allotted for this debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting. 64 GRIEVANCE DEBATE Question proposed: That grievances be noted. 64 64 16:34:00 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 0 Mr PRICE —I have a number of grievances to raise but I want to start off on a positive note and say that St Aidan’s Church at Rooty Hill in my electorate celebrated 50 years and I was very pleased to go along to the mass and the celebrations. I sincerely congratulate all those who put in so much time and effort to make it such an outstanding success. St Aidan’s has had four parish priests. Father Morreau, who I knew briefly before he passed away, was without doubt a legend at Rooty Hill and the huge inspiration and force behind St Aidan’s. Sadly, of the four parish priests we have had to date, three have passed on—tragically, Father Alex Sciberras at the very early age of 52. Again, I say: ‘Congratulations, St Aidan’s. You have served the community well for 50 years. I look forward to the next 50 years, although I cannot promise to be at that celebration.’ There are a couple of grievances I wanted to raise. Firstly, it comes as no secret to honourable members that I have taken a great deal of interest in family law matters and child support issues in the last decade. I was recently shocked by a constituent, who I will call Mrs Smith, who came to see me about a Family Court order she had involving visitation rights of her mother-in-law, a grandparent of the children. In recent times we have seen the role of grandparents increasingly recognised in family law and that has been a good thing. At the heart of the changes has been a move to ensure that in separated families the existing contact and relationship children have with their grandparents does not diminish because of the fact that the parents divorce or separate. I do not know of any member of this House who would not agree with that proposition, but this was an intact family. This was not a separated family; the grandparent had gone to the Family Court about visitation rights for an intact family. This came as a real shock to me. I absolutely thought there was something amiss with it, so not only did I ring the office of the Attorney-General but I also ended up writing to him. To my horror, I have found that, under this government, the Family Court can interfere in intact families and grant grandparents rights over grandchildren. I make no apology, both as the member for Chifley and as a grandparent, in saying I abhor this. It is a terrible mistake. I admit I am old fashioned. I believe that marriage is not only a civil contract but also a sacrament. The idea that the Family Court can interfere in intact families in this way is social engineering gone mad under the Howard government. I disagree with it, I oppose it; it is a bad law. Yes, we should have laws that protect children; we should have laws that guarantee they can be raised in a safe environment. But I do not think we should have laws that interfere in families in this way. I intend to raise this matter with Senator Fielding, who is the Family First senator from Victoria. I wonder what he thinks about the Howard government interfering in families in this way. We have already had a newspaper article saying that the Family Court is taking two years to make access arrangements with children in separated families and that they are not able to deal with their current case load—what is new in all that?—of separated family issues. But, in addition to that, the Howard government is now allowing the Family Court to interfere in intact families. I have got a simple proposition. I say: unless it is a criminal matter, unless it is a diabolical matter going to the welfare of the child, we should keep the Family Court out of the lives of Australian families and let them get on with the job that they were established to do—that is, to encourage divorcing or separating parents to make sensible arrangements for their children. I raise this in the parliament today, and I am going to continue to raise it because I think this is absolutely abhorrent. It is a step too far and the Howard government should not indulge in such social engineering as to allow and permit the Family Court to interfere with ordinary Australian families this way. The other matter I wanted to raise was the issue of the 40 dead seals in Victoria. I am pleased to say that there was absolute outrage at what appeared to be a couple of aberrant fishermen who were responsible for the death of these 40 seals. It has been in the papers; it has been on TV—and rightly so. But there is a great deal of hypocrisy, not only in the media but also in this government. As I have said before, we have 78,000 illegal fishermen coming to our shores annually. The measures that the government has announced have reduced this to 72,000 illegal fishermen every year. And what do these illegal fishermen do when they are fishing for sharks? They harpoon dolphins. Can I repeat that? For the two- or three-kilometre fishing lines that they set, they harpoon dolphins—not one, not 40, but I suspect hundreds if not thousands. There is not one bit of community outrage about what is happening each and every day on our northern borders. It is an absolute disgrace. I grieve for the seals, but I worry about the silence, particularly from the government, about the ongoing death of dolphins in our northern waters. Something ought to be done about it. I have taken a great deal of interest in illegal fishing. The opposition had set up a task force, ably led by the member for Chisholm. She did an excellent job, and we have uncovered a lot. One thing we did, thanks to the honourable member for Lingiari and Senator Trish Crossin, was to go to Maningrida. There we saw some sea rangers, and they are doing a good job. I put the following question on the Notice Paper: Has the ACS provided sea rangers with caps and mugs and does it intend to provide sea rangers with sugar, flour and tobacco. For any honourable member who has not read it, the answer the Minister for Justice and Customs has provided is this: Customs has provided items such as caps and mugs, which have the Customs Hotline Logo and 1800 … number inscribed on them. There is no intent to provide sugar, flour or tobacco— for the Northern Territory Indigenous sea rangers. I am terribly relieved, because they get no decent training; they do not get any pay—unlike the reconnaissance units set up under NORFORCE, who are inducted and properly trained as reservists. They get absolutely nothing except caps and mugs. Thank God they are not getting sugar, flour— (Time expired) 66 66 16:44:00 Henry, Stuart, MP E0L Hasluck LP 1 0 Mr HENRY —I appreciate the opportunity to speak in the grievance debate to again address the House on behalf of the electorate of Hasluck, which has been adversely impacted by the proposed BGC brickworks to be built on Perth airport land. I am deeply sorry and very disappointed that my constituents’ and my concerns regarding this development appear to have fallen on deaf ears and that, in this instance, our government has failed the people who elected me to represent them. On the 15th of last month, the Minister for Transport and Regional Services approved the building of these brickworks. This decision has devastated the faith of many in my community who believed that, somehow, the minister would get this decision right. He did not. This is not the way it is supposed to work and, if this brickworks goes ahead, the community surrounding the airport will bear the burden of this mistake for generations. Although I believe the Minister for Transport and Regional Services has made a serious error in approving this proposal, I am relieved to some degree that the conditions placed upon this approval have at least some chance of preventing our worst fears from being realised. But conditions are not enough to make a wrong decision into a right one, and I would argue that the minister should never have been put in the position of having to make this decision. This issue may technically concern Commonwealth land, but this is purely a Western Australian matter and should have been decided by the people it affects and the government of Western Australia. I sincerely believe that there was much more the state government could and should have done to provide alternative sites on which BGC could develop brickworks—for instance, the state government could have done more in partnership with the federal government to make alternative sites more commercially and logistically viable. There are other sites which would have enabled brickworks to be located much further from existing homes and community facilities—where air quality was not already seriously compromised, where the chimneystack could be built high enough to prevent problems from emissions and without causing potential risk adjacent to the flight path. There are other sites where local government leaders are keen to create employment and to attract such a development but, essentially, we all found ourselves on this path because BGC felt they had no reasonable alternative than to seek to build their brickworks on the Commonwealth land within Perth airport. I must confess to being seriously disappointed with the behaviour of many state government leaders. The state members for Belmont and Midland, Eric Ripper and Michelle Roberts, both senior ministers in the state Labor government, were happy to sit back and watch as others gave freely of their time on this issue in the hope that this decision would increase the chance of Labor regaining Hasluck at the next election. Along with Senator Sterle and the Leader of the Opposition—the often missing member for Brand—all they could do was to make absurd allegations about nuclear waste dumps that did nothing but insult the intelligence of my constituents. It is all too easy to say that people’s concerns have been taken into account. It is easy to say that this will be ‘the best brickworks around’. The community are not stupid—far from it. They see through this for what it is: empty posturing. We can say what we like; they know they have been overruled in this matter even though the truth is that the plant BGC plans to use is a second-hand plant from Germany that is already several years old. The truth is that the Western Australian Department of Health raised serious concerns about adverse health effects on those living nearby. The fact is that the Department of the Environment and Heritage found a long list of issues it felt were still too uncertain to justify approving this proposal. Those issues are referred to in the department’s environmental assessment report—for example, the proposed scrubber technology has not been used in Western Australia and the details of how the system will be managed have not been provided. BGC has not provided sufficient detail on whether the proposal is likely to meet the proposed stack emission limits. The department is not satisfied that the information provided to date is sufficiently rigorous to conclude that the modelling addresses air quality concerns. The department cannot be confident that the proposal will not result in adverse health impacts if only because of the uncertainty about the existing pollutant load and the speed at which existing brickworks will reduce their emissions. The proposal will require greater regulatory involvement than normal airport developments. The report states: Therefore, this proposal presents a range of challenges and uncertainties that have not been resolved. As environmental management philosophies go, wishful thinking went out decades ago. Uncertainties should be sorted out before we allow these brickworks to be built. The conditions put on this proposal do not give my constituents any reassurance, especially when BGC’s reputation in Western Australia for compliance with government regulations leaves much to be desired. How can we expect the community to have faith in conditions when this sorry tale actually started with BGC and Westralia Airports Corporation blatantly denying that a brickworks was even being considered, when they tried to get away without even having to hold a public consultation phase and only did so after intense community pressure? This is 2006. It is not good enough for us to approve major industrial developments amidst uncertainties about the negative impacts they will cause. It is not good enough for us to allow the system to ignore sensible, well-argued concerns of thousands of people who have made their homes and lives in this area. Given the negative impact of this decision and the unmet concerns of the community which have been reinforced by the environmental assessment report, the Minister for Transport and Regional Services should agree to include a community consultative group as part of the monitoring process, working alongside the airport environment officer. This would go a long way to overcoming some of the community scepticism and cynicism over this decision, adding an appropriate level of transparency to this process already weighted heavily in favour of the proponents. BGC is an important organisation in Western Australia and I would be remiss if I did not give credit to the contribution it has made and continues to make to our state’s prosperity. Companies like this should be encouraged to invest in Western Australia—indeed in all Australian states. Although the best information I have been able to find in my research is that the reported brick shortage in Western Australia is not as much of an issue as many claim and is compounded by skill shortages, I do support BGC—or any other company, for that matter—in its efforts to introduce more competition into the brick-making industry in Western Australia. But this does not and cannot make Perth airport a suitable site. We can dress it up with conditions and reassurances as much as we like but that plain and self-evident truth remains: if Perth airport were not Commonwealth land offering a loophole, this proposal would never have been made. Westralia Airports Corporation’s own master plan for managing this Commonwealth land states clearly that it will: ... implement good neighbour policies and contemplate only land-uses that complement that of adjacent communities. How can anyone claim that brickworks built less than the length of a school oval away from people’s homes be considered to complement the community, especially when the airport’s own flight path requirements prevent the emissions stack from being high enough to avoid health dangers from pollution? Notwithstanding the shortcomings of the state government in this matter, how can we as a federal government allow commercial developments to go ahead in direct opposition to local and state wishes? This proposal cannot be argued to be in the national interest, so how can we as a federal government use a legal loophole created by the Airports Act 1996 to overrule the people and the elected government of Western Australia? One of the reasons I am proud to be part of this government under the Prime Minister’s leadership, and what I believe has been this government’s greatest strength, is the Prime Minister’s steadfast refusal to take the Australian people for granted. I will not and cannot take the people of my electorate for granted. Labor Party members have predictably accused me of not doing enough; others have commented on my tireless efforts to stop the brickworks and to get the message of the community’s opposition across in Canberra. I am happy and proud to have taken a serious interest in this matter and to have been relentless in representing my constituents’ interests and views on this issue. I will continue to represent my community—my electorate—without fear or favour, irrespective of where the opposition comes from. 69 69 16:53:00 Vamvakinou, Maria, MP 00AMT Calwell ALP 0 0 Ms VAMVAKINOU —My grievance today relates to the war in Lebanon and the enormous human suffering that is caused when diplomacy and dialogue are sacrificed in favour of aggression. Today it is three weeks since a ceasefire was brokered under the auspices of United Nations Security Council resolution 1701, which called for a full cessation of hostilities in Lebanon. With the ceasefire, thankfully, still in effect, now is the time to take stock of what happened, especially the enormous damage suffered by Lebanon during the war as well as the political fallout that has already started to occur, particularly in Israel, where calls have been made for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to resign over his government’s handling of the war. It was only a year ago that a popular groundswell of support for democratic change swept across Lebanon as millions of ordinary Lebanese civilians took to the streets demanding that Syria withdraw its troops from Lebanon. Sparked by the assassination of the then Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and largely driven by student and youth groups across Lebanon, this popular groundswell of support for change came to be known as the Cedar Revolution. The Cedar Revolution served as an outlet for ordinary Lebanese civilians to vent their collective anger and frustration at decades of Syrian interference in the internal affairs of Lebanon and, in particular, its continued military presence in the country. The Cedar Revolution succeeded in ultimately breaking the back of Syria’s hegemony in Lebanon, and it helped unite the country in an atmosphere of promise and expectation for the future. The culmination of this promise was the running of the Lebanese Assembly national elections in May and June last year. Prior to the Cedar Revolution and Lebanon’s national elections, Lebanon had embarked upon a decade-long project to rebuild itself after the massive devastation it had suffered in the 1970s and 1980s as a result of war. One of the key figures in Lebanon’s postwar reconstruction had, of course, been Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. For the first time in decades, Lebanon finally seemed to be turning the corner. National reconstruction efforts, combined with the running of strongly contested national elections, marked the rebirth of Lebanon as a prosperous and democratic nation—one that was well on its way to embracing a new and promising future. Tragically, Lebanon’s path to national renewal has been cut mercilessly short, and that sense of a new and promising future now seems like a distant memory given the enormous devastation caused by this last war. Whatever Israel’s intentions were in Lebanon, the net effect of this war has been to destroy in a matter of weeks what it had taken the people of Lebanon both years and billions of dollars to rebuild and, in the process, to set Lebanon’s development back some 30 years. For those of us who watched the war unfold in scenes that were often brutal and devastating, it was hard not to conclude that Lebanon itself was under attack rather than just Hezbollah, as asserted by Israel. Both northern and southern Lebanon were targeted, essential civilian infrastructure and services were destroyed and ordinary Lebanese civilians were collectively punished for a war they had no part in starting. The physical, financial and psychological costs of the war will likely be felt in Lebanon for generations to come. Today, Lebanon is again faced with the daunting task of having to rebuild itself virtually from the ground up. The United Nations Development Program lists the cost of short-term recovery programs necessary to alleviate Lebanon’s current humanitarian crisis at a staggering $US46.3 million. The aim of these short-term recovery programs is to return Lebanon’s basic social, economic and administrative infrastructure to a minimum level of operation and to prevent the further deterioration of Lebanon’s national and natural assets. In the words of the UNDP, the sole purpose of these short-term recovery programs will be to ‘bridge the gap between crisis and reconstruction’, meaning that $US46.3 million is required before Lebanon can even begin to contemplate its longer term reconstruction and rebuilding, which will cost in the vicinity of $US3.6 billion. There are many aspects of this conflict that remain deeply disturbing to me and to many of the constituents that I represent in this place, and I want to briefly highlight some of them today. The first is the sheer speed with which this conflict escalated into all-out war, without warning and without any prior attempt made at diplomacy to mediate the tensions caused by Hezbollah’s cross-border capture of the two Israeli soldiers and its killing of several others on 12 July this year. In a region that is already highly volatile, there is always the possibility for any act of war, no matter how localised, to engulf other parts of the Middle East. This makes the actions of both Hezbollah and Israel doubly irresponsible, but Israel’s actions were more so given its disproportionate use of force that many in the international community have criticised. The second point relates to the utter failure on the part of the international community to either prevent this war from occurring in the first place or stop it once it had started. As the international community reached a stalemate over Lebanon, and with US attempts to reach an international consensus on a ceasefire hard to take seriously, Lebanon was left virtually defenceless. One consequence of our failure to secure an early end to the war was the tragedy of Qana. Our failure to stop this war early speaks of an international system continually compromised by a form of politics in which, to repeat the words of Thucydides: ‘The strongest do as they can, and the weak suffer as they must.’ The third issue of concern I have is simply that none of the justifications so far given for this war fall within the parameters of what the UN Security Council charter sanctions as a just cause for war. Israel’s justification for its military offensive in Lebanon continually changed. It went from being a war aimed at freeing the two captured Israeli soldiers to being a war of retaliation against Hezbollah’s rocket attacks on northern Israel. Then it became a war aimed at implementing UN Security Council resolution 1559, which calls for Hezbollah to be disarmed and disbanded. Finally, we were told that it was a war of self-defence and a war for Israel’s survival, even though it was Lebanon’s survival that hung precariously in the balance rather than Israel’s. On the other side, there is no justification for Hezbollah’s cross-border attack into Israel and its capture of the two Israeli soldiers. This was a grave provocation and a miscalculation on the part of Hezbollah, one for which Lebanon and its people have paid an enormous price, and Hezbollah’s firing of rockets into northern Israel only served to kill and traumatise innocent Israeli civilians and to perpetuate the war. However, it would be naive to believe that Hezbollah was the loser in this war or, alternatively, that Israel was the winner. While Hezbollah’s popularity has grown, the war has seriously damaged broader perceptions of Israel’s military strength, and domestic criticism in Israel continues to intensify over the Israeli leadership’s handling of the war. This was surely not the outcome that Israel envisaged when it commenced its attacks. Israel has long been the single most dominant power in the Middle East, given its strategic alliance with the United States. By virtue of this position, it has both an obligation and a responsibility to safeguard regional stability by pursuing diplomatic solutions built around dialogue, rather than relying on a policy of military deterrence. If nothing else, the devastation and human suffering caused by the war in Lebanon, and its resounding failure to resolve longstanding tensions in the region, again teaches us that war is not the answer—is never the answer—and that dialogue and diplomacy are the only real options available to us, especially in a region as volatile as the Middle East. It is completely fallacious to believe that the Lebanese government could in any way have resolved the issue of Hezbollah only one year into its term in office, and we need to listen to the Lebanese government when it insists that only dialogue and inclusion can succeed where war cannot. Let us not overlook the fact that the government of Lebanon was in discussions with Hezbollah prior to the commencement of the war and that it was hoping to effect the disarming of Hezbollah through dialogue. The government of Lebanon feels that it was not given a reasonable chance to pursue this course of action. Instead, Lebanon is today left with the task of picking up the pieces after the massive destruction of its infrastructure and the killing of over 1,000 civilians, with countless more injured. While both sides have suffered civilian causalities, it is the people of Lebanon who have suffered nothing short of a catastrophe, one that will take decades to overcome. The support and commitment of the international community is required to aid the recovery of the people of Lebanon. I would like to make the point that Australia’s commitment to assist in that effort is also required. I call on the Australian government to increase the level of aid that it has already committed to the rebuilding of Lebanon. 71 71 17:03:00 Pyne, Chris, MP 9V5 Sturt LP Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing 1 0 Mr PYNE —It is a pleasure to be speaking in the grievance debate today. As a parliamentary secretary, I do not get the opportunity to talk on wide-ranging issues in my electorate because I usually only get to speak on legislation before the House. This is one of the very few opportunities that a parliamentary secretary has to comment on matters that pertain directly to their electorates. Today I want to talk about a number of the programs that exist in Sturt that are funded and supported by the Commonwealth government. Often in this place we talk in public discourse about the issues of interest rates, unemployment, the economy, national security, the safety net and so forth. But there are many other government programs—excellent ones—that are being run throughout the country, in your electorate and mine, Mr Deputy Speaker Causley, that do not necessarily get the same amount of discussion in the public debate, so I want to touch on a few of those today. One of those is the Building a Healthy, Active Australia initiative. This is a program across Australia that is worth about $116 million. It is funded by the Commonwealth. It includes campaigns like the Go for 2&5 campaign about promoting the healthy eating of fruit and vegetables on a daily basis, and the Get Moving campaign, which is a TV advertising campaign designed to encourage children, in particular, into physical education and to eat well. In my electorate, we have 11 schools being funded. Each one has taken full advantage of the $1,500 that is available under Building a Healthy, Active Australia to redo their tuckshops and take other measures. In my electorate, that has ranged from having dietitians come and speak to students to newsletters, themed weeks and remodelling school tuck shops along lines that promote healthy eating among the students at those particular schools. That is coupled with the Active After-school Communities Program of the Australian government. That is designed to promote physical activity after school among students. Schools are less and less these days requiring sport to be compulsory, as it would have been when you were at school, Mr Deputy Speaker, and as it was when I was at school. I have visited a number of these programs in my electorate. Next week, I am going to St Pius X School, where they have a fencing program. I was at the Highbury Primary School not long ago, where they have a wheelchair sports program. Last week, I was at the Athelstone Primary School, where my football club, the Norwood Redlegs Football Club, run a football program for active after-school care. I was at Thorndon Park Primary School earlier this year looking at their ball skills program. This is a subsidised, structured activity. In many schools, it is designed to replace the school sport that would have been very common in years gone by. It is three times a week after school, and it is a program that is running over four years at a cost to the Commonwealth of $90 million. Staying with schools in my electorate and Commonwealth programs, we also have the very popular Investing in Our Schools program. Most members of the House would have availed themselves of the opportunity to ask the Commonwealth for funds for sometimes minor and sometimes major infrastructure development in their local schools. The program is designed to enhance the wellbeing and the education of the students, and it is $700 million over three years for largely capital works. There are 13 schools in my electorate that have taken advantage of the Investing in Our Schools program at a cost of $1.7 million, which in a large number of schools has been mainly for minor projects. At Athelstone Primary, for example, $150,000 has been spent to upgrade playing fields and amenities. At the Magill Junior Primary School $94,000 was provided for air-conditioning. At East Marden $100,000 was provided for a library upgrade and extension. At Burnside Primary, where my twins currently go to school, about $39,000 was provided for verandahs on some of their school buildings. So, Mr Deputy Speaker, you can see the level and the kinds of projects that are funded in Investing in Our Schools. They are not large infrastructure developments, they are not new schools, but they are filling a gap in school infrastructure for which parents, friends or others cannot raise the substantial amount of money needed. The Commonwealth has decided to step in and try to fill the gaps. There is a very obvious point to be made in all this: why is the Commonwealth running these kinds of programs? Why is the Commonwealth running an Investing in Our Schools program? Why is the Commonwealth investing in active after-school care for physical education of students, which is largely a responsibility of the states? The missing ingredient in this debate is the fact that the states have allowed their schools to get to the point where parents are demanding action and the Commonwealth feels it has to step in and try to make a difference. We should not have to be investing in state run primary schools. We should not have to be creating after-school active programs. These are the kinds of programs, the kind of infrastructure, which are the responsibility of the states. Yet again we see an example where the states have dropped the ball and failed in their basic responsibilities. Let us not forget that each one of these states is a Labor state and each one of these states is sloshing around in billions of GST revenue—a courageous political decision taken by this government—of which the state governments are the beneficiaries, as it is a state tax. They have no excuse as to why they cannot manage their schools better and why they cannot run the basic programs that you would expect state based education departments to run. Investing in Our Schools is a particular example where they should be doing some of the essential infrastructure upgrades—as simple as putting verandahs on school buildings and as simple as extending and upgrading library works. These are the things that state governments used to take pride in doing. Goodness knows what they are doing with their resources these days. There are two other areas of Commonwealth responsibility, or Commonwealth action, which I would like to comment on in this short 10 minutes. One is the Community Water Grants funding program. It is a $2 billion Australian government water fund program—it is part of that Australian government water fund—and it is designed to engage people in saving, reusing and improving the health of local water resources in their areas with practical projects such as the installation of rainwater tanks, irrigation and the replacement of valves, taps and cisterns in wet areas of schools, local councils and other community groups across electorates. In my electorate of Sturt alone it is anticipated that the Community Water Grants funding program will save over 23 million litres of water each year. Examples in my electorate are programs run by the City of Norwood, Payneham and St Peters, the City of Burnside in which I live, St Ignatius College, which is my old school, and Trinity Gardens Primary School, which I visited on Friday last week to present certificates indicating that they had won a Community Water grant to do up their ageing cisterns and wet areas in a school that is over 100 years old. It is an excellent program. It is $50,000 for each grant. They are not massive grants but they can make a difference. If you can build community local action and the kind of responsibility that comes with it, and give that kind of example, particularly to school students, the future looks rosy for respect by people for the very scarce resource of water, particularly in a country like Australia. Finally, I want to talk about Britannia Roundabout in my electorate. There is a group in my electorate called the Britannia Roundabout Action Group, which has been agitating for some years for the state government to take responsibility for the Britannia Roundabout and make it a priority road and a priority project. We have been fighting this battle for a very long time. Coincidentally, the state Labor government announced a redevelopment of the Britannia Roundabout before the last state election in March, at a very miserly cost of about $7 million or $8 million, which was welcomed by many of us in the eastern suburbs. Amazingly, since the state election the project has been cancelled and they have decided not to go ahead with it. It is just another example of state Labor governments—in this case the South Australian state Labor government—giving with one hand and taking with the other. The Britannia Roundabout Action Group is not resting on its laurels. It had a public meeting recently at Victoria Park Racecourse, where University of South Australia engineers were asked to present on some of the options for the Britannia Roundabout. I would urge the state government to take responsibility for this roundabout, to make it a priority project and to seek federal funding, which can come if they decide that it is a priority project for South Australia. The tragedy for the Britannia Roundabout is that Labor has never cared about the eastern suburbs and that has not changed. 74 74 17:13:00 Andren, Peter, MP KL6 Calare IND 0 0 Mr ANDREN —Today I grieve for the failure of this government to put in place meaningful targets for alternative energy development and greenhouse gas reduction. The Prime Minister says reliable low-cost energy makes our lives easier. It may make our lives easier in the short term, but life will not be easy if we follow our current path. In that same July speech, the PM said that we have extensive renewable energy resources. He cited hydro, wind and solar as representing a small but growing part of our energy mix. The wind power industry, for one, is sadly disillusioned by the lack of incentives for wind power generation at a national level. To date, wind power generation has largely been the product of the existing fossil fuel electricity industry. The Crookwell and Blayney wind farms in and near my electorate are a product of a coal based electricity industry that has no incentive to move away from coal generation to truly build a renewable generation industry. Indeed, I have rarely seen all the Crookwell turbines working. There is little commercial imperative to get them up and running when they do break down. Yet those companies are still happy to flog what they call green energy. Some may come from hydro, but the turbines seem more about PR than about serious green power. How much better it would be if there were a truly independent green power industry, working in competition with fossil fuel power generation, feeding into the grid with an imperative to be up and running all the time. But, to achieve this, we need new independent players in the market—players such as Gamesa Energy Australia and other companies that want to invest but are totally frustrated by the lack of any reasonable mandatory renewable energy targets. Proposals for a 100-megawatt wind farm at Paling Yards, south of Oberon, are stalled for want of a genuine MRET. The Prime Minister’s head-in-the-coal response to warnings from enlightened sectors of industry, such as the Business Roundtable on Climate Change, that we need to cut emissions by the equivalent of 10 per cent each decade for the next five decades was dismissed out of hand on last week’s Four Corners program. While solar initiatives for North Adelaide might look proactive, the lack of commitment to an increase in the pathetic two per cent MRET means that the value of renewable energy certificates to install a 300-litre solar water heater in New South Wales has halved since the decision was made to confirm the existing MRE target. Meanwhile, the price of solar units goes up through natural increase while the rebate heads south. Is that a proactive energy policy? Instead of extending the MRET between 2010 and 2020, with targets increasing to 20,000 gigawatt hours, the government has frozen the target at 9½ thousand gigawatt hours. In the meantime, the UK has adopted targets of 10 per cent by 2010 and 20 per cent by 2020. Germany has a 12 per cent target for 2010, and India, Greece and even the US outstrip our current target, which effectively becomes a pathetic 1.1 per cent by 2020. That net negative target is exactly the reason that the Paling Yards wind farm is in a holding pattern. There is no incentive to invest. As we fiddle with highly questionable carbon sequestration as a means of prolonging fossil fuel power, we do not even maintain a reasonable MRET, despite the PM talking up hydro, wind and solar as representing a small but growing part of our energy mix—small, yes; growing, I think not. Indeed, alternative energy developments, which are vital to stall and then reduce carbon emissions, are withering on the vine while the government plays with geosequestration and nuclear, which could not reduce carbon emissions in 15 years—even if taxpayer-subsidised work were to begin on a reactor tomorrow. Cost, time, security and the waste dilemma are four telling strikes against nuclear. It is in no way a clean energy until the Prime Minister, his current inquiry or anyone else can tell me and the rest of the community just how we could safely get rid of the waste. While the suggested growth in nuclear power generation around the world, particularly in India and China, is used as justification for our own venture into such energy production, let me tell you about Sweden. As Sweden begins decommissioning its nuclear power plants, time is running out in that country to find a new way to make 9,000 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel safe for the next 100,000 years. Rather than ramping up nuclear, Swedes voted for the phasing out of this technology, with the last of the country’s 12 reactors due to be closed down over the next few years. Despite some confidence being expressed in a copper canister-bentonite clay encasement for this waste as the safest way to store it 500 metres under the sea, the method is widely regarded as old technology from the 1970s that just will not work. With the US unable to bury its waste under Yucca Mountain or anywhere else because of similar storage dilemmas, such as groundwater contamination and radiation leakage fears, the Swedish Office for Nuclear Waste Review says simply that no-one in the world has a solution. Yet the PM said in July that there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that nuclear power has an important part to play in stabilising atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide. What a way of doing it: with a technology promoted as green that cannot get rid of the most unstable toxic waste known to man—waste that will become the problem of future generations. They will be very grateful indeed that we took that clean, green route! As well as developing real clean, green alternatives and sensibly phasing out nuclear, Sweden has embarked on a mission to become oil free by 2020. Its Commission on Oil Independence, headed by Prime Minister Goran Persson, has set the ambitious target of reducing oil in road transport by 40 to 50 per cent, eliminating oil from heating, reducing industry oil use by 20 to 40 per cent, large-scale production of biofuels, and injecting much more into public transport. In fact, the Swedish Public Transport Association anticipates an increase of 30 per cent in public transport use during the period 2006 to 2020. It is planned to significantly increase investment in new fast train connections between major cities, with a guaranteed low GST or VAT rate on train journeys. In Australia, the state government in New South Wales  has  not  even  the  wit  to  have  an Orange-Sydney XPT daily return service for commuters from the central west. Sweden plans to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases by 60 to 80 per cent by 2050 through a plan that makes our head-in-the sand policies look terminally ill by comparison. In addition, Sweden is planning far more efficient use of electricity in industry and a ramping-up of wind power as one of the ingredients. Solar cells, wave power and hydrogen gas for fuel cells are also part of the equation. I know that the energy mix is slightly different in this country, but it is absolutely important that we do not just stick our hands in the sand and think that, because we have unlimited reserves of coal, that is the answer. While cleaner coal research is important, we are certainly not anywhere near developing alternatives that will meaningfully fill in the energy gap. I will mention here the bill introduced today by my Independent colleagues, the Fuel Quality Standards (Renewable Content of Motor Vehicle Fuel) Amendment Bill 2006, and the call for biofuel production, especially ethanol, in this country in far greater quantities. In a speech I gave earlier this year, I mentioned things like this. That speech had to be incorporated into Hansard because the government gagged debate on the Renewable Energy (Electricity) Amendment Bill 2006. Imagine a government that is so contemptuous of parliament, at this time in our history, that it would guillotine such a debate. Rather than being the unchallengeable measure of progress, GDP could well be the villain in this crisis unless our current energy regime is reviewed. The WWF—which I know is the government’s favourite environmental lobby group—has come out with a report called A prosperous low carbon future. The report suggests, among other things, that we get serious about a carbon tax, an emissions trading scheme or a combination of both. The report outlines an affordable 30 per cent reduction in emissions—not the doomsday or ‘midnight’ economic scenario of such a greenhouse reduction target that the PM talks about if we were to go down that reduction path. If we do not take these measures, long after he and I have left this planet it really will be midnight. 76 76 17:22:00 Schultz, Alby, MP 83Q Hume LP 1 0 Mr SCHULTZ —I rise in this grievance debate today to talk about Home and Community Care—commonly referred to as HACC—funded services, such as community transport. My understanding is that the Home and Community Care services are 60 per cent funded by the Commonwealth and 40 per cent funded by the state. The community transport that services Boorowa, which is an isolated area, operates out of the Boorowa District Hospital. There is no public transport—no trains, no buses and no trams—in the township of Boorowa. Adjacent to the Boorowa district hospital is an aged care hostel called Burrowa House. The hospital, which is attached to the Southern Slopes cluster of hospitals, falls under the umbrella of the Greater Southern Area Health Service, or GSAHS. The Greater Southern Area Health Service has had considerable publicity over the last 12 months or so about its huge debt—a huge debt which has, without a doubt, been caused by maladministration and very poor handling of the health service itself. Some of the residents of Burrowa House aged care hostel require chemotherapy and/or specialist treatment on a regular basis. Prior to May 2006, those residents had been using the community transport vehicle of the Greater Southern Area Health Service, attached to Boorowa District Hospital, for 10 years. The transport vehicle is a four-door vehicle. On average, the vehicle has been used twice a month by one to two residents with this need. The residents made a contribution of $30 to $40 per travelling resident, depending on the destination—for example, whether the vehicle went to Canberra, Goulburn or Wagga Wagga. I might add that the vehicle that we are talking about, being a government vehicle, was purchased with significant tax concessions, including on registration. Also, as we all know, when government vehicles are traded in, they are traded in at a profit. So the cost of running the vehicle is centred on the cost of servicing the vehicle and the cost of petrol. Incidentally, the driver of the vehicle is a volunteer. Residents of Burrowa House aged care hostel were advised last May that they were no longer able to access the community transport service. According to the bureaucrats, the reason is that it is a community transport service and, once a resident is placed in an aged care facility, they are no longer considered part of the community. I will repeat that: the bureaucrats say that it is a community transport service and, once a resident is placed in an aged care facility, they are no longer considered part of the community. It needs to be kept in mind that there is no public transport available to the residents of that particular aged care facility. Comments had been made that there is nothing in the Commonwealth legislation that allows those residents of that aged care facility to access the community transport vehicle. The advice that I received from the federal minister’s office said: ‘Should a HACC funded transport service have the capacity, it may be possible for recipients of residential care to access that service on a cost recovery basis.’ That is what they have been doing for a decade. There is no requirement under the national HACC program guidelines that excludes residents of residential care homes from accessing HACC services unless the home is receiving government funding to provide this service. This aged care home is not receiving government funding to provide the service; therefore, quite rightly, it has had access to the HACC community transport vehicle from Boorowa District Hospital. It is also important to note that, if a resident of a residential care home receives HACC services, those services should be provided on a full cost recovery basis and only where the HACC service provider has the capacity to take on additional people without adversely affecting people in the HACC target group. The community transport service has been utilised by the residents of Burrowa House Aged Care Hostel for 10 years now and nobody has been affected by it. In fact, they only use the vehicle when it is not required elsewhere. When I approached the hospital and the departments under the umbrella of the Greater Southern Area Health Service, I found that health service managers were difficult to contact. They did not return telephone messages left by my office and, finally, after I intervened and made some phone calls myself, I had a response from a person whom I can only describe as a spin doctor, obviously dispatched to placate a member of parliament. I made it quite clear to that person that I did not want to talk to her; I wanted to talk to the people responsible for the decision for the hospital to no longer supply the community transport service to these elderly residents who had need of specialist care. Incidentally, the person who contacted me described herself as the manager of a development unit. That is obviously nice terminology for people who need to calm the waters and cloud the issue with regard to a complaint coming from a member of parliament. The Greater Murray Southern Slopes cluster service, which was the service that I apparently had to talk to, told me that the service was under review right across the whole of the Southern Slopes cluster service. The cluster service is a series of hospitals in the area of the Greater Southern Area Health Service which have community transport services. Those involved have been talking to one another about how they will resolve the issue for three months now. They have been drinking coffee and having their meetings and it is still not resolved, and in an environment where there is no transport for these elderly residents in need of specialist services. The barriers that have been put up on requests for information have been significant. I have been recently told—as late as last Friday—that the people responsible for the Southern Slopes cluster service, which is responsible for making the decision, cannot supply any information because it must go through the state minister’s office. As I said earlier, in the meantime elderly residents in an isolated community suffer from a lack of medical treatment and medical care. It is an absolute disgrace, and if we have to make some more definitive contribution to the act to ensure that they are covered under it then we need to do that. In closing, I appeal to the minister to change the legislation to ensure that the elderly are not treated in this disgusting manner by the state department or the state system, which have obviously been focused on penny-pinching cost reduction because of their own maladministration. More importantly, in the interests of looking after those elderly people in the twilight of their years—some of whom have very serious illnesses and have to travel in excess of 100 kilometres north, south or west in order to get treatment from specialists for their particular health problems—we really do have to put some pressure on the state minister to tell those involved in his area health service to get off their backsides and put the service back on so that these people can go about having their treatment. In any case, it is in an environment where they are making a contribution to the cost of the running of the vehicle. As I have said, I will pursue the issue until such time as that occurs. I thank the House for the opportunity to put those concerns to the parliament in the grievance debate today. 