The SPEAKER (12:01): I have received a message from the Senate informing the House that Senator Siewert has been discharged from the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services.

Mr SIMPKINS (Cowan) (12:03): Before my comments were interrupted by other parliamentary business in the last session I was speaking about Britney and how after her school graduation last year she and her mother became in need of additional further support after school. Her mother works as a nurse and she needs more support hours so that she can look after Britney and provide for the rest of the family. Most of that support comes from the state, but it does highlight the need for the Prime Minister to stop her politically driven fights with the states and seek bilateral agreements as everyone needs to be on board to drive change and deliver for all those with disabilities such as Britney, Mitchell and their families.

Throughout this debate, the government has repeatedly suggested that they are the party of the NDIS because the NDIS represents Labor values. But I remind the parliament that abandoning those in need is not the policy of any political party. The coalition supported the work of the Productivity Commission. We supported the $1 billion in the last budget and the five launch sites, and the agreement for the New South Wales rollout, and we support this legislation. The Leader of the Opposition has also demonstrated his personal commitment to those with disabilities by dedicating the 2012 Pollie Pedal charity bike ride to Carers Australia; $540,000 was raised.

An economy well managed by the federal government can deliver the NDIS in the time frame, but not this government. They talk about their values with the usual sanctimony, but in the end their spending decisions have damaged the ability of this nation to have an NDIS on time, and they must be held to account. Talk is cheap; the NDIS is not, and it will fall to a better government to deliver—and that better government, I hope, will be delivered soon when the Australian people reject the Labor Party.

I thank those constituents of mine who have come forward to tell me of their circumstances and to impress upon me their needs. What I would say is that under Tony Abbott we want to deliver the change required, but because of the wasteful spending of this government there is now more spending on interest payments each year than would be required to fully fund the NDIS. This Labor government has spent beyond the means of this country, and their recklessness is now holding back a comprehensive and effective NDIS. To cover up their inability to fund this worthwhile and necessary NDIS, they have picked fights with state governments to develop a smokescreen and deceive the people of this country. Australians should choose a Tony Abbott led government at the election to get this job done.

Mr MATHESON (Macarthur) (12:05): Today I rise to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012 and the positive benefits it will have for the people of Macarthur. I believe this is one of the most important pieces of legislation that has ever been and that ever will be spoken about in this parliament.

Since becoming the member for Macarthur I have fought hard to support the charity groups and organisations in my electorate who support those living with a disability and their families. These families should have access to the funding and support services they need to ensure the best quality of life possible for their loved ones. The NDIS will provide this much-needed support by providing the funding and support services they need. We hope this will in turn help them join the workforce and become active members of our communities.

The NDIS will empower individuals and reduce red tape for people living with a disability and their carers. It will provide funding to individuals and organisations to help people with a disability participate more fully in our communities through things like aids, equipment, supported accommodation and personal care. It is my strong belief that the financial support and assistance for these people living with a disability should not be the responsibility of the parents and carers, who already provide hands-on support to their loved ones 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The added pressure of fundraising for equipment and fighting for more services and financial support should not be left to these families who have so much on their plates already. The sad truth is that the lack of funding and support can put even more pressure and stress on these families and sometimes pull them apart. The NDIS will provide funding in the form of individual support packages for people living with a disability and the possibility of some block funding for different groups or organisations to support these Australians and their families. In my electorate the cracks are definitely showing. It is very obvious that our current system of support for people living with a disability in this country is not working. In Macarthur, people living with a disability and their families are relying heavily on the support of several charities, community groups and organisations who work hard to continually raise money to provide this vital support.

Many times in this place I have mentioned these groups and the fantastic work they do in my community to help those in need. These include KU Starting Points, an educational support organisation that offers a range of early intervention programs for children with disabilities and their families; the Right Start Foundation, a group of local parents who raise money and awareness to provide support for local families living with Down syndrome; the Kids of Macarthur Health Foundation, an organisation dedicated to improving health care for every child living in Macarthur by raising money and advocating for children's health services and research across the region; Society 389, an organisation that provides financial support and assistance for families of children with disabilities and special needs; Macarthur Disability Services, a not-for-profit organisation that provides support for people living with a disability, people with a mental illness, the aged, families and carers in the Macarthur region; Macarthur Temporary Family Care, an organisation that provides support and high-quality care programs for children of families in crisis and respite care for children and adults who have a physical or intellectual disability; NOVA Employment, offering specialist job-seeking assistance and post-placement support for people living with a disability; and Northcott Disability Services, one of New South Wales's leading service providers for people living with a disability, providing support and services direct to their clients as well as carers and family members.

All of these groups provide vital support to residents in my community and rely heavily on community fundraisers, state and federal government grants and hardworking volunteers to do the great work they do in my electorate. Many of these groups have played an active role in the Every Australian Counts campaign to raise awareness of the NDIS in Macarthur. I have attended many of these events and heard firsthand from those families who believe the NDIS would have a huge impact on their lives. While speaking about these groups in parliament I have also shared the stories of many children and families in my electorate who have relied on their support. One of these children was Brittney McKenna, who was born with the heartbreaking disease spinal muscular atrophy. Sadly, Brittney passed away in 2008 at just nine years of age. When I met with Brittney's parents last year they mentioned the lack of funding and respite for families living with SMA and the added stress this caused to their family. There was limited support offered to Brittney's family and no respite because she was classified as 'too high medical support'. Brittney's mum was proficient in all her medical needs including her IV medications. In between all the years spent in hospital, the 41 surgeries and the 24-hour intensive care for their daughter, Debbie and Andrew also had to do their own fundraising for equipment and home modifications to support Brittney. They told me that life by the hospital bed included a constant struggle with red tape, bureaucracy, budgets and politics in an attempt to get some support. My hope for the NDIS is that no family in Macarthur or anywhere else in Australia should ever have to experience what this family went through whilst trying to care for a sick child. Brittney's longest single admission in hospital was 21 months. Her dad, Andrew, was working interstate to support the family financially and her mum, Debbie, was by her hospital bed 24 hours a day. Their son Liam was passed around family and friends to give him some stability and routine. With the help of the community the family raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to give Brittney the life she deserved. It is no wonder they were left financially, physically and emotionally exhausted.