78 78 17:33:00 Wilkie, Kim, MP 84G Swan ALP 0 0 Mr WILKIE —I wish to raise the deplorable threat posed to one of Western Australia’s most successful Aboriginal training programs by the federal government. I was alarmed to learn today that the federal government will not undertake a long-term funding commitment to the Aboriginal School Based Traineeships scheme beyond 2008. Aboriginal School Based Traineeships are part of the Vocational Education and Training in Schools programs. A number of schools in my electorate, namely Belmont City College and Sevenoaks College, participate in this scheme. For the information of the House, this program was developed to achieve a number of outcomes for students, including to increase the number of Indigenous teenagers starting work after leaving school, to encourage Indigenous students to finish years 11 and 12, to encourage Indigenous students to access a broad range of education and training programs and to improve the relevance of education and training for Indigenous teenagers in school. In addition, the traineeships scheme provides paid on-the-job and off-the-job accredited training that forms part of the student’s study towards the Western Australian Certificate of Education. The history of the scheme is that, since the inception of the Aboriginal School Based Traineeships in 1997, the program has operated on a full 100 per cent wage subsidy for employers. All ASBT trainees are employed by the group training schemes and hired out to host employers. The 100 per cent wage subsidy has encouraged employers to host Aboriginal trainees in their workplace without the financial commitment. The 100 per cent wage subsidy was initially funded by ATSIC through the Community Development Employment Program. However, due to the uncertainty of CDEP funding arrangements, the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations allocated $915,200 to the program from July 2001 to December 2003 for the certificate II trainees. A further $2.93 million was allocated for the period July 2003 to December 2005. That contract allowed for the subsidisation of up to 500 certificate I trainees across 2003-04, based on completion payments only, and up to 375 certificate II trainees across 2004-05. Apparently, no further funding has been committed by DEWR. The department expects a commencement of approximately 350 certificate I trainees and 275 certificate II trainees in 2005-06, of which only 101 certificate II places are funded under the current contract, leaving the department to fund approximately 174 certificate II trainees and an entire 350 certificate I trainees. That leaves a significant gap. Since 1998, 2,000 young people have undertaken traineeships in this state-wide program. These traineeships cover industries such as horticulture, hospitality, information technology and business administration. This spectacularly successful program has boosted year 11 and year 12 retention rates for Indigenous students by 10 per cent. I know that many members of this House share my concerns about Indigenous education and training. It is amazing to me that the federal government can now turn its back on giving a long-term commitment to this program. More than 600 young Indigenous students stand to miss out next year and every year if the federal government goes ahead and allows this program to be axed. There are also, of course, enormous benefits for host employers, including raising awareness about their industry as a career choice, training and motivating students in the specific needs of their business for a known period of time and gaining support from schools, parents and the wider community. The program also enables employers to become more cost-efficient in training and recruitment and provides more recognition and promotion in the community. It provides access to professional development for mentoring and cultural awareness, as well as workplace assessment and training qualifications at nominal cost. It also creates an opportunity to further develop the communication and interpersonal skills of current staff. It provides an opportunity for direct input into the State Training Strategy. The key output of the State Training Strategy is the state training profile. The profile gives a summary of state-wide skills priorities and shows what types of training the Department of Education and Training intends to purchase over the next three years. It is vital that employers participate in that sort of program. As a former YMCA employment placement officer who worked to find jobs for young people, including Indigenous youth, I know full well how vital it is for kids to find education and training which is relevant and engaging. This program does just that. It keeps teenagers in the education system and provides them with the skills and the desire to become productive members of the workforce and society. As well, participants in the scheme act as role models for their peers. In my experience, the importance of role models for Indigenous youth cannot be overstated. In a previous employment program, similar to this but for adults, I was able to employ an Aboriginal senior elder in an employment and training role specifically to work in mentoring young Aboriginal people in employment and training related activities. That was through a traineeship program of this nature, which, again, was unfortunately axed by this government in the past. You cannot underestimate the value that these sorts of programs have when working with Indigenous people. I can only concur with the views expressed by the WA Minister for Education and Training, Ljiljanna Ravlich, who finds it hypocritical that the federal government highlights the plight of Indigenous Australians yet at the same time refuses to adequately commit to a program which actually makes a difference. I am not sure why the federal government has such a narrow vision of education and training in this country. I suppose it really confirms that its priorities are pretty short term. I urge the federal Minister for Education, Science and Training to reconsider the funding arrangements for this successful and unique program to ensure that this vital work is continued. It is absolutely imperative that we make sure we commit to these sorts of activities into the future. We need to ensure that our Indigenous youth are looked after and provided with the sorts of opportunities that should be available to all Australians, wherever they live and wherever they are in this community. The fact that I have two fantastic schools in my electorate, Sevenoaks Senior College and Belmont City College, that are prepared to participate in this program, find employment opportunities for the kids, get out there and work with employers and make these sorts of programs happen is commendable. The federal government has to get behind this sort of program. Without federal government funding, these programs just do not exist. Right now what it is doing is trotting out the usual hoary old chestnut—that is, arguing over who has the priority for this sort of funding and whether it is a state or federal responsibility. This cannot go on. Clearly, the federal government, through DEWR, has a responsibility to provide employment program subsidies. Having also run the employment and training division of the YMCA, I know that these subsidies are vitally important if you are going to get people long-term work. You need to be able to go to an employer and say: ‘Look, we know you might have some concerns about employing people this way, but what we are going to do for you is offer you an opportunity so that you can see just how good these people are. If you give them an opportunity to participate in your workforce, we will not only fund their wages but also provide training.’ My experience was that those people who completed the programs were, at the end of the day, producing a very positive outcome for the employers and a really positive outcome for the workplace and the community. And back at home they were providing the great role model that I talked about before. I found that at the end of the program people were employed by that employer. The employer’s attitude greatly changed as well, because the employer noticed that these people were making an absolutely wonderful contribution to their business and were earning them money. Not only had employers got this benefit from the employment subsidy in the past but they were in a situation where these people were producing a great income benefit to them. At the end of the subsidy period most employers were crying out to retain these people in their business. That is the sort of result that we want from programs that operate with both Indigenous and non-Indigenous people, but in this case we are dealing with Indigenous youth. It is what we need; it is what we want. It is high time that this government decided that it is something that should be supported. I notice that on a number of occasions the minister has overturned the decision not to fund this program and has continued funding it. I urge the minister to, in this case, sit back, review the positives, forget about the state-federal argument and decide that this money needs to go where it is deserved. It needs to go where it is going to achieve some worthwhile result. The minister needs to increase and continue this funding in the long term. 81 81 17:42:00 Thompson, Cameron, MP 84C Blair LP 1 0 Mr CAMERON THOMPSON —I rise to speak once again about the Goodna bypass and the Ipswich Motorway. These projects are essential to the development of the Ipswich region and to the growth corridor moving west from Brisbane. The Goodna bypass is the project put forward by the Commonwealth to resolve the problems and to create sufficient capacity to be able to deal with the immense increase in traffic volumes going into that area. It has been proven by Maunsell engineers, in their first study of the issue, that merely upgrading the existing road cannot provide sufficient capacity to accommodate all the traffic that is heading into that region. It certainly cannot. The Maunsell study found that the Goodna bypass was essential to provide sufficient capacity. The Commonwealth, to its credit, has been pursuing that with alacrity. I am sad to say that that has not been the case with the state government. They have done everything in their power to be a dog in the manger for the people of Ipswich and the road users. They have sought to disrupt the project. They have sought to put up hastily concocted alternatives that have turned out to be woefully engineered and even more woefully conceived. I am very pleased to come into the House today to speak about this because of the second Maunsell study. The first study investigated engineering issues to do with the Goodna bypass. The second study will now go on to look at which of the three routes found by the first Maunsell study to be feasible is the one that the Commonwealth should build. It will also proceed to produce all the necessary information that we need to be able to go to tender on that project by the end of the year. I look forward to that. I can say I look forward to it because I can tell you now I know that the Maunsell report has cleared its first hurdle, which is where the engineers looked at the questions of afflux and undermining to see whether there were any possible engineering impediments to the creation of any one of the three roads. The fact is the project has passed that hurdle with flying colours. It has leaped that hurdle and it has moved forward, as predicted by every engineer who has looked at the project. It is quite a simple project by way of its conception. It is simply a matter of building a road. There are three alternatives, three different routes you could go. As it turns out, we could build all three of them because none of the three has any kind of flaw from an engineering perspective. That is an important issue because fatal flaws have been a fantasy put forward by the member for Oxley and by the state Minister for Transport and Main Roads in Queensland, Mr Lucas. They have put forward this phantom of fatal flaws in the Goodna bypass to say that it cannot possibly happen, that we should stop it, that we should get in the way of it, that we should not allow it to occur and that we should do what the state government wants. That is a total crock of nonsense. It has been proven that these so-called fatal flaws do not exist. They are the fantasy of the state transport minister, Mr Lucas, and the member for Oxley, Bernie Ripoll. The first Maunsell report found that all three routes for the Goodna bypass are feasible. I really want to celebrate that because that is an important issue. People in Ipswich can now look at this as a real opportunity for the transport corridor through our region to be able to carry the traffic that is coming. It was just not a possibility under what the state government were putting forward. They have harped on about it. All their apologists in the local area have continued to campaign for us to upgrade the existing road, which would merely inconvenience everyone for something like seven years while they did it, and then at the end of it the time line for its actual service life was something like five years. So seven years of total construction chaos gives you five years of momentary relief. That is exactly the process we went through back in 1994 when the Labor Party last unveiled an upgrade of the Ipswich Motorway. It failed after six years. It was a total failure. The idea that they push us through a repeat of the process is really an insult to local people. Why is the Goodna bypass better than the upgrade? Apart from the fact that all three options for it now have the green light from the engineers and apart from the fact that there is no such thing as an afflux or undermining problem anywhere on that route, by proceeding in this fashion the Commonwealth will largely avoid all the consequences of disruption during construction. There will still be considerable disruption with the work on the interchange at Logan—and further down the road there will be that kind of disruption—but further disruption will be minimised because we will be using a greenfield site. CK6 Hardgrave, Gary, MP Mr Hardgrave —You’ll save lives. 84C Thompson, Cameron, MP Mr CAMERON THOMPSON —We will be saving lives, and that is a significant issue. According to the first Maunsell report, the carrying capacity of this road would meet the coming flow of traffic for 30 years—and that is if we just build a four-lane Goodna bypass. It is a great opportunity when you consider that the alternative, the state favoured upgrade, would last only five years. It would separate heavy trucks from local commuters by giving them a separate road to operate on. It provides network redundancy so that if there is a blockage on one route the other route can continue. There is no such network redundancy now. It would make Goodna a much better place to live because we are not going to have this great big traffic sewer running through the middle of it. It would create a new motorway type highway and also a new arterial road network for Ipswich, that being the existing motorway in a new guise because all the heavy trucks will be moved off it. There are also many other improvements which come with the option for a bypass. The Goodna bypass will basically do for Ipswich what the M1 did for the Gold Coast. It will mean that the true potential for growth in our region can be realised. There is no other way to realise it. I have continued to fight for this right throughout, but state members and their fellow travellers in our region continue to obfuscate and continue to get in the way of it. They want us to do what the last upgrade involved and to produce the same outcome, which was practically nothing after years of blood, sweat and tears. I am proud to have been involved in the campaign to get the Goodna bypass up and running. I am out to do something good for Ipswich and the motorists who at the moment are absolutely frustrated with the current corridor. This is the only short-term, medium-term and long-term solution to their problems. Minimising the serious prospect of disruption during construction is the short-term issue. In the medium term is an immediate opportunity for relief, which would not come until much later with the upgrade process. Finally, in the long term is a horizon of 30 years versus five years under the other scenario. I got on this bandwagon because years ago, in 2001, the state main roads department’s own engineer told me what a dog of a project the state government’s proposed upgrade would be. He told me that. He told me about the chaos that would follow and the lives that would be lost during construction and in traffic on that road because of the state’s determination for what they want to do. They are worried that when we build the Goodna bypass they will have to take responsibility for the existing motorway. It is saving lives versus some kind of financial impediment the state sees in this project—as opposed to the utopia of having the Commonwealth pay for everything. What are lives in Ipswich worth? Honestly! I listened to that engineer, and it is a pity that the state main roads department did not listen to him too; otherwise we would have started the Goodna bypass study back in 2001 and not at this late date. By the end of this year Maunsell should have prepared everything we need to go to tender for the construction of the Goodna bypass, and the Commonwealth and the state government should be ready to recognise that and to proceed as quickly as possible. The state Labor government keep saying that it is wrong for politicians representing the needs of motorists to draw lines on a map to show where a needed road should go—nonsense. What they mean is that, because Labor do not have the guts to stand up for motorists and for Ipswich, no-one else should either. I say to Labor: stop making excuses, stop telling lies and get out of the way because the Goodna bypass is coming through. 10000 McMullan, Bob (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr McMullan)—Order! There being no further speakers, I put the question: That grievances be noted. Question agreed to. 83 BILLS R2535 83 BILLS R2349 83 Message from the Governor-General reported informing the House of assent to the bills. 83 BILLS R2556 83 BILLS R2528 83 BILLS R2582 83 Message received from the Senate returning the bills without amendment or request. 83 BILLS S513 83 Bill received from the Senate, and read a first time. Ordered that the second reading be made an order of the day for the next sitting. 83 BILLS R2590 83 Debate resumed from 16 August, on motion by Mr Pearce: That this bill be now read a second time. upon which Ms Macklin moved by way of amendment: That all words after “That” be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: “whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House: condemns the Government for: failing to deliver urgently needed funding for Indigenous students by insisting on complex and bureaucratic administrative arrangements that prevent many schools and communities from benefiting from education programs; causing a $126 million underspend in Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives expenditure in 2004-05 through bureaucratic bungling; imposing impenetrable red tape that has led to a decline in the involvement of Indigenous communities in the parent-school partnership initiative; failing to provide sufficient resources for early intervention programs in schools to raise Indigenous children’s literacy standards; reducing the number of Indigenous school children who access tutorial assistance by making eligibility requirements more restrictive and short-term; and presiding over ten long years over continuing gaps in educational and training participation and performance between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students; and calls on the Government to reform its funding criteria and guidelines so as to the address the above concerns and provide all Indigenous students with the opportunity to achieve quality schooling results” 84 17:54:00 Haase, Barry, MP 84T Kalgoorlie LP 1 0 Mr HAASE —When the second reading debate on the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 was adjourned on 16 August I was speaking about the school based sporting academies. The projects will run in partnership with sporting bodies to give children the chance to learn a new skill, be part of a team and boost their self-esteem. This funding may give children a reason to engage with or remain at school as well as improve their health. A perfect example of this is the Clontarf Football Academy in Western Australia which is run by Gerard Neesham. That project has now been taken to many schools across Western Australia to engage predominantly Indigenous youth in the finer arts of playing football—something that they are incredibly naturally skilled in already. There is ample evidence at the very highest level of Aussie Rules football as to how good those Indigenous players are. I commend Gerard Neesham for taking up the opportunity to use some of this federally allocated funding to encourage children through sporting engagement to participate in schools and therefore participate more in a real education. I say again and again that, without continuous attendance at school and full participation in the whole school curriculum, Indigenous youth do not have a fighting chance of engaging fully in society and enjoying all that the independence of employment has to offer. How can children who are brought up in an environment of malnourishment, violence, sexual abuse shorter life expectancy, unacceptably high levels of illiteracy, higher levels of diabetes, infant mortality, alcoholism, drug abuse and imprisonment, and the highest levels of unemployment, aspire to make a contribution to the tax-paying society of today? There is provision in this amendment of $7.3 million for Indigenous youth festivals as part of the Community Festivals for Health Promotion campaign. These festivals combine music, dance and art to engage youth and promote healthy and positive lifestyles. You cannot simply sit a child down and tell them not to eat junk food, watch television all day or sniff petrol if that is the only example they know. We hope that the children will participate in these festivals and it will give them some sense of pride through participation as well as an education. A classic example of this was to be found most recently with the Croc Festival in Meekatharra in Western Australia, where we had some 600 predominantly Indigenous children from, I believe, 15 schools in the area participate in a three-day event which culminated in a concert that those children contributed to. I had the pleasure and the good fortune of attending that Croc Festival with Minister Joe Hockey. He got a finer appreciation of the good works that these festivals do in promoting lifestyles that are healthy and beneficial. This will greatly contribute to the outward nature of these children. The opportunity for them to engage in and experience some education in lifestyle and careers by participating in things like the Croc Festival is something that many of us that sit in this place take for granted but in reality is an absolutely rarity. It is a look into the future, almost a rose garden, for many Indigenous students that come from remote communities. It is sometimes the only opportunity that they will have to engage with a range of other people and to witness firsthand the diversity that is the reality of life in employment today. The Australian government is also providing money for Indigenous youth—in this case, an additional $43.6 million—through the projects that I have outlined under this bill. However, too often the expenditure of those Indigenous communities becomes a great source of frustration, because the resources are too often eaten up by what they call the seat-warming bureaucrats rather than used by more practically minded people on location who might actually make a difference. It is the real problem. In many cases we do not need to reinvent the wheel. What is required is an honest delivery of services that so many departments, both state and federal, theorise about and gain great publicity for but, in reality, often fail at the point of delivery. We have classic, topical examples today in child welfare delivery and police delivery. Too many of the remote communities in my electorate of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, which is 91 per cent of the Western Australian land mass, do not see a police presence. There is no sense of real community in families. Women and children are fearful for their personal security and, when you consider that we take these state delivered services of child welfare and police absolutely for granted, we would be horrified if in any of our Perth suburbs we had to wait a couple of days for a police presence. We would find that totally unacceptable, and yet it is the absolute norm in my remote communities. States should be ashamed of the fact that they do not deliver secure communities for the people of those communities. Until such time as they do, women and children will continue to be fearful for their safety, and with that base premise you cannot expect mothers to be fundamentally involved in and concerned with sending their small children out of the home, where the children afford some degree of company and there is some sort of natural security, to a classroom where they will no longer be able to come to their aid in the case of domestic abuse. Too many people sleep well in their leafy suburban environments, convinced that Indigenous youth can move through life as their children do—educated, eventually employed, useful and equipped with the skills needed and having the opportunity to gain self-esteem through finding their place in society and gaining from all that is modern Australia. The aspirations of Ministers Bishop and Brough and of this government are high and well intended but, until such time as state governments take responsibility to cooperate for the improved future of Indigenous people and until such time as appropriate, grassroots programs are resourced in a meaningful way, we cannot expect the situation of Indigenous communities to change. We must move away from well-intentioned and politically correct projects which often do not address the grim reality of community life. We do not need to reinvent the wheel; we simply need to make the appropriate investment in people resources that will assist in the provision of the basic tenures of civilised life. The alternative is to endure as a reality the continuation of the past, which those persons well informed know is unacceptable. I commend this bill to the House and congratulate our current ministers, who are working with the full cooperation of the coalition backbenchers, for their efforts to effectively create a groundswell of change. 86 18:03:00 Ellis, Annette, MP 5K6 Canberra ALP 0 0 Ms ANNETTE ELLIS —I welcome the opportunity this evening to speak on the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006. This bill provides some welcome additional support for Indigenous students by providing an additional $43.6 million over 2006 to 2008. The concern is that it has still left some major gaps in relation to early literacy intervention and for parent-school partnerships. I will now discuss these particular issues in more detail. Of course, Labor welcomes the provision of $14.5 million for extended tutorial assistance to year 9 Indigenous students and of $11.2 million for extended tutorial assistance to TAFE and vocational training and education students. Unfortunately, this additional funding will be offset by a tightening of eligibility requirements for Abstudy allowances for Indigenous students under 16 years of age. A further issue that the government fails to mention in relation to this funding is that it is restoring the support that was previously available under the Aboriginal Tutorial Assistance Scheme, which is not available under current guidelines. There are major concerns with the current guidelines for the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme, ITAS. Funding is not available for students in metropolitan areas that enrol fewer than 20 Indigenous students, for example. Of course, the result is that many students miss out on the assistance that they desperately need. The funding guidelines also state that funding for students in remote locations will be given priority. Obviously, we agree that students in remote areas require that additional support, but that should not ignore the needs of students in metropolitan and other areas who also need assistance with their reading, writing and numeracy. I believe the government should not be deciding which group of disadvantaged Indigenous students will be missing out. It should, in fact, be helping students, wherever they are, based on their educational needs. This funding system is very different to the open-ended funding available under the Commonwealth General Recurrent Grants program, which provides automatic funding to all students. Shouldn’t we provide this type of funding system to disadvantaged Indigenous students? I am also concerned that the bill is lacking in assistance for early primary students. I understand that students will have to wait until year 4 before they can receive tutorial assistance. This flies completely in the face of research showing that early intervention is essential in improving educational performance anywhere. Surely we should not wait until students have difficulty after their year 3 test before they get that additional support. Indigenous children need urgent support. On my travels around some of the remote communities in this country, that point is always made. It is made in places like this and whenever you have a discussion with people on these particular issues. Part of the difficulty in some of these communities that we are talking about specifically here is how you engage and keep those students early on in their education before they have a chance to start missing out on the advantages that education can give them. I do not understand why these steps are taken only for year 4 and onwards. Why do they not come in as early as is required—I would suggest from the beginning of their education—to ensure that that connection will occur for the life education of these particular students? This bill does not address concerns about the way in which the parent-school partnerships program operates. Many parents and community members are now excluded because of the bureaucracy in these programs. Parents do not understand the new processes, and this prevents them from being involved. Schools still have to undertake considerable work to access very modest funding and they complain that they spend more time in writing submissions for funding than in designing the best educational programs for their students. What really saddens me is the context of this bill. There is a chronic underspending of Commonwealth funding for Indigenous education. The department admitted in Senate estimates that there was an underspend of $126 million in 2004-05. This is just not acceptable. What a sorry state of affairs when you consider how great the need is to provide this assistance—good basic educational opportunity—to these Indigenous children. These concerns are the reason that I support my colleague the member for Jagajaga in moving a second reading amendment—and I want to repeat that amendment here: ... the House: condemns the Government for: failing to deliver urgently needed funding for Indigenous students by insisting on complex and bureaucratic administrative arrangements that prevent many schools and communities from benefiting from education programs; causing a $126 million underspend in Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives expenditure in 2004-05 through bureaucratic bungling; imposing impenetrable red tape that has led to a decline in the involvement of Indigenous communities in the parent-school partnership initiative; failing to provide sufficient resources for early intervention programs in schools to raise Indigenous children’s literacy standards; reducing the number of Indigenous school children who access tutorial assistance by making eligibility requirements more restrictive and short-term; and presiding over ten long years over continuing gaps in educational and training participation and performance between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students; and calls on the Government to reform its funding criteria and guidelines so as to the address the above concerns and provide all Indigenous students with the opportunity to achieve quality schooling results” What we are seeing these days, in current times here in this parliament, is the enormous temptation which the government has fallen to of finding someone else to blame for anything that it believes it needs to be addressing. We are hearing it again and again: ‘It’s the states’ problem, it’s the territories’ problem. It’s everybody’s problem but ours.’ I think that after 10½ years of being in government there is no right available to the government to fall on that excuse any longer. It is now becoming a little bit of a joke. I happen to be a member of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs. For some months now we have been engaged in an inquiry looking at employment outcomes for Indigenous people in this country. It is as obvious as the nose on your face: everybody we speak to, everywhere we go, what is it they tell us? It is education, education and education. With regard to assistance being targeted through to Indigenous children, as I said a moment ago, why bring assistance in at year 4? Why do that? Why only allow it for remote communities? Why do that? Where we are looking into employment opportunities for our Indigenous people, it does not matter where we go on that committee, whether we are in Sydney, Melbourne or out the back of nowhere, the point is that the same issues arise in terms of connection, encouragement, support and belief—all bound up in education. While I am pleased to see the expenditure of this money—as I said at the outset, of course I am pleased to see it—and pleased to see something being done, there are deficiencies in what is being done, and that has to be commented upon. I think back only two or three hours to question time today when I looked up from my seat here in the House to the public gallery opposite and saw two completely full rows of quite young, primary school aged children with very dark faces from a remote community in Central Australia. They were visiting here in the national capital on what I believe would be a wonderful, marvellous opportunity for them. I looked at them today and I thought about this bill. I thought about them and their colleagues, their peers, their friends all over the rest of the country, and I thought: what wonderful opportunities are we able to present to these youngsters in true, honest fashion? What is it we are really hoping to offer them for their future? How can we work constructively with them for their future? Nothing would make me happier than to believe that their future entails a full, supportive, engaging education, at the end of which they have opportunities that at the moment most of them sadly only dream of. When I looked at those little black faces today, I really thought about this funding and I thought about this government. I thought about how easy it is for some politicians to just stand up and say: ‘The blame lies everywhere else—with the people themselves and with every other government but ours.’ Thank you to the government for putting this money in but, please, have a full, honest approach to this. Look carefully at what you are doing and do not draw restrictions around it. Make sure that initiatives like this are available to as many people as is needed. The word is ‘need’. Where there is a need, the money should be spent. Do not hold back $126 million next time. Make sure you are actually spending it properly, constructively and with all the right motives in mind so that all of those children in the future will have something that we know they would like to have: full participation in our community to the best of their advantage. 88 18:14:00 Slipper, Peter, MP 0V5 Fisher LP 1 0 Mr SLIPPER —Like the honourable member for Canberra, I am also a member of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs. While I have also been participating in the discussions—that inquiry that she referred to concerning Indigenous employment outcomes—I must say that I have not drawn the same conclusion from all of the evidence that the member for Canberra has in her contribution. Having said that, I respect the fact that the member for Canberra is relaying to the House what is her recollection. However, what I think is very reassuring for the country at large, and for our Indigenous communities in particular, is the fact that both sides of politics are now taking a very keen interest in improving Indigenous disadvantage. Historically in Australia, governments have sought to solve the problem of Indigenous disadvantage by throwing money at it. What we need to do, as this government is doing, is to look at outcomes and to look at what we are able to achieve, and to look at practical reconciliation to make sure that ultimately Indigenous communities do attain the same opportunities and the same standard of living as the general Australian community at large. This government and the current Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs have focused on what have been some of the endemic problems in Indigenous communities. So often governments in the past have tended to throw these problems in the too-hard basket. They find that it might be politically incorrect to talk about violence in Indigenous communities and that it might be politically incorrect to state some of the home truths that this government has stated. It really is important that we spend money as required to redress Indigenous disadvantage. But what is important is not the process; what is important is the outcome. This is what this government has sought to achieve. CK6 Hardgrave, Gary, MP Mr Hardgrave —Hear, hear! 0V5 Slipper, Peter, MP Mr SLIPPER —I thank the member for Moreton for his supportive interjection. We are not going to apologise for the fact that we do demand the same level of accountability for Indigenous organisations as for non-Indigenous organisations. Mr Deputy Speaker McMullan, I do know that you yourself have a keen interest in Indigenous affairs and have had for a very long time. I think that it is going to be so much easier for the government of the day to obtain the political support from the Australian community to spend what needs to be spent if we can guarantee to the Australian community that there are appropriate levels of accountability, achievement and successful outcomes. This government’s approach has been spot on, and I am heartened by the fact that so many Indigenous leaders have supported the position taken by this government. What we need to do is get away from the sit-down mentality, the concept where Indigenous people are paid substantial amounts of taxpayers’ money to basically live a cycle of welfare despair. I am not saying that money should not be made available to those who need it as a helping hand and as a safety net, but ultimately our aim as a community ought to be to redress Indigenous disadvantage so that ultimately Indigenous people are like the Australian community at large. That is what this government is seeking to do. I hope that is what some members from the other side are seeking to achieve. Ultimately, of course, no-one has ownership of this particular issue. Both sides of politics are endeavouring to redress what everyone accepts is an unacceptable situation. Where the opposition is not supporting everything that this government is doing I think it is, to an extent, playing politics. That is unfortunate and it is regrettable because this government, through the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006, is endeavouring to assist Indigenous people. We are endeavouring to bring forward the right policy parameters to ensure a successful outcome. Ultimately in any piece of legislation you can always say that, while what is being spent is great, more ought to be spent. What a responsible government needs to do, while looking at the resources available to it, is to spend taxpayers’ money in accordance with community priorities. What we have sought to do in the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill is to have a balanced situation. We have sought to achieve what we can achieve. I know that, for instance, one of the reasons that year 9 students are being looked at is that there are very strong levels of evidence that year 9 is the time when many Indigenous children actually drop out of the system. CK6 Hardgrave, Gary, MP Mr Hardgrave —Kids go off the rails in year 9. 0V5 Slipper, Peter, MP Mr SLIPPER —Kids go off the rails, not only Indigenous kids in year 9 but kids more generally, but Indigenous children have been identified as needing specific assistance at this time. That is one of the reasons why year 9 has been selected as one of those periods when Indigenous children need particular assistance. A statement on the Australian Bureau of Statistics website notes that education is one of the key factors in ensuring that the lives of young Indigenous Australians are improved. It notes that many studies have: ... shown that improved health and socioeconomic status are directly linked to educational participation and achievement. The comments go on to say, however, that a number of factors affect the rates of involvement of Aboriginals in education. These include difficulties in accessing educational facilities, financial hardships and community and cultural pressures. The website also says: While targeted programs aim to improve outcomes in some educational areas, Indigenous students continue to engage in education and training at lower rates of participation and achieve lower levels of educational attainment than for all Australian students. The initiatives we are debating in the bill before the House today aim to have a positive impact in changing what I think all of us would accept is an unacceptable situation. The Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 does provide for significant funds to be directed towards education and training programs that assist Indigenous students to achieve their full potential. It is worthy to note that while the Indigenous community makes up something like 1.9 per cent of Australia’s population, Indigenous students—regrettably—only make up 1.2 per cent of our university population. The Australian government already has several programs in place to address this underrepresentation in higher learning environments. These programs include the Indigenous Support Program, which arranges for grants to go to higher education institutions to help them meet the specific needs of Indigenous students; the Indigenous Staff Scholarship Program, which has the aim of supporting and encouraging Indigenous staff at our higher education facilities who assist Indigenous students to ensure that they complete their courses; and the establishment of the Indigenous Higher Education Advisory Council which, among other things, aims to develop strategies to help increase the proportion of Indigenous Australians on staff at higher education facilities and also to enhance their career paths. These are just three general examples of higher education initiatives for Indigenous Australians through the Department of Education, Science and Training. The Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 will add to those initiatives by targeting school students and those in training during the 2006 to 2008 calendar years. The initiatives include $14.5 million in additional funds to provide tutorial support services to Indigenous students in year 9. It is interesting to note that the proportion of non-Indigenous students who progress from year 9 to year 10 is around the 98 to 99 per cent, which is pretty high—close to 100 per cent. It is almost unthinkable that a student would drop out at that stage but, sadly, the proportion of Indigenous students who make that same transition is around 89 per cent. With these figures in mind, the year 9 students are regarded as a key group that may benefit from additional support services that will help them make the transition to year 10 education. In addition, $11.2 million is being provided toward expanding the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme to include those students enrolled in vocational and technical education programs. By widening the net that this tutorial program covers, it is believed that Indigenous students enrolled in vocational education will be encouraged to continue with their training. The upshot of this initiative is that it is hoped that it will help encourage young Indigenous Australians who are neither employed nor involved in work related training to enrol and remain in vocational educational programs. Eighteen school based sporting academies will be funded for Indigenous Australians at a cost of $9.1 million. This is designed to help male and female Indigenous students become more involved in academic pursuits through sporting programs. Many people in our community may not be aware that sporting programs can also have a positive effect on the health and fitness of young people, their self-confidence and their general social and leadership skills. The bill will also provide $7.3 million for Indigenous youth festivals, and this will promote healthy, active and positive lifestyles among Indigenous Australians. Finally, this bill will assist up to 1,000 young Indigenous Australians in remote and desert regions who are involved with unproductive and damaging petrol sniffing and other substance abuses with a $1.5 million funding allocation. These initiatives amount to some $43.6 million dedicated to improving the resolve of Indigenous students and their parents and giving them additional support to remain enrolled in schooling and vocational training programs until completion. If we are able to achieve that outcome it will assist Indigenous students to be prepared for the workforce and give them greater opportunities in the general community. So while it might be okay for the Labor Party to come in here and play politics, to criticise the government and damn us with faint praise and to say that it is great that we are giving this money but that there ought to be more, the Australian community does require all us to be positive and to give credit where credit is due. CK6 Hardgrave, Gary, MP Mr Hardgrave —Hear, hear! 0V5 Slipper, Peter, MP Mr SLIPPER —I thank the member for— LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr Martin Ferguson —Moreton! He’s one of yours. 0V5 Slipper, Peter, MP Mr SLIPPER —No, it was Mr Martin Ferguson, the member from Victoria, the shadow minister at the table, who was supporting me in this and I thank him for that. I commend the bill to the House. It is a very positive initiative. The government is deserving of praise and support for this initiative. It is not a panacea to solve all the problems but it is another important step forward and I am very pleased to add my voice to the voices of those honourable members supporting the bill. I ask the member for Canberra to be a little less condemnatory when she does address these particular matters. She ought not to play politics and she ought to support this initiative, which is very positive. 91 18:26:00 Ferguson, Martin, MP LS4 Batman ALP 0 0 Mr MARTIN FERGUSON —I welcome the opportunity to address the House on this important debate on the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006. I listened with interest to the contribution from the member for Fisher but I simply remind the House that, as the member for Canberra implied, it is good to see that he could at least get to this debate. There is an important committee reference of the House underway at the moment and he finds it difficult to get to committee hearings. In dealing with what I think is a fairly important issue, it is not only about coming in here from time to time and making a speech; it is also about a whole-of-government commitment to doing something serious about a major social and employment problem confronting Australia. That is why this debate is very important, and I am pretty disappointed with the lack of speakers in this debate in the House on what is a key issue. It is one of the key social problems confronting Australia at the moment, across a range of social indicators. It is about how we as a community, using a whole-of-government approach and working in partnership with the private sector, do something about making a serious improvement in the ability of our Indigenous community to make progress on issues such as health, education and training. The opposition is pleased that an additional $43.6 million proposed over the period from 2006 to 2008 is on the table. But I think we should also be clear—and I note that the member for Fisher has now decided to stay in the House and listen to this important debate—that that contribution will only benefit Indigenous kids if the government can expend the money and implement the proposed programs competently and on time. The facts show that that has been one of the weaknesses of the Howard government, so fully supported by the member for Fisher, with respect to Indigenous education in recent times. If we are to make progress on this front, it requires the absolute cooperation of the Australian government with state and territory governments. I also believe that if we are to make progress at a community level we have to look to support from the private sector. I have the shadow responsibilities for this on behalf of the Labor Party. Think about the importance, for example, of the resources sector, the energy sector, forestry and tourism in regional Australia for Indigenous communities and think about trying to bring in these private sectors to assist in the provision of education and support for local educational opportunities. It is with those comments in mind that I say: there is a bit of extra money on the table, but more has to be done. I say that because we are now talking about the same government that the member for Fisher is so proud of—and I must say, I am waiting to see whether he supports John Bjelke-Petersen in the election next Saturday, having knocked him off previously with respect to parliamentary representation! 0V5 Slipper, Peter, MP Mr Slipper interjecting— CK6 Hardgrave, Gary, MP Mr Hardgrave —You are cruel and unfair, Member for Batman! LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr MARTIN FERGUSON —At least I have got his attention! 