In recent years I have become very close to many families in my electorate who love and support someone with a disability. That is why this issue is very close to my heart. It is no secret that I am a big supporter of the Right Start Foundation, a charity group that supports local families living with Down syndrome. The foundation was started by a group of mums who have children living with Down syndrome. These women continually fight for funding and support and are now raising money to establish Australia's first Down syndrome specific centre in Macarthur to ensure children and families receive all the therapy and support they need for the right start in life. These parents really are an inspirational group of people. Not only do they provide so much love and support for their own children; they work hard to raise awareness and to fundraise to support others living with Down syndrome. My hope is that the NDIS will give these children the support they deserve and greater opportunities to support themselves as they grow older.

Another reason the NDIS is very close to my heart is that one of my very own staff members has a son with a disability. Ben Upfill was born with one of the most severe forms of Angelman syndrome, a rare neurogenetic disorder which causes severe intellectual disability, speech impediment, sleep disturbance, unstable jerky movements of the limbs and seizures. Ben's Mum, Carla, his dad, Dave, and siblings, Joel and Olivia, give Ben all the love and support they can as a family to make sure he has the best quality of life possible. Unless you have a child with a severe disability it is hard to imagine what it is like to provide such intensive care to a child at home whilst working to pay the bills and provide for your disabled child and the rest of your family. Just a few years ago the Macarthur charity Society 389 could see the family was in need of a new car to help them transport Ben in his wheelchair. Through a charity night more than $45,000 was raised to buy the family a car to make life a little easier for them.

My point is that families, like this one, who are caring for a child with a disability, are very lucky to have the support of many charities made up of volunteers to help them raise money to support their children. For some the support of these charities is a godsend, because without them these families would be forced to make a choice between supporting their disabled child and paying the bills and putting food on the table. Unfortunately the resources of these charities and organisations can become quite stretched, with so many people in my community needing their support. That is why the National Disability Insurance Scheme is so important and why it is so important that we get it right.

We need a new system of support based on need. The person living with the disability and their family or carers need to be at the centre of the scheme and in charge, able to choose the support, aid, equipment, and service providers of their choice. This is the vision of the National Disability Insurance Scheme which I wholeheartedly support. The coalition supports the National Disability Insurance Scheme because we know that the current system of support for Australians living with a disability is not working. This is why the concept of the NDIS has gained momentum over the past five years. In my own electorate, groups like Macarthur Disability Services, Northcott Disability Services, Macarthur District Temporary Family Care, Campbelltown, Camden and Wollondilly councils, Sunnyfield Independence, the Macarthur Disability Network and Macarthur Diversity Services have all worked together to raise public awareness about the importance of the scheme and show Macarthur's support for its successful implementation.

In October last year I attended the Macarthur NDIS Big DisabiliTEA to hear from these groups and show my support for the NDIS. It was a great day with many families from across my electorate there to share their stories and show their support. Events like this one are very important. Not only did it raise awareness for the scheme but it was to me like a cry for help from these Macarthur families who love their children so much and want to see them given the support they need now and into the future. So many of the parents I spoke to fear what will happen to their children once mum and dad are no longer around to look after them. Yes, many of them have siblings who love them and will take on the role of carer when it is their turn, but it is important that these siblings are given the support they need to carry on this role.

I believe that the NDIS will give many parents peace of mind that even when they are no longer around to provide for their children the Australian government will ensure they have access to the support services and funding they need. And of course it is not just Macarthur residents who will benefit from the scheme. It is estimated that 7,500 young Australians who require full-time care are currently living in aged-care facilities and more than 700,000 young Australians are being cared for at home by their loved ones.

There are so many young people and so many Australian families who need our help. It is our job to make sure that they do not slip through the cracks. Perfecting the NDIS gives us an opportunity to do just that. This is why the coalition has supported the initial work by the Productivity Commission, which confirmed that our current system of support simply is not good enough. We support the National Disability Insurance Scheme and believe it requires bipartisan support from both sides of government.

While we supported the $1 billion promised in last year's budget, it was disappointing that this figure fell short of what the Productivity Commission estimated would be needed in the first four years of the scheme by $3 billion. I would hope to see the Treasurer account for this shortfall in his coming budget. The coalition has also supported the five launch sites for the NDIS and the agreement between the Commonwealth and the New South Wales governments for a full statewide rollout after the launch in the Hunter.

We believe that the NDIS can be delivered within the time frame recommended by the Productivity Commission by a sensible government that manages it well. We are ready to work with the government to see an NDIS delivered as soon as possible and we believe that we must get this right the first time around, with a very high level of consultation and attention to the detail from now until its full implementation.

So far we have heard very little in regard to how each individual will be assessed and who will be eligible for the scheme. I would like to know if the NDIS is going to extend to those who might look healthy from the outside but are struggling with a terminal illness. For example, in Macarthur there are more than 80 people living with cystic fibrosis, a genetic condition that effects more than 3,000 people in Australia. The condition is life threatening, and daily physio treatment, regular hospital stays and life-threatening lung infections can limit a person suffering from CF and their carers from leading a full and productive life.

Cystic Fibrosis Australia has put forward a submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee in regard to the NDIS. In the submission the organisation has asked that the NDIS framework include people living with cystic fibrosis. It has asked that the scheme provide the full range of equipment used by people with CF, including parts and servicing for nebulisers, oxygen saturation machines, mouthpieces and inhalers. They would also like to see the inclusion of non-PBS medicines, both dietary and other supplements, as well as travel and accommodation allowances to attend specialist clinics. The submission pushes for a needs assessment and support service for carers and the inclusion of preventative services such as exercise programs and equipment for CF sufferers. These are just some of the things needed by people living with cystic fibrosis that could be provided under the NDIS.

I am also concerned about the eligibility for residents in my electorate who are over 65 years of age. Will they be eligible to benefit from the NDIS? There are many unanswered questions that must be worked through properly. This is why the coalition has called for the establishment of a joint parliamentary committee to be chaired by both sides of politics to oversee the establishment and implementation of the NDIS. This would lock in all parties and allow us to work through the design and eligibility together.

I find it disappointing that the government has knocked back the coalition's call for bipartisanship on so many occasions. I believe that the implementation of the NDIS should be placed above politics. I think that this is a time when we must come together to ensure that we get it right for all people living with a disability in our electorates. There is no reason for one side of politics to take on such an important piece of legislation on its own.

I believe that if we work together we can implement one of the best disability policies in the world, one that ensures no person living with a disability falls through the cracks. If the scheme is to succeed it will need the support of all levels of government in all states and territories across this country. If it is well-implemented, the scheme will ensure people with a disability have the support they need today and into the future.

I spend a lot of time with families in my electorate who have children living with a disability. I am continuously inspired by their positive attitude and their dedication to breaking down barriers and raising awareness of their child's condition. But no matter how amazing the parent or the child might be, raising a child with additional needs can be extremely challenging and isolating. That is why I believe that it is imperative that we work together on this one, because I want nothing more than the best for my community and those Macarthur families who will benefit from this scheme. I wholeheartedly support a National Disability Insurance Scheme for the people of Macarthur and the people of Australia. I hope that as a parliament we can work together to ensure the scheme is rolled out as effectively and as soon as possible.

Mr HUNT (Flinders) (12:19): In addressing the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012, let me begin by giving my wholehearted support to the bill and to the broader underlying principle. I want to speak briefly today across three fronts: the humanity behind the bill; the principles to be enshrined in the bill; and the issue of supported accommodation, which, for those living in the Hastings area as well as across the electorate of Flinders and across Australia, is a critical element of care and treatment for those who have some of the most challenging disabilities that we face in our country.

I want to begin by looking at the humanity, with people that I know. There is a young fellow, Tom McGann, whom I have known for over a decade. His situation is that has had:

… a neuromuscular disability since birth which means I have never walked and have been in a motorised wheelchair from age 4.

He is now a young adult. He went through mainstream schooling at Mount Martha Primary School and then secondary school. He is a joy to be with and he is an absolute source of pride to his parents. These days, he is studying IT at TAFE and his goal is to have a career in the field. He has been involved with Boccia, a Paralympic sport, and with Channel 31, where he has an on-camera role.

He has also been involved with Beyond Disability. Beyond Disability is a local self-help group created to assist those with disabilities to have access to the appropriate technology. It was started by a magnificent local constituent, Richard Stubbs, who was a very successful banker. He developed a severe neuromuscular condition and lost much of his mobility. His response was not to feel sorry for himself but to establish a practical self-help group named Beyond Disability. I have watched as their charitable work has grown and expanded. It has provided a window to the world, an avenue and means of communication, self-respect, creativity and fulfilment.

Out of that process has come Tom McGann. Tom has been determined to live the best life he can lead. He is really a shining example to me of a life well lived. So it is a real honour to have known him since he was such a young age and to have watched him develop through primary and secondary school and then enter tertiary education as a fine young Australian. His story is powerful because it is an example of what we can be and how we can overcome challenges and be our best selves. He has done that despite great difficulties, with the support of stunningly helpful and committed parents. In many cases, family circumstances just do not allow these steps forward. That is why we come to the issue of a national disability insurance scheme.

I saw another example only a couple of weekends ago, when the Disabled Surfers Association of Australia held a disabled surf event at Point Leo on the Mornington Peninsula. My understanding is that there were over 50 participants. I was there in a wetsuit as one of the support crew—

Dr Southcott: Shameless!

Mr HUNT: Yes! I gave my little bit. There were 50-plus participants who have disability, and they had the time of their lives. Some were a little bit frightened, but you could see their fear being overcome as something new came into their lives. You could see the joy—they were just thrilled to be in the water. By my count, there were over 200 volunteers there. It was one of the most uplifting events you could ever witness. It was Australians supporting Australians, locals supporting locals and families supporting families, in the best of all possible ways.

Many of these people and their families have endured extraordinary challenges and difficulties. Whether it is Tom McGann or the crew at the Disabled Surfers Association of Australia or the people for whom they are caring; whether it is Richard Stubbs or another local constituent, Alan Lachman, who, in order to give his daughter, Francesca, the best support he could, helped establish the Insight school for those with visual challenges, blindness and other forms of eyesight disability; whether it is those working in the autism space—and we have pledged to work with Senator Mitch Fifield, our shadow minister responsible, towards a national autism summit; whether it is any of those or the many other areas in which challenges abound, it is time for a National Disability Insurance Scheme.

The principle behind this is that, if you were designing a budget from scratch—if you had a blank sheet of paper—supporting those with disabilities in the best possible way would be right at the top of the list of measures because it is an expression of our humanity, an expression of decency and an expression of what we do. But, as we have developed in different ways over different times, we come to the point where we are today, with a different budgetary position.

So what we have to do now, I think, is adopt two fundamental principles: firstly, flexibility of delivery and, secondly, a non-bureaucratic model. The critical principle of flexibility of delivery is that we find the right solution for the right person. Each person's needs will be different. That may mean that for some it is about respite, for others it is about ongoing care and for others it is about material assistance such as customisation of a car or other vehicle or provision of computer equipment. Our approach should be flexibility, and that is what I think is critical—a flexible approach.

That leads to the non-bureaucratic model. I am very heartened by what I have seen come out of Western Australia. I think the Barnett model of flexibility is non-bureaucratic and an extremely important way forward. I think we should all look to the way in which Western Australia has provided a model. At the end of the day, we want to achieve a simple, flexible, non-bureaucratic model which is not about employing lots and lots of public servants but about giving individual families, carers and those suffering from disabilities the ability to meet their most significant needs.