10000 McMullan, Bob (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr McMullan)—You are also not in your seat, Member for Fisher. LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr MARTIN FERGUSON —More seriously, I want to remind the member for Fisher that this is the same government that managed to underspend—he talks about criticism; it is appropriate criticism by the member for Canberra—the Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Program in 2004-05. This underspend was the massive amount of $126 million through bureaucratic bungling. That raises issues in the minds of the opposition about confidence in the Howard government to actually get things right, but we are prepared to give the government a go because things are so bad with respect to educational opportunity in our Indigenous communities. In any case, the bill also fails to provide sufficient resources to address the huge gap between the participation and achievement rates of Indigenous and non-Indigenous students in secondary education. So it is not only about primary education; it is also about how we make further progress with one of the real areas of weakness—that is, at the secondary education level. In that context, I believe that we also have to work out how we more closely marry VET in Schools at a secondary level with the Indigenous communities. I think about the industries I have raised today, such as resources, forestry, energy and tourism, and the shortage of skills that exists in isolated areas of Australia. Just think about the skills opportunities in the training and education of the Indigenous community that exist in those sectors. I therefore remind the House of the comments by the member for Jagajaga and shadow minister for education and training by which she has previously informed the House on numerous occasions that the retention rate for Indigenous people when it comes to completing year 12 was just 39.5 per cent in 2005, compared—and this is an amazing difference—with 76.6 per cent of non-Indigenous students. Clearly there is room for a lot of improvement. It requires assistance by all political parties and all tiers of government. I now go to the issue of achievement. Unfortunately, just 50 per cent of Indigenous year 7 students achieve national benchmarks for numeracy, compared with 80 per cent of all Australian year 7 students. When the shadow minister for education and training spoke on this bill, she said: ... I do not think anybody in this chamber would say that this massive difference is acceptable. I merely want to echo those comments, and I think—to be fair to both sides of the House—that would be the view of all members of this House, irrespective of their political allegiances. We have a lot of work to do. I also draw attention to the comments by the member for Capricornia when debating the same subject almost two years ago. She has a long-term commitment—and she represents a huge regional seat in Queensland that includes not only the beef industry but also, importantly, the coal industry—to trying to do something about the needs and aspirations of Indigenous people. She said in this debate almost two years ago: ‘It can well be said that we do not spend enough time in this parliament discussing and debating the level of disadvantage that exists for Indigenous Australians in this country.’ Let us hope that, as suggested by the member for Capricornia, debates such as this actually start drawing sharper attention by the Australian community to our need to do a better job. For that reason, I can only agree with my colleagues the members for Jagajaga and Capricornia, who have correctly and wholeheartedly raised some of these problems. But, in doing so, I also further lament that, whilst we have seen more debate in recent months, its genesis took the sensationalisation of events in the Northern Territory communities, and its content still lacks a focus on economic empowerment. I think that is fundamental to building healthy, sustainable communities for the long term. Obviously, from time to time, the media will want to sensationalise some of these stories because it is easy reporting. That does not solve the problems on the ground. That actually requires assistance from government but also, importantly, a willingness by the local leadership of these communities to get serious about a partnership with government and the private sector to try and make a concerted contribution to overcoming these problems. I think all of us know that it is not going to be easy. It is fair to say that in many instances we have almost lost a whole generation of our Indigenous community. In all the problems of a lack of education and the social dislocation issues of drugs and alcohol, we have all failed in our efforts to try and work out how we are supposed to make a fresh start. We cannot make the same mistakes. It requires all of us, in some ways, to assess some of our past views on these issues. I say that because I think it is imperative for us to better understand the scale of the problem that confronts us at the moment. We also have to understand the reasons for our underachievement. We have underachieved in Indigenous Australia in education, health and employment. That creates an imperative for us to address the low employment participation rate for Indigenous Australians, because we are not going to resolve these problems in the Indigenous communities until we accept that, for them, just like for Australians generally, you define yourself by your capacity to work. If you have not achieved educationally then you cannot get an employment opportunity. If you do not have competence in your ability to work and deliver for your family then that creates major problems in local communities. So, in a lot of ways, education is the foundation that creates the opportunities to overcome some of the other problems in Indigenous communities. We have never had a better time to do something about this, provided that there is empowerment at a local level, a willingness by the leadership of these communities to get serious about their problems with support from government, and a willingness also by the private sector—as they have suddenly realised—to actually give local support, not just as they have in the past, surfacing some football oval or creating some lights around the basketball or netball court. They thought that was about doing something for local communities. I have come to the conclusion that local communities are no longer interested in those little social programs; they want the fundamentals fixed. They also understand that a private employer such as a Rio Tinto, an Accor in the hospitality sector or a Southern Plantations in the forestry sector giving a commitment that, if kids are prepared to apply themselves at school, they are prepared to give an employment opportunity will over time have a major impact on changing the level of achievement in these communities. That raises where we are as a nation at the moment. Australia faces a severe skills shortage and desperately needs more people participating in the workforce. It is an indictment of this government that Indigenous employment lags so far behind mainstream levels of participation. I think it is little known that by 2020 every second Australian living north of the Tropic of Capricorn or above Port Augusta in South Australia will be of Aboriginal descent. This is a staggering statistic. By 2020, one in two Australians living in Northern Australia will be of Aboriginal descent. This has important implications for a lot of resource development in Australia and also in terms of trying to confront some of the difficulties—for example, in the tourism sector. These Indigenous people are the future workforce of Northern Australia. They are important in industries such as the pastoral, agriculture, forestry, horticulture, tourism and resources industries. In particular, as I have said this evening, Indigenous Australians are a logical source of labour and skills for Australian mining. They often live in remote areas and they are also there at the centre of industry. I therefore refer to a recent comment by the Rio Tinto Chief Adviser on Aboriginal and Community Relations, Bruce Harvey, in a very important article in the Australian Financial Review of last Friday. I urge all members to read this detailed article. In that article, Mr Harvey is reported as saying: ... recruiting from local communities is a matter of survival. The business case for us is pretty simple ... Most of our long-life mines are in northern Australia ... Well, who do we think is going to be running the mines? …     …         … With burgeoning Aboriginal population growth rates at 4 per cent, by 2016 we will have 10,000 additional Aboriginal people in the valleys of our operations. If they are all ungainfully employed, they will be doing ungainful things. That represents a threat to our operations. If we help build a sustainable regional economy, you’ve got a source of skilled, mobile employees who can come and go as they want, you have local service and supply that gives you a normal market economy, you’ve got stable civic governance, environmental ecological management, and good lifestyle. The whole thing becomes attractive for people to stay there and support the mine. I support those comments of Bruce Harvey, the representative of Rio Tinto. This company, like a number of other major resource companies in Australia, is now a corporate leader in Indigenous employment, employing about 700 Aborigines and a further 300 Aboriginal contractors. According to the Australian Financial Review, while Aboriginal representation in mining workforces in northern Australia averages about nine per cent, Rio Tinto is doing much better, with roughly 25 per cent at Argyle Diamonds in Western Australia and 18 per cent at Comalco at Weipa in Queensland. Importantly, the company has also said that, if a young person finishes year 10, they are guaranteed a job with Comalco at Weipa. It is those commitments by the private sector that can make this education initiative by the Howard government a bigger success. I urge corporate Australia to get behind initiatives by state and territory governments and the Australian government to do something about Indigenous education by creating that extra carrot: a commitment to actually employ these people if they improve their education. Then there will be a greater willingness of people to put their heads down and do the hard work at school. I know that many other mining companies have a similar view and are also adopting new good practices to assist the advancement of Indigenous Australians. That is important because Indigenous employment, education and training, and business and community development opportunities must be a key consideration in all mining approvals and management plans. This has got to become part of government consideration at a state and federal level in thinking about how we develop the mining sector in the future. This is also a responsibility of the industry itself, and it is now spoken about by the Minerals Council of Australia. That raises why we have to do this more successfully. I say that that is also economically smart because some estimates put the cost of Indigenous unemployment to government at $1 billion per annum. The cost to the Australian economy in lost productive output associated with Indigenous unemployment is estimated at $3 billion, and related social welfare expenditure and foregone tax revenue is a further $3 billion. As I have said before in this House, not only is it shameful in the 21st century that a modern, developed and wealthy society tolerates the level of Indigenous unemployment and social disadvantage that this country does, but it is also costing us roughly $7 billion a year. Notwithstanding the unforgivable human cost, imagine the financial cost to Australia of Indigenous unemployment by 2020 if we fail to properly address the incredible social disadvantage faced by Indigenous communities today. This is an issue of social and economic importance that we cannot ignore. The education of young Indigenous Australians is an absolute priority. It is about improving their future employment opportunities and the future productive opportunities of the Australian nation as a whole. That is why I support wholeheartedly the second reading amendment moved by the member for Jagajaga which is about putting in place a more comprehensive and inclusive set of policies and programs for Indigenous students, parents and communities. Governments, the private sector and Indigenous communities must now act in partnership. We have to create educational opportunities that mean that Indigenous communities can actually grasp those employment opportunities that are emerging in remote regional and rural Australia. I have talked about the mining companies. Another example, in the tourism sector, is Accor Asia Pacific, which manages the Sofitel, Novotel and Mercure hotels and, according to the Australian Financial Review article last Friday, now employs about 150 Indigenous Australians, compared to just 10 five years ago. Similarly, at Port Keats, a Wadeye community, there has now been talk of investment in forestry, which can aid the building of skills based on the education in those local schools. The Tiwi islands project is also widely reported in the Australian Financial Review of August of this year. It talks about achievements in the Tiwi Land Council area with respect to investment in the forestry industry, historically for research opportunities but now for sustainable forestry opportunities. Obviously it involves plantations, and I must say that the issue of plantation investment is a matter that has to be resolved by the government sooner rather than later because it is creating uncertainty in industry at the moment as to whether the plantation industry will be able to survive if the government withdraws some of the tax benefits or incentives that have existed over recent years. With a focus on Indigenous forestry, again I simply urge that the government be required to make this final decision on the investment scheme that has been available to the plantation industry in recent years. This is the type of investment, side by side with education, that will do something about overcoming Indigenous disadvantage. It is about productive investment in education and working with the private sector to create productive employment opportunities and to enlarge Australia’s economic cake. I therefore refer to the Weekend Australian, where it talks about Great Southern Plantations doing something about the Tiwi workforce. Out of a full-time workforce on site of 58, 29 Tiwis work for Great Southern Plantations already—which is a great achievement—in real jobs, for competitive wages and not CDEP or dole pittances. These people are now emerging as the leadership of these communities because of their employment status. In conclusion, I simply say that this bill does provide additional welcome funding for Indigenous education—it is a start—but I also say that we have to do better. With the implementation of this additional funding, there is an absolute requirement for cooperation between state and territory governments and the Australian government. I also emphasise, as I have said throughout this speech, that Indigenous Australians expect better and we as a decent community expect to do better—and also that we must do it in partnership with the private sector. We can create a multiplier effect by linking up education and employment as a result of these initiatives. I commend the bill with the additional funding to the House, but I also support the second reading amendment, which is about improving the administration and delivery of Indigenous education. I thank the House for the opportunity to address what I regard as a very serious issue. 97 18:47:00 Hall, Jill, MP 83N Shortland ALP 0 0 Ms HALL —Firstly, I would associate myself with the very positive comments that have been made by the member for Batman in relation to Tiwi islanders and the associated programs that are taking place, such as employment programs that mining companies have introduced, particularly in the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and in relation to companies involved in the tourist industry that are also embracing Indigenous Australians and offering them employment opportunities. I believe that education—and I think most Australians would agree with this belief—is a key factor in addressing social disadvantage. Education provides knowledge and opportunity, and an overwhelming majority of Indigenous Australians need and often have difficulty accessing it. All key social indicators demonstrate that a much greater level of disadvantage exists for our Indigenous Australians than our non-Indigenous Australians, and I believe that as a nation we should hang our head in shame about that. Looking at health, you can see that morbidity and mortality rates are much worse for Indigenous Australians. Indigenous Australians are sicker and they die younger. I think we have been very slow in addressing that issue. When it comes to unemployment, domestic violence and the number of Indigenous people that are languishing in our jails, the figures are all deplorable. Moving to education and looking at any of the benchmarks, you will see that Indigenous Australians are performing at a much lower level than other students in our nation. Their access to education is much more limited. If you make a comparison between indigenous people overseas—I think Canada and New Zealand are two prime examples—and Indigenous Australians, you find that other countries have recognised the need for education and creating opportunities while we in Australia have languished far behind them. The government has recently focused on problems with Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory and I feel that quite often it has come back to blaming those Indigenous Australians. I would like to emphasise very strongly tonight before the House the fact that the best results can be achieved with partnerships—partnerships between the Commonwealth, the state and the private sector. The key to success is always education, education, education. I take great pleasure in supporting the legislation that we have before us tonight, the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006, and I also support the amendment that has been moved by the member for Jagajaga. The legislation will provide an additional $43.6 million over the years 2006-2008 for Indigenous education and training. It will extend tutorial assistance to students in year 9 of school and in vocational education in TAFE. It will also support community festivals to promote health and anti substance abuse—which, given the comments I have already made, I feel is essential—as well as school based sporting academies and related activities for Indigenous Australians. The amendment that has been moved by the member for Jagajaga really highlights some of the concerns I have about this legislation. The fact is that it has not really honed in on the issue of addressing problems relating to literacy and early intervention in literacy as well as problems with parent-school partnerships, which I do not think have been adequately addressed in this legislation. The funding will be based on assessments of students’ needs and the availability of funding. I think that the assessment of needs is a very good principle. As a nation, we really need to make sure that those funds are available to address those needs so we can eliminate the disadvantages that exist for our Indigenous Australians. Funding should be available to all students who need help; it should not be based on competition for those dollars. Commonwealth general recurrent grants are open ended. The government provides money to some of the richest schools in Australia. They are not restricted because they have a special formula applied or based on whether or not the money is available. Surely the same criteria should apply to the most disadvantaged students in our nation, but that is not the case. The bill does nothing for primary school students. The ITAS continues to be linked to year 3 literacy and numeracy results, which means that a student has to wait until year 4 before they can receive tutorial assistance. This is inconsistent with the overwhelming message that has come out in relation to educational research. Early intervention is paramount if you are going to improve educational performance. Indigenous children need urgent support: only 20 per cent in remote areas are achieving the national reading benchmarks in year 3. That really necessitates the need for assistance in year 1 and 2, before they fail in year 3. It is not only Indigenous students in remote areas who are failing these benchmarks; it is not only Indigenous students in rural areas who are having difficulties; it is Indigenous students in all areas. I would like to share with the House tonight a story about one of the schools within the Shortland electorate. A constituent recently approached me about this particular situation. Gorokan Public School runs a homework scheme for Indigenous students, which is funded by the Department of Education, Science and Training. The facility was made available to all of the school’s Indigenous community. That was done through parent meetings and newsletters, and it was embraced by Indigenous families within the electorate. There were 24 students who were accessing the centre—it is an after school hours centre and homework centre—and these students were receiving intensive tutorial assistance from trained tutors, which is just what they need to be able to address their educational disadvantage. The students who were involved in the centre showed improvement in their normal classrooms, and their parents and classroom teachers were commenting on the changes that had occurred. It was not only the changes that were occurring educationally; there were also social changes occurring. These students felt a lot better about themselves. That is one of the things that achieving does: when people achieve, when students find they are reading with the best of them in their class, they feel good about themselves and they are prepared to take risks; they are prepared to push themselves just a little harder. This was happening at Gorokan Public School. The Indigenous children who were attending this homework centre were performing at a level that surpassed anything that they had performed at previously. But a problem arose in the school. It was discovered that 12 of those 24 students were under the age of eight—the age when children are best able to learn—and they were told they had to take those children out of that homework program. It is true that the guidelines for the program say that the children must be eight years of age or older, and those guidelines were put in place by the Howard government in 2005. It said homework centres would: focus on improving outcomes in literacy, numeracy and other curriculum subjects; encourage partnerships involving schools and local business and community groups— which this homework centre at Gorokan does, and— involve suitably skilled personnel in the supervision of homework where possible … Of course those people who were involved in the supervision and providing the extra assistance to the students at Gorokan primary school are more than suitably qualified and committed to the students of the school. The final point is: target students aged more than eight. So the students have to fail: they have to get to the age of eight, be unable to read and be unable to get the assistance they need before they can access the service of a homework centre like the one at Gorokan Public School that has achieved such outstanding results. The constituents who have approached me about this were very disappointed that these young people had to be removed from the classroom. The school was told that unless other students could be included in the homework centre then it would close. That is despite the fact that students had made such a dramatic improvement and despite the fact that every study supports early intervention as a key approach to addressing educational disadvantage and any problems that are surfacing in the area of education. I have been reliably informed that the school has now approached local schools, and students from both Toukley and Kanwal are attending the homework centre. There are still fewer than 30 students, but what really worries me is that there were students who under the age of eight years. It was a prime time to address the problems that they had with education, and now they have been removed from the homework centre and they will only be allowed back when they are eight years of age. When that happens, their problems will be a lot greater than they are now. I look at the amendment that has been moved by the member for Jagajaga, and the example that I have given fits right into the guidelines of what she refers to in it. The amendment looks at the imposition of red tape by the government. I do not think that you could have a better example of where red tape and bureaucracy are affecting the outcome that each and every member of this House would like to see. That outcome is addressing educational disadvantage of Indigenous Australians. I implore the government to rethink, to revisit, that particular issue and to consider what restricting access to homework centres for children under the age of eight can mean long term. In addition to the issue that I have highlighted—an issue that is so important to my electorate—I point out that there has been chronic underspending of Commonwealth funding for Indigenous Australia in the context of this bill. Department officials have admitted to an underspend of $126 million. So we have $126 million underspent and students being denied access to a homework centre. That does not gel with me. The underspending was accompanied by changes to program administration which were very similar to the type of thing that I have mentioned. As a nation we owe it to Indigenous Australians to ensure that they have the greatest opportunity to access education. We owe it to Indigenous Australians to address those key factors of disadvantage that I mentioned earlier in my contribution. We owe it to Indigenous Australians to work together in partnerships of the Commonwealth, the states and the private sector. And we owe it to Indigenous Australians not just to provide an extra $43.6 million over the period of 2006 to 2008, but to see that that money will provide them with the opportunities that they need to succeed in the future. Whilst supporting the legislation, I strongly urge the government to look at the issues raised by the member for Jagajaga and I ask them to revisit issues like the homework centre and many others. I know that the member for Lingiari will be able to draw the attention of the House to issues that are of great concern in remote areas of Australia and he will be able to demonstrate most definitely how Indigenous students in the Northern Territory are being disadvantaged by changes that this government have made to Indigenous education. 100 19:04:00 Snowdon, Warren, MP IJ4 Lingiari ALP 0 0 Mr SNOWDON —I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006. Of course, this is not the first time I have spoken on this type of legislation in this place since I first came here in 1987. I have to say that the theme is not going to change much in this contribution because my observations about the state of Indigenous education tell me that it is as powerless today as it was then. It is for different reasons, but what we do know is that we have to do a great deal more to address the needs of Indigenous Australians generally, to understand the chronic poverty that many Indigenous people and those who live in remote communities in particular experience and to appreciate that, if you want to get out of poverty, you have to address the fundamentals such as education, health and housing. That is something which this government, unfortunately, has failed to recognise and has certainly failed to do. Nevertheless, I do support the appropriation of $43.6 million from 2006 to 2008 in this legislation, which will be going towards the extension of tutorial assistance for year 9 school students; the extension of tutorial assistance for TAFE, vocational training and education students; school based sporting academies and related activities; supporting Indigenous youth festivals; and programs to discourage substance abuse. To my way of thinking, a fundamental aspect of this bill is the proposal to extend the ITAS, the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme, to year 9 Indigenous students and to extend tutorial assistance to Indigenous vocational education and training. Unfortunately, the government took a range of decisions over the last 18 months which have militated against getting better achievement and higher success rates from Indigenous communities for Indigenous kids. It is certainly true that tutorial assistance is a key contributor to better school retention. I have been a schoolteacher and—for the benefit of the Minister for Education, Science and Training, though she is not presently in the chamber—a history teacher. I am now a parent of four, and my kids are at various stages of making the transition from primary school to high school to higher education. So I value all of the incentives that encourage young people to stay at school to learn and succeed. However, it is a great shame—and, indeed, I think it is an indictment of the government—that they changed the Indigenous Education Direct Assistance Program in 2004 in ways that limited parents’ participation in their children’s education and subsequently limited access to ITAS. At the time these changes were made, I made speeches in this chamber, put out press releases and questioned the minister, and got very unsatisfactory responses. In fact, the proof of the pudding has been in the eating: we already know that the government have underspent on ITAS by $124 million-odd over 2004-05. This has all meant limiting the access of Indigenous students and their families to support which they require and should have fundamental access to. As I said, I spoke last year of how the changes to ASSPA would continue to have a negative impact on schools and communities. Since the changes were made, I have travelled extensively through my electorate of Lingiari, visiting many schools. You would appreciate, Madam Deputy Speaker Bishop, it is a significantly large electorate, covering 1.3 million square kilometres, and around 40 per cent of my constituents are Indigenous. Most of those 40 per cent live in small, remote communities. There are 125 schools in my electorate. I must say that, although I have not visited all of them, I have visited a significant number of schools and communities since last year. The clear message that I gave this chamber last year remains the same today: the changes to the Indigenous Education Direct Assistance Program have led directly to less Indigenous participation in schools, less interaction and less involvement in decision making by Indigenous parents. This is a view shared by the Australian Education Union, who last year undertook a survey on the impact of changes on schools. Their conclusion was very significant and is worth quoting: With less opportunity to participate, Indigenous parents are voting with their feet and staying away from schools. Parents have little understanding of the changes, or the reasons for them. Formal avenues for Indigenous participation in mainstream school structures, such as school councils, have been diminished by these changes. There is a simple point to be made—it should be understandable for the government; it certainly is understood by educationalists: unless parents are engaged in school activities and the education of their children and work with the professional educators in a school environment, Indigenous students will continue to disengage and not attend. The changes to the funding of the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme have meant that not all students are now eligible for tutorial support—prior to the changes being introduced last year, tutorial assistance was available to all Indigenous students—and I can remember railing against that in this chamber. The changes mean that ITAS funding is now based on the number of Indigenous students who fail year 3, 5 or 7 numeracy and literacy tests in the previous year’s multiple assessment project benchmark testing. I am not sure what idiot thought this process up. I know the idiot who was the minister at the time and who advocated it in this chamber. He did not have an answer when I asked him then and I know there is not an answer now. If educationalists identify that young people need tutorial type assistance when they first enter the school environment, why would you limit it to those years after they have failed a test? Others have spoken in this place about the failure rates, lack of achievement and lack of attainment of Indigenous kids in these benchmark tests across Australia. I can tell you that the experience of educators in the Northern Territory is that not only are we having less engagement with Indigenous parents but people who would otherwise have been employed as tutors are no longer in the field because they have not been able to rely on those resources for a job. Now I am getting representations from Indigenous communities who say that those people who had otherwise made themselves available for tutorial assistance are no longer making themselves available because they can now get a job with Centrelink or the local council and get reliable work. So now, even if tutorial assistance programs are available, many communities, because of the changing way in which the program is being administered, are unable to find tutors. It seems to me that this short-sighted, stupid approach needs to be reviewed. I said it at the time and I say it again. In the case of Indigenous students in the Northern Territory, I know it very, very well. We know that funding is based on year 1 to year 9 Indigenous school students who are at risk of not achieving the relevant Northern Territory Curriculum Framework learning outcomes for their year level. What this means is that funding available for tutorial assistance, 2.5 hours tuition per student per week for 32 weeks of the year, will be based on the number of students who are not achieving. There is no funding for those who are achieving and want to get better. This government talks about rewarding and encouraging success. This program militates against that encouragement. It takes away the support and the incentive to get greater improvement. What we now know is that the allocation of resources is based on the number of kids in the class who fail. Even if we could get better results for those kids who are passing and who want to achieve higher results—perhaps they are gifted—we cannot provide it because the resources are no longer being made available. What this has meant is that schools in the Territory have had to consider new ways to deliver tutorial assistance to ensure that all students who want assistance can get some tutorial support. Teachers and parents have had to do more with less financial assistance. As I pointed out, because there is less money, there are now fewer Indigenous tutors, with flow-on effects to family stability, attachment to their community and indeed community life. The combination of making it harder for parents to be involved, to make their decisions about their children, and less ITAS funding means that there is real danger that much of the good work done in the development of the curriculum programs to encourage and support attendance and literacy and numeracy development may well wither. In the long run, what we are doing is turning back the clock. I mentioned earlier that I am a proud parent of four. My children are very fortunate. They live in a community that is supportive and encouraging in the development of their positive self-identity. They participate in a range of activities, social, cultural, academic and sporting. They feel safe and comfortable in the education system and have a sense of achievement in any number of ways. They are also from a wealthy middle-class family. They have got everything going for them. My kids, like many others in their circumstances, see attendance at school and learning as a natural activity. Although occasionally they moan and groan about getting up and attending, particularly at the start of each semester, they know the routine and have a sense of purpose as they go about it each day. They understand the purpose of it and they are prepared to dedicate themselves to it. If we want Indigenous kids to have the same sense of purpose and to be comfortable with their identity and environment, we need to provide the scaffolding and networks to support social, cultural, academic and sporting activities in Indigenous communities. The previous structures in place for ASSPA committees and for access to ITAS funding for all students provided key ingredients for students to have a supportive and encouraging environment attune to their needs so that they too could develop positive self-identities. I welcome the extension of ITAS to VET students; however, as parents and teachers will tell you, by the time a student reaches 13 or 14 it could well be too late. In fact in many of these communities unless you get the kids in year 1 or year 2 you may well have missed the boat. This is particularly the case if they have not learnt to read and write by the time they get to that year 9 stage. If they have not had encouragement and reinforcement for what we might think are minor achievements, if they do not feel comfortable, if they are embarrassed, if a learning environment is foreign, then it is too late. If they suffer from otitis media, which is a chronic ear disease for many kids in the Northern Territory who cannot hear properly, if they do not have a proper diet, if they do not go to school with full bellies, if they do not get lunch, if they live in a house where there are 20 or 30 other people, how do we expect these people to achieve? Yet what we see in this program, as a result of this legislation, are some of the supports which were helping these people being withdrawn. I am getting a bit sick and tired—in fact, very sick and tired—of seeing respective ministers in this government swanning around the bush as if they know every bloody thing when on most occasions they know next to nought, pontificating on how to get better results, telling people to take rocks off roofs and not addressing the underlying issues. It is about time they did. I have to say that I am encouraged by some aspects of this legislation. I was at a community in June of this year—I cannot remember exactly which one it was; during that month I had been to quite a number. It could have been Elliott, Yuendumu, Borroloola, Harts Range, Utopia or Ntaria—it could have been any number of places. I came across an old Furphy water tank embossed with its famous motto: ‘Good, better, best—never let it rest—till your good is better—and your better best’. I think this is as good as any motto for Indigenous Education Direct Assistance. We can never let it rest. While I support this legislation, I think we really need to do a great deal more. I believe the government needs to go back to the drawing board and work out how it can provide more effective assistance to Indigenous kids. I have to say that I am encouraged by the support for the sporting programs that are in this legislation. Today during question time in this chamber you may have noticed, Madam Deputy Speaker, that a number of Indigenous kids were sitting up in the gallery. They were from Ntaria and Areyonga in Central Australia and Sanderson High School in Darwin. I wish they were here tonight because they would appreciate what we are talking about, they would understand the issues which I have spoken about and they would know the concerns that their parents have about their ability to access regional education outcomes. I also want to commend the support for the Indigenous festivals and, whilst the amount is minuscule, the money to discourage students from substance abuse—but it is minuscule. I first started working on substance abuse programs in 1979. I can tell you that from 1979 until now, no reasonable, real effort has been made by any government of any political persuasion anywhere in Australia to provide the resources that are absolutely necessary if we are to hit this problem on the head, and it is still the case. The member for Batman referred to a very proper observation made by Bruce Harvey from Rio Tinto. We have had a lot of debate in this place about skills shortages recently. He made this observation in the Financial Review last Friday: Most of our long-life mines are in northern Australia— and this is significant— and, by 2020, every second Australian living above the Tropic of Capricorn or above Port Augusta in South Australia, will be of Aboriginal descent. I know that Rio Tinto has done an enormous amount to ensure that Aboriginal people around the mines in which Rio Tinto work are being fostered and encouraged through the school system by this company. Other companies are making similar efforts, but many in other industries are not. This government needs to encourage those companies who are working in or near these communities to understand their obligation—an obligation which will affect their bottom line in a positive way by providing them access to skilled workers in due course. We need to say to these people: you too need to make a contribution to assist Aboriginal people in regional and remote Australia to get decent educational outcomes which will hopefully lead them to meaningful jobs. (Time expired) 104 19:25:00 Livermore, Kirsten, MP 83A Capricornia ALP 0 0 Ms LIVERMORE —Labor is supporting the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 because it provides for additional funding for Indigenous education. In total there will be an extra $43.6 million over the 2006 to 2008 quadrennium. Specifically, that funding will be broken up in the following way. There will be an amount to extend tutorial assistance to students in year 9. Similarly, there will be tutorial assistance available for students in vocational education and TAFE. There is money for community festivals, money for activities that promote health and anti substance abuse and funding for school based sporting academies and related activities for Indigenous students. From that list it is obvious that Labor has no problem with what is in this bill. Rather, our problem is with what is not in the bill. There is nothing in it to indicate that the government has learned anything from the mess it has made of funding for Indigenous education over the past couple of years. For those who take an interest in the state of Indigenous education, there is a much more accurate reflection of what is going on to be found in the second reading amendment moved by Labor’s shadow minister. Labor’s amendment reflects the urgency of the task facing governments around the country when it comes to addressing the gap in educational outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. It is all there in the second reading amendment. It condemns the government for failing to deliver urgently needed funding for Indigenous students by insisting on complex and bureaucratic administrative arrangements that prevent many schools and communities from benefiting from educational programs. We have heard from other speakers already about the $126 million underspend in the Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Program. We have heard criticism already, and it is in the second reading amendment, of the impenetrable red tape that has been introduced to many of the programs now making up the Indigenous education funding from the Commonwealth government. This red tape has led to a decline in the involvement of Indigenous communities in the Parent School Partnership Initiative. The government has failed to provide sufficient resources for early intervention programs in schools to raise Indigenous children’s literacy standards. It has reduced the number of Indigenous schoolchildren who access tutorial assistance by making eligibility requirements more restrictive and short term. Finally, the amendment condemns the government for presiding for 10 long years over continuing gaps in educational and training participation and performance between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. It is without doubt a comprehensive second reading amendment and it is also a comprehensive indictment of the government’s failure on Indigenous students in this country. You do not have to look very far for statistics to back up that failure. The most recent statistics benchmarking Indigenous students’ performance in writing, reading and numeracy against that of non-Indigenous students show a very significant gap of up to 20 or more percentage points between the average performance of Indigenous students and that of their non-Indigenous counterparts. As we have heard from other speakers already in this debate, the government’s policy for improving the outcomes for Indigenous education is in absolute disarray. In the past couple of years radical changes have been made to longstanding programs and practices in this area. You might say there is nothing wrong with radical change, especially when faced with the shocking statistics on Indigenous education that I have just referred to. The problem is that there does not seem to have been any clear rationale for the changes and there has been almost no effective consultation with educators and members of the Indigenous community in arriving at these changes. I will go through the changes one at a time, and first are the changes to the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme. Previously, schools received funding to provide tutorial assistance to Indigenous students based on the school’s assessment of who needed the extra help. Students who had been identified by their teachers as needing extra assistance were eligible for up to five hours of tuition per week, either as individuals or as part of small groups. For the most part, the tuition was provided outside the classroom. One of the changes to the tuition program is the shift to using in-class tutors to provide supplementary assistance to students for up to 2½ hours per week, but what has really changed the nature of the tuition program is the way in which eligibility for assistance is determined. Funding is now provided to schools based on the numbers of Indigenous students who fail the years 3, 5 and 7 benchmark tests for literacy and numeracy. You have to ask where on earth DEST came up with that idea. It was certainly not from anyone with educational experience. The evidence at the recent Senate committee inquiry into these changes was overwhelming in its criticism of DEST’s failure based approach to funding for tuition. The report referred to the submissions on ITAS as highlighting ‘the disjuncture of funding policy and educational practice’. Reading through the evidence, I really felt for the principals and teachers. They are desperately trying to make sense of a program that is contrary to everything they know from educational theory and their own experience to be effective in assisting Indigenous kids with literacy and numeracy. Thankfully, the government has made one small concession that will give schools some chance to use the tuition money according to their own assessment of what works for their students. Following the debate on the original Indigenous education bill back in 2004, when Labor vehemently opposed the proposed changes to ITAS, the minister did allow some flexibility in the way the money can be used. Schools can now determine for themselves which students will receive the tutorial assistance and when it is provided to those students, but the amount is still based on the number of students who fail the tests. As I said, though, there is flexibility in how it is utilised across the school to best meet the needs of the students. But that is a minor improvement to a system which still completely flies in the face of the early intervention approach that educators will tell you is the key to building strong foundations and achieving good educational outcomes. In contrast to the weight of evidence in favour of early intervention strategies, the recent Senate report states that DEST was ‘unable to cite any assessment of the educational validity of the failure based approach to funding’. Common sense tells you that that is because there is not any. Submission after submission to the Senate inquiry made that point. For example, the Catholic Education Office in Darwin described the funding model as ‘pedagogically unsound’. The Association of Independent Schools of South Australia questioned the design of ITAS that focuses support for students on post-benchmark failure. Intervention at that point is inappropriate, as early intervention is the key to educational success for students at risk of failure. Why should Indigenous kids have to struggle and fail in year 3 and be even more alienated from the education system before they are eligible for help from the federal government? The surprising thing is that the minister for education obviously knows the importance of early intervention strategies and their success in improving the educational outcomes of students experiencing difficulties with literacy and numeracy. I say that because we have just celebrated National Literacy and Numeracy Week. Schools around Australia were recognised by the minister for their achievements in improving literacy and numeracy for their students. I cannot imagine that any of the recipients won for offering programs that do not address students’ problems until after they have failed in year 3. I know one school that certainly would not advocate that approach. I am talking about Blackwater North State School, in my electorate, which was awarded a highly commended award for their program Leap into Learning, which has achieved outstanding results for students in the early primary school years. The program was initially aimed at year 2 students, but elements of the program are now incorporated in preschool and year 1 lessons as well as year 2. I raise the example of Blackwater North for two reasons. One, of course, is to congratulate the school and its staff on their commitment to providing quality education, which has been recognised with this national award. I also raise it to underline the point that I have made about early intervention. Here was a school that identified problems at the year 2 level, but what was their response? Their response was not to wait until the students failed a year 3 test and then give them assistance in year 4, but quite the opposite. The school’s application for the literacy week award said: Leap into Learning outlines a commitment to the early years as they are critical to children’s ongoing learning and development because they set firm foundations for learning and progression through school which is reflected in this project. The example of Blackwater North State School is just one example of what we saw time and again before the Senate inquiry. Teachers know their students and are in the best position to assess how best to meet their needs and improve their learning outcomes. They want to give students that help as and when they need it, not according to the convenience and the dictates of the department of education. I will now talk about the other