That leads me to my third and final point, which is about supported accommodation. The Hastings model, as it is sometimes called, of small supported accommodation started just across the road from my office. Families such as Norm and Dizzy Carlyon, Joy and David Jarman, and Karl and Marie Hell—Karl has now passed on—came together to say that we needed a small, local supported accommodation centre. That was funded and it is largely built, but I have to say, with great respect to the Commonwealth, that nothing has happened in the best part of 18 months. The buildings have been frozen and the Commonwealth has not intervened to ensure that a building issue is resolved. I would respectfully say to the minister: now is the time to intervene, bring together the different parties and make sure that this building dispute is ended. It is a great model and one which I would like to see as part of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, but this case in Hastings can and should be resolved so we can get young people into supported accommodation. They are waiting; they are desperate; their families have visited. So I say to the minister: please intervene. This is an early example of the positive things that can be done by a national scheme. It is a pilot, an exemplar and a model. I ask for your help.

Having said that, when I think of Tom McGann, disabled surf Australia, Richard Stubbs, the work that Alan Lachman has done and those parents of children with autism, for whom we did our walk two years ago, they need and, above all else deserve, our support. As a parliament, we can be our best selves by supporting them. I commend the notion of a joint parliamentary committee. We will, as a parliament—as a unified group of people—continue to work towards a model which ultimately is not about bureaucracy nor tight rules; it is about finding the right solution to the needs of each family with a significant disability so that those families and those with the disability can be their best selves.

Mr TEHAN (Wannon) (12:30): I rise today to give my whole hearted support to the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. It is an important bill. It shows that, as a country, we can be compassionate and fair, and we can look after those who are less fortunate—who, due to circumstances out of their control, have had things happen to them that mean that they will need assistance and help throughout their lives. As a society, we can recognise that and do what needs to be done.

As a young boy growing up, my parents every year took me along to support the Mansfield Autism Centre. They held a ball every year. It was put on to raise money for that centre, and as a young boy I came across the parents, the carers and the children who were in the centre, and I got an understanding of all the issues that they were dealing with. It has meant that as I have gone through life I have had a great deal of compassion and sympathy, but above all else I have had a great deal of admiration for everyone who works in the disability sector and for all those people with disabilities as they go about their lives.

As a parliament we have a real opportunity to make a difference with this bill, and that is what we should do. Only three or four months ago I was reminded of the time that I spent as a young boy trying to help and support the Mansfield Autism Centre, when I met with the Ararat Disability Parent Support Group. I went along to talk to the Ararat Disability Parent Support Group but also, more importantly, to listen. While I was there—I was there for a couple of hours—I heard some of the most compelling testimony that you would hear in your life as to why we need a national disability insurance scheme.

One lady in particular read out a four-page letter about the difficulties that she had had getting respite for her child. It was an incredibly moving letter. I do not think anyone in the room—and there were 30 or 40 of us—had a dry eye by the time she has finished. The sad thing about her letter was that it showed clearly the difficulties that people face in this area. More often than not it is not because anyone sets out to deliberately cause problems or issues; it is just that the system is broken. It is having a huge personal toll on those who are dealing with this system. That is why we need to implement this bill. We need to implement the trials that are part of this bill and we need to get on with making sure that the National Disability Insurance Scheme becomes a reality.

I would like to take the time to thank the opposition shadow minister for disabilities, carers and the voluntary sector for the time that he has spent in my electorate explaining what the scheme would mean to our local communities. He has visited Portland, Warrnambool, Avoca and Maryborough. I am sure—he has said so—he would more than willing to come back and meet with other groups to explain how important this NDIS scheme is. I have met with more groups across the electorate, and everywhere I go all I can think is that the case is even more compelling for this scheme.

I would like to congratulate those who have campaigned for the NDIS. I had a meeting on 8 September 2011 with Jacqui Pearce and Lynn Foreman, who came to my office to promote the NDIS. Lynn Foreman in particular went beyond the call of duty to ensure that she got to that meeting and was able, once again, to make me aware of the need for the NDIS. She tried to get down by train. In the end she could not, and ended up having to come in a taxi—which shows once again the difficulties people with disabilities face on a daily basis. But, once again, they were able to put an extremely compelling case—and that has been done across the nation, to all MPs and to all senators, to both state and federal parliamentarians, because we are going to require the cooperation of those two levels of government to ensure that the NDIS is rolled out and rolled out properly.

I would also like to take this opportunity to mention Bill Shorten because, in his previous role as the parliamentary secretary for disabilities, he spent a lot of time publicising the need for the NDIS. In a show of bipartisanship I would like to recognise the contribution that Bill Shorten has made.

I would also like to recognise the contribution that the Productivity Commission has made. It is not easy getting the parameters right around implementing such a thing as the NDIS. This is serious reform and it needs to be done in a way that we know will work. There are people whose hopes are dependant on the NDIS and its successful rollout, and the Productivity Commission to date has done an outstanding job in setting the framework as to how that should take place.

When we talk about bipartisanship I think we should note—and this will be as important on our side, if we win the next election, as it is currently to the government—that we need to do everything we can as a parliament to make this a bipartisan step. This is something that all sides of this House should be able to get together and work on, to make sure that what we get is an excellent product. Neither side of this place has the wherewithal and the brains to ensure that every single element of this is rolled out to perfection. What we need to do is to make sure that we cooperate, that we work together, that we ensure that by putting our minds together collectively we do the best we can—and I think it is beholden to the government to look at what it can do to ensure that the NDIS is a bipartisan initiative, as much as it will be on this side if we win the next election. That is something that I will be extremely keen to see in the months and years ahead, as we continue to roll out the scheme.