major change, which was to the ASSPA program. It was not a change but a complete abolition of the Aboriginal Student Support and Parent Awareness program. This has been replaced by the new Parent School Partnership Initiative program, but the transition between the two programs has been a disaster. It is not even a question of the merits of the PSPI program; it is just that the transition has meant that nothing can truly succeed with what has been left behind. The sad thing is that it was a disaster that was entirely foreseen. Labor did not support the abolition of ASSPA but, once it was clear that the government would persist with that policy, we wanted to make sure that the transition to the PSPI program was done properly, without completely destroying the relationships that had been established between schools and Indigenous parents under the ASSPA program. At the time we were debating the amendment bill at the end of 2004, Labor members were begging the government to use 2005 as a transition year to allow for time for the changes to be properly implemented. That included time for DEST to figure out what it was doing and to disseminate information to its staff in regional offices around Australia and time to explain the changes to school communities so that they were not completely ambushed by the loss of their ASSPA funding. Of course, none of that happened, and the reaction from schools and Indigenous parents that Labor members predicted and warned the government about has occurred, with the end result being a huge loss of faith in the process and many Indigenous parents just walking away from involvement in their kids’ schools. Again, just like the changes to ITAS, there is no real policy rationale underlying the change to ASSPA. The government points to a review of the program conducted by DEST in 2002 and 2003 but the report from that review is quite inconclusive, and even reasonably supportive of ASSPA. No-one reading that report would say that it advocates or provides the basis for the wholesale scrapping of the ASSPA program but, nonetheless, that debate took place and the bill was passed at the end of 2004. For most schools it was only when the school year started in 2005 that they realised that they would no longer receive the ASSPA money that had supported many activities for their Indigenous students. Instead of receiving the automatic funding based on the number of Indigenous students enrolled, schools were to learn that they now had to go through a two-step application process to compete for funding which they may or may not receive. The whole idea of ASSPA to start with was to have reliable and predictable funding to support Indigenous students to take up opportunities that they might otherwise miss out on. It was also there for the school to run activities like nutrition programs and events such as NAIDOC Week—the kinds of activities that would make Indigenous students and their parents feel that they are a valued part of the school community. ASSPA committees had proved to be an effective way of encouraging Indigenous parents to become involved in schools and in school decision making. It was the parent committee’s job to work with the principal and other school staff to come up with the plan for using ASSPA funds. For good reason, the story of what happened in 2005 was the subject of the Senate committee’s inquiry. The committee heard from schools in Indigenous communities around Australia, and the experiences related to the committee matched the warnings given by Labor in 2004. Important school activities that for years had been funded by ASSPA were not possible in 2005 for most of the schools that appeared before the committee. These activities were mainly extracurricular but they had significant linkages to educational outcomes that were recognised by the people who should know—the principals and teachers who had worked with ASSPA committees to incorporate the activities into the schools’ programs. There is a recognition by teachers that the issues relating to Indigenous education are broad and often go beyond what happens inside the classroom, so there has to be a lateral approach taken to solving problems like behaviour management and academic progress. ASSPA funding was often the answer to some of those creative solutions. I note that, ironically, the kinds of programs that this bill is now funding follow the same rationale as that for the ASSPA funding—the recognition that the issues affecting Indigenous students go far beyond what happens when they walk into the classroom. Some other examples that were funded out of ASSPA funding were things like nutrition programs, which came up frequently before the Senate inquiry. Teachers fronting classrooms know that you cannot teach kids who are hungry, so running a breakfast club or similar activity is part of achieving educational outcomes at schools where they know kids are attending classes without receiving adequate nutrition at home. It was a similar story with sporting activities. At many schools ASSPA money paid for Indigenous kids to take part in sport, whether it was money for travel or for equipment. Again, this was recognised by teachers and the community as giving the students a positive experience of school and helped back in the classroom when it came to their academic results. With the demise of ASSPA, the money that funded those types of activities is gone. But, worse than that, the way that ASSPA was abolished and replaced by the PSPI program has been a big setback in trying to get Indigenous parents involved in schools. Where once parents were invited to work with the school to plan for the use of ASSPA money, now there is no money until someone at the school goes through a two-step application process to access Parent School Partnership Initiative funds. Not surprisingly, there has been a big backlash by schools against the process. DEST have finally, it appears, started listening to those directly involved in helping and educating Indigenous kids and I believe that they have folded the two steps into a single application. But it is very hard not to think that the damage has already been done. The message has been sent, by the way DEST handled the whole process, that Indigenous parents are not important and that they cannot really be trusted to make decisions for their kids. The government did not consult with the Indigenous community about abolishing ASSPA and did not explain how they could be part of the new scheme. The PSPI program is overly bureaucratic and so badly designed that you could not come up with something more alienating and off-putting for Indigenous parents if you tried. That was certainly echoed by one of the schools that I spoke to in my electorate. I tried to get a bit of feedback from around the place. One large primary school in Rockhampton related their experience. They put in two applications under PSPI—one last year and one again in 2006. Both have been rejected. The application both times was to employ a teacher aide to support learning amongst Indigenous students. The deputy principal, whom I spoke to, told me that the process for applying is quite onerous, with excessive paperwork, lots of supportive documentation and many hours of work. Of course, it was very frustrating for the school staff and the Indigenous parents whose kids were relying on that assistance when those applications that have been worked on over many hours were rejected. The deputy principal said that she is quite hesitant to apply for PSPI again after the fruitless effort they went to with the previous two applications. The deputy principal said that they used the ASSPA funding, which now of course is not available to the school, for Indigenous kids to go on excursions and to take part in sporting activities and that she knows for a fact that the kids are worse off for the loss of that money. This school also had an experience of losing funding under the ITAS program. They said that they employed a full-time staff member to assist Indigenous kids previously but the changes to ITAS have forced that staff member to be made part time, and there is subsequently less time to give to those kids to improve their educational outcomes. Another school I want to mention is Crescent Lagoon State School. This school has quite a large proportion of Indigenous kids and they recently held a very successful set of NAIDOC Week activities. They lost their ASSPA funding, of course—they no longer have their ASSPA committee—but the Indigenous parents and a teacher, Amanda Power, got together to make sure that their kids would not miss out. They were not going to let the lack of federal government funding get in the way of them having a fantastic NAIDOC Week. They wrote to businesses around Rockhampton to get together money so that they could set up the activities. They got an awful lot of support from throughout the community. One of the highlights of the NAIDOC Week activities was a special assembly I attended where an ‘adopt an elder’ program was put in place. They have adopted Mrs Nyoka Hatfield. Her name is Gami, which is Aboriginal for grandmother. Mrs Hatfield has had a long involvement with the school and this formalised what she has contributed over the years in teaching these kids at Crescent Lagoon about the Indigenous history of our local area and Indigenous culture. In conclusion, I support the second reading amendment which condemns the government and calls on it to reform its funding criteria and guidelines so as to address the problems and provide all Indigenous students with the opportunity to achieve quality schooling results. 109 19:45:00 Vamvakinou, Maria, MP 00AMT Calwell ALP 0 0 Ms VAMVAKINOU —The disadvantages that continue to plague Australia’s Indigenous communities in the areas of health, education and employment opportunities speak of past injustices suffered by Indigenous communities as much as they highlight the work that still has to be done today in order to redress these ongoing disadvantages. At a time when a debate about public education and the dwindling resources allocated to it under this government continues to rage both in this place and elsewhere, and when improving educational opportunities as well as numeracy and literacy skills standards remains of critical importance in ensuring Australia’s future prosperity, it is especially important that we pay particular attention to Indigenous education and continue to look for new ways to lift the school retention and success rates as well as the literacy and numeracy skills of Indigenous school children. Among Australia’s Indigenous communities there is a proportionally higher number of school-age children aged under 15 years in comparison with the rest of Australia. The Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 sets aside an additional $43.6 million to be spent from 2006 to 2008 on Indigenous education and training. The extra funding listed under this bill will target several key initiatives currently maintained by the Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Program. They include tutorial assistance programs aimed at year 9 school students as well as at students undertaking TAFE and vocational training and education courses; school based sporting academies and related activities, as well as Indigenous youth festivals; and programs designed to discourage substance abuse among Indigenous youth. The Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill serves as a conduit for funds to be channelled into such programs—programs that were originally designed to improve Indigenous student learning outcomes and further close the gap that still exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students in their respective school retention and success rates. To take one example, the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme for year 9 Indigenous students currently provides them with up to four hours of tutorial assistance per week for up to 32 weeks in a year. In doing so it aims to increase the chances of these students making it to year 10, and then hopefully going on to successfully complete year 12. As it stands, this bill promises a further $14.5 million on top of the $15.6 million already allocated to this program over the next two years. Of course, this can only be a good thing. In truth, however, the extension of year 9 tutorial assistance and vocational education and training programs made possible by this additional funding only restores support that was previously available to Indigenous students under the Aboriginal Tutorial Assistance Scheme. At the same time its benefits are offset by this government’s continued tightening of eligibility requirements for Abstudy allowances for students under the age of 16, including the introduction of means testing and the requirement that students be enrolled in full-time studies in order to receive maximum Abstudy assistance. In addition, for Indigenous students living in urban centres, only those who are studying in schools with an enrolment of 20 students or more are eligible to apply for the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme. This bill fails to address ongoing concerns regarding the operation of the Parent School Partnership Initiative program, whose increasing bureaucracy has only had the effect of alienating parents and Indigenous community members alike, and whose maze of grants and applications means that teachers and school administrators frequently become bogged down in submission-writing exercises. But perhaps most crucially, this bill does nothing new in terms of early intervention programs for Indigenous students. By continuing to limit access to ITAS to students in year 4 and above it ignores current education research that has highlighted the crucial importance of early intervention programs as a way of significantly improving a student’s chances of successfully finishing his or her schooling. What this bill does is mask the continued underspending of Commonwealth funds on Indigenous education, which now stands at somewhere in the order of $126 million. This is money that the government has withheld from Indigenous education programs that are designed to help address the disadvantages and inequalities that a vast majority of Indigenous students still face. And when you look at the figures for school retention rates, what they tell you is that this government is still not doing enough in the area of Indigenous education and that we as a country still have a long way to go before there is anything like parity between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. Year 12 retention rates for Indigenous students are still half that of non-Indigenous students. Only 39.5 per cent of Indigenous students made it to year 12 in 2005, compared with 76.6 per cent among non-Indigenous students. This figure of 39.5 per cent represents only an eight per cent increase in year 12 retention rates for Indigenous students over the six years since 1994. Of course that is not good enough. In terms of higher education, in 2003 the participation rate of Indigenous students in our higher education institutions actually declined relative to non-Indigenous students enrolled in higher education. There has been little noticeable improvement in the retention rates for Indigenous students at university relative to non-Indigenous students, and there is still a big difference between Indigenous success rates at university compared with the success rate of non-Indigenous students. Whilst this bill promises an extra $43.6 million for strategic Indigenous education initiatives, the reality is that a whole lot more needs to be done across the board if we are to see any substantial improvement to Indigenous education. The bill signals but a small step in the right direction, yet current government guidelines that restrict access to educational assistance and tutorial programs for some Indigenous students as well as access to Abstudy only threaten to undermine whatever gains are made by this bill. I take this opportunity to recognise the invaluable work done by Mr Terry Kildea and his staff at the Gunung-Willam-Balluk Learning Centre, which offers a Koori programs unit in partnership with Kangan Batman TAFE, and which is located in my electorate of Calwell. The Gunung-Willam-Balluk Learning Centre is a leading provider of vocational education and training to Indigenous students throughout Melbourne. The centre aims to empower students by merging the cultural heritage and values of the traditional landowners with contemporary Aboriginal culture and cutting-edge learning technology. It uses a combination of classroom, practical and applied initiatives, including art exhibitions, music festivals, community projects and cultural camps, to encourage its students to learn. Importantly, the learning centre also offers its students additional support in helping them find either employment or further educational opportunities once they have completed their studies. I have had the opportunity to visit the Gunung-Willam-Balluk Learning Centre on a number of occasions, and each time I have been greatly impressed by the hard work of its staff, who provide Indigenous students with training and education courses and opportunities that they would otherwise not have access to. Many of the difficulties that the learning centre faces daily are broadly indicative of the enormous challenges that still lie ahead in improving attendance rates, retention rates and employment opportunities for Indigenous students. According to Terry Kildea, who manages the learning centre, one trend that remains of particular concern is the early age at which Indigenous students are leaving school. The centre has had to cater for school leavers as young as 11 years old who need assistance. The need to cater for large numbers of early school leavers as well as students who become caught up in the juvenile justice system is putting enormous pressure not only on the learning centre in Broadmeadows but on other Koori education units affiliated with TAFE institutions around Australia. What this means is that much more needs to be done to find ways to significantly lower the number of early school leavers amongst Indigenous students, and to reduce the number of Indigenous children currently caught up in Australia’s juvenile justice system. Housing, health, transport and a host of other difficulties only compound the obstacles Indigenous students face in this country. A number of the students enrolled at the Gunung-Willam-Balluk Learning Centre live in public housing, which tends to make them fairly transient, and they frequently complain of difficulties travelling to and from school. Very few students have either a drivers licence or access to a car. Transport is a problem that affects Indigenous students living in urban centres, not just those who live in remote areas. In response, one of the many initiatives that the learning centre in Broadmeadows has introduced is driver education courses for those students without a driving licence or without enough experience driving on the roads. The funding that is provided under the IESIP is crucial to this and many other programs and initiatives that the learning centre offers its students. It allows the learning centre to host a monthly rewards and recognition luncheon that recognises and rewards diligent students with such prizes as supermarket vouchers, travel passes and movie passes as a way of encouraging students to persist with their education and training. In themselves, these prizes speak volumes about the disadvantages and difficulties that Indigenous Australians and Indigenous schoolchildren still face. Food vouchers and travel allowances are a good indication of just how interconnected and systemic are the problems Indigenous children face. One of the centre’s great success stories is its distribution of refurbished computers to those students who, because of travel difficulties, childcare commitments, family responsibilities and so forth, find it difficult to regularly attend courses at the learning centre. These computers make it possible for students to study from home, and since its introduction this program has seen something in the order of a 300 per cent increase in student retention and success rates. IESIP funding also enables the centre to provide tutorial assistance for its students as well as cultural studies and cultural support programs that enable community elders to visit and speak with students at the centre and those in custody. These and other such programs initiated by the Gunung-Willam-Balluk Learning Centre provide vital resources and support for Indigenous students, making the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Act and the Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Program key components in ongoing efforts to lift school retention and success rates among Indigenous children. It is crucial that funding for these programs arrives on time. Mr Kildea drew my attention to delays that the learning centre experienced in receiving last year’s funding. Such delays often occur because of disagreements between the Commonwealth and relevant state governments. In the case of the Gunung-Willam-Balluk Learning Centre, the IESIP funding that was supposed to arrive at the beginning of the 2005 academic year did not arrive until late December 2005. The timely distribution of IESIP money is absolutely essential to future planning as well as to ensuring that a range of programs remain available at the learning centre. As a 2005 report commissioned by the Council of Australian Governments clearly states: Students who stay on at school and complete Year 12 are much more likely to undertake additional education and training. In turn, they will have more, and better, employment options. In the long term, people who have completed secondary or post-secondary education are more likely to encourage their children to do the same, so that benefits can flow from one generation to another. Until we as a nation achieve parity in school retention and success rates between Indigenous and non-Indigenous children, it is incumbent upon us to find ways to improve the educational prospects of Indigenous children in this country. As other speakers have done before me, I am happy to support this bill. 112 19:58:00 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 0 Mr PRICE —I am pleased to speak on the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 and, in particular, the fact that an additional $43.6 million over 2006 to 2008 has been appropriated by this bill for Indigenous education and training. I want to say—and I am sure that you would agree with me, Mr Deputy Speaker Kerr—that, in trying to reach out to our Indigenous community and ensure that they are guaranteed the same opportunities that we pride ourselves that each and every Australian has, you cannot apply a one-size-fits-all approach to the problem. I would never dispute the honourable member for Lingiari, in his contribution to the House, talking about the Indigenous population of the Northern Territory. But I have to say that in my own electorate of Chifley, which outside the Northern Territory has the largest number of Indigenous people, we too have special problems, and I am not sure that they are being addressed. I say to the honourable Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Education, Science and Training, who was so recently in my electorate at the opening of Richard Johnson Anglican School—and I sincerely thank him for that—that we have special problems. Firstly, let me say that, notwithstanding the very large Indigenous population that I have, with schools in my electorate being required to assess how many Indigenous students they have for this funding, it is often counterproductive to the very aims and ambitions that we hope to achieve. What do I mean by this? I have a very large Islander population in my electorate as well, so I have many Aboriginal students and Islander students—and, I might say, some white students—who present with the same problems, the same educational disadvantage. What we are not doing in electorates like Chifley is saying: ‘Whatever the disadvantage, whatever the colour of the disadvantage, we’re going to offer a solution. We’re going to offer a helping hand.’ The fact that Aboriginal students are in receipt of some assistance, rather than encouraging or setting out to assist them, in fact becomes an issue of division within my community. I fundamentally believe a few things. One is that, no matter what the colour of a student who presents at a school, whether it is in private or, mostly, in public education, and whatever the family circumstances of the student, those students deserve to have their educational potential developed by the school and realised. I say to the parliamentary secretary that, notwithstanding good intentions, I am far from happy that students in my electorate are not having their potential realised. This particularly applies to Aboriginal students. The general unemployment rate in Chifley is unacceptable, but the rate of unemployment for the Indigenous community is absolutely beyond the pale. The best way of tackling unemployment is by ensuring that, at schools, students get a solid foundation and have their talents realised and that they are able to enter the world of work. All too often, we set benchmarks for retention in years 11 and 12, but often they are little more than warehousing students. It cannot be said that their educational potential is being realised. This is totally unsatisfactory. We can get reasonable results, if not good results, in primary school, but they fade away at high school and are particularly disastrous in years 11 and 12. I value measures like targeted assistance, notwithstanding their shortfalls, but I say to the parliamentary secretary: given that my electorate has the highest number of urban Aboriginals outside the Northern Territory, how many students are benefiting from this program? Are you satisfied that the program is really meeting the needs of urban Aboriginals? Mr Deputy Speaker, you will know that, when the Labor government were in power, we set an ambitious target—that is, we wanted 1,000 Aboriginal students to enter the teaching profession. It gave a huge fillip to our Aboriginal community, but those brave targets and ambitions seem to have fallen away. Really, in a way, we need to have the courage to start setting those very same targets. Yes, why can’t we say that, in 2006, we would like to see 1,000 Aboriginal students enter the teaching profession? But I would say to the parliamentary secretary that I am equally concerned to ensure that Indigenous students are able to enter the world of work and, in particular, to enter trades. Why shouldn’t we set some benchmarks for our Indigenous students of being able to enter apprenticeships? If the parliamentary secretary feels that I am talking about what we used to call traineeships, I am not opposed to that. Certainly we ought to set some targets there. But why can’t we also set some targets in relation to traditional apprenticeships? Why can’t we set a figure for how many apprenticeships we would like Indigenous students in the year 2006 to aspire to enter in 2007? If it was good enough under a Labor government to have 1,000 Aboriginal teachers, are 1,000 bricklayers, electricians, carpenters and hairdressers beyond our wit? Can we not set such a target? No such targets are being set now, and the reality is that Indigenous students are in no way getting their fair share of apprenticeships—their fair share of becoming bricklayers, their fair share of becoming carpenters or their fair share of becoming hairdressers or any of the other trades that I have mentioned. Again, I have always respected the honourable member for Lingiari and his absolute commitment to the Indigenous community in the Northern Territory. But we tend to overlook those members of our Indigenous community who happen to live in the cities. We do not seem to be tracking their success with the same degree of diligence. I think we should. I ask the parliamentary secretary and, indeed, the minister: what are you doing about it? What do you think is a reasonable target to aim for? To what extent will this $43.6 million over 2006-08 contribute to students in my electorate being able to not only do years 11 and 12—and precious few of them do—but also then go on either to a university education, and I mentioned the teaching profession, or to a traditional apprenticeship and become bricklayers, carpenters and what have you and have the same rights of aspiration that every other person in Australia enjoys? It is not being delivered. I say to the minister and the parliamentary secretary: the status quo is totally unacceptable. Yes, I am supportive of targeted assistance, but it does create problems in an electorate like mine, where you have increasing numbers of Islanders who very often are presenting with the same problems. One Aboriginal elder said to me: ‘You know, in Mount Druitt, disadvantage does not wear a colour. It is not black; it is not yellow; it is not white.’ In fact, it covers all of them—that is what he was trying to say. That was very perceptive. If this targeted assistance is picked up in the high schools in the electorate of Chifley, what about the Islander kids who are not eligible for it? What are they supposed to do? What are they supposed to feel? For that matter, this measure is not meeting the needs of those white kids who suffer the same disadvantage—and there are some. There is a gap there. I am quite happy to set some targets for the Indigenous community. Do not get me wrong. I have mentioned teaching and the vocational area of apprenticeships. I have no problem with that. But at school, where people suffer a disadvantage and need assistance, there should be no colour bars. The Commonwealth should be prepared to fund the disadvantaged wherever they are found. Worthwhile measures like this that may work very well in the Northern Territory—and I accwept, notwithstanding some criticisms in the second reading amendment, that they do—in an urban community actually add to racial tension. That is something that I want to speak out about. The Minister for Education, Science and Training, seated at the table, has a lot to say. I say that, in terms of reducing the unemployment rate in Chifley, one of the keys to success is providing greater assistance and a helping hand to students in my electorate so that they can reach their educational potential. In public schools, that is not happening at the moment. I certainly agree with the proposition in the second reading amendment—that is, the more money that we invest in early literacy and numeracy intervention, the better off we will be. The more we can involve parents and schools in a partnership to tackle those issues, the better off we will be. But we should not be prepared to reinforce the proposition that, just because people may live in a relatively disadvantaged urban environment, they should somehow expect second-rate outcomes from the education system, and the public education system in particular. I would like to pay tribute to a district superintendent that we had in Mount Druitt, Lindsay Wasson, because, when he became the district superintendent, he said to the primary schools and to the high schools: ‘In your first year I want you to halve the difference between your results and the state average. In the second year I want you to meet it and in the third year I want you to exceed it.’ Regrettably, he has been promoted out of the job, but he was achieving fine results at some of those schools with that mission. We could achieve a lot more with additional commitment by the federal government to ensuring the quality of educational opportunities. I want to sum up in this way: there is a second reading amendment, which I fully support; but, by and large, I support the idea of seeing better educational outcomes for our Indigenous community. No matter where you travel in Australia, in seeking to ensure equality of educational opportunity for our Indigenous community, different solutions are needed for different communities. You cannot use a ruler and apply a one-size-fits-all solution to them all. In my electorate—which, other than the Northern Territory, has the largest urban Aboriginal community—we are failing. We are not delivering what I believe is the birthright of these Indigenous students. They have every right to expect equality of educational outcome and it is not being delivered, notwithstanding what I believe to be an overwhelming Commonwealth responsibility to see to its delivery. Last but not least, setting targets is ho-hum in relation to management theory but very rare in terms of government. The previous Labor government was prepared to set some targets for Indigenous students entering the teaching profession, which worked well. Why can’t we repeat that? Why do we have to abandon it? In particular, why can’t we set some targets for Indigenous students entering the world of work and, in particular, traditional apprenticeships? I would very much like to see that done. 115 20:16:00 Bishop, Julie, MP 83P Curtin LP Minister for Education, Science and Training and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women’s Issues 1 0 Ms JULIE BISHOP —In summing up the debate on the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006, I take this opportunity to thank all previous speakers, particularly the member for Kalgoorlie and the member for Fisher, for their contributions to this important debate. The bill amends the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Act 2000 to increase appropriations over the 2006-08 calendar years to provide additional funding for intensive tuition for Indigenous students in year 9 and Indigenous students in vocational and technical education, support for community festivals for health promotion activities addressing substance abuse by Indigenous youth in remote areas and delivery of school-based sporting academies and related activities for Indigenous students. Specifically, $14.5 million in new funding appropriated under this bill will encourage Indigenous students in year 9 to continue with schooling to complete year 12, thereby enhancing their opportunities for further education and training and employment. Extending intensive tuition to Indigenous students in vocational and technical education through additional funding of $11.2 million will complement a suite of measures under the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme. Up to 18,000 young people annually will benefit from allocating $7.3 million to the Indigenous youth festivals initiative; this is a component of the Community Festivals for Health Promotion program. Funding of $1.5 million will be used as part of a whole-of-government response to address substance abuse issues. This measure further consolidates the whole-of-government regional approach that was announced in September 2005. Funding of $9.1 million is being appropriated to support 18 school based sporting academies by the end of 2008 and related strategies. Over the four years that will, in fact, total some $20 million. During the course of the debate, the opposition made a number of unfounded assertions. While it is very tempting at this hour to ignore those assertions, I believe they should be rebutted—at least for the record. The opposition’s amendment seeks to condemn the government for failing to deliver urgently needed funding for Indigenous students by insisting on bureaucratic process. In addition, the opposition claims that red tape has led to a decline in the involvement of Indigenous communities in the Parent School Partnership Initiative. The government rejects absolutely this assertion; it is just not supported by the facts. Since the Whole of School Intervention Strategy was introduced in 2005—of which the Parent School Partnership Initiative is a component—its administrative procedures have been streamlined considerably. Two funding rounds per year have replaced the initial five rounds per annum; a single application form has replaced the previous two-stage application process; and contracts have been significantly simplified, especially for those of up to $50,000. The Australian government views parental and community engagement as being an important—indeed, essential—strategy for improving Indigenous educational outcomes. Australian government expenditure has significantly increased for projects specifically designed to enhance the participation of parents and communities in the education of their children. As at 31 December 2005, $36 million had been approved under the Whole of School Intervention Strategy. By May 2006, approvals had increased to some $50.6 million. The 2,186 projects approved by May had leveraged around a further $34 million from other sources. The opposition accuses the government of overseeing a $126 million underspend through bureaucratic processes; again the government totally rejects this accusation. Reported shortfalls in expenditure for 2004-05 were due, in part, to extended negotiation with some 20 major and 230 minor education providers in reaching agreement on education outcome targets to accelerate further closure of the education divide between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students and to strengthen the accountability and reporting arrangements for the 2005-08 quadrennium. The act appropriates funding on a calendar-year basis and allows 18 months for that funding to be expended. So all of the funding appropriated for 2005 had been spent within the time allowed by the act, with more than $226 million in funding actually being paid to providers in calendar year 2005. The opposition further accuses the government of failing to provide sufficient resources for early intervention in schools to raise Indigenous literacy standards. Again this assertion is absolutely rejected by the government. The Australian government recognises early childhood is a critical period for the physical, emotional, intellectual and social development of children. The government has committed an additional $5 million over the remainder of the quadrennium to strengthen early childhood education. Parent school partnership initiatives will focus on strong partnerships between Indigenous parents and early childhood educators and will help Indigenous children make a smooth transition from preschool to school. Indigenous specific funding is supplementary to mainstream funding and is designed to accelerate improvements in Indigenous education outcomes. It should not substitute for mainstream funding by state and territory government and non-government education providers. Mainstream areas should fulfil their responsibilities for all students, including Indigenous students. Tutorial assistance is now more strategically targeted to key points in education where the mainstream has failed Indigenous students, particularly those who do not reach the national literacy and numeracy benchmarks. There is flexibility in the funding arrangements for the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme. This flexibility enables tutorial assistance to be made available to Indigenous students in years 1 to 9 who are at risk of not meeting the relevant literacy or numeracy curriculum outcome levels. The opposition’s amendment claims the government has reduced the number of Indigenous students who can access tutorial assistance by making eligibility requirements more restrictive and short term. A part of the Australian government’s approach to accelerating Indigenous students’ school outcomes involved reshaping the tutorial assistance program for Indigenous students from 2005. At the same time as increasing the funding for this Indigenous-specific tutorial assistance, the Australian government is determined to make mainstream programs and services work more effectively for Indigenous students, particularly those in metropolitan areas. Indigenous specific funds provided by this government are targeted to areas of greatest need, and the tutorial assistance program is now more strategically targeted towards identified key points in education for Indigenous students. Tutorial assistance is available to metropolitan schools with 20 or more Indigenous students. This funding should not be used by mainstream education providers to substitute for their own shortfalls in providing assistance to Indigenous students. Australian government mainstream general recurrent and targeted funding is available to all students, including Indigenous students in metropolitan areas. These Indigenous students generally have greater access to mainstream services than those in remote areas. I can confirm to the House that over the last decade this government has tied its supplementary Indigenous funding for education providers to accelerating significant and measurable improvement in Indigenous student outcomes and to funding programs that have shown demonstrable success—and real progress has been made since 1996. For example, Indigenous school enrolments have increased by 46 per cent to 135,097 in 2005. Year 12 Indigenous student enrolments have almost doubled—3,427 in 2005 compared with 1,738 in 1996. Year 12 Indigenous student retention has increased from 29 per cent to 39.5 per cent in 2005. Six of the nine 2004 literacy and numeracy benchmark test results for Indigenous students are the best results to date. Indigenous vocational training enrolments increased 94 per cent to 62,726 in 2005. The opposition’s amendment calls for the government to reform the funding criteria and guidelines. This is not supported by the government because Indigenous specific funding arrangements were reformed for the 2005-08 quadrennium to heighten the requirement for education and training providers to accelerate Indigenous educational outcomes. The government’s strategic directions for 2005-08 are to improve mainstream service provision for Indigenous students, redirect existing resources to initiatives that work and to provide a greater weighting of resources to Indigenous students at greatest disadvantage—those in remote areas. Indigenous education is a major priority of the Australian government. The government’s approach is to give Indigenous Australians the same opportunities given to other Australian children to receive the best education available to develop their skills, to secure employment and to share in Australia’s wealth. In conclusion, this bill will appropriate an additional $43.6 million to accelerate further closure of the education divide between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. The Australian government places great importance on achieving better educational outcomes for Indigenous students. To achieve this, new investment is necessary in schools, vocational and technical education and health related activities. The Australian government is committed to developing the capacities and talents of Indigenous people so they have the necessary knowledge and skills and values for a productive and rewarding life. I commend this bill to the House. 10000 Kerr, Duncan (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DJC Kerr)—The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Jagajaga has moved as an amendment that all words after ‘That’ be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The question now is that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question. Question agreed to. Original question agreed to. Bill read a second time. Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced. 118 Ms JULIE BISHOP (Curtin —Minister for Education, Science and Training and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women’s Issues) 20:29:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 118 BILLS R2519 118 Debate resumed from 29 March, on motion by Mr Truss: That this bill be now read a second time. 118 20:30:00 Bevis, Arch, MP ET4 Brisbane ALP 0 0 Mr BEVIS —The Maritime Transport and Offshore Facilities Security Amendment (Security Plans and Other Measures) Bill 2006 amends the Maritime Transport and Offshore Facilities Security Act 2003. Its principal purposes are to simplify the procedures for making changes to maritime ship and offshore facilities security plans, to clarify measures relating to the plan approval process, to make a number of technical amendments to clarify the intent of the act, to make amendments to various acts consequential to the enactment of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003 and to make a technical amendment to the Customs Act 1901. These provisions are of course now far more important in the minds of many, given the events in 2001 and the concern that we all now have to ensure that threat from not just criminal activity but terrorist activity is minimised. The bill before us has three schedules. Schedule 1 deals directly with the act. Schedule 2 contains only technical amendments as a consequence of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003 and is quite formal. Schedule 3, similarly, is formal and updates the Customs Act to reflect the new short title of this act as changed in 2005. I therefore refer to schedule 1 of the bill, which deals directly with the matters under consideration. The main purpose of these amendments is to require various ships, ports or offshore facilities to have security plans in place to minimise the danger to them and to Australia from terrorism or other acts of violence. Maritime security plans identify security measures to be implemented when different maritime security levels of threat are in force. ‘Maritime security plan’ simply means a plan prepared for the purposes of part 3 of the Maritime Transport and Offshore Facilities Security Act 2003. Such plans must be approved by the Secretary of the Department of Transport and Regional Services. An example of the sorts of changes to the process of approval of security plans that is contained in the bill is that the secretary will now have 60 days to approve a security plan instead of the current 90 days. This is obviously intended to streamline the process, and we welcome that. However, I note that the secretary will effectively be able to extend this time by a further 45 days when additional information is required in order to make a decision on a security plan. I would expect, though, that the department and the government, in implementing this, and industry, in complying with it, would seek to expedite those plans on the shorter time frame. Clause 1 of the bill involves the repeal of the existing section 47(1)(c) of the act. That section requires that maritime security plans include the contact details for a responsible maritime security officer. The substitute wording for that requires a participant to designate by name or position all of the security officers responsible for implementing a maritime security plan. That is a sensible improvement. Labor understands that designated security officers might move on to other employers or indeed to other positions with their existing employer. This amendment allows flexibility by designating the position rather than an individual’s name. It is a sensible, straightforward alteration to the act. The bill also enables variations to a plan to be submitted. This is a far more workable alternative to the current situation, which requires a new plan to be submitted rather than simply amending an existing plan. The bill has valid improvements to security, but there are still many serious maritime security issues that this government has failed to address and that cause those on this side of the parliament grave concern. We have in the past warned the government about the dangers of ammonium nitrate being freighted around our coastline by foreign flagged vessels with foreign crews that have not undergone any background check or security clearance. Ammonium nitrate, when mixed with fuel, is a high-end explosive. Indeed, it has been an explosive of choice by terrorists in a number of attacks in the last couple of decades. When the French freighter Grandcamp, carrying 2,300 tonnes of ammonium nitrate, was docked in Texas City after the Second World War in April 1947, an explosion showed just how serious the consequences could be. On that occasion, when the deck caught fire the ammonium nitrate exploded. The explosion was heard as far as 150 miles away and there was a mushroom cloud that rose 2,000 feet above the city. Locals thought there had been a nuclear bomb. The Grandcamp’s 1½-tonne anchor was flung two miles from the ship’s berth and was embedded 10 feet in the ground. Texas City was devastated. The explosion killed at least 567 people. It is simply irresponsible that the government, having been warned about these dangers, refuses to fix the problem. Labor has also pointed out that Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiah, two terrorist groups in our region linked to the Osama bin Laden network and al-Qaeda, have the skills and opportunities to launch a maritime terrorist attack. Reports from United States intelligence sources have indicated that al-Qaeda’s operations extend to owning or having long-term charters on a fleet of between 15 and 18 bulk carriers or general cargo vessels. Whilst it is believed that these vessels are used to generate revenue and/or support the group’s logistics network, it is nonetheless feasible that one of the vessels could be used as a floating bomb in a suicide mission, heavily laden with ammonium nitrate. There is a real threat of a ship being used as a weapon in a terrorist strike, just as a jet was used in 2001. A maritime vessel can be used against a population centre adjacent to port facilities or shipping lanes. It can be used to damage the port or to block access to the port. Labor have been calling for urgent improvements in maritime security for some time, but unfortunately we get precious little from this government and this minister. We do welcome this bill, which makes a number of improvements but which ignores so many other vital areas. As a result of those concerns, I will be moving an amendment to the second reading. I want to take some time to talk about the areas of concern that are set out in the amendment. They are of genuine concern not just to those on this side of the House but to those in the industry as well. In the past the government has enacted legislation with the support of the Labor Party and then failed to properly administer it. One of the areas of grave concern is the way the government has allowed ships to come to our ports without any prior notice or advice of cargo or crew. In fact, with the support of the Labor Party, the government enacted laws to require all ships to advise details of their cargo and crew 48 hours before they reach an Australian port. Yet the most recent information given to the Senate on this tells us that just 67 per cent of ships coming to Australian ports actually comply with that requirement to advise 48 hours before they arrive. About one-third of all the ships coming to Australian ports do not comply with the legislative requirement to inform the Australian authorities of their cargo and crew, and the government does precious little about that. It is not much use having laws passed in this parliament if the incompetence of the Howard government sees them poorly administered. In this vital area of maritime security, one-third of the ships coming to Australia flout the law, and the government does nothing about it. Not only do they fail to advise of their cargo and crew before arriving but, on the figures given to the Senate just a few months ago, 15 per cent of those ships do not even tell the authorities what their cargo or crew is until after they have berthed. Think about that for a moment. With 15 per cent of ships coming to Australian ports the authorities have no confirmed knowledge of who is on the ship or what cargo they are carrying. There is not a lot of point in having bills like the one before us being carried in this parliament when the government is so free and easy in the way in which it implements them. Restricting ships coming to your ports is a serious matter, but, in fact, other countries in the world monitor their ports adequately. In the United States they have a similar requirement that a ship must advise the authorities of crew and cargo 48 hours before the ship berths. If ships do not provide that information 48 hours beforehand, they are required to stand offshore and, if need be, the Coast Guard will make sure they do. In Australia we do not require them to stand offshore and we do not have a coastguard to stop them anyway. The Howard government are quick to talk about these security matters; they are appallingly slow in doing anything about it. In the area of national security that relates to our ports, they have been found sadly wanting. That is only part of the sad story of the Howard government’s incompetence in the handling of maritime security, I have to say. Effectively, the government conduct no security checks on foreign crews whatsoever. So even those ships that do inform the authorities of their cargo and crew are not able to be verified—at least not before they arrive in port and the manifesto and details of the ship’s crew are provided to the authorities. Those names are then checked against existing databases to see if there are people on the list whom we might not want to have come into Australia, but there is actually no way of knowing at that point whether the people on the ship are who they say they are. There are no security checks done in any event on any of them. That stands in stark contrast to Australian seafarers. Australian seafarers undergo a rigorous and thorough security check by the Australian Federal Police and by ASIO. They have to have a maritime security identification card, or MSIC—the same sort of card which many members and people in the community would know of at airports. Aviation security identification cards certify that the holders are people of good character and good background who can work in security sensitive areas, and we can all rest easy knowing they are there. The background checks that are done on Australian seafarers are not done on any of these flag of convenience crews. And yet the Howard government hand out permits for those flag of convenience crews like it was a Friday night chook raffle at the local pub. The simple fact is that, under the Howard Liberal government, permits for foreign flagged crews to trade the Australian coastal route in place of Australian ships and crews have become commonplace. Those permits were originally designed to pick up the slack—to be there for peak periods of demand. The Howard government have changed that process from one in which those permits were there to deal with peak demand to a system where, now, they are used to replace Australian ships and Australian crews. The government might have an industrial relations agenda underneath that plan, but they expose Australians to a serious security risk. They appear willing to sacrifice security in order to pursue their industrial relations agenda. The simple fact is those foreign crewed vessels are carrying dangerous chemicals, as well as ordinary goods, around the Australian coastline. Last year the Leader of the Opposition, Kim Beazley, and I went to Gladstone to conduct a press conference overlooking Gladstone Harbour, where a ship had just come in to berth. The ship was the Pancaldo. The Pancaldo was carrying 3,000 tonnes of ammonium nitrate. I have just mentioned that ammonium nitrate has been an explosive of choice for terrorists. An explosion in 1947 of 2,000-odd tonnes of it was seen and heard by people who thought it was a nuclear explosion. There were 3,000 tonnes on the Pancaldo in Gladstone last year when Kim Beazley and I were there. It was on a flag of convenience ship crewed by people that the Australian government had no background knowledge of whatsoever. There were no security checks done on any of the crew. In fact most of the crew came from former Soviet republic nations, Eastern European nations. If memory serves me correctly, the ship was actually flagged out of Panama, one of the major flagging nations for ships of convenience, where you can get your ship flagged with no questions asked. The government has been quite happy to allow ships of convenience with foreign crews we know nothing about to carry dangerous materials around Australian waters and to place Australians around the coastline in serious threat. The Labor Party have made it clear that we think that is wrong. We have made it clear that ships that come to Australian ports should be obliged to provide the details of their crew and their cargo at least 48 hours before arrival. If they do not, then we should do exactly what the United States does, and that is to prevent their entry into our ports. Similarly, we take a clear view in the interest of Australian security: only security cleared crews on safe and sound ships should be carrying dangerous materials around the Australian coastline. Whilst ammonium nitrate has been the explosive of choice for terrorists on a number of occasions, it is also the standard explosive used in the mining industry, so it is widely used in Australia. It is not something we can easily eliminate. We need to ensure that the protocols put in place for handling ammonium nitrate do not place Australians at risk. We need especially to ensure that people who would do harm, those who might be involved with terrorist organisations, do not have the opportunity to turn one of those cargo ships into a floating bomb. The Howard government, along with the state and territory governments, has quite properly put in place new laws to restrict the way in which ammonium nitrate can be used once it is taken off the ship. There are quite rigid controls for the records that are kept. I recall that it upset some of the National Party members because ammonium nitrate is used in the agricultural industry as well. Governments of all persuasions, including the Howard government, have acknowledged the need to provide those restrictions on the use of ammonium nitrate in Australia once it is here. But when it comes in bulk by the thousands of tonnes in a container ship, the government does nothing to inform itself about who is carrying the ammonium nitrate, what the background of the crew is and who owns the ship. Is the ship owned by Osama bin Laden or al-Qaeda? Is it one of the estimated 15 to 18 cargo ships that the al-Qaeda network either owns or leases? Frankly, the government would not know. It beggars belief that the government can seek to make so much of national security matters while it so incompetently handles that issue. But it does not just stop with dangerous chemicals and flag of convenience vessels. At the moment, the government proudly boasts that it X-rays about 10 per cent of the containers that come off ships. That leaves about 90 per cent of the containers that go unchecked. The odds are pretty good if you happen to want to hide something in a container. In a number of speeches I have referred to earlier examples of where explosives have been found in containers. Indeed on one occasion—and this comes from the department of foreign affairs own reports on these matters in 2003—they found a stowaway who actually had aviation security passes for the United States, false passports and equipment that clearly identified him as a person who was involved with terrorist organisations. He was housed inside one of the containers and found by accident because he opened one of the vents to let a little more air in and, as he did it, there happened to be some workers beside the container who got suspicious. In the Australian context, he would have been in the 90 per cent of shipping containers that we do not even look at. The government cannot come before the people of Australia or this parliament and say that they are doing their job when they allow 90 per cent of containers to come through our ports without being checked at all. In Hong Kong they understand the importance of security in these matters. Of course, maritime trade is vitally important to Hong Kong. It is one of the busiest ports in the world. They have nine terminals. At the moment in two of the nine terminals they are trialling new systems with new equipment to X-ray 100 per cent of the cargo. Every single container going out of the port of Hong Kong in two of their nine terminals is now being X-rayed because they understand that one incident is one too many. One terrorist or one bomb on a container going from Hong Kong to San Francisco or Sydney is one too many. So they are trialling a 100 per cent screening process. It is being spoken about by legislators in the United States who are looking at that Hong Kong model as a way forward to help protect the United States against the threat that maritime security problems present. But here in Australia the government are asleep again—on this occasion, at the helm of the ship. They do not think it matters a great deal and in fact boast about the fact that they X-ray 10 per cent and forget about the other 90 per cent. I do not think too many Australians would share their view that that is an acceptable performance. It is little wonder that these problems occur when the government have not been willing to make the hard decisions, knock a few heads together and create a homeland security department so that there is one government department with responsibility for all of these matters. Instead of having four ministers and something like a dozen different agencies underneath them with responsibility for these things, as the government do now, the proper course to follow would have been to establish a dedicated department to bring together all of these areas of government that have to work closely if we are going to maximise the security of Australians here at home. One of the most important areas where that happens is with our border security, our ports. It is also very hard to do that if you do not have a dedicated coastguard—not a navy—for the purpose. The Navy is there as part of our defence forces to conduct a range of activities. We have seen it in many roles over the years but principally the Defence Force is there for one reason: to defend the nation. It is there for warlike activity. However we may characterise these responsibilities, they are not actually warlike. That is why in a number of countries—and the United States is often mentioned because I guess most people are familiar with the United States Coast Guard—including some in our region, like Malaysia, are forming coastguards. It is why the international maritime community is working together to create a multinational coastguard for the African coastline. The reason they are doing it off the African coastline is that they are victims of one of the highest levels of piracy in the world. The only place in the world that has more piracy than the African coastline is our backyard. The world’s worst place for piracy is the straits to our north-north-west. The Strait of Malacca and the areas around Indonesia and Malaysia are more prone to piracy than any other waters in the world. Last year two ships reported piracy incidents and four were hijacked. That actually understates the problem because a number of shipowners will not report the incidents because they are not very good advertisements for their shipping lines. It understates quite significantly the problem of piracy and hijacking of ships on the high sea. The waters to the north-north-west of our coastline are the area of the world that endures the greatest amount of piracy of all of the shipping lanes in the world. We should do what other countries confronted with this problem have done, and that is establish a dedicated coastguard for the purpose. Here too the government have dropped the ball. I have heard many commentators on this make the observation that the government would have set up a homeland security department and created an Australian coastguard years ago except for the fact that it was Labor policy years ago and they cannot bring themselves to do it. They should take the lead from a number of countries in the world who understand the difference between the role of a coastguard and the role of a navy. They should have a look at the work that is being done by the international community off the coast of Africa and by our neighbours in the region who are establishing and strengthening their coastguard—not navy, but coastguard—to deal with these threats. Maybe if we had a coastguard we could enforce the laws that the government wanted and the Labor Party supported that require ships to provide notification 48 hours before they arrive in port of who their crew are and what their cargo is. Maybe the government would have the capacity to implement those laws. They are sound and sensible but this government has failed to properly implement them. The bill before us is quite brief and straightforward and makes a number of small adjustments that Labor supports. Sadly, it does not address the range of maritime security issues to which I referred and which my second reading amendment addresses. I hope that the provisions in this bill are acted on and implemented with a greater degree of competence than has characterised this government in its dealings in transport security generally and in particular here in relation to maritime security. We are a maritime nation. Our seagoing industry has been vitally important to the country for many years, and with a coastline of 37,000 kilometres it remains vitally important to us. I trust that the government will prove to be more competent, although I do not hold out great hope, in administering this brief bill than they have proven to be in relation to the broader issue of maritime security. I move: That all words after “That” be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: “whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House condemns the Howard Government for its failure to provide necessary maritime security and protect Australians, including: the Howard Government’s failure to conduct security checks on foreign crews; the Government’s continued failure to ensure foreign ships provide manifestos of crew and cargo before arriving at an Australian port; the ready availability of single and multiple voyage permits for foreign flag of convenience ships including the ready availability of permits for foreign flag of convenience ships carrying dangerous materials in Australian waters and ports; the failure of the Howard Government to examine or x-ray 90% of shipping containers; the Government’s failure to create a Department of Homeland Security to remove dangerous gaps and to better coordinate security in Australia; and the Howard Government’s failure to establish an Australian Coastguard to patrol our coastline”. 10000 Jenkins, Harry (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Jenkins)—Is the amendment seconded? LN6 Hatton, Michael, MP Mr Hatton —I second the amendment. 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Brisbane has moved as an amendment that all words after ‘That’ be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The question now is that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question. 125 20:58:00 Hatton, Michael, MP LN6 Blaxland ALP 0 0 Mr HATTON —In the two minutes or so until we go to the adjournment I will address a very small part of this simple bill, the Maritime Transport and Offshore Facilities Security Amendment (Security Plans and Other Measures) Bill 2006. I will come to the broader question in terms of the opposition’s amendments to this bill later when I get a chance to speak again. In the second paragraph of the second reading speech the Minister for Transport and Regional Services outlined more of what is in this bill than you could do in almost a month of Sundays. It says the particular instruments that are involved here are affected in this way: The act implements a preventative security regime to enhance security at ports, terminals, offshore facilities and on board ships, giving effect to Australia’s international obligations under the International Maritime Organisation’s (IMO) International Ship and Port Facility Security (ISPS) Code under chapter XI-2 of the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) Convention 1974. How does it do it? Essentially it changes the administrative arrangements for people who are in the maritime industry to allow them to make amendments to their previously put forward security plans and to not have to put a completely new plan into place, so that when an amendment is put it can be dealt as a variation and that variation can have the same onus as the original plan and can be allowed through. Secondly, a particular person is not designated to be in charge of implementing the act, so significant changes do not have to be made if the person changes his job. Debate interrupted. 125 ADJOURNMENT 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! It being 9 pm, I propose the question: That the House do now adjourn. 125 Mr 125 21:00:00 Brough, Mal, MP 2K6 Longman LP Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs 1 0 Mr BROUGH —On indulgence, today is a very sad day for many Australians, for many around the world and particularly for the people of Glasshouse and Beerwah with the passing of Steve Irwin. Steve was a personal friend of mine, as he was of many people. He was a larger-than-life character and wore his heart on his sleeve. He has been an inspiration to millions when it comes to conservation. He was a man of enormous passion, but most importantly that passion was for his family of Bindi, Bob and Terri. He had himself in trouble a couple of times with some of his antics with Bob, but this man is going to be greatly missed by many people. Tonight I want to express the great loss that our community has had. Some 500 people work at Australia Zoo, and they are a close-knit family of people who will now gather around Terri, Bindi and Bob and show them the love and support that they need. When I talked to people back home this afternoon and this evening, many have expressed the emotion of disbelief, of not wanting to believe that this could possibly have happened to a man who has stared death in the face many times and done things that we mere mortals would have thought were impossible. To find that he has lost his life in such a way today is a tragedy beyond belief. He has taken Australia to the worldwide stage as a tourist destination. He has also taken a belief in wildlife, with what we call Wildlife Warriors, to people who otherwise would never have understood or experienced what it means to conserve some of the most wonderful creatures this earth has known. There are many things that Steve has done that people are unaware of. For me personally, whenever I asked him for a hand to help underprivileged kids or kids looking to improve themselves through leadership, nothing was too much trouble. He was always there. You basically never got a quiet moment with Steve, but when you did you realised that the character you saw on the television—the character that fronted the President of America in his khakis—was him to a tee. What you saw was what you got, but nothing would stand between him and his family, and tonight they really need all of our love and support. The tributes are already flowing, with a confused community at home leaving tributes at Australia Zoo. Whilst there is a huge hole in many lives left by this man, many have been enriched by the fact that we have known him. He had a wonderful team of support up there. There is Wes, a mate since schooldays, who was chomped on the back of the leg by a croc and Steve dragged him out and saved him. Lifelong friends such as Wes, John, Nicole, Frank the brother-in-law and Joy are all there tonight and are wondering why and how this could possibly have happened. I want the Irwin family, Steve’s dad and the whole crew to know that there are many people down here tonight who want to express their love, support and gratitude. We have lost a great Australian today and we will miss him greatly for a long time to come. 126 126 21:03:00 Sercombe, Bob, MP QK6 Maribyrnong ALP 0 0 Mr SERCOMBE —I would like to join with the minister in briefly extending condolences on the death of Steve Irwin. I did not know him personally, like the minister did, but from his public persona he was certainly a larger-than-life character, and I am sure that all Australians will feel his loss. A number of times over recent years I have raised privacy issues affecting Telstra. These are particularly important matters because of Telstra’s sheer size and also because of its extraordinary technological capacities and the potential for those capacities, in some circumstances, to infringe on the rights of other Australians and on privacy considerations. In the past I have referred to a policy document from Telstra released in December 2003 called Employee Monitoring and Surveillance Procedure. Frankly, the data that this internal document of Telstra gives them the authority to collect about its employees are beyond the pale—racial or ethnic origins, political opinions, religious beliefs or affiliations, sexual preferences or practices, and the list goes on. I think that is reflective of an authoritarian culture within Telstra and of a culture that is not sufficiently reflective of the importance of privacy. Over recent times I have also referred to the circumstances of Ms Kimberly Sund, a constituent of mine and a Telstra employee, who has been involved in a fairly long-running dispute with Telstra. My purpose in rising tonight is not to immediately canvass her circumstances but, nonetheless, to raise some issues that flow from them. I have written to Minister Coonan on Ms Sund’s behalf, without satisfactory results, concerning the extraordinary approach that Telstra have taken, particularly arising out of Administrative Appeals Tribunal proceedings involving Ms Sund, where the AAT has determined that it requires Telstra to release all documents concerning Ms Sund’s case, but this continues to be challenged by Telstra. One has to wonder, in this circumstance, where a judicial body has made a ruling, what Telstra have to hide. Maybe what they have to hide are documents relating to their apparent belief that Ms Sund has had the audacity to communicate with her member of parliament—in this case, me—seeking some advice in relation to achieving a more just set of outcomes for the circumstances in which she found herself. It is quite interesting: I spoke in the parliament last on this matter on 31 May; Telstra had a crisis meeting on 3 June to discuss this matter. We know about this because, whilst Telstra is resisting the release of all documents, it had to release a number of documents which include diary notes from a senior Telstra manager. On 3 June, he said: Later that day I attended a meeting in Shamini’s office. ... This meeting was to discuss what course of action that Telstra can take in relation to the disclosure of information to the Member of Parliament. That is, me. It continues: Sonia Millen gave numerous options and the attached risks to those, and advised she will document them and will forward a detailed copy of them via email. An email, in fact, has been referred to elsewhere in material released, and it would appear, to me at least, that it is precisely the contents of that email that Telstra is defying the Administrative Appeals Tribunal on and declining to release. I do not know why it is declining to do that, but possibly it will reflect a contemptuous attitude of Telstra’s management towards people who have the audacity to approach their member of parliament. I think all members of the House are aware of the possible implications of that. In addition to those diary notes, Telstra has produced two documents prepared by employees of Allianz Australia insurance, which is its WorkCover insurer. Those documents claim that the particular people who processed Ms Sund’s matter within Allianz were not aware of the existence of this particular email of 7 June. That is very strange because it was the Allianz file that was produced for Ms Sund that in fact contained the diary notes that I have referred to previously. In the shortness of time I cannot go on at this point but I will in future. I have to say that, if Telstra treats its own employees this way, what hope have the rest of the punters got. (Time expired) 127 127 21:07:00 Barresi, Phillip, MP ZJ6 Deakin LP 1 0 Mr BARRESI —To the thousands of people in the eastern suburbs, one of the biggest causes of concern is traffic and road congestion. It has been the source of much complaint for the entire 10 years that I have been in office. Notwithstanding the highlighting of the Scoresby issue from time to time in this House, there is another issue which people need to be aware of. Recently, I was pleased to inform my electorate that the federal government has offered $25 million to upgrade one of Melbourne’s most congested hot spots. Roads and transport are key issues in Deakin. While the Bracks Labor government has lied to people of the east on tolls, there are other prominent issues in the eastern suburbs, and this federal coalition government is taking a stand and saying that we are prepared to address one of the worst traffic black spots in the entire state of Victoria. The intersection of Springvale and Whitehorse roads in Nunawading, compounded by the rail level crossing only 100 metres away, results in serious traffic congestion at the junction of two of Melbourne’s major arterials. The need for action on this intersection is pressing. These roads will act as feeders for the Scoresby-Frankston road currently under construction. If this situation is not addressed properly by the Bracks government it will continue to worsen. There has already been a lot of money poured into that intersection by the federal and state governments but there is an urgent need to address the problem in a more sustainable way. Springvale Road is one of Melbourne’s major north-south thoroughfares, used by approximately 125,000 vehicles per day. Whitehorse Road, travelling east-west, connects the city and inner east with the outer eastern suburbs. The area is experiencing continued growth in population and demand for services. It is time that the Victorian Labor government acknowledged the problems that their disastrous 2030 planning policy has created and will continue to create. The level crossing, less than 100 metres from this intersection, services the two main eastern railway lines and accounts for 250 passenger trains a day. Springvale Road and the railway line clearly need to be separated. To their credit, the local Whitehorse City Council has recognised the importance of this and has conducted a study of grade separation at the site. It will contribute $30,000 of its own money to a preliminary engineering study. I was pleased to see the local mayor, Councillor Sharon Ellis, welcome the federal government announcement with open arms. She and her fellow councillors realise what the Bracks government has been doing to the people of the east through their neglect. The federal government has taken a lead role in addressing this issue by announcing funds for not only the project and whatever the community decides is most appropriate but also an extended feasibility study to determine the most appropriate course of action. In fact, $1.5 million is available right now for the Whitehorse City Council to commence its engineering study. Contrary to what the Mr Batchelor may say, this is not a stunt. This is $25 million of federal taxpayers’ money that is able to be spent on fixing one of Melbourne’s worst traffic congestion and black spots. Yet the Bracks government and Mr Batchelor seem to be totally committed to rejecting offers of a federal contribution. The Victorian government has been sorely lacking in the last seven years a commitment to the quality of life for the people of Melbourne’s outer east. I say to the state transport minister: acknowledge your years of neglect, acknowledge that there is a viable and sustainable solution to this problem and promise the people of Deakin, Casey, Aston, La Trobe and Menzies that you will help ease the burden they feel every day on their way to and from work. Since writing to the electorate and the affected suburbs on the federal government’s contribution, I have been inundated with letters of support from residents. Each one of them has shown absolute amazement at Mr Batchelor’s response in claiming that this is a stunt. One person who sent me an email today has basically said: The response of the Bracks government, and Peter Batchelor in particular, highlights the contempt they have for the eastern suburbs. Remembering Batchelor’s work in the 1984 Nunawading by-election scandal, their do-nothing attitude is endemic of a government in decline, that is becoming lazy and has simply run out of ideas. I look forward to the Bracks government making a funding commitment to the Springvale Road. They are funding an intersection down the road at a level crossing at Middleborough Road. There is no question about it; all level crossings need to be eliminated. But when you have $25 million of federal government funding, why would you turn your back on that kind of contribution? I say: address the issues, start the work on the engineering study today and acknowledge your failings. (Time expired) 128 128 21:14:00 Roxon, Nicola, MP 83K Gellibrand ALP 0 0 Ms ROXON —I would like to raise in parliament tonight a number of issues affecting our federal courts and federal judiciary, particularly the Attorney’s lack of a long-term plan for dealing with the growth in federal jurisdiction. Our courts, as everyone in this House knows, are the vital third arm of government in our system of democracy yet the judiciary does not get the careful attention, consideration and debate that it deserves. There are a number of pressing concerns that I want to highlight tonight: the question of how the various federal courts are structured, the work we expect them to do and whether they have adequate resources to do it well and in the manner that we expect for the community. While the federal judicial system has expanded in size and function since Federation, the federal courts have grown exponentially over recent years. Initially of course we had only the High Court. The Family Court was established in 1976 and the Federal Court in 1977. Most recently we have seen the establishment of the Federal Magistrates Court in 2000. We have gone from 76 judges in 1979 to 138 federal judicial officers today. In the time that I have been in the parliament we have created that new court, the Federal Magistrates Court, which seems to be constantly having its jurisdiction extended. We have increasingly complex family law disputes involving violence and substance abuse, and a new, intensive method for handling children’s matters more quickly. These are only a few of the very many examples of change that I could go to tonight, but the point that I really want to make is just how different our federal judiciary is now from what it was even a few decades ago. I want to expressly put on the record my concern that Mr Ruddock does not appear to have a plan for the federal judiciary—no map for how the federal courts should interact with one another, no strategy for the number of judges that are needed and no concern for the prompt resolution of federal legal matters. Family Court judges are retiring and not being replaced; federal magistrates are being appointed for their apparent expertise in particular areas but the court itself does not recognise these specialised streams; and there is media and public concern, quite legitimately, about delays in hearings that seem to be quite excessive. Yet amongst all of these and many other issues we have not seen or heard anything from the Attorney about a long-term direction for our federal courts, a full debate over the resources that they need, nor any real discussion about reforms that are occurring in other countries. Given that the effect and importance of these issues will last long beyond the life of any one government or any one Attorney, if Mr Ruddock does not intend— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member should refer to the minister by his title. 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —I apologise. If the Attorney does not intend to raise these matters, I will. I hope that today I can start a proper, responsible and informed debate about where we need to go from here. Given time constraints of this debate, forgive me for just briefly listing some of the matters that I think need to be included as a part of that important debate. Should the Federal Magistrates Court become a court of first instance, a sort of trial court or district court for federal matters and, if that is the direction that we go in, how will that affect the jurisdiction of the other courts? What is the optimum number of judges for each court and how should they interact with each other? What resources does each court need to do its job properly? We also desperately need a decent debate about our appointments process. The current one is shrouded in secrecy. I have already made it clear and public that I support more transparency in the process, but we should have a full debate about all options including a judicial commission. In some countries these commissions deal with appointments as well as complaints. We need to acknowledge a current weakness in our system for the handling of complaints against judges that can range from the mischievous to more serious matters of health or misconduct. We need to have a full debate about the best way that we can go forward with this. I think we even need to include in this debate what powers a head of a jurisdiction should or should not have over the court over which they preside. And there is another whole group of issues, some arising around the retirement age of 70 as the general health of our population improves, and the perennial queries over pensions and superannuation. These are all very weighty issues that cannot be solved or even properly debated today. My purpose is to flag that if we are, for example, to change the role of the Federal Magistrates Court then let us debate a proper plan rather than do it by stealth. A change of direction or planning cannot be easily implemented from day to day, nor should it be. There must be an overarching strategy and this is sorely lacking from our current Attorney. I call on the Attorney to consider a public process which engages the parliament, the community and the courts in this vital and overdue discussion. We must not keep making appointments of judges today that last a lifetime but have no plan for the work that they might do beyond this electoral cycle. It is just not good enough. 130 130 21:19:00 Ticehurst, Kenneth, MP 00ANF Dobell LP 1 0 Mr TICEHURST —On Wednesday 23 August the Prime Minister visited my electorate of Dobell where he attended a community morning tea, hosted by me, with over 500 local residents. Many more could not be put into the situation. Businesspeople, community groups and school representatives were included in the group. It was a fantastic event and the Central Coast community thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to meet the Prime Minister face to face. He also made a trip to Wyong and over 120 people called the Central Coast Express Advocate to note his visit. The Prime Minister also visited the Mardi Dam where he announced $2.6 million in federal funding toward the Porters Creek Wetland Stormwater Harvesting project. This project will help protect the significant wetland areas of Porters Creek from stormwater that will flow from urban development in the catchment. With the Central Coast’s rapidly growing population this announcement comes at a vital time and builds on existing water-saving measures already in place. This announcement is in addition to the $6.6 million in federal funding that I secured earlier this year toward the construction of a pipeline that is capable of transferring 20 megalitres of water per day from the Hunter to the Central Coast. These funding announcements reflect the Australian government’s commitment to securing the Central Coast’s water future. The Porters Creek Wetland Stormwater Harvesting project will enable stormwater to be collected and treated from the Porters Creek Wetland and transferred to the Wyong River and Mardi Dam. The project also has the potential to provide a cost-effective solution to securing the region’s water supply. The scheme, when completed, could also contribute 5.4 gigalitres of harvested water per year to the region’s drinking water supply, subject of course to New South Wales government approval. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Wyong Shire Council and Gosford City Council for their innovative approach to finding water solutions for current and future generations on the Central Coast. They are trying to future proof our water supply on the Central Coast and I enjoy working closely with them on important projects such as this. This is only a catch-up as opportunities have been lost in the past when Labor controlled all three levels of government. This is why I am extremely disappointed at a newsletter by Labor MLC John Hatzistergos that has recently been circulated in parts of my electorate. The lead story purports that Premier Morris Iemma has a major plan to fix the Wyong and Gosford councils’ water mismanagement. He then accuses our local councils of years of inaction and blames both councils for the water crisis on the Central Coast. What an absolute fraud. Mr Iemma then tries to take credit for the construction of the $30 million pipeline from the Hunter to the Central Coast. Where is his government’s commitment? Where is your miserly money, Morris? Nothing has been put on the table. This project is in fact a joint collaboration between various levels of government, with the federal government, the Hunter Water Authority and the Central Coast Joint Water Authority each contributing one-third of the required funding. The brochure is full of ALP promises that they are going to contribute this or that. In fact, I eagerly kept reading the newsletter expecting to see in the print guarantees of yet another fast train from Sydney to Newcastle. It is an absolute perennial. Every time there is a state election, up comes the fast train to Newcastle. They have re-announced everything else; why not that? The truth is: Wyong Shire Council Mayor, Councillor Bob Graham, and Gosford Council Mayor, Councillor Laurie Maher, as well as the engineering directors and general managers of both councils should be commended for the efforts they are taking to improve our water resources. It is a bit rich for the Australian Labor Party to distribute glossy brochures to local residents attacking our local councils while they sit and do nothing to stop conglomerate after conglomerate coming to the Central Coast to profit from coal mining, gas mining and other projects that are likely to contaminate our water supply. The only level of government that is guilty of mismanagement and putting our water supply and natural environment at risk is the New South Wales Iemma Labor government and I call on them to support a moratorium on any further mining proposals in the Wyong valleys of Yarramalong and Dooralong. Rather than announcing a Central Coast highway which amounts to nothing more than signs, let us see them do something practical. Rather than 400 metres on the Pacific Highway and 400 metres on The Entrance Road, let us do something positive. Forget your glossy brochures; get on and do your job. 131 131 21:24:00 Irwin, Julia, MP 83Z Fowler ALP 0 0 Mrs IRWIN —Last Saturday a rally was held in Cabramatta in my electorate of Fowler to voice community concerns about the impact on local residents and businesses of the proposed southern Sydney freight line. When the southern Sydney freight line was first proposed, I am sure the Australian Rail Track Corporation thought that it would be a simple matter to push their design through and that there would be few objections. But, since the proposed design has been made public, it is now quite obvious that the track will cause serious noise and vibration problems for nearby residents. We know that there needs to be a freight line but we have a right to expect that the line will have the smallest impact on our community. We want to see effective measures to reduce the levels of noise from trains passing every half hour in the middle of the night, but we do not want huge walls to scar our streetscape, as the design proposes—a sound wall up to 10 metres high in parts. It is an ugly wall stretching for kilometres along the track and visually cutting communities in half, a wall that will be a magnet for graffiti and will soon become an eyesore. But the worst effect of the line would be that it cuts the commercial centre of Cabramatta in half. As a community in Cabramatta we have worked hard in recent years to overcome problems of crime and drug abuse. We do not want to see our community cut in half by that huge wall. We have a thriving commercial centre with great potential for further development but this design will make it impossible to build the Cabramatta we all want to see now and for future generations. We are not saying no to the line but we are saying that we want a real say and a fair say in how it is built. The final design will need to address the problems of noise and vibration and it should have the smallest impact on our streets. That will cost quite a bit of money but the way it is being presented to us at the moment, the cost will be born by the residents and businesses close to the line. The federal government just wants to ignore the people of Fairfield. For nearly a year I have been seeking a meeting with the federal transport minister together with representatives of Fairfield City Council but he has not got the guts to meet with me face to face on this important issue. The minister just wants to hide behind his bureaucrats and pretend that there are no problems with the freight line. They just want us to go away and when the freight line is built they will say that it is too late to do anything about it. Fairfield City Council has proposed lowering the rail bed at Cabramatta station to avoid ugly and ineffective noise walls and has listed other impacts, including traffic, closed-circuit TV security cameras, which are at present in operation, landscaping and flooding. In other areas we have seen governments introduce measures to reduce the adverse impacts of developments. But the proposed design by the Rail Track Corporation does not go near enough to satisfying even the basic requirements of residents and businesses. What is needed is a complete redesign of the project. It is not good enough for the Rail Track Corporation to just dump the line in south-western Sydney without genuine consultation with the local council and residents. Public meetings have been a sham. The bureaucrats go away and come back with nothing of any value whatsoever. Worthwhile proposals by Fairfield City Council are not being taken on board because they would increase the cost. New South Wales planning minister, Frank Sartor, is soon to report on the environmental assessment of the project, but the bad design can only be accepted or rejected. It is time for the federal transport minister to order the Australian Rail Track Corporation to go back to the drawing board and come up with a design that addresses the concerns of Fairfield City residents. We will continue to speak out until the federal government agrees to sit down with the New South Wales government and our community and give serious consideration to what we are seeking. We definitely do not want a Berlin Wall in our community—a wall that will divide our town. (Time expired) Question agreed to. 132 21:29:00 House adjourned at 9.29 pm 132 REQUESTS FOR DETAILED INFORMATION 132 132 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 Mr Price asked the Speaker, in writing, on 8 August 2006: Have any bound Hansards been produced for this Parliament; if not why not. What are the guidelines for the production of bound Hansards and have they been met; if not why not. If no guidelines exist for the production of bound Hansards, what is the reason for this. 133 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 The SPEAKER —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: House of Representatives and Senate bound volumes of Hansard for the 41st Parliament, first session, first to fourth periods (16 November 2004 to 9 December 2005) are in the final stages of production. They have been printed and are being bound and lettered. The extended delay in producing the bound volumes was due to a misunderstanding with the printing contractor which came to light in April 2006. The printing contractor is planning a staged delivery of the 18 volumes (11 House of Representatives and 7 Senate) to be completed in 6-8 weeks, starting with the first three House of Representatives volumes which are ready for distribution. Bound volumes for 2006 will be produced following delivery of all the bound volumes from 2005. There are no formal guidelines on production dates or timeframes for bound volumes of Hansard.  DPS’s contract with the printing contractor states that bound volumes should be produced “within six months of the provision of the Official master copy of the final sitting week [of a sitting period]”. That provision was not met for 2005 due to the misunderstanding with the printing contractor. DPS is developing a Hansard printing policy, which will include guidelines for the production of bound volumes of Hansard. 2006-09-04 The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Jenkins) took the chair at 4.00 pm. 134 COMMITTEES 134 134 Debate resumed. 134 16:01:00 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 0 0 Mr MELHAM —I welcome the opportunity to make some comments on the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Procedure report, Learning from other parliaments: study program 2006. While I was not able to participate in this study tour of parliaments in the United Kingdom and France, I am speaking to the report because as deputy chair of the committee I have a keen interest in some of the issues that arose during the trip. Committee members visited the House of Commons and the House of Lords in London; the Scottish parliament in Edinburgh; the Tynwald in Douglas, on the Isle of Man; the National Assembly for Wales in Cardiff; and the French National Assembly in Paris. The committee observed some significant differences between the way proceedings are conducted in the chambers of these parliaments and the way we conduct proceedings in our own chamber. Some major themes on which the committee reported were: encouraging an interactive debating chamber; formal votes; programming business; electing a Speaker; question time; and opportunities for private members. It is interesting to note the high level of interaction involved with debates in other chambers. Members are expected to be present in the chamber for much longer than is the case in the House of Representatives. For example, in the House of Commons, any member wishing to participate in a debate is expected to be present at the beginning of the debate and, after speaking, members usually remain in the chamber for at least the following member’s speech. The Speaker is unlikely to allocate the call to a member who has not been listening to the debate in the chamber. There is a convention in the Scottish parliament that a member wishing to speak should be in the chamber for the whole debate—but, more strictly, they are expected to be present for at least the preceding and following speakers. The House of Commons and the Scottish parliament also allow interventions, similar to the practice in our Main Committee chamber. The practice is common in the Scottish parliament, where one member estimated that about half the speeches in the chamber have an intervention. In this context, I note the Procedure Committee has, in a previous report, recommended a mechanism to support more interactive debating in the chamber. It is proposed that second reading speeches be cut from 20 minutes to 15 minutes, with an optional five-minute question and answer period at the end. While this recommendation has not yet been adopted, I believe it has fairly broad support from both sides of the parliament. Another aspect of particular interest to me was hearing about the way in which other parliaments similar to our own conduct question time. Members on the study tour observed the equivalent of question time in the House of Commons, the Scottish parliament and the French National Assembly and noted that they were not marked by the level of political disputation that is common during question time in the Australian House of Representatives. There are some interesting aspects of the process in the House of Commons that may be relevant to this. While it is not something that I would personally support, points of order are not generally allowed during question time but are heard at the end, and there is no process for dissenting from the Speaker’s ruling. Also, the rules relating to questions and, perhaps more significantly, answers in the House of Commons are more detailed than those of the House of Representatives. These rules are set out in their parliamentary practice rather than the standing orders. Another factor which may result in a more orderly and useful question time is that some parliaments have time limits on questions and answers. For example, in Wales, the time limit for a question and answer is three minutes in total. Similarly, in France, the time limit for a question and answer is five minutes. Under rules such as these, it is obvious that if a member’s question was too long it would not leave much time for an adequate answer. Therefore, questions would become more direct and concise, which may lead to answers also becoming more direct and concise. As the committee reported, time limits would certainly not permit a leisurely canvassing of alternative policies. I would also like to briefly comment on opportunities for private members. This is one area in which the committee believes that the House of Representatives performs particularly well in comparison with other parliaments. Our members seem to have more opportunities to speak on matters of personal interest and the interests of their electorates than members in comparable national parliaments. The committee also noted that the House of Commons acknowledges the model of our Main Committee in its development of Westminster Hall, an innovation which has significantly improved the opportunities for their private members. I believe that a number of issues arising from this study tour of other parliaments would be worth while investigating, to see if any improvements can be made to the way in which we conduct proceedings in our own chamber. Following the study tour, the Standing Committee on Procedure has initiated two inquiries—one into the petitioning process and another into encouraging an interactive chamber. I would encourage all members to consider providing input into these inquiries. I commend the members of the Standing Committee on Procedure who went on this study tour. They used money from their allowance for study tours to come up with this report. I think the parliament has a bit to learn from other similar parliaments. We should not be so staid that we do not allow change. I was on the Procedure Committee at the time that it recommended the operation of this second chamber, and I think the development of this second chamber has improved the workings of the parliament. I do not mean to diminish the debate in the other chamber, but it has allowed extra opportunities for private members’ business to take place. I commend the report to the House. I think it is a worthwhile report. We do not need to adopt everything that other parliaments do, because we have our own unique way of doing things in this, our Australian parliament. It is a little bit different. I cannot imagine question time not being robust. I would like it to be more informative. I believe that in the 16 years I have been in this place question time has diminished, and it is the main focus of people’s attention in terms of this parliament and observation of it. This government came to power on the basis that they were going to raise the standards; the reverse has happened in relation to the operation of question time. That is not to say that the opposition should not conduct itself somewhat differently in question time. I believe that as a parliament we can no longer obtain information from the executive and hold them to account. That has been left to Senate estimates committees. With both chambers now having a government majority, one questions how effective an estimates committee will be. It is incumbent on us as private members and on members of the Procedure Committee to raise these issues. It is not about political advantage, as one day the opposition will be in government and the government will be in opposition. It is about bringing forward reasonable and fair rules that enhance this parliament. My colleagues who took the time to go away together and study these other parliaments have produced a beneficial report on which this parliament can draw. I commend them and I commend the report to the house. 136 16:10:00 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 0 Mr PRICE —It is a pleasure to follow the deputy chair of the Procedure Committee, the honourable member for Banks. He and I share an interest in parliamentary reform. Whilst as Australians we can all be proud of our parliamentary traditions, in Australia and, in particular in this parliament, there is what has been termed a democratic deficit. In other words, the power of the executive over the legislature has increased disproportionately. It is now time to start fighting back. I was very pleased to be able to utilise my study leave to travel with the Procedure Committee and have a look at some of the other parliaments and how they operate. I was particularly pleased that the Chief Government Whip joined the committee in its travels and hope that, when the Procedure Committee brings down some reports, the whip, having seen other parliaments operating firsthand, will lend his considerable influence and prestige to ensure that some of the report’s recommendations are adopted by the government. Members of the House of Representatives fundamentally have been elected to keep the government accountable, yet we do not have in this House, by comparison with other parliaments, a proper scrutiny of legislation. It is true, as my colleagues on this side of the House know, that as an opposition we try as best we can to examine and debate the government’s bills. More often than not we are gagged. We cannot say that there is proper committee scrutiny of all bills—and there should be. We are not doing our job on behalf of the people of Australia if we cannot fulfil our first and most fundamental role—that is, the scrutiny of government bills and holding the government accountable. The lack of accountability in the Australian parliament is an absolute disgrace and we need to address it. I remind honourable members that, when the Howard government was elected to office, it was on the basis of raising parliamentary standards, yet its first act in the parliament was to cut $300,000 out of the parliamentary committees’ budget. The biggest cut to any department was applied to the parliamentary committees. When I was first elected as a member of parliament you could be guaranteed a few things: the head of a department would come and speak to a parliamentary inquiry about the department’s submission; a minister—a Labor minister—would often come along with the head of the department; and a parliamentary committee would have a secretary and research staff. These days you do not even get a nominated secretary. We are setting up to fail one of the best things in this parliament—the parliamentary committees. We are putting enormous stress on those who service the committees. I would like to say to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, that the big difference between the success or failure of a committee is in its membership. I would never say that the members of a committee have no role to play or no influence but, undoubtedly, the success of a committee goes to the way in which it is supported by way of staff, its research capacity and its ability to deliver a decent report rather than being stressed out by having to look at a number of inquiries and get out a number of committee reports. I fundamentally disagree that these changes have been in the best interests of parliament or parliamentary traditions. We need to start investing back into the parliament. I say this: if we had proper parliamentary scrutiny of legislation, we would probably have less debating time. We would probably have less debating time because, without a doubt, a lot of the munching and crunching could occur through the parliamentary committee process. It does not happen and if it were to happen tomorrow we would not have the resources to fulfil it—and shame on the government of the day that is running it. In other parliaments—in the Scottish parliament, in the Welsh parliament and even in Westminster—they actually have a body corporate. There are not only members of the government serving on it but also members of the opposition. In the case of the UK parliament a cabinet minister serves on it. There is never a conflict in the issue of resourcing or investing in democracy in the UK parliament—and certainly not in the Scottish parliament or the Welsh parliament—yet this parliament is being deprived of resources in the most vital areas. The Procedure Committee has recommended a full-blown estimates procedure for the House of Representatives. That acknowledges, again, that our fundamental role as members of parliament, whether we are on the government side or on the opposition side, is to hold the executive to account. Whilst that has been totally rejected by the Howard government, even if we were to agree to do it tomorrow the committees would not have the resources to undertake it. The other area I want to comment on is petitions. I have been a petitions sceptic because, under existing standing orders, any minister can put in a response to a petition. There has not been a response for 10 years. From time to time, perhaps inappropriately, I rise and ask the Speaker at the conclusion of the reading of petitions: ‘Have any responses to petitions been received?’ This government has a duck. Never once has it done it. Therefore, I have always been sceptical of establishing a petitions committee. But I commend to honourable members the Scottish parliament, which has a committee which looks at petitions and has the power to compel ministers to attend. In fact, ministers would not think of not attending if they were invited. It brings down reports to the parliament where appropriate. I am in favour of a petitions committee because it is an ancient and proper right. You would know, Mr Deputy Speaker, that for a long time I have had on the Notice Paper a proposition that says that if there have been concerned citizens in your electorate, my electorate or anyone else’s electorate who have collected a petition and are able to travel to Canberra then they should be able to present that petition at the bar of the parliament and read the prayer of the petition. That would be democracy in action. That would be empowering people. That is one of the problems we have as a parliament—people feel that they cannot influence the parliament, they cannot talk to politicians and that politicians do not listen. We need to look at the way we conduct ourselves, whether it is as individual members, as a committee or as a parliament, so that we can redress that perception. It may be that some ministers believe that that perception out in the community is a good thing but I, for one, feel that most members of parliament want to address that. They care about this institution. In conclusion, this is a preliminary report of the trip we have undertaken and the Procedure Committee will work its way through the issues that it saw in those parliaments, from the mother parliament, the most recent parliaments and the most ancient parliament—the Tynwald in the Isle of Man—as well as looking at the French system, which also had things to commend it. I ask that all honourable members participate and involve themselves in the work of the committee, as they have been invited to do, and hopefully we can bring down worthwhile recommendations which will correct a democratic deficit that operates here and reverse the disinvestment in democracy that has been the hallmark of the Howard government. Debate (on motion by Mr Cameron Thompson) adjourned. 138 MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS 138 Debate resumed from 17 August, on motion by Mr Abbott: That the House take note of the document. 138 16:21:00 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 0 0 Mr FITZGIBBON —I rise to speak to the Prime Minister’s so-called energy statement, and I should begin by saying that this is one of those speeches that was interrupted by a two-week recess. In the absence of an opportunity to check on what I was saying when I was adjourned last time, I will do my best to pick up where I left off. What is really intriguing about this energy statement is its very title. This was presented as the Prime Minister’s response to spiralling petrol prices in this country and the burden that they were placing on families, individual motorists, business and the economy as a whole. But we saw nothing in this about petrol prices, and we saw nothing in this about energy. A real energy statement is one which first of all identifies and quantifies Australia’s present and future needs, identifies and quantifies our own domestic resources and then strives to maximise our self-sufficiency. Energy independence is becoming critical for all nation states around the globe, and we need to work a lot harder at self-sufficiency and energy independence. A real energy statement also strives to deliver affordable energy to Australia’s consumers, whether they be householders or industry; it strives to maximise efficiency; and it strives to ensure that we consume our reserves of energy, whether they be domestically produced or imported, in the most environmentally friendly way. That is not an exhaustive list, but it gives you some idea of what I see as an energy policy and what you would expect from a Prime Minister delivering an energy statement. But we saw none of that. We did see one thing and almost one thing alone, and that was the announcement that the government would subsidise the conversion of petrol motor vehicles to LPG, an initiative I have calculated will be of assistance to just three per cent of motorists in this country. It is not going to do anything for those who do not have the opportunity to convert, and it is not even going to deliver much benefit to those who do convert. Given your background you probably know even better than me, Mr Deputy Speaker Somlyay, that, given the simple laws of supply and demand, if you push everyone onto LPG conversions and demand outstrips supply, the price of conversions goes up. And if you push more people onto LPG— IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr Snowdon —Are you a member of the Country Party? 8K6 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP Mr FITZGIBBON —No, I am not going to go there, Member for Lingiari. If you push more people onto LPG then, obviously, over the medium and long term the LPG price will go up as well. This is a policy wrong in isolation and wrong in aggregate. You cannot produce a response to fuel prices and focus on one fuel alone. It is a silly public policy response that will deliver no benefit and no relief to Australian motorists. What the Prime Minister needed to do was take a holistic and long-term approach to our fuel prices crisis, our increasing dependence on imported fuels, our increasing exposure to the whims of the Middle East and global insecurity and all the problems that that brings. But he chose not to do that. He decided to put it in the too-hard basket and do none of that. What he should have focused on, and should have been focusing on six or seven years ago, was an eventual shift to a gas based fuels economy—an economy with a wide-ranging mix of LPG, petrol, diesel, CNG, ethanol and biodiesel—and a commitment to converting our abundant reserves and natural gas into liquid diesel fuels. That is something capable of being done today using current technology and it is economically viable while ever the price of oil is $US25 per barrel. Of course, at the moment it is around $US70 and, in recent times, it has been as high as $US75. It is capable of being done. All we need in this country is some encouragement from the major oil companies. They do not seem willing to go down this path and it is up to this government to push them in that direction by both carrot and stick. By ‘carrot’ I mean the financial incentives to do so, and by ‘stick’ I mean adjusting the regulatory regime to stop oil companies sitting on warehousing and sequencing gas projects to suit their bottom line rather than the national interest. Another issue surrounding this LPG policy which has been of great interest to me is the extent to which the government is advertising this scheme. Today, all things being well, hopefully there will appear on the Notice Paper some questions from me on this issue. This government is spending millions of dollars advertising a subsidy scheme for which demand will dramatically outstrip supply. Given the media coverage this scheme has had, I doubt that there is a motorist in this country who was not already aware two days after the prime ministerial statement was issued that this subsidy was available, yet we see all this advertising—which costs literally millions of dollars—not just in the Australian Financial Review and the Australian and the other majors but in every regional newspaper I have seen across the breadth of this country in recent weeks. Every newspaper has contained advertisements, costing probably tens of millions of dollars, promoting a flawed scheme which will reach just three per cent of motor vehicles—in other words, which will produce a situation where demand will outstrip supply. What is the government’s motivation in advertising this scheme so extensively? It is simple. This is a subliminal message. This is an attempt at sending a message to the Australian electorate that the government is doing something about petrol prices in this country by delivering this subsidy scheme. But, as I said, this scheme will do nothing for the 97 per cent of motorists who will not have the opportunity to convert to LPG as a result of this initiative. It is a disgrace that so much money is being wasted on a scheme already well known and a scheme which most motorists will not have access to anyway. There is no common-sense explanation, other than the one I have given about the political perspective, as to why the government would spend that sort of money advertising a scheme only capable, given the funding that has been directed to it, of reaching three per cent of motor vehicles. So our challenge to the government is to go back and start again. Our challenge to the Prime Minister is to come back into the parliament and have another go, this time not trying to divert attention by fancy names for the statement but to say, ‘I’m here today to deliver some short-term, medium-term and long-term relief to all those people, all those families and all those businesses, including agricultural businesses, who are suffering under the weight of higher petrol prices.’ His priorities should be, firstly, a regulatory regime that keeps the major oil companies, the wholesalers, the distributors and the retailers honest and stops excessive profiteering. We have shown the way for that process. The Prime Minister has refused to go down that path. His second priority should be a proper policy which goes across the diversity of fuel mixes. In the medium to long term, he should seriously look at our energy dependence or, more importantly, our energy independence and start to get serious about converting the enormous reserves of natural gas we have in this country into liquid diesel fuels. 140 16:30:00 Snowdon, Warren, MP IJ4 Lingiari ALP 0 0 Mr SNOWDON —What an erudite performance from a bloke who did not even read the speech he got interrupted from delivering in the last sitting period. 83V Emerson, Craig, MP Dr Emerson —And he wasn’t listening at the time! IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr SNOWDON —He was not listening at the time and he cannot recall a thing he said. That can hardly be true. Mr Deputy Speaker Somlyay, I understand you do understand the laws of supply and demand well and that is why you are in the seat that you are in. You understood well enough the politics of that seat to join the party you are involved in. I am not sure you always believed in them, but nevertheless you are there. You would have been welcome with us, but you have taken another course. 83V Emerson, Craig, MP Dr Emerson —It’s not too late, Alex. IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr SNOWDON —It is never too late to change, my friend, and you are always welcome. 10000 Somlyay, Alex (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. AM Somlyay)—Order! That is a reflection on me, not on the chair. IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr SNOWDON —Seriously, I note the contribution made by my colleague. As he rightly pointed out, there is nothing in the Prime Minister’s statement about petrol prices, something which I have railed against in this parliament on many occasions. Indeed, as late as the last sitting fortnight we had a debate on a separate issue from the energy policy paper on fuel and I made a number of what I think were quite salient points about that, particularly the impact of fuel prices on people living in rural and remote Australia and, most particularly, the impact of the effect of a tax on a tax, the GST, and how it disproportionately impacts on people who live in the bush and pay the highest price for fuel and therefore pay a higher proportion of their fuel price in GST. That is something that I think this parliament needs to address. I know I have spoken to my colleague about this. He does not accept this argument, by the way, and a lot of people do not. But I think there is a way to deal with this, and that is to cap the GST at the average of capital city prices so that people all over Australia pay the same GST on fuel and people in the bush are not disadvantaged because of where they live. I think it is an entirely appropriate course to follow, and I commend others involved in this debate to take it up. I also argue—and, again, my colleague probably does not agree with me but nevertheless it is something I am very concerned about— 83V Emerson, Craig, MP Dr Emerson —I’ll seek a personal explanation, Mr Deputy Speaker. IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr SNOWDON —He may do; he is like that. It is something that I know has exercised the minds of others, and I know it has exercised his mind as we have discussed it previously—that is, the question of doing something more about tax zone rebates to ensure that people who are disadvantaged because of cost differentials and their geographic location have those issues addressed properly by the parliament. At the moment they are not. From memory, I think the last time the tax zone rebates were changed was in 1992. There has been no change since and so the value of that tax zone rebate has diminished quite substantially. I am not going to canvass all of the arguments made by others in this debate. What I want to do in the first instance, though, is to remind the chamber that this is a complex discussion. The member for Hunter was absolutely correct in saying that there is a need for a comprehensive energy paper that addresses all aspects of energy, including alternate sources of energy, and that there is a need for more efficient energy use. I want to give two examples of activity in my own electorate which I think provide an insight into what can be done. If I get time, I will pick up on the issue of gas to liquids because I think that, in the context of bringing down our dependence on foreign oil, the gas-to-liquids proposals have significant benefit. The Northern Territory itself and the coast off the Northern Territory could make a significant contribution to the provision— Opposition members interjecting— IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr SNOWDON —that is exactly right—of gas for gas-to-liquid projects, as would the offshore areas in Western Australia. I want to talk briefly about a project which involves the Cocos Islands. I know you are aware of the Cocos Islands, Mr Deputy Speaker Somlyay, because of a previous executive function you filled within the government. I am sad that you are not still there, to be truthful, but nevertheless I do not have a vote in your caucus! 83V Emerson, Craig, MP Dr Emerson —He could have a vote now. IJ4 Snowdon, Warren, MP Mr SNOWDON —But you could have a vote now. It is very easy; you just have to jump the fence! As you would know, Mr Deputy Speaker, Home Island is part of the Cocos group, and Cocos is around 3½ thousand kilometres north-west of Perth and around the same distance, roughly—or a little further—from Darwin. Approximately 480 people live on the island. A Darwin based company, Powercorp, was responsible for installing a new power station on the island. What is significant about this is the nature of the power station and the systems that were used. The system comprises a 1.28 megawatt diesel fuel generator and an 80 kilowatt wind farm which work together. Powercorp developed a number of technologies to enable better utilisation of wind plants in wind diesel systems. Traditionally, wind power has contributed small amounts of power to these systems, with little or no adverse effect. It is when the level of contribution increases that the power fluctuation generated by the wind plant causes unacceptable instability and, therefore, reliability. Battery systems and controls have been unsuccessful in solving the problem. It was not until Powercorp began its intense research at the Denham test site that the real nature of the problem was uncovered. Short-term power fluctuations—up to 80 per cent of rated power loss over two to three seconds and recovery to full power, for example—were recognised as the cause of instability. If you could solve this problem, you could get wind penetration rates of over 90 per cent; they are certainly possible. Powercorp began with its Dynamic Grid Interface and inverter system designed to very rapidly sink energy into discretionary loads such as boilers for space heating. The secret here was the high-speed control which differentiates the technology from load dump systems. The progression was to develop its Low Load Diesel system from which long-term energy support could be drawn. The ultimate solution is to use PowerStore to provide grid stabilisation. The selection of which PowerStore product is best for the site is based on the configuration, size and load profile of the site. Powercorp engineers model the system and advise which system is best. Powercorp is a company which was formed in 1988 in Darwin to automate the wide variety of diesel generator power stations in the Northern Territory and Northern Australia for the Power and Water Corporation. This program encompassed some 60 communities, and work was extended throughout Australia. Now they operate internationally. With the success of the automation program came the need to integrate renewable energy for fuel saving. This work, and the demand-side management capability—you will recall those words again, Mr Deputy Speaker: demand, supply; in this case we are talking about the demand-side management—of the control system led to advanced wind diesel systems in Western Australia for Western Power Corporation. After winning a Renewable Energy Showcase grant from the federal government, Powercorp pioneered high-penetration wind diesel systems through the late 1990s. The chief problem facing wind diesel systems—and, indeed, any renewable energy fuel-saving technology when connected to isolated grids—is the instability caused, as I said earlier, by power surging. Such surges and frequent losses of power can be caused by wind gusts and lulls, or cloud cover in the case of solar systems. It is not possible for conventional generators to cope with these power instability issues, and blackouts usually result. Even when the wind flow is low, the fluctuations in wind speed can cause an unacceptable generator response called ‘hunting’, which uses more fuel and can cause engine damage. This grid instability issue is seen in many small grids and at the end of long distribution lines. In the mining sector, large electrical equipment such as winders and crushers can cause power fluctuations much the same as those seen in a renewable plant. PowerStore, the company’s flywheel inverter system, can absorb and deliver power very quickly, to dampen all instability and maintain the grid specifications to utility standards. It is important that we understand the significance of this. Powercorp has developed expertise in inverter technology, specialising in high-speed bidirectional control to solve the grid’s instability problem. With these solutions now a commercial reality—and this is very important—Powercorp stands to be the most advanced high-penetration renewable energy company in the world. This is just a small company based in Darwin. Its work has expanded to encompass mine sites and industrial complexes. It is worth pointing out where Powercorp’s projects are. It has projects in the Cocos Islands, Hopetoun in Western Australia, Denham in Western Australia, Bremer Bay in Western Australia, Leinster in the goldfields, Mount Mueller in Western Australia, Albany in Western Australia and Windy Hill in Queensland. It has a manufacturing base in Darwin and Low Load Diesel sites at Bremer Bay, the Cocos Islands and Rottnest Island. It is responsible for 36 automated power stations in the Northern Territory and operates in Malaysia, Alaska, Antarctica and the coast of Portugal. This company is doing something that we all ought to applaud—that is, providing us with the capacity to use alternative energy sources in conjunction with more conventional energy sources. I think it is worth while pointing out that Alan Langworthy, who I think was a geologist, is the managing director of this company and his head of research and development is Juergen Zimmermann. These people are innovators and should be recognised for the work they do. The second project I want to talk about in some minor detail is a small one called the Alice Springs Cool Living House. The reason I want to raise this is that it shows just how we can address energy issues at home. The cool living house was built in 1974 as a conventional housing commission home. It was rented to tenants until 1999 and then sold to private owners Simon Murphy and Margaret Carew. They did substantial renovations, and they used mechanisms in house design and product use to conserve energy. They were able to substantially reduce their reliance on energy to such an extent that in 2003 the energy and water bills were $1,258 less than for an average house. These are quite substantial savings, and it is important that we note that this sort of innovation can be done with technologies that are currently available. These are the sorts of things we should be promoting throughout the community. This requires a bit of thinking outside the square but it says to us that, whilst we have on us all these pressures about the use of energy and the high costs associated with that, we should use the innovation strengths that currently exist in our community. We should use the design parameters that people have been able to establish for making houses cooler in summer and warmer in winter and we should make better use of water. You can do those things within a domestic environment and provide substantial savings in not only energy use but also, as in the case of this house in Alice Springs, water use. When the Prime Minister made his energy statement, these among others are the sorts of things he should have been talking about. I know that the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow minister responsible for this area, the member for Batman, Martin Ferguson, have talked extensively about how we might decrease our dependence on overseas oil. I want to briefly mention the work that is being undertaken in the Northern Territory and the potential capacity for the Northern Territory to provide substantial gas and oil resources to the Australian community. In 2005 there were two record oil and gas discoveries off the Northern Territory. These are important. Phillips built a huge LNG plant, which was commissioned, in Darwin in 2006. That plant has the capacity to do a great deal more than it does currently, but we have seen the extensive exploration capacity that has been promoted in the northern waters. Ultimately, with the investment being made by the private sector, there is the capacity for the Australian community to benefit quite substantially. I do want to mention one recent agreement—which has been signed, as I understand it—and that is an arrangement between the Power and Water Corporation of the Northern Territory and ENI, an Italian company, for the development of the Blacktip gas field. That is located in the Permian Keyling formation of sandstone in the south-eastern Bonaparte Basin. What that will do is provide substantial gas inputs into the Northern Territory grid and potentially great savings for the Northern Territory community. I say to the Prime Minister: you need to do something far broader and far better if you are to have a satisfying, real discussion on Australia’s energy needs. Debate (on motion by Mr Cameron Thompson) adjourned. 144 MOTIONS Debate resumed from 17 August, on motion by Mr McGauran: That the House take note of the statements. 144 16:46:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 0 Mr BOWEN —I am pleased to speak on this motion and to associate myself with the comments of both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition in this chamber. Australia provided the third biggest force amongst the allies in the Vietnam War, after of course the United States and South Vietnam itself. At its peak, we had 7,672 service people in Vietnam. In total, between 1962 and 1973, 59,000 Australians served in Vietnam—520 of these lost their lives and approximately 3,000 were wounded. There are approximately 50,000 of those 59,000 who are still with us today. As has been said by others, the Vietnam War was different to other wars. It was different for a number of reasons. It was different because of the manner of fighting. It was different because ambush was a much more important tactic in the Vietnam War than perhaps in other wars that we have faced. It was different because the climate of war was different, because we were engaging in a guerrilla war against an enemy who knew their own country much better than we did. It was different because of the use of chemicals. Of course, chemicals were used in World War I, but it has been unusual to see them used in more recent conflagrations. Chemicals were used substantially in the Vietnam War—not necessarily with the intention of killing people but with that result. It was also different because our veterans were not honoured in the way they should have been when they returned. Much has been said about that. It is true to say that even veterans say they do not need an apology. I agree that they do not need an apology; they are owed one. They are not owed one just by the people who opposed the Vietnam War. Nobody should apologise for opposing the Vietnam War. It was a point of view that people were entitled to have, and indeed many veterans of the Vietnam War now say that they view the war as not having been worth the effort or the sacrifice that was made by so many Australians and people from other nations. But people should apologise if they did not support our veterans or if they were involved in denigrating our veterans when they returned from Vietnam. As the honourable member for Cowan has said, that applies equally to people who supported the Vietnam War and people who opposed it. But apologies are not enough. We need to give better support to our Vietnam veterans. An apology is hollow unless we back it up with action. Veterans in my community tell me they feel it is tougher to get a TPI pension, and in fact the government’s own figures back up this assertion. They show an eight per cent reduction in the number of total and permanent incapacity pensions over recent years. So, when our veteran community is getting older and presumably sicker and is in greater need of TPI pensions, we find an eight per cent reduction in the number of those pensions being granted. Of course, the TPI pension has decreased in value by $80 a fortnight since 1997 compared to other pensions, because of a change in the indexation method that was put into place for those pensions. So, compared to other service pensions and compared to the age pension, veterans on the TPI pension are being disadvantaged—and they are people who should never be disadvantaged. They have made very great sacrifices for our nation. I am sure you would agree, Mr Deputy Speaker, as would others, that these people should not be disadvantaged; but they are being disadvantaged by $80 a fortnight. That is a significant figure. It is not something that should be trifled with and we need to be doing better. Not only soldiers but also nurses, airmen and sailors served in Vietnam. I have a notice of motion in the House about the service of sailors in particular. We all know that the Vietnam veterans have a higher mortality rate than that of the general population, but perhaps what honourable members might not appreciate is that those who served in the Royal Australian Navy have the highest mortality rate. They have a higher mortality rate than those who served in the Army and the Air Force. A 2002 report by the National Research Centre for Environmental Toxicology found that the method of providing drinking water to sailors on Royal Australian Navy ships in Vietnam made it likely that dioxins had contaminated the water—and there, perhaps, we have an explanation for that very high mortality rate amongst veterans of the Royal Australian Navy. I am very privileged to have residing in my electorate a seaman from the HMAS Sydney—which transported many thousands of troops to Vietnam—Mr Jess James. He and others who live in and close to my electorate have raised this issue with me. I think it is incumbent on the government to do better when it comes to supporting those Royal Australian Navy veterans who are suffering ill health effects so many years later because the water provided to them to drink when they were in harbour in Vietnam was not adequately cleaned. I would like to say a few words about the effect on the partners—in particular, the wives—of Vietnam veterans. In my electorate I have been very lucky to meet a number of partners of Vietnam veterans through the Nepean Vietnam veterans partners and widows support group—and a finer group of women you could never hope to meet. I was introduced to them by Judy Shepherd, and I have attended several of their meetings. Earlier this year, I took my honourable friend the member for Cowan to meet with them. He was very impressed with them, and they with him. They provide a valuable role in supporting each other through the trials of being a partner of a Vietnam veteran. Vietnam veterans suffer increased mortality rates and increased rates of suicide and mental illness, and that of course has an effect on their partners. Health studies on Vietnam veterans have shown that their partners have been adversely affected. Two-thirds of partners of Vietnam veterans attending post-traumatic stress disorder clinics were found to be very severely distressed. This was recently reported by Professor Hedley Peach in the Australian Family Physician magazine. We need to be doing better by their partners. We also need to be doing better by their children. To people who are not familiar with these issues, this may appear at first glance to be somewhat of a stretch. Why should the children of Vietnam veterans receive any government assistance or support? The case for it is very strong indeed. Out of 100 children of Vietnam veterans, between six and nine of them have been in a situation where both their parents—because of the impact on the partners, which I referred to—have suffered mental illness. During their childhood, they have had not just one parent but both parents suffering mental illness. That compares to one in 100 in the wider population. Perhaps most disturbing is the suicide rate of children of Vietnam veterans: it is three times higher than that of the general population. You do not need to be a genius to work out why. Their fathers and mothers have suffered much distress because of their service to our country—for doing what our country and government asked them to do—and they are now paying a price. I want to take this opportunity to call on the government to lift the age limit for those children of Vietnam veterans seeking assistance through the Vietnam Veterans Counselling Service. It is impossible at the moment to receive assistance from that service if you are over 36. Of course, many of the children of Vietnam veterans are now over 36, and they should not be cut off from that service just because they have passed some arbitrarily set limit which says: ‘Now you are 36, you are on your own. You are not entitled to suffer mental grief anymore. You are not entitled to be suffering post-traumatic stress syndrome or any of the associated traumas that go with that. You are now on your own.’ I do not think that is good enough. I call on the government and the minister—whose genuine interest and commitment to these issues I acknowledge and respect—to lift that age limit so that the children of Vietnam veterans are not placed on their own. In the time available to me, I would like to say a few things about the Battle of Long Tan, the anniversary of which this chamber is considering today. Important battles are very significant in understanding Australian history, but they are also an inspiration to others facing adversity. Long Tan has joined Kokoda, Tobruk and Gallipoli as a great inspiration to all Australians who are facing difficult circumstances. Recently in my electorate I hosted a film night and tribute to the veterans of Kokoda. It was launched by General Peter Cosgrove, who accepted my invitation and the invitation of the member for Chifley to launch the event. Many people were moved by what they heard that night. I will soon be doing something similar with respect to the Battle of Tobruk. The Battle of Long Tan has a similar message: people who were massively outnumbered and who, on any objective analysis, could not have been expected to win that battle, showed courage and perseverance and—as the Vietnam veterans from the other side recently acknowledged—won that battle. I want to refer briefly to the controversy about the awarding of medals for the Battle of Long Tan. I do not propose to go into the details; they have been well traversed in other places. I note that the Prime Minister said, in moving this motion, that it was difficult for the government to fix this matter—and I acknowledge that. I do acknowledge that this is a difficult matter and that it is very hard to retrospectively correct the injustices of the past. But because it is difficult is not a reason not to do anything. I urge the Prime Minister and the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs to seriously examine the injustices that have been perpetrated by the wrongful denial of appropriate medals for gallantry to the veterans of Long Tan and to fix the situation. I think all Australians would join in celebrating such a decision. It may go against the military grain and it may go against the tradition of not awarding medals retrospectively, but I think it is justified in this case. Finally, I want to make a brief mention of not only Australian veterans of the Vietnam War but also the South Vietnamese veterans of the Vietnam War, many of whom reside in my electorate and perhaps more of whom reside in the electorate of my honourable friend the member for Fowler. There are thousands of them living in south-western Sydney, and I have met many of them. They are predominantly men. They have great passion for their country and served their country gallantly. I am thinking in particular of Dr Tien Nguyen, the Federal President of the Vietnamese Community in Australia, who served alongside Australian soldiers and United States soldiers in the South Vietnamese Army and now resides in south-western Sydney. I am thinking also of two others whom I have had the great honour to meet: veterans of the South Vietnamese forces who, after the war, served many years in labour camps in Vietnam because of their commitment to democracy. The best way that we can honour those veterans and all veterans of the Vietnam War is to do all in our power to ensure that democracy does come to Vietnam. Because of the result of the Vietnam War, Vietnam has been under an oppressive regime for the last 40 years. The best way that we can honour those veterans is to ensure that their sacrifices were not in vain and democracy is returned to Vietnam at the earliest opportunity. I know many veterans—South Vietnamese veterans, Australian veterans and, I am sure, United States veterans and other allies—would support that call. 147 16:59:00 Hayes, Chris, MP ECV Werriwa ALP 0 0 Mr HAYES —I rise today to pay tribute to the veterans of Long Tan, and also to pay tribute to all of the Australians who served in the Vietnam War. The commemorations that took place throughout the country on 18 August, including those in the south-west of Sydney, certainly stirred the emotions of those who were involved in the conflict, their families and those of us who recognised the efforts that they put in on behalf of a grateful nation. As in all other theatres of conflict in which Australians have served, those Australians who bravely served in Vietnam served their nation with distinction and commitment. Having said that, the veterans of the Vietnam conflict were treated poorly on their return to this country. No matter what your views may be on the war in Vietnam, those who served this country, at this country’s behest, did not deserve the treatment they received when they returned to this country. I would like to put on record my apologies to those veterans who were subjected to that treatment at that point in time. It is something that needs to be said, as grieving is still taking place amongst Vietnam veterans, and particularly, I know, amongst the veterans in my electorate of Werriwa. There is no excuse at all, and there never will be an excuse, for treating our returned servicemen and women in this manner. They dedicated themselves to the task at hand—the service of their country—and no matter what conflict it was, no matter how they were recruited to do so, they nevertheless discharged their duty with valour and honour, which would ordinarily be regarded as something very prominent in the Australian psyche. In making these comments, I am reminded of the story of a local Vietnam veteran, Peter Millar. He is a former New South Wales police officer. In Mr Millar’s case, having served in Vietnam between 1968 and 1969, during which time he served for a period in Saigon, as a police officer in New South Wales he was not only entitled but would have been expected to wear the necessary service ribbon, in recognition of the honoured service that an officer has performed in a theatre of conflict. However, because of the hostility that he faced when he returned home, Mr Millar kept his service, quite frankly, to himself. Worst of all, he kept many of his experiences bottled up inside him as well. It is simply wrong that veterans like Mr Millar have been forced into this dilemma, feeling that they need to keep their service on behalf of their country secret and private. The bravery of those who served should never be questioned, and the treatment of many Vietnam veterans, received at the hands of the rest of the population, should never be allowed to occur again. The Battle of Long Tan adds to and enhances the Anzac spirit that was established in Gallipoli. I would like to think that what the New South Wales Police Commissioner, Ken Moroney, had to say when he addressed the Campbelltown commemorative service on 18 August resonates with the rest of us. He said: The name of Long Tan adds to those of Gallipoli, the Somme, Tobruk and Kokoda. Long Tan was the first major engagement in Vietnam in which Australians were involved. That battle is the stuff that legends are made of and should be recognised as such. Once again, Australian soldiers found themselves in a position where only their sheer bravery and determination allowed them to battle against the odds. It should be recalled that Delta Company, 6RAR, encountered a numerically superior force in the rain, the mud and the mist of that rubber plantation just outside the village of Long Tan. Who would reasonably have expected the results that occurred? I would suggest that no-one could have reasonably expected that a force of 108 Australians, mostly national servicemen, led by a few regular soldiers and artillery, could hold off a force comprising over 2,000 NVA and local Viet Cong. That is equivalent to almost two battalions. As wave after wave of enemy attacked the Australian position during the few hours of this battle, there were many acts of bravery and the obvious aspects of mateship which have come to typify that Australian or, realistically, the Anzac spirit. For three hours they fought in the rain, with nothing more than the trees of the rubber plantation and the mist generated by the rain for cover, all the time waiting for reinforcements to arrive. Sadly, lives on both sides were lost that day. By the end of the battle, 18 Australians had lost their lives, with another 24 having been wounded. It is interesting that the oldest Australian casualty was a 22-year-old and the youngest was a 19-year-old. To put it in the context of their own families certainly shoots back to me the stark reality of this conflict. On the other side I understand they lost somewhere in excess of 250, with another 500 wounded. As I mentioned at the outset, despite the significance of the Battle of Long Tan, the commemoration of this battle is not simply about the battle itself; it is about all Vietnam veterans. It is about the nearly 500,000 who served in Vietnam. It is about the soldiers and about the families of more than 500 Australian troops who lost their lives in the service of this country, and it is about the 3,000 who were wounded during the conflict. As the member for Prospect reminded us, it is also about those who have returned carrying the scars of their time in the service of this country, and that is something that should never be lost. Everyone who served in the Vietnam conflict deserves our proper recognition and our full respect. I would like to take the opportunity to recognise the veterans and the organisers of the commemoration ceremony that took place in Campbelltown on 18 August. It was an honour for me to attend and pay my respects along with hundreds of local residents in Mawson Park in Campbelltown. I would particularly like to pay tribute to Bob Roach, President of the Vietnam Veterans Association South Western Region sub-branch, and Ken Foster, and to everyone else involved in the organisation of the commemoration service. I would like to recognise the attendance of many from the Vietnamese community as well, which is a very strong community in Campbelltown. Their attendance was very much in recognition of the contribution that Australian troops made in fighting for their country during that period. I was also pleased, quite frankly, to see so many of the younger generation turning up, so many from local schools. I know their presence was not lost on the veterans who marched on that day. While it is disappointing that it has taken so many years for such recognition, it was heartening to see that all Vietnam veterans can finally stand proud of their service, when once they could not. We need always to be mindful of the fact that, even though the last of our troops left Vietnam in 1972, it was not until 3 October 1987 that Australia officially held ceremonies recognising the homecoming of Vietnam veterans. While I have never taken the position that political statements should be made when showing appreciation for the service of our troops, I cannot let this opportunity pass without making some comment on the reluctance of government to conduct an inquiry into the Long Tan bravery award fiasco. When the Prime Minister rose in the House on 17 August, I personally hoped that he would take the opportunity to announce that, on 40th anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan, an inquiry would be conducted into the bravery awards of that period. Sadly, that did not occur. He said: The difficulty faced by any government in reopening a particular set of recommendations, having regard to changes that might have been made on the original recommendations, is that as one sense of grievance might be addressed so many others are opened up. Quite frankly, that is unacceptable. It is unacceptable with regard to the issue at hand, and it is certainly unacceptable in addressing the injustices that have occurred. We cannot paper over this simply by saying that it is either too hard or that there may be other consequences. The argument that the issue should not be re-examined on the basis that it might cause other problems in the future or that it might be too hard to do in retrospect is simply, and should always be considered by this House to be, unacceptable. I stand proudly behind Labor’s longstanding policy and support an inquiry into the Long Tan bravery awards. This should be a bipartisan position. It is time that we right this wrong. Vietnam veterans throughout the country continue to suffer and are haunted by the ghosts of their involvement in that war. Recently I met with a veteran who outlined to me how, as a direct result of his involvement in the war, he has suffered—how he lost his job and how he is still suffering from terrible psychological problems. He said to me that he had only just started to attend Anzac Day parades and other commemoration services but was continually perplexed that the positive statements about the bravery of our troops did not seem to be reflected in the support that our veterans receive. I deeply sympathise with him and with those like him who suffer. Largely, the veterans and their families have been left to deal with the aftermath of the war with limited assistance. I commend the bravery, dedication and commitment of all our Vietnam veterans. I welcomed the opportunity to attend the commemoration service held in Campbelltown and the opportunity to meet and talk with so many Vietnam veterans and their families, basically to personally recognise their bravery and acknowledge their sacrifice. Commissioner Ken Moroney said in Campbelltown: I recommend to a younger generation to take up the reading of this history ... to gain an understanding of who we are as a people. It is an important part of Australian history and should be given such status. I hope that no group of Australian veterans is ever treated by Australians in the way that we treated our Vietnam veterans. We need to right that wrong. 