There are going to be important aspects of the scheme that we are going to have to make sure we get right. The previous speaker, Mr Hunt, expressed some of these aspects. There are two in particular that I would like to pick up on; one is that we are going to have to make sure that there is flexibility of delivery. There cannot be a one-size-fits-all approach to this, because it will not work—across disabilities there are unique circumstances. When it comes to how this is rolled out, and the services delivered between metropolitan, regional and rural communities, a one-size-fits-all approach will not work. So we have to ensure that there is proper flexibility in the system. If we do not do that, then once again we will see people battling the system, and they have been doing that for too long. That is what the NDIS is all about: trying to prevent the bureaucracy and the red tape from sucking the life out of people as they try to get help for their loved ones. We have to make sure that the system we put in place is flexible across disabilities, but it must also be flexible across communities, whether they are metropolitan, regional or rural.

We also have to ensure as best we can that red tape is minimised, because nothing strangles more than red tape. For people who are emotionally dealing with incredibly difficult circumstances, the last thing they need is having that emotion added to by having constant battles with red tape. Often the red tape is well-intentioned. It is put there to ensure that delivery occurs according to how the system is legislated, but we have to make sure that, in putting this system in place, what we want to see occur is very clear and we have to make sure it allows people to get on with caring for their loved ones.

The time has come for this piece of legislation. It is something we need to see as quickly as possible. When I have met with groups across my electorate, there has been one uniform and compelling thing that they have said to me, and that is that they want to see compassion from their government—they call it 'their government', and they should call it 'their government'. They want to see an understanding, they want to see that people are listening and, above all else, they want to see a government which is prepared to step in and help them deal with the issues that they are dealing with on a daily basis. That is what this piece of legislation will enable. We still have a long way to go. We have to make sure that the trials are done properly; we have to make sure that we learn lessons from the trials; we have to make sure that the feedback from the trials will feed into the final NDIS; and we have to make sure that the establishment of the NDIS is done in such a way that we can continue to have bipartisan support for the model. These are going to be the challenges that we are all going to have to meet as we go forward.

I would like to say this: failure on this piece of legislation is not an option. Once you have met with community groups, once you have met with disability carers groups and once you have seen what these people are currently going through, you have to keep in the back of your mind that failure is not an option. They are doing wonderful work. They are dealing with things that we have to make sure we comprehend. We have to compassionately show that we understand and want to lend a hand. If we do not do that as a national parliament, we will fail. I do not want that resting upon my shoulders, as I am sure no-one else in this parliament wants it resting on theirs. I give my wholehearted support to this piece of legislation. We still have a lot of hard work to do, but we have to make sure that we do it and we get it right.

Mr CROOK (O'Connor) (12:44): I also welcome the opportunity to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. I agree with many statements made by members of this House, on both sides of politics, and I would particularly like to endorse the comments of the member for Wannon. I have enjoyed the non-politicised, passionate words from members such as the member for Gippsland and my friend the member for Denison. As members are all too aware, the current disability support system is unfair, underfunded and disjointed. The current system fails to give people with a disability proper choice about their future and gives no guarantee of access to appropriate support.

Australia is a fortunate, wealthy country where most Australians enjoy freedom of choice and boundless opportunities. However, one of the largest minority groups, people living with a disability, are not afforded basic rights and are not protected by the social safety net that protects most Australians. In many cases Australia has failed to provide people living with a disability with the very basic commitments of fairness and human rights. It is sad to hear that by most empirical measurements Australians living with disabilities and their carers are among the most disadvantaged groups in Australia. All Australians deserve a fair go. In this respect, these changes are long overdue. I believe we will look back at this time as an important crossroad in our nation.

There have been many times in this 43rd Parliament when I have been embarrassed about the politicking, infighting and obsession with party room antics that occur at the expense of our constituents, but today I am proud. I am proud to be a member of this parliament when both sides of politics are working together to improve the lives of Australians and to give people with a disability a right to realise their potential—a right that should be afforded to all Australians.

In such an important debate, I feel it is important to stop and make some acknowledgements. As members have done before me, I take this opportunity to acknowledge the carers of people with disabilities—to all the O'Connor electorate carers who I have had the pleasure of meeting and all those who I am yet to meet and, indeed, all carers in Australia. I acknowledge the enduring love and lifelong commitment that carers give to their disabled family members and friends. I acknowledge the huge amount of work that carers undertake and their willingness to participate in vital, unpaid work that benefits the entire community. I acknowledge the integral role that carers play in the Australian health system and in the Australian economy. I acknowledge and congratulate many of those carers who have done so much work to put this debate on the national agenda for those who cannot.

I also acknowledge the professional staff who work in the O'Connor electorate and I acknowledge the professional staff who work in high-care facilities, nursing homes and schools throughout Australia. Thank you for your tireless work. It not only improves the lives of many individuals and their families but contributes to the social fabric of our regional communities.

Finally, I acknowledge all of those people living with a disability in the O'Connor electorate. I acknowledge all those who joined me for a morning tea in Kalgoorlie and to all those who joined Wendy Duncan, at the time the member of the Legislative Council in Western Australia, for a DisabiliTEA in Esperance. In particular, I acknowledge the special people from my electorate who have taken the time to share their stories with me and to contribute to this debate.

Throughout 2012 I heard from many constituents on this issue—some with disabilities, some carers, some support service professionals, and many community members who thought that people with a disability deserved a fairer go. As members have done before me, I would like to share a couple of stories. It is most important to remember that these stories reflect what it is like every single day for many Australians. One such story that sticks in my mind is from Kathy and Greg Jones in Narrogin in regional Western Australia. Kathy and Greg are 60-year-old parents of a son with cerebral palsy. Their son is in a wheelchair and is fully reliant on his parents for everything. He is unable to walk or talk. Kathy and Greg, like many committed parents with a disabled child, often wonder, 'What happens when we are unable to care for our child? Once we pass away, where will our child live? How will he be looked after?' Without the NDIS, the answer to these questions and to many more is too difficult to contemplate by any parent. Kathy and Greg have commented that, once they know that the NDIS is on the way, they may begin to sleep at night again.