150 17:14:00 Bevis, Arch, MP ET4 Brisbane ALP 0 0 Mr BEVIS —On 18 August 1966, a small but brave band of Australians went out on patrol from Nui Dat to find themselves caught in the middle of an ambush by an estimated force of 2½ thousand Viet Cong and regular Vietnamese soldiers. That Australian force numbered barely 100 and, in the dire fighting and hours that followed, 18 Australians lost their lives. It was estimated at the end of the fighting the next day that somewhere in the order of 245 Vietnamese had died in that battle, with a number of other wounded having been taken from the battlefield. The valour displayed by those Australian soldiers was truly in the highest traditions of Australian service personnel. In the face of overwhelming odds, numerically about 100 facing 2½ thousand, that they could maintain their order and their focus, stand their ground and survive, is a truly remarkable thing. It should be recorded that they had wonderful support from the New Zealand artillery battery, who very accurately brought fire to the positions that were called in, which were literally on top of the Australian soldiers in what was very close combat. It was a great honour for me 10 years ago to attend the 30th anniversary commemorations of the Battle of Long Tan at the Enoggera Army Barracks in my electorate, which is the home of 6RAR, the unit involved. I was again humbled to attend the 40th anniversary services that were conducted about a fortnight ago on the day following the resolution moved in this parliament by the Prime Minister. To see those veterans, a few of whom I have come to know in the 10 years in between, is always a good thing. They are wonderful Australians. When their nation called them to duty, irrespective of what their views may have been about the conflict, they answered the call and performed as extremely capable professional soldiers, and did us all proud. Therefore, it really does sadden me to see that here we are, on the 40th anniversary, still unable as a parliament to properly ensure that the awards for those involved in that battle are recognised. Some people do not know the history of this issue of medals for the Battle of Long Tan. It was a matter of surprise to those involved in the Battle of Long Tan that the awards that were given were of a lower level than that recommended by the commander in the battle, Harry Smith. I have spoken to Harry, and he and I have exchanged a number of emails over the years. It was not until 1996 that the reasons for that became clear. The year 1996 is important in this matter not because that is when the Howard government was elected but rather because it was the 30th anniversary of the battle, and the 30-year rule on the disclosure of documents enabled previously secret documents to be made public. For the first time, at the end of 1996 the veterans of the Battle of Long Tan were able to see the documents and to find out why it was that the awards that were meant to be given, that were recommended by the commander in the battle, were never given. They were able to find out why it was that higher awards were given to senior officers who did not fire a shot in the battle and who arrived in one case—in fact, certainly in one case and I think in both cases—at the end of the column of armoured vehicles that brought the relief. Those people who did not fire a shot in anger nor had one shot fired at them managed to receive the highest awards for that battle. The soldiers who stood in the mud and the rain as their comrades fought for their lives and as they fought for their own lives, and who were the heroes of that encounter, found themselves receiving lesser awards. After the 30-year rule allowed these documents to be seen, they discovered that in fact the recommendations of the battlefield commander were never pursued. An alternative document was created recommending lesser awards for those in the battle. Those lesser awards in one case included a mention in dispatches, which is a totally honourable award for someone to receive. The thing that has stuck in the craw of many of these veterans, and I have to say in mine as well, is that in exactly the same list of awards in which those Long Tan medals were listed, the postal clerk in Vung Tau got a mention in dispatches as well. I am sure he did a good job but to suggest that he should receive the same medal, the same award, that one of the heroes of the Battle of Long Tan received beggars belief. This saga has been going on for 10 years. I had a look at some of the occasions on which I have raised this matter. I raised it in a question without notice to then Minister Bronwyn Bishop in April 1998; I raised it in a detailed question to the next minister in December 1999; I spoke about it in debates in this parliament in November 2003, March 2004, December 2004 and May 2005. I have asked further questions about it. I again made a speech referring to it on 15 June. And I am standing here again doing the same thing. On the occasion of the 40th anniversary, when the government decided—and I think very rightly—to have a formal reception here, I thought now would be the time to address these matters, that finally some justice would prevail for those brave souls and they would get the recognition that in fact was recommended but had been denied them. When the Prime Minister started to talk about the medals, I thought: ‘Good. I’ll be the first to hop up and congratulate the government on doing the right thing, as somebody who has stood in this place on many occasions to chastise and criticise them for doing the wrong thing.’ But it did not happen. Not only did it not happen but the Prime Minister, in my view, rubbed salt into the wound. His comments were grossly offensive. At the end of the Prime Minister’s remarks he said: ... I would like to frankly explain to the House the difficulty of opening up in the manner requested this particular set of recommendations— I thought, ‘Okay, let’s hear the reason.’ No reason followed. This is what the Prime Minister said next: without also legitimately opening up others, indeed in relation to battles stretching back to World War II and in respect of relatives from battles stretching back to World War I ... So the Prime Minister’s reason for not doing the right thing, for not doing what everybody who has looked at this over the last 10 years—since the documents were available to be seen—knows should be done, was to say that because there might be an injustice from World War II or even World War I, heaven forbid, we might have to fix two problems and not one. The thing in all of this that absolutely astounds and offends me is that this nation under a coalition government—the Prime Minister’s government was in office at the time—thought it was a good thing to send troops off to this battle but not to treat them decently afterwards. You have a situation now where these people have been denied justice for 40 years. For the last 10 years they have known why they were denied justice, and the Prime Minister’s answer is, ‘We can’t give them justice because it will set a precedent.’ You know what, Prime Minister? These veterans are not asking you or this parliament to do the things this parliament asked them to do. As members of parliament we do not have to put our lives at risk. We do not have to stand in harm’s way. We do not have to take a bullet or see our lifelong friends die in front of us. We do not have to spend years away from our families in the mud and the rain in a war in South Vietnam which we may or may not have thought was a good idea. They do not want you, Minister and Prime Minister, to do the things that they had to do; all they want is for you to just have the guts to stand up and do the right thing. Do you know what the government’s response was as recently as two weeks ago? They said that it was too hard because it might set a precedent and maybe someone who fought in World War I or World War II has the same problem. If there is someone from World War II or World War I who suffered the same injustice, fix it, too. Do not hide behind some bureaucratic mumbo jumbo and pretend that precedent somehow prevents this parliament from righting a wrong. How hypocritical of the government to welcome those veterans here, to laud the work of those 100 who stood in the Battle of Long Tan, and then squib out of it and not have the guts to say, ‘We’re going to fix the problem with your medals.’ You could have at least set up an inquiry. If the minister, the government and the Prime Minister are not willing to take the decision now—and I think they should; in my opinion there is enough evidence already—at least set up an inquiry and let someone else look at it. I mentioned a series of questions I have asked and speeches I have made about this for some years. In 1999 I asked a series of detailed questions, the last of which was to the minister at the time: What action will he take to ensure that Lt Col. Smith’s original recommendations for Military Cross awards to be given to his Platoon Commanders is now acted on. The minister’s response in writing was: ‘None.’ That was the response from the minister then; that is the response now, except they have also been given a few mealy-mouthed words. As parliamentarians we do not have to do the same courageous things that those soldiers did for us but we should at least have the decency to make sure that they are acknowledged for what they did. No-one between 1966 and the disclosure of these documents in 1996, bar the handful involved in the activity, could have known what transpired. So this is not a business of laying blame on someone in 1966 or anywhere between then and 1996. Indeed, I am willing to give the government a year or two years grace to look through the stuff after they became aware of the problems in 1996. But that was 10 years ago. In 1999 the official response to my question, ‘What are you going to do to fix it?’ from the minister of the day was, ‘Nothing.’ That is what has been happening for the last 10 years. It is not good enough. It is an enormous affront for anybody who has a shred of decency or even moral consistency to stand in the Great Hall and applaud and welcome the veterans, as we did, and not to turn around and, with strong commitment and vigour, defend their right to receive awards which should have been provided by the government 40 years ago but were not. Let us put the past in the past and recognise the wrong. I hope that out of this 40th anniversary a couple of things happen. I do hope all Australians understand that, whenever a conflict occurs, whether we think as a matter of politics and policy that it is right or wrong for Australia to deploy its troops to that theatre of war—whatever the politics and policy may be—we all must commit to supporting our troops to ensure their safety and return as soon as possible. I hope that reflection on what happened in Vietnam becomes ingrained in our minds, because what happened to the Vietnam veterans is a blight on our history. They were not treated with the respect they deserved when they returned. I hope the other thing that comes out of it, particularly now, when the Battle of Long Tan really does come to mind as one of the major recent battles that Australian troops have been involved in, is that the troops who served under Harry Smith in that battle get the awards that they were recommended for. It can be done, and the only thing standing in the way is the will of this government. It is time to put an end to the mealy-mouthed comments that we have heard for 10 years. It is now time to have the guts to do that. As I said earlier, we are not being asked to put our lives on the line as those soldiers were. We have the easy job. We just have to do what we know is right—put our hand up and vote for something that we know is right. That is what the government should do, and until they do it I intend to continue to pursue it as vigorously as I possibly can. 153 17:29:00 King, Catherine, MP 00AMR Ballarat ALP 0 0 Ms KING —I commend the member for Brisbane for his speech. I am going to touch on many of those issues in my contribution as well. Last month we had the honour of commemorating here in Canberra, and I in Ballarat, the services of some of Australia’s finest defence personnel—our Vietnam veterans. In honouring their contribution to our community today, I want to quote fairly extensively from a speech given by Bill Wallace at the commemorations in Ballarat. I think it is one of the best speeches I have heard from a Vietnam veteran about their experiences of the war. Bill says of the war: For the first time in Australian History a war was lost. There was no return of conquering heroes to a grateful nation. The attempt to prop up the corrupt military dictatorship in South Vietnam failed and the reunification of Vietnam under the North Vietnamese Government is now a permanent fixture. Australia fought this war with limited political aims, mainly to convince the United States that we were a true and valuable ally, and that the US should fill the vacuum created in SE Asia by the British decision to withdraw to Europe. It could be argued that this also has failed and that Australia is still pursuing a foreign policy to achieve these objectives. Bill goes on: It is now beyond dispute that the intelligence advice to the government before the decision to deploy combat troops was taken, was that the war was not winnable. Yet the decision was taken which cost the lives of 501 young Australians. As the ADF knew this, the motivation for the soldiers deployed to Vietnam was based purely on mateship, pride and professionalism. When they returned, none of this was recognised. The soldiers felt betrayed by the nation and because of this, they buried themselves back into the community. But the recognition that was given to the men after World War II was not afforded to them. Allowances were not made for the effects of war on these young men. Bill says: I remember when I was a boy that a man’s shortcomings would be tolerated because he was a ‘Returned Man’. This did not happen in Australia in the 1970’s and 1980’s. Happily, it is now being done, but for a great many, the damage is irreparable. Over 50,000 Australians were involved in the Vietnam War. More than 500 died and about 3,000 were wounded. For the veterans who returned, the scars run deep and will for many never truly heal, nor for their families. In Kim Beazley’s speech, he read a letter from the member for Cowan where he stated: Today is a day when our federal parliament should honour our Vietnam veterans, recognise their service and say to them that they did a good job in the best tradition of the ANZACs. With this year marking the 40th anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan, I want to talk about one of the men who was in this battle, Bill ‘Yank’ Akell, someone from my constituency but also someone whom I count as a very close friend. In doing so, I also want to acknowledge the Vietnam veterans of other battles that were waged as part of that war and the many support and medical personnel without whom our casualties would have been so much higher. Bill Akell is one of those veterans that encapsulates the very best of the Anzac tradition. He joined up in the Army at the age of 18 on 14 May 1964. He was a member of Delta Company, 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, and he arrived in Vietnam for his first tour of duty in 1966. Bill, at a mere 20 years of age, alongside 108 other young Australians, was involved in the Battle of Long Tan. Many words have been spoken about the battle and the role it played in determining the tactics of the North Vietnamese for the rest of the war. But the voices of the individual soldiers who were at Long Tan and the many other battles of Vietnam are really only now being heard and only now is any interest shown in their stories. The History Channel documentary on Long Tan, I am reliably informed by Bill, is a pretty accurate description of what it was actually like. He watched that documentary with his family and said that he had many a tear in his eye as he shared those experiences for the first time in 40 years with his family. I have had the privilege to work with many Vietnam veterans in my time as member for Ballarat. All have been amazingly generous in telling me their stories but also in making sure that the outstanding issues for Vietnam veterans are placed fairly and squarely on the public agenda. I want to touch on three of these issues. Bill Akell first drew my attention to the outstanding issue of medals in relation to the Battle of Long Tan. The bravery, courage and pure guts of Delta Company prompted the then South Vietnamese government to award those who took part with a unit citation and also to single out 20 individual soldiers who would receive various levels of the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry. Mr Akell was one of those soldiers. Yet, due to the intervention of the Australian ambassador, the citation and medals were not awarded. Forty years on, successive governments have failed to recognise these men and their families. Whilst the issue of the South Vietnamese medal has now been resolved, the issue of the unit citation has not. The broader issue of Australian bravery awards has also not been resolved. The 40th anniversary of Long Tan presented the ideal time for the government to announce the terms of an inquiry into the unfairness of bravery awards following the Battle of Long Tan. The Battle of Long Tan was the most significant battle during Australia’s long involvement in the Vietnam War. It also led to the most controversial and yet unresolved issue of the bravery awards. After the battle, Harry Smith, who commanded the battle on the ground from the start, had his bravery award downgraded, as did Platoon Commanders Sabben and Kendall. Other recommendations for bravery awards made by Smith were simply ignored or amended without further reference to him. The Australian gallantry and distinguished service Vietnam publication in 1974 noted: It would appear the system of rationing awards (in Vietnam) resulted in those furtherest from the actual combat being the first to claim awards. If the government were genuine in its welcome of these veterans in Canberra to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the battle, it should have honoured their presence and announced an independent inquiry to examine the fairness of the bravery awards following the Battle of Long Tan. The second outstanding issue for many Vietnam veterans is the issue of a health study into Vietnam veterans’ children. Geoff and Sue Parker, from my electorate, have been leading the way on this issue and again have made sure that I understand the impact that the Vietnam veterans’ service has had on their children. The scope and methodology for the study has been sitting on the minister’s desk for some time now, and I note an article by Hedley Peach in the Australian Family Physician this month that again highlights the serious health issues facing Vietnam veterans and their dependants as a result of their service. The government has raised the expectations of the veteran community on this study, and the delay is simply unacceptable. The minister now needs to either announce the study or stop stringing the veteran community along and tell them that he does not have the money or cannot get support for it. It is unfair to veterans who have worked cooperatively with this government on the scope of the study and on this broader issue to keep stringing them along. The third issue is T&PI Vietnam veterans. Many in my electorate are angry about the erosion of their pension. Veterans such as Bill Dobell, John Hevey, Charlie Mackenzie and Bill Wallace and many others have been tireless in raising this issue. Again I want to draw on the words of Bill Wallace. He said: Vietnam Veterans feel betrayed. In 1969 when I was placing my life on the line for this nation, the special rate of pension paid to permanently incapacitated servicemen was 90 per cent of average weekly earnings. TPIs did not receive welfare. The neglect of all governments since, which has been accepted by the electorate, has resulted in those people now being welfare dependent. When the automatic adjustments are made next month, for the first time welfare will constitute more than 50 per cent of the income of most TPIs, and the special rate of pension will be about 40 per cent of the average weekly earnings. Of the 40,000 Vietnam Veterans still alive (5,000 have taken their own lives—10 times as many who died during the conflict), 18,000 are now classed as Totally and Permanently Incapacitated ... I return to my earlier comment that Veteran entitlements should be appropriate, not just adequate. These are just three of the issues outstanding for Vietnam veterans that the government absolutely must address. Again in the words of Bill Wallace: But why do we remember these veterans? What is so special about being a Veteran? The answer quite simply is that these are the only servants of the Australian Nation who have had to be prepared to die to implement national policy. No others are required to make this commitment. When undertaking this service to the nation, these men and women are deprived of any of the personal rights which properly protect our freedom and democracy. When you don a uniform, you lose the right to refuse a lawful command at every level from the CDF to the lowest recruit. If the Government says that is what is required, the defence force has no alternative but to say “Yes Sir”. This is why the nation does not have occasions such as this to remember the service of government employees who work in the ATO or in the Diplomatic Service. Only Veterans have been required by the Australian Nation to make this ultimate commitment. Only Veterans have been required to be prepared to die in the service of the nation. This is why Vietnam Veterans are “special”. Mainly for reasons we would rather have ignored or wish had not occurred at all. Whilst there are 40,000 of us still alive, the nation has a chance to make amends, not merely by public expressions of sorrow and gratitude, not by glittering dinners and ceremonies at the fine memorials which have been built, but by changing the things which affect the everyday lives of veterans. The 40th anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan was a missed opportunity to rectify some of these wrongs for the Vietnam veteran community. Debate (on motion by Mr Neville) adjourned. 156 17:40:00 Main Committee adjourned at 5.40 pm 157 Answers to Questions on Notice 157 157 2507 157 Hoare, Kelly, MP 83Y Charlton ALP 0 Ms Hoare asked the Minister representing the Minister for the Environment and Heritage, in writing, on 13 October 2005: Does the Minister’s department administer any Commonwealth funded programmes to which community organisations, businesses or individuals in the electoral division of Charlton can apply for funding; if so, what are the programmes. Does the Minister’s department advertise these funding opportunities; if so, (a) what print or other media outlets have been used for the advertising of each of these programmes, and (b) were these paid advertisements, if so, what were the costs of each advertisement. In respect of each of the Commonwealth funded programmes referred to in part (1), (a) what is its purpose and (b) who is responsible for allocating funds. In respect of each Commonwealth funded programmes referred to in part (1), how many (a) community organisations, (b) businesses and (c) individuals in the electoral division of Charlton received funding in (i) 2003 and (ii) 2004 and what was the name and address of each recipient. 157 Truss, Warren, MP GT4 Wide Bay NATS Minister for Transport and Regional Services 1 Mr Truss —The Minister for the Environment and Heritage has provided the following answer to the honourable member’s question: and (3) Yes, details as follows: Programme Current/ Lapsed Advertising* Cost if paid Purpose Approver Australian Antarctic Science (AAS) Grants Current The Australian / The Weekend Australian $1,627 / $2,993 Provides support for high-quality research projects that will make a significant contribution to Australia’s Antarctic research programme. Minister for the Environment and Heritage ABRS Participatory Programme Current The Australian / Annual Biologue Newsletter $1093 / - (internal publication) Supports research on the Australian Biota, and the development or design of products that aid in the dissemination of taxonomic information. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Australian Government Community Water Grants Current Lake Macquarie News / Newcastle and Lake Macquarie Post $338 / $775 To help local community organisations save, reuse or improve the health of their local water sources. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Commemoration of Historic Events and Famous Persons Grant-in-Aid Current No - Commemorates people, events and places of national historical significance. The programme provides funds for the graves of former Australian Prime Ministers and, where appropriate and necessary, for erecting suitable plaques. Its scope has grown to include other kinds of commemorative projects, exhibitions, surveys of historical sites and curatorial work etc, all of historical significance. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Cultural Heritage Projects Programme Lapsed (2003-04) No - To restore and conserve significant cultural heritage places, and identify and protect significant Indigenous places. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Envirofund Current Various print media $174,440.00 The local action component of the Natural Heritage Trust, helping communities undertake local, on-the-ground projects aimed at conserving biodiversity and promoting sustainable resource use. Natural Heritage Ministerial Board (Ministers for the Environment & Heritage and Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry) Environmental Education Grants Current No - Provides funds for activities that support the Australian Government’s objective of improving the community’s capacity to protect the environment. Minister for Environment and Heritage Grants to Voluntary Environment and Heritage Organisations Current The Weekend Australian $4,144 Assists eligible environment and heritage organisations to value, conserve and protect Australia’s natural environment and historic heritage by assisting with their administrative funding. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Indigenous Heritage Programme Current The Australian and Indigenous specific radio broadcast $20,000 (total cost) To support the identification, conservation and promotion of the Indigenous heritage values of places important to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Indigenous Land Management Facilitators Current No - To help Indigenous Australians to address their land management needs, contribute to national objectives and to gain access to Natural Heritage Trust (NHT) funding. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Indigenous Protected Area Programme Current No - Indigenous landowners are being supported to manage their lands for the protection of natural and cultural features. Minister for the Environment and Heritage National Heritage Investment Initiative Current Sydney Morning Herald / The Weekend Australian / Architecture Review Australia $3,002 / $3,767 / $1,210 To restore and conserve Australia’s most important historic heritage places. Minister for the Environment and Heritage National Reserve System Current No - Buying high priority land for establishing a national park or privately owned and managed protected area, or establishing a private protected area of high priority land already owned by an organisation. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Photovoltaic Rebate Programme Current No - Provides cash rebates to householders and owners of community use buildings who install grid-connected or stand-alone photovoltaic systems. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Preservation and Protection of Indigenous Heritage Lapsed (2004-05) Unable to determine (previously administered by ATSIC/ ATSIS) - Preservation and protection of Indigenous heritage. Minister for Immigration, Indigenous and Multicultural Affairs Sharing Australia’s Stories Current The Australian / Sydney Morning Herald / Koori Mail / The Land / Local Government Focus / New Indigenous Times $4,226 / $3,570 / $705 / $994 / $1000 / $543 To support projects that contribute to an understanding of the great events and themes that characterise Australia’s national heritage. Minister for the Environment and Heritage Solar Cities Programme Current The Australian / Financial Review / Newcastle Herald / Sydney Morning Herald $3,763 / $2,286 / $934 / $2,879 To: 1) demonstrate the economic and environmental impacts of integrating cost reflective pricing with the concentrated uptake of solar, energy efficiency and smart metering technologies; and 2) identify and implement options for addressing barriers to distributed solar generation, energy efficiency and electricity demand management for grid connected urban areas. Minister for the Environment and Heritage * print or other media outlets of relevance to the electoral division of Charlton. The Australian Government also delivers part of its Natural Heritage Trust through regional delivery arrangements. Under these arrangements in New South Wales, Catchment Management Authorities (CMA) develop investment strategies, which are the basis for Australian Government investment from this component of the Trust. The electoral division of Charlton falls within the responsibilities of the Hunter/Central Rivers CMA. While community groups may be the ultimate beneficiaries of funding provided to CMAs through investment strategies, they do not apply directly to the Australian Government for these funds. The CMAs are responsible for allocating funding they receive amongst regional stakeholders according to regional priorities. (4)   The recipients of funding from these programmes in the electorate division of Charlton were as follows: 2003 (2003-2004 financial year) Programme Recipient Address Amount ($) Envirofund Araleun Landcare Group (community group) 65 Faucett Street, Blackalls Park 2283 13,637.00 Photovoltaic Rebate Programme 4 Householders (individuals) - 15,960.00 2004 (2004-2005 financial year), None Note: Natural Heritage Trust funding provided through regional delivery arrangements is only recorded at the Catchment Management Authority (CMA) level, and hence financial information is not available by electorate. 159 159 2692 and 2695 159 Roxon, Nicola, MP 83K Gellibrand ALP 0 Ms Roxon asked the Minister of Foreign Affairs, in writing, on 28 November 2005. What sum did the Minister’s department spend during 2004-2005 on external (a) barristers and (b) solicitors (including private firms, the Australian Government Solicitor and any others). What sum did the Minister’s department spend on internal legal services. What is the Minister’s department’s projected expenditure on legal services for 2005-2006. 160 Downer, Alexander, MP 4G4 Mayo LP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 Mr Downer —On behalf of the Minister for Trade and myself, the answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: During the 2004-2005 financial year, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spent: and (b) $1,215,806.00 on solicitors including the Australian Government Solicitor. This includes $15,244.49 as fees for barristers. $103,611.00 on administered legal costs; and $227,149.25 on outsourced legal services for the Overseas Property Office During the 2004-2005 financial year, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spent $2,188,800.00 on internal legal services. The budgeted amount for legal services in 2005-2006 is: $2,696,041.00 for outsourced legal services; and $1,796,679.81 on internal legal services. All figures quoted above exclude GST. 160 160 2940 160 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 0 Mr Fitzgibbon asked the Treasurer, in writing, on 7 February 2006: How many amendments has the Government made to the consolidation regime since it was introduced in 2002? How many tax bills were circulated under confidentiality agreements in (a) 2004 and (b) 2005? Will he explain the rationale for the increased use of these agreements? 160 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr Costello —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The core rules of the consolidation regime were introduced in 2002. Since that time, an additional 44 measures have been introduced. 19 of those measures insert new provisions into the income tax law to cover areas not dealt with initially. The remaining 25 measures clarify the operation of the law and ensure it operates as intended. The consolidation regime represented a major structural reform to the taxation of corporate groups. The Government actively consulted with business and professional groups during the development of the legislation to implement the regime. In this regard, at the First National Consolidation Symposium in February 2003, Ken Spence of Shaddick & Spence stated that ‘the formulation of the consolidation provisions should be seen as a benchmark in consultation with tax professional bodies and associations’. The Government has continued to consult with business and professional groups to ensure that the consolidation regime is operating effectively. The amendments have been made in response to issues raised by those groups as they get practical experience in applying the consolidation regime. Those amendments have enhanced the operation of the consolidation regime by addressing issues affecting special classes of taxpayers and by clarifying extensive interactions with other parts of the income tax. No substantial amendments have been made to modify the core rules or to correct errors. Information in respect of consultation at the policy and/or draft legislation stage on announced tax and superannuation measures is available on the Treasury website and is updated three times a year. . The website provides details of the consultation strategy on announced tax and superannuation measures and the progress of consultation. The number of consultations conducted using confidentiality agreements is a function of the type and number of consultations conducted and therefore varies from year to year. 161 161 3074 161 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Minister for Education, Science and Training, in writing, on 16 February 2006: Since 2001, on what dates and for what purposes, has the Minister or any of her staff, and her predecessor or any of his staff, met with the Australian Higher Education Industrial Association and who attended each meeting. 161 Bishop, Julie, MP 83P Curtin LP Minister for Education, Science and Training and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women’s Issues 1 Ms Julie Bishop —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The records of the meetings of the previous Minister and his staff are not maintained by this office. Between my swearing in on 27 January 2006 and the date of the question, 16 February 2006, there were no meetings between me or any of my staff and the Australian Higher Education Industrial Association. 161 161 3126 161 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 Mr Price asked the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, in writing, on 28 February 2006: When was the new Supported Accommodation Assistance Program agreement for the  homeless signed. Prior to the signing of the new agreement, what sum per year did each State and Territory receive under the program. For each year covered by the new agreement, what sum will each State and Territory receive from the Commonwealth. Prior to the signing of the new agreement, how many beds were provided for each State and Territory and each Commonwealth electoral division. For each year covered by the new agreement, how many additional beds are expected to be provided for each State and Territory. How does the Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs calculate unmet demand for beds. For each year covered by the agreement and for each State and Territory, what is the expected unmet demand for beds. 161 Brough, Mal, MP 2K6 Longman LP Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs 1 Mr Brough —The answer to the honourable member’s questions is as follows: Although responsibility for the day-to-day administration of SAAP rests with the State and Territory Governments, the Australian Government is very serious about its commitment to provide support for homeless people. As a result, the Australian Government will contribute $931 million in funding to States and Territory Governments to help them meet their responsibilities in this area. Details of Australian Government funding to States and Territories under SAAP V is set out in the SAAP V Multilateral Agreement (available online at www.facsia.gov.au/aboutfacs/programs/house-saapv). SAAP funding figures up to and including 2004-05 are available in the annual data reports for SAAP, Homeless People in SAAP – SAAP NDC Annual Report (available on-line at www.aihw.gov.au). They are also published in the statistical supplement to the Report on Government Services (available online at www.pc.gov.au/gsp). The Multilateral Agreement for SAAP V was signed on 30 September 2005 and the Bilateral Agreements with the States and Territories were signed over the period 25 January to 31 January 2006. SAAP data on people assisted and unable to be assisted on an average day is collected by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) in a demand survey conducted twice a year. The methodology is explained in the AIHW report Demand for SAAP accommodation by homeless people 2003-04. The SAAP National Data Collection 2004-05 and the AIHW report Demand for SAAP accommodation by homeless people 2003-04 are both available on the AIHW website (www.aihw.gov.au). SAAP does not fund beds. It funds support services to people in accommodation managed or accessed by SAAP agencies. SAAP is not administered by electoral division nor is such data readily available. 162 162 3127 162 Murphy, John, MP 83D Lowe ALP 0 Mr Murphy asked the Minister for Health and Ageing, in writing, on 28 February 2006: Can he explain why the breast cancer drug Herceptin for use by women with early breast cancer is not currently listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. Can he confirm that women diagnosed with early onset HER2 positive breast cancer currently have to pay between $50,000 and $70,000 to use Herceptin. Has he seen the results of a clinical trial published in May 2005 in the Breast Cancer Action Group newsletter which suggest Herceptin can significantly improve the survival rate for women with HER2 positive breast cancer and reduce the risk of breast cancer recurrence; if not, why not. Is he aware of the recent survey of oncologists, published in Annals of Oncology, which has found that some oncologists may not discuss expensive drug treatment options with their patient if the drug is not subsidised; if not, why not. Can he confirm that all women diagnosed with early onset HER2 positive breast cancer have been provided with the necessary information about Herceptin enabling them to make an informed choice about their treatment; if not, why not. Will he ensure that all drug approval processes are efficient and effective so that Australian women have timely and affordable access to useful breast cancer treatments such as Herceptin; if not, why not. 162 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 Mr Abbott —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC) is unable to consider an application for Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) subsidy for a medicine outside its terms of registration. The Therapeutic Goods Administration approved the registration of the extension of indications for trastuzumab (Herceptin®) for use by women with early breast cancer on 21 April 2006. On 17 March 2006 Roche Products submitted an application to PBAC for PBS listing of trastuzumab for the early breast cancer indication. At its July 2006 meeting, PBAC recommended that the Australian Government subsidise, under the PBS, the drug trastuzumab for the treatment of patients with HER-2 positive early stage breast cancer following surgery, for a maximum period of 12 months to be commenced concurrently with adjuvant chemotherapy. PBAC further specified that: - Eligible patients would require a HER-2 gene amplification test to ensure that they are in the group for which the drug is clinically effective. - The sponsor company, Roche Pharmaceuticals, would need to enter some commitments to ensure that the listing could go ahead, particularly in regard to unnecessary wastage and alerting PBAC to fuller studies on optimal dose and duration of treatment. - Patients who have a particular vulnerability to heart damage should not receive the drug. Negotiations with the company and formalisation of conditions of listing are in progress. The outcome of these negotiations will inform Government consideration of the PBAC recommendation. Because the dosage of trastuzumab relates principally to body weight, the cost of treatment can vary between patients. The Drug Utilisation Sub-Committee estimates the average cost of treatment for one year as approximately $67,000. Yes. Yes. No. Consultations between a doctor and patient are private. Yes. The registration and consideration of trastuzumab for PBS listing for the new patient group have been managed as expeditiously as possible, consistent with the need to comply with legal requirements to ensure that the drug is safe, effective and cost effective for this group. 163 163 3217 163 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 Mr Price asked the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, in writing, on 27 March 2006: What programs and services do the department and each agency in the Minister’s portfolio provide for indigenous communities and individuals in the electoral division of Chifley. In respect of each program, (a) what sum is spent annually (i) nationally and (ii) in the electoral division of Chifley and (b) how many people is it intended to assist (i) nationally and (ii) in the electoral division of Chifley. 163 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence 1 Mr Billson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The Department of Veterans’ Affairs does not provide programs and services based on electoral divisions or ethnic groups. Programs and services are provided to members of Australia’s veteran and defence forces communities, war widows and widowers, widows and dependants, through programs of care, rehabilitation, compensation, income support, commemoration and defence support services. Access to these programs and services is available to eligible indigenous communities and individuals. Indigenous communities and individuals accessing DVA’s programs and services are not specifically identified and therefore funding is unable to be reported. 163 163 3267 163 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Attorney-General, in writing, on 29 March 2006: Did the department or any agency in the Minister’s portfolio engage the services of a public relations, public affairs or media management consultancy in 2005; if so, what was the (a) purpose and (b) cost of each engagement. What was the name and postal address of each company engaged for these purposes. For 2005, what sum was spent on public relations, public affairs or media management consultancies by the department and each agency in the Minister’s portfolio. 163 Ruddock, Philip, MP 0J4 Berowra LP Attorney-General 1 Mr Ruddock —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: I am advised that the portfolio agencies listed below engaged the services of public relations, public affairs or media management consultancies in 2005. Family Court of Australia To review the Court’s external communications strategies. (b) $18,691.97 (incl. GST) Lawry Cohen Consulting Pty Ltd, PO Box 4957, Kingston ACT 2604 $18,691.97 (incl.GST) Insolvency and Trustee Service Australia (ITSA) To manage media.  (b) $6,352.50 (incl. GST) Rave Communications, 20/3 Geelong Street, Fyshwick ACT 2609 $6,352.50 (incl.GST) National Native Title Tribunal (NNTT) Design development and style guide production. $23,280.40 (incl. GST) Marketforce, 1314 Hay Street, West Perth, WA 6005 $23,280.40 (incl. GST) Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) Gain publicity regarding classification compliance in the cinema industry. (b) $8,112.50 (incl. GST) Encourage parents to use film classification information during school holidays. (b) $4,950 (incl. GST) Communications Plan. (b) $3,960 (incl. GST) Communications advice. (b) $2,497 (incl. GST) Launch Management Ptv Ltd, Level 6, 1-7 Bligh Street, Sydney NSW 2000 (The same company was used for each engagement). $19,519.50 (incl. GST). No other portfolio agency engaged the services of public relations, public affairs or media management consultancies in 2005. 164 164 3297 164 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, in writing, on 29 March 2006: Will the Minister provide a list of the recruitment agencies which were used by the department and each agency in the Minister’s portfolio in 2005. What sum was paid to each agency identified in (1). For 2005, what sum was spent on recruitment agencies by the department and each agency in the Minister’s portfolio. 164 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence 1 Mr Billson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: and (2) The following table lists recruitment agencies used in 2004-05 and the sum paid to each agency (excluding GST). The amounts listed include all recruitment agency fees including payment for services rendered by contractors who were provided by the recruitment agency. Recruitment Agency Sum paid in 2004-05 (excluding GST) Adecco Australia Pty Ltd $50,870 Allstaff Australia Pty Ltd $2,436 Candle Australia Ltd $74,146 Capital Recruitment $1,089 Careers Unlimited $89,971 Catalyst Recruitment $13,259 DFP Recruitment Services Pty Ltd $2,343 Drake Australia Pty Ltd $15,791 Effective People Pty Ltd $671,266 Frontier Group Australia Pty Ltd $100,563 Gillian Beaumont Recruitment Pty Ltd $84,096 Green & Green Group $31,760 Hudson Global Resources (Aust) Pty Ltd $19,426 Hugo Personnel Pty Ltd $36,122 Icon Recruitment Pty Ltd $175,928 Integrity Staffing $3,732 Inter Staffing Services (Vic) Pty Ltd $645 Jet Personnel & Recruitment $1,980 Kelly Services (Australia) Ltd $39,657 Lefroy Employment Group $4,364 Locher & Associates Pty Ltd $19,775 Maxima Recruitment $1,500 Merit Solutions Pty Ltd $1,800 MJL People Dynamics $1,238 North Coast Workforce $2,979 Peoplebank Aus Pty Ltd $9,548 Prime Placements $441 Professional Careers $6,272 Quadrate Solutions $2,367 Recruitment Management $13,392 Ross Human Directions Ltd $1,970,401 Select Australasia Pty Ltd $250,277 Skilled Group Ltd $3,577 SOS Recruitment $861 Spherion Recruitment $70,669 The Green & Green Group Pty Ltd $90,480 The One Umbrella $83,017 Townsville Personnel $2,098 Wizard Personnel & Office Services Pty Ltd $119,620 For 2004-05, the sum spent was $4,069,756 excluding GST. 165 165 3336 165 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Prime Minister, in writing, on 29 March 2006: Did the department or any agency in the Minster’s portfolio engage the services of a media training company in 2005; if so, how many individuals in the department and each agency received media training. For 2005, what sum was spent on media training by the department and each agency in the Minister’s portfolio. 166 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr Howard —I am advised the answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: No. Not applicable 166 166 3379 166 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, in writing, on 29 March 2006: Did the (a) Minister and (b) his personal staff receive any media training in 2005? What was the cost of the media training? What was the name and postal address of each company engaged to provide media training? 166 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence 1 Mr Billson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: I am unaware of any media training undertaken by the former Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and her staff. N/A N/A 166 166 3413 166 Thomson, Kelvin, MP UK6 Wills ALP 0 Mr Kelvin Thomson asked the Treasurer, in writing, on 9 May 2006: Has he stated that it is not so much the size of the Current Account Deficit that matters, but what proportion it is of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Was the Current Account Deficit 4.1% of GDP in 1996; if not, what was it. Is the Current Account Deficit 6.4% of GDP in 2006; if not, what was it. What has happened to his concerns about Australia’s Current Account Deficit. 166 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr Costello —The answer to the honourable member’s questions is as follows: The Hansard and transcripts of my comments are readily available. and (3) ABS publication 5302.0 contains the latest estimates of the CAD, including revisions. Australia is a large, resource rich country with a high demand for capital, and has relied upon foreign investment to meet these needs over most of its history. The result has been persistent CADs – or net lending from the rest of the world, which have resulted in a higher standard of living compared to a situation of no net lending. By running budget surpluses while economic growth is strong, the Commonwealth Government does not contribute to the CAD, but instead adds to Australia’s national saving. The Commonwealth Government has delivered seven cash budget surpluses in the last eight years, with the budget for 2006-07 forecast to be a surplus of $10.8 billion. This represents a turnaround from the situation for the majority of the 1980s and early 1990s, when the Commonwealth Government was a major contributor to the CAD. 166 166 3434 166 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 Mr Price asked the Minister representing the Minister for Justice and Customs, in writing, on 9 May 2006: How many and which Aboriginal communities have sea rangers in Australia’s northern waters. Are sea rangers members of NORFORCE and are they trained and paid as any other reservist. What is the formal and informal relationship between the Australian Customs Service (ACS) and sea rangers. Do sea rangers report intrusions into Australia’s northern coastal waters, if so, what feedback on the reports does the ACS provide to sea rangers. Do sea rangers implement part of the Government’s policy on foreign fishing known as ‘catch, kiss and release’, if so, what exactly are their roles. Do sea rangers undertake any other role that assists the ACS; if so, do they receive remuneration other than through the CDEP and if they do not, why not. Does the ACS provide any training, equipment or funding for sea rangers; if not, why not. Has the ACS provided sea rangers with caps and mugs and does it intend to provide sea rangers with sugar, flour and tobacco. 167 Ruddock, Philip, MP 0J4 Berowra LP Attorney-General 1 Mr Ruddock —The Minister for Justice and Customs has provided the following answer to the honourable member’s question: This is an issue for the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF), I am advised that my colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry is responding to Question on Notice 3436. This is an issue for the Department of Defence. Customs has an informal arrangement with Sea Ranger groups. Customs provides training to indigenous communities in the Northern Territory on what type of information Customs is interested in receiving in respect of border protection under its Community Participation Program (CPP). Customs also uses Sea Ranger groups to: facilitate introductions to key personnel in indigenous communities, act as guides to indigenous community out-stations and geographical locations in their area, participate in land and sea patrols and provide charter boats if available to assist with responses. Yes. Sea Ranger groups regularly report unusual activity to the Customs Hotline number 1800 06 1800. Customs seeks to provide feedback to reporters that can include confirmation of report details and potential response. In some instances sea rangers are asked to monitor the activity and provide updated reports to facilitate foreign fishing vessel apprehensions. The Government has no such policy. Customs will pay for services if they use Sea Ranger assets or officers in patrol or response activities. Customs has trained approximately 80 individual Sea Rangers in the past two years in the Northern Territory under the Customs CPP. Customs has provided items such as caps and mugs, which have the Customs Hotline Logo and 1800 06 1800 number inscribed on them. There is no intent to provide sugar, flour or tobacco. 167 167 3445 167 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 Mr Price asked the Minister representing the Minister for Justice and Customs, in writing, on 9 May 2006: Does NORFORCE contain Aboriginal reserve surveillance units that are trained and paid the same as other reserve units; if so, will these units be supplying information to the Offshore Protection Command. Will sea rangers be providing information to the Offshore Protection Command; if not, why not; if so, what are the arrangements for their remuneration by the Commonwealth other than through the CDEP. 168 Ruddock, Philip, MP 0J4 Berowra LP Attorney-General 1 Mr Ruddock —The Minister for Justice and Customs has provided the following answer to the honourable member’s question: This question has also been asked of the Minister for Defence. The Minister for Defence will respond to this question as it relates to the Defence portfolio. The Australian Customs Service encourages all members of the community, including sea rangers, to provide information on illegal activities to the Customs Hotline number. Where this information is relevant to the responsibilities of the Joint Offshore Protection Command, it is immediately passed from the Customs National Monitoring Centre to the Coastwatch National Surveillance Centre in Canberra. There is no remuneration for provision of information to the Customs Hotline. Customs also uses Sea Ranger groups to: facilitate introductions to key personnel in indigenous communities, act as guides to indigenous community out-stations and geographical locations in their area, participate in land and sea patrols and provide charter boats if available to assist with responses. Customs will pay for services if they use Sea Ranger assets or officers in patrol or response activities. 168 168 3512 168 Jenkins, Harry, MP HH4 Scullin ALP 0 Mr Jenkins asked the Minister for Education, Science and Training, in writing, on 22 May 2006: At 30 June 2005, how many people with an outstanding or accumulated HECS debt resided in the postcode area (a) 3074, (b) 3075, (c) 3076, (d) 3082, (e) 3083, (f) 3087, (g) 3088, (h) 3089, (i) 3090, (j) 3091, and (k) 3752. At 30 June 2005, how many people with an outstanding or accumulated HECS debt who were not enrolled in tertiary studies resided in the postcode area of (a) 3074, (b) 3075, (c) 3076, (d) 3082, (e) 3083, (f) 3087, (g) 3088, (h) 3089, (i) 3090, (j) 3091, and (k) 3752. At 30 June 2005, what was the value of outstanding or accumulated HECS debt of people that resided in the postcode area (a) 3074, (b) 3075, (c) 3076, (d) 3082, (e) 3083, (f) 3087, (g) 3088, (h) 3089, (i) 3090, (j) 3091, and (k) 3752. 168 Bishop, Julie, MP 83P Curtin LP Minister for Education, Science and Training and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women’s Issues 1 Ms Julie Bishop —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The following data have been provided by the Australian Taxation Office and are subject to the following limitations: - Only cases with a valid postcode are included.  Some clients may reside overseas or not have a valid address stored. - The postcode recorded may not reflect the client’s current residence.  The address may be dated, or reflect a contact address other than the place of residence. - The data provided is as at 30 June 2005. - Higher Education Loan Programme (HELP) debts from the first half of 2005 have been included in the outstanding debt count. Number of persons with an outstanding or accumulated HECS debt by specified postcode Postcode 3074 3075 3076 3082 3083 3087 3088 3089 3090 3091 3752 Total 1,003 758 748 1,779 1,713 544 1,926 609 84 68 385 Number of persons with an outstanding or accumulated HECS debt who are not enrolled* in tertiary studies by specified postcode Postcode 3074 3075 3076 3082 3083 3087 3088 3089 3090 3091 3752 Total 706 569 542 1,230 1,149 399 1,352 419 58 50 292 * The persons identified in this table are those who had a HECS debt reported in the second half of 2004 or before, but who did not have a HELP debt reported in the first half of 2005.  The Australian Taxation Office is unable to exclude those students who were enrolled in higher education in the first half of 2005 and who paid their tuition costs up-front. Total outstanding or accumulated HECS debt by specified postcode Postcode 3074 3075 3076 3082 3083 3087 3088 3089 3090 Total $11.057m $8.310m $7.873m $19.069m $18.568m $5.485m $19.573m $6.139m $0.842m Postcode 3091 3752 Total $0.703m $3.782m 169 169 3533 169 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 0 Mr Melham asked the Prime Minister, in writing, on 22 May 2006: Further to the answer to question No. 157, what sum has been provided for facilities, accommodation, staff, travel arrangements etc. for the former Governor-General, Dr Peter Hollingworth, since 31 December 2004. 169 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr Howard —I am advised by my department that the answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The costs incurred during the period 1 January 2005 to 31 May 2006 are provided in the following table. Item Cost Property Operating Expenses $157,850 Staff $106,441 Support $22,822 Travel (including vehicles) $26,654 Total $313,767 The expenditure reflects ongoing costs to support the operation of Dr Hollingworth’s office. The support provided to Dr Hollingworth as former Governor-General is consistent with that provided to all former Governors‑General and the costs incurred are comparable. 169 169 3582 169 Irwin, Julia, MP 83Z Fowler ALP 0 Mrs Irwin asked the Minister for Community Services, in writing, on 29 May 2006: Was $267,000 in emergency relief funding allocated to the Fairfield Local Government Area in NSW for 2005-2006. Was the funding withheld from Fairfield Community Aid which had dispensed funds in previous years. Was $40,000 allocated to The Salvation Army in Fairfield for emergency relief funding for 2005-2006. Were any other organisations allocated emergency relief funds for dispersal in the Fairfield LGA; if so, what sums were allocated to which organisations. Has the entire $267,000 for Fairfield been allocated and will it be spent this financial year; if not, how does the Government intend to distribute the funds. Were other agencies selected in the “expressions of interest” tender process to administer the remainder of the funds allocated for 2005-2006; if so, what sum was each organisation allocated for 2005-2006. 170 Cobb, John, MP 00AN1 Parkes NATS Minister for Community Services 1 Mr John Cobb —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaCSIA) has not withheld funding from Fairfield Community Aid and Information Service (FCA). FCA did not accept the funding offer for the 2005-06 financial year. The funds were allocated to other providers as follows: The Salvation Army- Fairfield Community Service Centre $40,000 Cabramatta Community Centre (New provider) $40,000 Lifeline Macarthur - Narellan $26,670 Vantage Community Services $35,095 Tharawal Aboriginal Corporation $14,466 St Vincent de Paul Liverpool $15,801 St Vincent de Paul Campbelltown $15,801 St Vincent de Paul Wollondilly $15,801 Anglicare Campbelltown $66,365 Anglicare Glenquarie Macquarie Fields $20,000 170 170 3599 170 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 0 Mr Fitzgibbon asked the Minister for Health and Ageing, in writing, on 1 June 2006: What sum was collected from registration fees for the National Industrial Chemicals Notification and Assessment Scheme (NICNAS) in (a) 2004-005, and (b) 2005-06. How many businesses are currently registered with NICNAS. How many businesses registered with NICNAS pay the annual registration fee of $353. How many of the businesses registered with NICNAS import products with a total annual value of less than (a) $5,000, (b) $3,000, and (c) $1,000. When will the NICNAS registration fee and minimum import value next be reviewed. To date, how many businesses have been (a) investigated by the NICNAS compliance unit, and (b) warned, fined or prosecuted. 170 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 Mr Abbott —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The revenue collected in the financial year 2004-05 from NICNAS registration was $4,835,699. (b) The revenue collected from NICNAS registrants this current financial year, up to 31 March 2006, is $4,293,840. For this registration year, which commenced on 1 September 2005, NICNAS has registered 5,600 companies or individuals, as at 14 June 2006. All companies and individuals who register with NICNAS pay the annual registration fee of $353. , (b) and (c) It is not NICNAS’s practice to collect actual import and/or manufacturing values for relevant industrial chemicals based on a policy to ensure no unreasonable administrative cost to industry. NICNAS asks companies and individuals to estimate their Tier for registration purposes. First registration requires that the prescribed form is completed including actual value but this is not mandated. Renewal forms simply require a self estimate of Tier. In relation to import values, an examination of the data provided by the Australian Customs Service for 2004-05 for companies or individuals importing relevant industrial chemicals estimates that: - 821 imported less than $5,000; - 621 imported less than $3,000; - 307 imported less than $1,000. In accordance with the Australian Government’s cost recovery policy, cost recovery arrangements for NICNAS were reviewed in 2004-05 to ensure they complied with guidelines issued by the Department of Finance and Administration. NICNAS registration fees and charges are scheduled to be reviewed during 2009-10, as part of the overall review of NICNAS cost recovery arrangements. and (b) The NICNAS compliance team monitors all companies importing or manufacturing relevant industrial chemicals to ensure that they are registered in compliance with the Industrial Chemicals (Notification and Assessment) Act 1989. For the registration year commencing 1 September 2005, as at 14 June 2006, NICNAS has made follow up enquiries into the registration obligations of 1,636 companies or individuals. NICNAS has investigated 514 companies or individuals this registration year. There have been no fines or prosecutions. 171 171 3628 171 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 0 Mr Melham asked the Prime Minister, in writing, on 13 June 2006: Can he confirm that the United States Director of National Intelligence, John D. Negroponte, visited Australia in December 2005. On what dates did Mr Negroponte visit Australia. Did Mr Negroponte hold any discussions with Australian Government Ministers; if so, on what dates did those meetings take place. Did Mr Negroponte hold discussions with the Office of National Assessments; if so, on what dates did those discussions take place. Did Mr Negroponte hold discussions with any other Australian Government departments or agencies; if so, which departments or agencies were involved and on what dates did those discussions take place. Did Mr Negroponte’s meetings with the Australian Government include any discussions of the future of the Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap. Did the Australian Government make any public announcement or statement concerning Mr Negroponte’s visit to Australia. Did the United States Government make any public announcement or statement concerning Mr Negroponte’s visit to Australia. 171 Howard, John, MP ZD4 Bennelong LP Prime Minister 1 Mr Howard —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Recommended: and (2) Ambassador Negroponte visited Australia on a working visit in December 2005. On 5 December, I met with Ambassador Negroponte. I am advised that Ambassador Negroponte also met separately with the Foreign Minister and the Attorney-General. I am advised that Ambassador Negroponte had discussions at ONA on 5 December. I am advised that on 5 December, Ambassador Negroponte attended a lunch hosted by the Director General ONA, which was attended by heads of Australia’s intelligence and security agencies. He also had a separate meeting with the Secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Dr Peter Shergold. Consistent with the long-standing practice of successive Australian governments, I do not intend to reveal details of discussions on intelligence-related matters with the United States or other partners. No As far as the Government is aware, it did not. 172 172 3635 172 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 0 Mr Price asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs, in writing, on 13 June 2006: Which of Australia’s neighbouring countries are signatories to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Does the UNCLOS (a) permit enforcement measures, such as boarding, inspection, arrest and prosecution for offences against the fisheries law of a coastal State within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of that State, (b) require that boats and crews arrested for offences occurring in the EEZ must be released upon the posting of reasonable bond or security, and (c) preclude penalties of imprisonment for illegal fishing in the EEZ. Does the UNCLOS permit agreements to be made between States to include the penalty of imprisonment of foreign nationals for illegal fishing in a coastal State’s EEZ; if so, (a) have any such agreements been concluded by Australia, (b) when, and (c) with which countries; if not, has Australia commenced negotiations with any countries; if so, (i) when, (ii) with which countries, (iii) through which Commonwealth department or agency, and (iv) when will the negotiations be completed. 172 Downer, Alexander, MP 4G4 Mayo LP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 Mr Downer —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The States Parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea can be found on the internet at, http://www.un.org/Depts/los/reference_files/status2006.pdf. Yes; (b) Yes; (c) Yes. Yes; (a) No; (b) Not necessary to answer; (c) Not necessary to answer; No; (i) Not necessary to answer; (ii) Not necessary to answer; (iii) Not necessary to answer; (iv) Not necessary to answer. 172 172 3637 172 Gibbons, Steve, MP 83X Bendigo ALP 0 Mr Gibbons asked the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, in writing, on 14 June 2006: Is he aware that on 22 August 2005 the National Office of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (DVA) wrote to providers of community nursing services advising that (i) current Deeds of Agreement would expire on 30 April 2006, and (ii) the DVA anticipated that a Request for Tender (RFT) would be advertised on 22 October 2005, but would “confirm the actual advertisement date closer to the time”; his Department did not provide further advice to community nursing providers about the RFT advertisement date; the RFT was advertised only in the national and major metropolitan press on 5 November 2005; consequently, a number of agencies, including the Maryborough District Hospital, were unable to submit tenders, and were advised by DVA that they would not be considered as future service providers, despite providing services to local veterans for many years; and agencies, such as the Maryborough Hospital, were advised that the DVA would consider engaging service providers from outside the area to provide local nursing services. Does he acknowledge that, for reasons of continuity of care, and the benefits of providing community nursing services through a locally integrated health service, the course of action proposed by the DVA may not provide a service that is the most cost effective or in the best interest of veterans’ health. Will he give an assurance that providers of community nursing services, including the Maryborough District Hospital, that formally appeal to the DVA, will receive a fair and impartial hearing, which will result in the best service for local veterans. 173 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence 1 Mr Billson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: and (ii) Yes. A letter of 21 October 2005 to providers advised that the RFT would be advertised shortly. A firm advertisement date was not provided at that point, as explained in the letter, to avoid confusion in the industry in case of delays due to unforeseen circumstances. The RFT was conducted in accordance with the Commonwealth Procurement Guidelines (CPGs). The RFT was placed on the AusTender website, the DVA website (www.dva.gov.au), in one national newspaper and major metropolitan newspapers in each State and Territory. The RFT was open to all providers of community nursing services and DVA considered all applications that met the requirements of the RFT. The RFT outlined the process by which the Department would fill any gaps that might occur in the panel of DVA-contracted community nursing providers at the end of the tender process. The tender process was completed in April 2006 and the panel of DVA-contracted community nursing providers came into effect on 1 May 2006. approaching the members of the panel of DVA-contracted community nursing providers to determine their interest and capacity to fill gaps; and approaching other community nursing providers that did not participate in the tender process to fill gaps that could not be filled by the panel of DVA-contracted community nursing providers. One of the fundamental principles of the CPGs is undertaking procurement processes that ensure value for money. The aim of the RFT was to ensure that veterans and war widows/widowers continue to receive quality community nursing services. The Department has implemented a transition strategy to ensure that any veterans and war widows/widowers that have to transfer community nursing providers as a result of the outcomes of the tender process, will have a seamless transition between providers to ensure continuity of care and minimum disruption to the veteran or widow/widower. The Department has identified, and is currently addressing, a number of gaps in the panel of DVA-contracted community nursing providers in rural and remote areas. Maryborough District Health Service has been invited to apply to fill one of these gaps. Any community nursing provider who is direct sourced must meet all of the requirements of the original RFT to be offered a Deed of Standing Offer to join the panel of DVA-contracted community nursing providers. Yes. 174 174 3665 174 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP 0 Mr Rudd asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs, in writing, on 15 June 2006: Will he provide a breakdown of (a) the $361,283 spent on “food and beverage costs” and (b) the $283,161 spent on “VIP staff costs” by his Department for the Aichi Expo. Will he provide a definition of “VIP staff costs”. 174 Downer, Alexander, MP 4G4 Mayo LP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 Mr Downer —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: These costs were incurred by an Australian company, Australian Pavilion Operations, as part of a contract negotiated with the Department, following an open tendering process, for the staffing and operations of the Australian Pavilion at the Aichi World Expo. Expenditure related to the procurement of food supplies and beverages for 217 events (attended by a total of 10,312 guests) undertaken as part of the Australian Pavilion’s hospitality program. These costs were incurred by an Australian company, Australian Pavilion Operations, as part of a contract negotiated with the Department, following an open tendering process, for the staffing and operations of the Australian Pavilion at the Aichi World Expo. Expenditure related to the provision of staff for the hospitality programme at the Australian Pavilion. “VIP staff costs” refer to those costs incurred by the Australian company, Australian Pavilion Operations, for the provision of services for the hospitality programme at the Australian Pavilion at the Aichi World Expo including Australian chefs, kitchen staff, wait staff and receptionists. 174 174 3666 174 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP 0 Mr Rudd asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs, in writing, on 15 June 2006: Further to the answer to question No. 2855 (Hansard, 27 March, 2006, page 155), will he provide a cost breakdown of the “Entertainment Program” for the Australian Expo at the Aichi Expo. 174 Downer, Alexander, MP 4G4 Mayo LP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 Mr Downer —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: These costs were incurred by the company Jack Morton Worldwide under a contract negotiated with the department, following an open tendering process, for the provision of the arts and entertainment program associated with Australia’s participation in the Aichi Expo. Expenditure related to the arrangement and staging of 750 live performances by Australian artists and entertainers at all major public venues at the Expo site, and at the Australian pavilion, throughout the 185 days of the Expo. 174 174 3676 174 Plibersek, Tanya, MP 83M Sydney ALP 0 Ms Plibersek asked the Minister for Transport and Regional Services, in writing, on 19 June 2006: Do any agencies in the Minister’s portfolio offer childcare to employees; if so, which agencies. In respect of agencies that offer childcare, (a) is the childcare (i) long day care, (ii) outside school hours care, or (iii) another type of care, (b) is the childcare facility located at the agency’s premises; if so, (i) what is the maximum capacity of the childcare facility, (ii) is enrolment at the facility available to children whose parents are not employees of the agency, and (iii) do the children of agency employees receive preferential enrolment over the children of non-employees; if so, what are the provisions of the preference rule; and (c) will the Minister provide a copy of the information sheet given to employees seeking employer assistance with childcare. Are employees given the option of salary-sacrificing childcare offered by the agency. How many employees within each of the Minister’s portfolio agencies have made salary-sacrifice arrangements with the employing agency for childcare expenses. In respect of the employees identified in the response to part (5), how many use on site-childcare. Do any of the Minister’s portfolio agencies have salary-sacrifice agreements relating to childcare with employees who do not use the on-site childcare centre; if so, how many agreements of this type are there? Will the Minister provide a copy of the childcare benefits provisions from the Certified Agreements of each of the Minister’s portfolio agencies. What financial assistance for childcare, other than salary-sacrificed fees, is available to employees (including those on AWAs) of each of the Minister’s portfolio agencies. Have any agencies in the Minister’s portfolio sought private or public rulings from the Australian Taxation Office relating to childcare and fringe benefits tax; if so, when. Do any of the Minister’s portfolio agencies have arrangements with other Government agencies to provide childcare to employees, such as sharing childcare facility costs at a site within, or external to, one of the agencies. 175 Truss, Warren, MP GT4 Wide Bay NATS Minister for Transport and Regional Services 1 Mr Truss —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Airservices Australia subsidises participation in a school holiday program for children of Canberra based employees. The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) pays a Vacation Childcare Subsidy of $5.00 per day to an employee whose child is placed in vacation childcare with a registered provider. No other portfolio agencies offer childcare to employees. In respect of agencies that offer childcare, Airservices Australia offers: a School Holiday Program. The childcare facility is not located at the agency’s premises. Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable A copy of the information sheet provided to employees seeking employer assistance with childcare is attached. No portfolio agencies currently give the option of salary sacrificing child care. No employees within portfolio agencies have made salary-sacrifice arrangements with the employing agency for childcare expenses. No employees use on-site childcare. No portfolio agencies have salary-sacrifice agreements relating to childcare with employees who do not use on-site childcare centres. The CASA Certified Agreement contains the following on child care: “75.1 CASA may pay a Vacation Childcare Subsidy of $5.00 per day to an employee whose child is placed in vacation childcare with a registered provider. The Vacation Childcare Subsidy of $5.00 per child per day is available to employees who have school aged children up to fourteen years of age. 75.2 Ongoing childcare arrangements do not constitute vacation childcare. Vacation childcare service providers are those that offer special leisure type programs for children during school holidays.” No other portfolio agencies Certified Agreements contain child care provisions. Airservices Australia has a subsidy of $14 per child for the school holiday program for children of Canberra based employees. CASA pay a Vacation Childcare Subsidy of $5.00 per day to an employee whose child is placed in vacation childcare with a registered provider as detailed above in (7). No. No. 176 176 3689 176 Plibersek, Tanya, MP 83M Sydney ALP 0 Ms Plibersek asked the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, in writing, on 19 June 2006: Do any agencies in the Minister’s portfolio offer childcare to employees; if so, which agencies. In respect of agencies that offer childcare, (a) is the childcare (i) long day care, (ii) outside school hours care, or (iii) another type of care, (b) is the childcare facility located at the agency’s premises; if so, (i) what is the maximum capacity of the childcare facility, (ii) is enrolment at the facility available to children whose parents are not employees of the agency, and (iii) do the children of agency employees receive preferential enrolment over the children of non-employees; if so, what are the provisions of the preference rule; and (c) will the Minister provide a copy of the information sheet given to employees seeking employer assistance with childcare. Are employees given the option of salary-sacrificing childcare offered by the agency. How many employees within each of the Minister’s portfolio agencies have made salary-sacrifice arrangements with the employing agency for childcare expenses. In respect of the employees identified in the response to part (5), how many use on site-childcare. Do any of the Minister’s portfolio agencies have salary-sacrifice agreements relating to childcare with employees who do not use the on-site childcare centre; if so, how many agreements of this type are there? Will the Minister provide a copy of the childcare benefits provisions from the Certified Agreements of each of the Minister’s portfolio agencies. What financial assistance for childcare, other than salary-sacrificed fees, is available to employees (including those on AWAs) of each of the Minister’s portfolio agencies. Have any agencies in the Minister’s portfolio sought private or public rulings from the Australian Taxation Office relating to childcare and fringe benefits tax; if so, when. Do any of the Minister’s portfolio agencies have arrangements with other Government agencies to provide childcare to employees, such as sharing childcare facility costs at a site within, or external to, one of the agencies. 176 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence 1 Mr Billson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Department of Veterans’ Affairs: No Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable No The Department of Veterans’ Affairs Enterprise Agreement 2006-2008 includes the following provisions relating to child care benefits: Child and Dependant Care 209. Where employees are required by DVA to be away from home outside normal working hours, managers may, in exceptional circumstances, reimburse some or all of the costs of additional family care arrangements provided by appropriate care providers. These arrangements would apply for short-term emergencies. 210. Where an employee has a timely application for leave (recreation, purchased or long service leave) refused or cancelled, the Department will reimburse child care costs of up to $100 per week for leave that coincides with gazetted school holidays or non-gazetted school holidays confirmed in writing by the school. As provided in the DVA Enterprise Agreement. Refer to (7). No No Australian War Memorial: No Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable Not applicable No No 177 177 3692 177 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Treasurer, in writing, on 19 June 2006: How many senior officials in the Minister’s department have a personal leadership coach or trainer. In each of the cases identified in part (1), what is the cost per hour of the leadership coach. What sum has been expended on leadership coaching in the Minister’s Department during the 2005-2006 financial year. 177 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr Costello —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: to (3) As part of Treasury’s training programme, senior executive service officers (SES) have access to one on one training from a panel of service providers on an as needed basis. Eight SES officers used this service. The cost of this training ranged from $330 to $454 per hour, and totalled $17,235 for the 2005-06 financial year. 178 178 3708 178 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP 0 Mr Bowen asked the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, in writing, 19 June 2006. How many senior officials in the Minister’s Department have a personal leadership coach or trainer. In each of the cases identified in part (1), what is the cost per hour of the leadership coach. What sum has been expended on leadership coaching in the Minister’s Department during the 2005-06 financial year. 178 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence 1 Mr Billson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: None currently. N/A $7,934 178 178 3746 178 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 0 Mr Melham asked the Minister for Local Government, Territories and Roads, in writing, on 21 June 2006: Since March 1996, has the Commonwealth Government engaged in any discussions or exchanges with the Government of New South Wales concerning the possible transfer of responsibility for the Jervis Bay Territory back to the State of New South Wales; if so, (a) who participated in the discussions or exchanges, and when did they take place, and (b) what consultation, if any, took place with the residents of the Jervis Bay Territory, including the Wreck Bay Aboriginal Community. What are the benefits to the Commonwealth Government of retaining Jervis Bay as a Federal Territory. What would be the potential benefits to the Commonwealth Government of returning Jervis Bay to the State of New South Wales. For each financial year since 30 June 1996, what was the total cost to the Commonwealth Government of the provision of services to, and administration of, the Jervis Bay Territory. Which services in the Jervis Bay Territory are provided by (a) Australian Capital Territory Government agencies, (b) New South Wales State Government agencies, (c) New South Wales local government bodies; and (d) private contractors. In respect of each of the services identified in part (5), will he identify (a) the specific service provider and (b) the cost of the service for the 2005-06 financial year. What is the current status of the Memorandum of Understanding between the Commonwealth and the Australian Capital Territory Government for the provision of services in relation to the administration of the Jervis Bay Territory. 178 Lloyd, Jim, MP IK6 Robertson LP Minister for Local Government, Territories and Roads 1 Mr Lloyd —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: No. As such, questions part (a) and (b) are not applicable. The Jervis Bay Territory was excised from the State of New South Wales in 1915 to provide the national seat of government (Canberra, ACT) with access to the sea. No detailed financial or policy analysis as to the benefits of ‘retaining’ or ‘returning’ the Jervis Bay Territory has been undertaken by the Australian Government. See question (2). The Department of Transport and Regional Services (the Department) is required to keep finance reports for seven year under the Administrative Functions Disposal Authority (February 2000), issued under Section 24 of the Archives Act 1983. Accordingly, the Department is only able to provide data from 1999-2000 to 2005-2006. The table below provides costs information for the provision of services to, and administration of, the Jervis Bay Territory from 1999-2000 to 2005-2006 by the Department. Costs of services to the Jervis Bay Territory (1) Estimated Additional Costs(2) 1999-2000 $3,511,294 $196,497 2000-2001 $3,542,061 $328,793 2001-2002 $3,548,437 $316,497 2002-2003 $4,773,229 $166,895 2003-2004 $4,052,782 $225,215 2004-2005 $5,178,608 $504,901 2005-2006 $4,662,700 $168,721 (1) Direct costs are net of revenue received from the provision of goods and services to the residents of the Jervis Bay Territory and also exclude the effect non-operating accounting gains and losses, as well as asset increments and decrements. (2) Costs for National Office indirect costs in relation to the Jervis Bay Territory were not kept as separate reporting items by the Department. Accordingly, these costs can not be readily assigned to the provision of services in or administration of the Jervis Bay Territories and have been estimated based on the staffing profiles of teams responsible for Territories services and administration. For answers to Question 5 parts (a) to (d), please see the table below. For answers to Question 6 parts (a) and (b), please see the table below. Service Agency 2005-06 (3) ACT Government Ageing and Disability Services Disability, Housing and Community Services $77,000 Welfare Services Office for Children, Youth and Family Support $493,036 Education Services Department of Education and Training $1,541,086 Court Services Magistrates Court and Tribunals $74,071 Births, deaths, marriages Department of Justice and Community Safety (Registrar General’s Office) $5,657 Public Health Service ACT Health $52,511 Vehicle registration and driver licensing Department of Urban Services $32,670 NSW Government Ambulance Services NSW Ambulance Service $11,000 Community health services South Eastern Sydney and Illawarra Health Service $274,080 Fire management NSW Rural Fire Service $56,378 NSW Local Government Mobile library service Shoalhaven City Council $16,497 Telemetry maintenance Shoalhaven City Council $14,905 Waste collection Shoalhaven City Council $14,360 Domestic animal ranger services Shoalhaven City Council $6,240 Private providers Jervis Bay water treatment Jirgens Contracting $168,807 Jervis Bay sewerage Jirgens Contracting $157,253 Jervis Bay roads and stormwater drains Wreck Bay Enterprises $4,223 Other municipal work - mowing, clearing roadside verges, clearing firebreak areas Wreck Bay Enterprises $5,903 Maintenance of Administration, clinic and school buildings Spotless Property and Services $103,011 Electricity – meter readings and checks, disconnection/reconnection Shoalvac $8,967 Maintenance of electricity infrastructure Integral Energy $103,954 Technical advice on electricity supply and service issues Electric Power Consulting Pty Ltd $19,180 (3) Normal annual services directly to the Jervis Bay community, excluding ad-hoc or one-off items such as intermittent lawn maintenance for Australian Government assets. The Memorandum of Understanding between the Australian Government and the Australian Capital Territory Government for the provision of services in relation to the administration of the Jervis Bay Territory has expired, and is now operating ‘by‑agreement’ between the ACT and Australian Governments. 180 180 3750 180 Windsor, Antony, MP 009LP New England IND 0 Mr Windsor asked the Minister for Health and Ageing, in writing, on 21 June 2006: Can he confirm that the Government’s regulated blood transfusion service, conducted by the Australian Red Cross, is one of the last in the westernised world not to have adopted the use of Filtered Red Cell Transfusion Technology. Is he aware of concerns that continued use of non-filtered transfusions can allow diseases, infections and cancers to be transferred to blood recipients. What is the Government doing to address this issue. 180 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 Mr Abbott —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Australia follows the Council of Europe Guidelines for the preparation, use and quality assurance of blood components. These guidelines provide the gold standard for blood transfusion services and form the basis for many national guidelines within and outside Europe. While not a requirement under the Council of Europe Guidelines, Australia does use Filtered Red Cell Transfusion Technology for removing white blood cells from blood products (a process known as leucodepletion). There are two types of leucodepleted blood products currently available in Australia - red cells and platelets. It is up to individual states and territories to place orders for the specific blood products they require under the national blood supply arrangements. There has been a national trend towards the purchase of leucodepleted products, with nearly all states and territories ordering 100% leucodepleted platelets for 2006-07. I am aware of recent media concerns in relation to benefits of leucodepleted versus non‑leucodepleted products. It is recognised that the removal of white blood cells from blood products provides a number of clinical benefits for patients, including a reduction in adverse transfusion reactions and complications in patients with compromised immune systems. It is a matter for treating physicians to determine the most appropriate use of leucodepleted products based on best clinical outcomes for the patients under their care. The Australian Government supports the purchase of leucodepleted products required by the states and territories by contributing 63% towards their costs. 180 180 3760 180 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 0 Mr Melham asked the Minister for Defence, in writing, on 22 June 2006: Further to the answer to question No. 2094 (Hansard, 1 November 2005, page 110), how many (a) Australian Defence Force personnel, (b) Defence civilian personnel and (c) private contractor personnel are stationed or employed as at 30 June 2006 at each Defence owned or leased property listed in the answer: 181 Nelson, Dr Brendan, MP RW5 Bradfield LP Minister for Defence 1 Dr Nelson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Making such aggregated data publicly available has security implications in relation to Defence sites and capabilities. 181 181 3843 181 Ferguson, Martin, MP LS4 Batman ALP 0 Mr Martin Ferguson asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs, in writing, on 8 August 2006: Is he aware that journalist Nguyen Vu Binh (a) suffers continued imprisonment in Vietnam, (b) is an Amnesty International prisoner of conscience and (c) had previously assailed a border agreement with China and attempted to establish an Anti-Corruption Association; if so, have Australian authorities made any submissions to Vietnamese authorities around issues of adequate food and medical care; if not, given Vietnam’s adherence to relevant International Conventions, will Australia’s concerns regarding this situation be raised. 181 Downer, Alexander, MP 4G4 Mayo LP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 Mr Downer —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: In response to points (a) to (c), yes. We make regular representations to the Vietnamese Government concerning the conditions of Mr Binh’s detention and urging his release. 181 181 3853 181 Gibbons, Steve, MP 83X Bendigo ALP 0 Mr Gibbons asked the Attorney-General, in writing, on 9 August 2006: Is the Attorney-General aware that in September 1993 the Commonwealth Bank claimed exemption from the Freedom of Information Act 1982 under Section 7, Div 1 of Part 1 of Schedule 2. Is the Attorney-General aware that the Commonwealth Bank is not listed in the Freedom of Information Act 1982 as an exempt agency or body. Will the Attorney-General explain how the Commonwealth Bank can claim such exemption. Will the Attorney-General advise how information that would assist in a claim for compensation can be obtained. 181 Ruddock, Philip, MP 0J4 Berowra LP Attorney-General 1 Mr Ruddock —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: In September 1993 the Commonwealth Bank Officers Superannuation Corporation, the Commonwealth Trading Bank, the Commonwealth Savings Bank and the Commonwealth Development Bank were listed in Part I of Schedule 2 to the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (FOI Act). Part I of Schedule 2 to the FOI Act lists bodies which are deemed to be not subject to the FOI Act. Yes. The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) is not subject to the FOI Act as it does not fall within the definition of an ‘agency’ in the FOI Act. Therefore, the CBA is not referred to in the FOI Act or the Schedules to the FOI Act, and it is not required to respond to an FOI request. The bodies referred to in the answer to Part (1) of the question were removed from Part I of Schedule 2 to the FOI Act as a result of the Commonwealth Bank Sale Act 1995. No. It would not be appropriate for the Attorney-General to provide legal advice in relation to such matters. 182 182 3885 182 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 0 Mr Fitzgibbon asked the Minister for Revenue and Assistant Treasurer, in writing, on 10 August 2006: What is the estimated current stock of capital losses released, but not yet offset against capital gains, for Capital Gains Tax purposes? 182 Dutton, Peter, MP 00AKI Dickson LP Minister for Revenue and Assistant Treasurer 1 Mr Dutton —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The amount of net capital losses carried forward is published in Taxation Statistics. The latest edition of Taxation Statistics relates to the 2003-04 income year, which states that total net capital losses carried forward is $7.5 billion for personal income taxpayers, $49.6 billion for companies and $38.9 billion for trusts. 182 182 3890 182 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 0 Mr Fitzgibbon asked the Treasurer, in writing, on 10 August 2006: In relation to Table 4 in Budget Paper No. 1, what sum was collected through (a) petrol and diesel excise and (b) GST on petrol and diesel for each State and Territory for the (i) 2004-05 and (ii) 2005-06 financial year. 182 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr Costello —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Data on excise collections for petrol and diesel by State and Territory are not available. Data for GST collections by commodity (such as petrol and diesel) are also not available. 182 182 3898 182 Murphy, John, MP 83D Lowe ALP 0 Mr Murphy asked the Minister for Industry, Tourism and Resources, in writing, on 10 August 2006: Is he aware of comments made by Mr Bob Gordon, Executive Director of Renewable Fuels Australia, that: “Caltex, Shell and BP seemed unlikely to meet their first-year target under a voluntary agreement to lift bio-fuel consumption to 350 million litres by 2010”; if not, why not. Can he be certain that Australia will meet its target of producing 350 million litres of bio-fuels by 2010; if so, why; if not, why not. 182 Macfarlane, Ian, MP WN6 Groom LP Minister for Industry, Tourism and Resources 1 Mr Ian Macfarlane —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: Yes, I am aware of the comments. On 22 December 2005, the Government released its Biofuels Action Plan, which consists of individual Action Plans drawn up by the major oil companies, members of the Independent Petroleum Group, and the major retailers. These set out volumetric goals and business plans, including marketing and retail strategies, for both ethanol and biodiesel blended fuels. Based on the plans submitted, the industry expects to exceed the Government’s biofuels target of at least 350 megalitres by 2010. The Government is monitoring the progress towards the biofuels target and I am confident that the industry is on track to achieve it by 2010. In 2006 there have been a number of new contracts that have been signed, and announcements made by the oil majors and the biofuels industry. The level of activity by the industry, in conjunction with the Government’s new and existing support for biofuels, indicates that the industry is well placed to achieve the 2010 target. 183 183 3927 183 Kerr, Duncan, MP RH4 Denison ALP 0 Mr Kerr asked the Treasurer, in writing, on 14 August 2006: Is he aware that at least some of the information booklets accompanying the 2006 Census contained questions which did not match the Census form. Can he state whether all of the booklets were incorrect or only some; if the latter, how many. Will these errors result in incorrect data being collected; if so, how will this be remedied to ensure that accurate information is eventually compiled. Will additional human and financial resources be provided because of the additional work this will require. 183 Costello, Peter, MP CT4 Higgins LP Treasurer 1 Mr Costello —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: to (4) There are two main information booklets accompanying the 2006 Census forms. One is entitled the Household Guide (blue coloured cover) which was delivered with Household Forms. The other is entitled the Personal Guide (orange coloured folder) and was delivered with Personal Forms. The Australian Statistician has advised that some Personal Guides were delivered with Household Forms, which may have given rise to a perception that some information in the booklet did not match the form. The Australian Statistician further advises that no booklets are known to be incorrect, this should not result in any incorrect information being collected and that no additional work will be required.