Another example is Jill, a tireless worker in disability support services in the city of Albany on the south-west coast of my electorate. Jill has described the astonishing amount of stress that families are put under when they are unable to access proper support for their disabled child. Under the current system, families have to bare their souls and participate in a very crisis-driven application process for support. Jill knows of families that simply cannot cope with the stress of not having support for their child. Some families have ended up with mental illnesses and within the mental health system from the stress. This, in fact, compounds the problem because, as we all know, mental health has its issues around funding and service delivery, particularly in regional and remote Australia.

Other families have considered handing their child back to the Department of Child Protection. This a notion that, to most, is incomprehensible and a decision that must be devastating. These levels of stress are echoed by participants in the Productivity Commission inquiry who noted that parents regularly contemplate suicide as they have been unable to find adequate support for their child.

My next story is of a very special Goldfields woman who gave me information about the NDIS in 2010 at my campaign launch in Kalgoorlie prior to being an elected member of this House. I have known Jo Russell for many, many years. For Jo the NDIS has been a very long time coming. Jo is the mother of three children and her eldest and youngest, Daniel and Megan, both have autism. Jo has dealt with disability service providers for over 20 years and I trust her when she says that the problem with disability care is that the system was not created and modelled by those who actually use it. I cannot summarise some of the information Jo has provided to me, so will read Jo's comments. She stated:

Too often, we have to repeat our stories over and over, only to be told we are not 'eligible' or that funding is insufficient for our needs. We have to create and recreate our stories of stress, misery, financial insufficiency and difficulties. Absolutely humiliating and hardly uplifting.

We are sick to the back teeth of service providers and organisations 'assessing' us, and determining what they feel is best for us.

Truthfully, it makes me want to vomit—so tired of the emphasis of service providers on doing things for and 'to' people, rather than 'with' people.

Disability assistance is seen more as a charity model—the terms used in disability language is revolting—we are known as 'clients'—actually we are PEOPLE, thank you!

Jo continued:

THEIR words include things like victim, support, care, crisis, assimilation, programmes, behaviours.

But the language of disability should include words like empowerment, rights and participation, choice, control, and self-determination, dignity, and assurance.

It is critical that we have a system that supports people to make their own decisions, chart their own course, call the shots, but needs to be accompanied by appropriate checks and balances on outcomes. And that system is the NDIS.

Jo added:

So that people with disabilities and their carers have the RIGHT to build the best life THEY can, through their own design and choice, with the help that is needed to get there. This is the NDIS.

Jo, I could not have put that any better myself and I am proud today to stand in this House and read your words. Jo is a strong advocate for not only her own children but also every other family or individual touched by disability in the Goldfields region. Keep up the amazing work you do, Jo. I am totally bewildered by how you do it all on two hours sleep a day.

On a personal note I have a niece with Down syndrome and have seen firsthand the unexpected difficulties that can arise for families including my own. Tess is a twin and she and Emma are now both 11 years old. My wife and I babysit Tess from time to time, and getting her out of the pool is like pulling teeth. Tess does not let me watch the footy when the Dockers are playing because her mum and dad have brainwashed her into only watching the Eagles. That is something that really bemuses me. Tess attends a wonderful school in Kalgoorlie which can cater for her needs and that of her classmates. Again I touch on the amazing work that carers and teachers offer our young students with disabilities. Tess is a great kid, with so much energy, enthusiasm and love to give. However, I know the NDIS will give her just that much more support for her to continue to grow as the gorgeous young lady she already is.

These stories fill me with mixed emotions. The first is to do with the love that families have within them. The second is disappointment that the current system has failed so many Australians. However, the strongest emotion must be the one of hope in all of us for the change that the NDIS promises to so many families and hope that this place can work to support people with disabilities. As politicians, as leaders, as community members, as members of families, we have a responsibility to work together to ensure the implementation of this program without letting politics get in the way. This cannot and must not be politicised.

The unavoidable truth is that this program needs both sides of politics to work together. Although the key players from government and the opposition should be congratulated on bringing this issue to the floor, the success of the NDIS will require ongoing collaboration, non-partisan commitment and funding security. The NDIS will require funding from this government and from future governments, even in a tight fiscal environment. The NDIS will require commitment to its implementation from this government and from future governments. For this reason alone, the amendment moved by the opposition leader should be absolutely endorsed. The most important issue in this debate in my view is that we must not raise the hopes of these very special people in our community only to fail them at the very last hurdle. In this respect, I support the bill and encourage all members to truly put aside party politics on this issue. We must keep politics out of the debate. We need to do what is owed to these families affected by disability. For these reasons, I support the bill. Thank you.

Mrs MIRABELLA (Indi) (12:56): It gives me great pleasure to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. We on this side of the House stand ready to work with the government to ensure that a successful and working NDIS is delivered as soon as possible for all those in need. It is an increasingly rare event for parliaments across the country to consider a piece of legislation so universally supported. That is because the NDIS is all about a fair go for those Australians who need help and support structures to ensure that they can more fully participate in our community. It was Winston Churchill who once said that you measure the degree of civilisation of a society by how it treats it weakest members. It is a statement that I believe most members in this place would agree with.

Providing adequate care for people with a disability is absolutely core government business. I make this point at a time when government is larger, more intrusive and more bloated than ever before. I am reminded by the whole debate leading up to this bill why we are actually here: we are here to protect and improve the lives of all Australians, including disabled Australians.

Last year alone, there more than 250 pieces of legislation passed through this parliament. In many cases, those bills had the effect of increasing regulations and limiting freedom. The pursuit of freedom is something that many opposite place a lower degree of importance on than we on this side of the House. But that pursuit of freedom, both in a personal and community sense, is ingrained in the DNA of the opposition. The bill before us today is unusual in that it will increase the size of government, and most certainly increase expenditure but, at its core, will have the effect of dramatically increasing the freedom of so many people in this country who suffer from a disability—and, in fact, it will dramatically increase the freedom of their carers.

This is no small thing. In 2009, 3.5 million Australians were reported as having a specific limitations or restriction. About 1.3 million people had a profound or severe core activity limitation. There is a huge section of our society whose daily freedoms are restricted through no fault of their own. If there is anything that we as national legislators can do to improve the daily lives and increase the freedoms of a large portion of our society then we should do whatever we can in order to achieve this.

I want to briefly go over some statistics that help paint a picture of disability in Australia. These figures were presented in a PricewaterhouseCoopers report a little over a year ago. The report notes that people with a disability in this country are some 50 per cent less likely to be employed than those without a disability. Beyond that simple fact, a lack of employment obviously leads to financial stress and has an impact on a person's freedom, their confidence, their living standard and their ability to pursue other life objectives. For someone who has recently acquired a disability, the loss of employment often has a more dramatic result. In that instance we often see a rapid downward spiral. It is imperative that we do everything that we in this place can to enhance the opportunities of people with a disability to seek, gain and retain employment.

The next statistic is shocking, particularly when you compare the figure with those from other comparable and, relatively speaking, wealthy nations. When you know that 45 per cent of Australians with a disability live in poverty you realise how grim things are. This is more than 2.5 times the rate of poverty experienced in the general population and more than twice the OECD average, which is 22 per cent. On this issue, we rank a lowly 21st out of 29 OECD countries. When we look at other OECD figures, we see that the OECD average for relative poverty risk is approximately 1.6, which means that those with a disability have a poverty risk 1.6 times higher than those without a disability. Australia has a relative poverty risk of 2.7, making us by far the worst performer in the OECD. These figures are grim and should give all of us reason to pause and think.

It would be naive to suggest that the NDIS will be the answer to all our problems. It will not be. It is important that we do not present this program as some type of magical cure or panacea. Indeed, one of the authors of the PricewaterhouseCoopers report that I referred to earlier said that the NDIS could help drive greater workforce and community participation for those with disabilities but only if it was accompanied by a broader cultural shift. He went on to say: 'Without other things happening, an NDIS won't deliver its full potential. If kids with disability can't get into education or access transport to get to a job, we'll continue to fall further behind, even with an NDIS.'

The PricewaterhouseCoopers report suggested that the implementation of an NDIS could support an additional 370,000 people with disabilities into the workforce by 2050. An additional 80,000 carers could also enter the workforce as they were freed from their daily caring responsibilities. This would be terrific. But let us not forget that if there are around 4.5 million Australians who suffer from a form of disability and if a large proportion of those people are already living below the poverty line then we cannot expect an NDIS to make all problems in this space go away—and certainly not overnight—through some miraculous stroke of the pen. This is a very important scheme, but it would be foolish of us to raise expectations where the point that the inevitable reaction of the Australian community is one of disappointment.

Having said all of that, the coalition obviously approaches this bill in the most constructive spirit possible. We supported the initial work by the Productivity Commission, we supported the $1 billion in the budget last year and we supported the five launch sites. We support this legislation because we want the NDIS to be a success. Also, we will support measures in the months ahead to ensure that we get a robust and workable NDIS that services our community.

I want to thank all of the parents in my electorate who took the time over the last few years to come and see me and relate their very personal stories, very painfully and very emotionally at times, to me. I know that many of their fellow carers have done the same with my colleagues on this side of the House and with members of the government. They need to be given particular credit. They take time out from their very important commitments to care for family members. Without their persistence and perseverance—they give the issue of disability care and disability services a very real and human aspect—I suspect we may not have reached this point at this particular time. I want to thank them and acknowledge their contribution in standing up and demanding of government what they need, what their families need and what any civilised society ought to provide in order to give those in our community with disabilities, and their carers, the freedom to more fully participate in our society.

Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth) (13:07): I begin where my friend and colleague the member for Indi finished, speaking about the sacrifices that so many parents and families make supporting loved ones, especially children, with disabilities. It is long overdue that we are debating a national disability insurance scheme and that we are on the verge of seeing a national disability insurance scheme actually realised in Australia. It is a testament to the significance of this reform that we have seen so many members from both sides of this chamber add their voices to this debate. As the Leader of the Opposition has said, this truly is an idea whose time has come, and the coalition are strongly committed to an NDIS and have been since we supported the government's referral to the Productivity Commission of an inquiry into a national disability insurance scheme, in 2009. That report was released in 2011 and it confirmed that our current system of support for people with a disability was utterly inadequate, a finding that, while disheartening, we recognised and acknowledged called for action from governments at both the federal and the state level. Australia's funding and support system for those most in need is clearly broken, and this National Disability Insurance Scheme has been a long time coming.

I am proud to say that along with all the other members of the coalition—and I note in particular the advocacy work of Senator Mitch Fifield—I support this proposal to support people with disabilities and their families. It should be a thoroughly core government business. A federally funded scheme that will provide people with a disability, and their carers and families, with regular care and support and with the therapy and equipment they need to live a dignified and fulfilled life is a challenge that faces us all, but it is one that we must all confront to ensure that parliament turns this dream—apparently a bipartisan dream—into a fully functioning and fully funded policy.

It is very important that the government, through this debate, stop trying to represent the National Disability Insurance Scheme, the NDIS, as being a Labor reform. It is not a Labor reform; it is a reform that has the wholehearted support of all sides of politics and it is one that will be more compelling and more likely to come to realisation if it is seen as being one of those causes, those political or social reforms, that is not the property of one side of politics or another. There are some issues and causes in this House that are very much the property of one side of politics—some that the government holds dear to but we would disown, and vice versa. But this is one that we should all stand united upon because it is a huge challenge. It is huge in the scale of its complexity, dealing with so many people, each with individual needs and each with thoroughly unique needs. The scale of the resources needed is formidable. An increase in funding from $6 billion to $12 billion towards disability services is not a trifling amount of money. I might say that it underlines the need for prudent economic management, for prudent use of government resources and to ensure that we have a strong and growing economy that will generate the government revenues that will be needed to meet the requirements of this scheme.

The concept, as the Productivity Commission has recommended, would see all Australians contributing to and, should they need it, having access to a well-funded individualised scheme for their own care where individuals needing support would receive vouchers they would be able to spend on service providers, who, over time, would start to provide competitively the service that individuals need. This system will be one where support is based on need, where the individual has more control over the support services, aid and equipment they need in order to live their life to the full and to be able to rise above their disabilities.

As I noted earlier, the coalition supported the initial reference to the Productivity Commission, we supported the $1 billion allocated in the last federal budget, and we have supported the five launch sites as well as the agreement between the Commonwealth and the New South Wales government to extend the trial to a full state-wide rollout following the Hunter region launch. It has been encouraging, too, to see this concept of a national disability insurance scheme endorsed at COAG.

Many of my own constituents in the electorate of Wentworth have raised this matter with me directly. Whether it is principal Ian Gallan from the Wairoa School in Bondi, or Dr Chris Blackwell, one of our local clinicians, or the many other parents with stories as heartrending as they are profound, they have supported this important initiative. I am a proud patron of SailorswithdisABILITIES, which is a not-for-profit organisation in my electorate of Wentworth that is committed to changing not only the way those with disabilities view themselves but also society's perception of those with a disability. SailorswithdisABILITIES helps over 4,000 disabled children and adults annually through their sailing programs and has an extensive network of volunteers from the local community offering their support.

As a thoroughly able-bodied seaman I know just how difficult sailing can be, certainly in some conditions. It is wonderful to see SailorswithdisABILITIES not only build the confidence of those living with a disability by demonstrating just what they can achieve, but also developing the skills and showing the benefits of working in a team. The founder of SailorswithdisABILITIES, David Pescud, said that he could never accept being written-off because of his disability. He said, 'I was always more interested in what you can do rather than what you cannot do.' That goes to the heart of what an NDIS should be all about. It is about enabling those with a disability to fully participate in all aspects of life. It is about giving those living with a disability the opportunity to maximise their potential, to give them the dignity, the lifestyle and the independence they deserve.

Last year the SailorswithdisABILITIES crew completed the Sydney to Hobart race, crossing the finishing line after three days, 20 hours, four minutes and two seconds at sea. Their crew of disabled sailors beat 50 other boats in the international blue water race, led by the organisation's founder, David Pescud, and president, David Leslie, both of whom are sailors with disabilities. Brett Pearce, a member and volunteer, said of the organisation, 'Being part of SailorswithdisABILITIES is about being part of an organisation that empowers disabled people to achieve more than they thought capable.' Of a National Disability Insurance Scheme David Pescud said the benefits for the members to have the decision-making power to decide who, how and where they choose to spend their funds for their services that they require 'empowers people to make decisions for themselves and the opportunity of the governance of their own lives'.

Another institution in my electorate, which provides education and other services to students with intellectual and physical disabilities from four to 18, is the Wairoa Special School at Bondi. Every year, at our annual Christmas party, we raise money for that school—and it receives support from many other generous people in the community. As Wairoa school and its supporters, families and teachers will be all too aware, it is absolutely vital that those living with a disability get the proper care and education early, before those difficulties multiply—and this is the fantastic service that Wairoa offers, by providing the physical environment which specifically addresses the varying needs of their many students and fosters a culture of support both at school and at home.

For Wairoa, one of the biggest issues is ensuring children are properly assessed. Those who are better-off financially often have more opportunity to have their child assessed properly; and then, if they are assessed as acute, they can receive the maximum level of care. At Wairoa, 50 per cent of the children cared for have autism—and yet their needs differ greatly. Wairoa's experience is that determining the level of care that is required for a child with mild autism or acute autism is like comparing chalk and cheese, as often the children are not assessed properly, because their symptoms are all so different—and, as I said earlier, early assessment is absolutely critical. What Wairoa hopes for in an NDIS is to have a more structured assessment process and a more structured level of assistance to parents so there will be surety and equity of care. One of the main concerns for Dominic Sweeney, a teacher at Wairoa, is the level of care the children receive once they leave the school—the support they get there is fantastic, yet there is a failure at every level, he says, to provide adequate care for them once they move on. An NDIS should be able to address this.

Windgap, another organisation, just outside of my electorate in Eastlakes, knows just how important education and support for those with disabilities are to ensure they reach their full potential and raise community awareness to their needs and aspirations.

Another institution in my community that would have a remarkable difference made to it by an NDIS is Jewish Care, which runs a disability support program for 140 members of the Jewish community with an intellectual disability and provides support for 180 more with a mental illness. The clients of Jewish Care rely almost entirely on the community-raised income for their support. Claire Vernon, of Jewish Care, tells me of a 61-year-old woman living in Department of Housing and Community Services accommodation and attending Print-35, a fantastic initiative established by Jewish Care, which I visited, which employs people with disabilities to produce quality printing while contributing to their personal development and sense of worth. However, to enable this lady to manage in the community, Jewish Care provides a case manager and 16 hours of drop-in support every week—of which eight hours are contributed by the New South Wales government. She is like many with a disability: as they age their needs become more complex. Providing individuals with the funding to enable them to continue to live independently in the community, to direct support to the services they need the most, would, in Jewish Care's opinion, be a wonderful initiative. The need for flexibility and a person-centred approach is something that Jewish Care has recognised and acted on through its flexible funding program which provides $3,000 to $5,000 to families to purchase therapy and respite support.

As Jewish Care knows all too well, for too long families have had to negotiate the maze of services and the lottery of gaining a spot in a program or service. The great virtue of a NDIS is that funding is linked to the needs of each individual and the maximum autonomy and independence is accorded to that individual as their care plans and services are identified.

While there are clearly great prospects and great needs for a NDIS, many concerns remain. So much of how the scheme operates will depend on the rules that are still being finalised and on establishing the long-term funding arrangements to guarantee lifetime support. Above all—and I emphasise this not in any sense of partisanship—the prudent economic management of the government of the Commonwealth is absolutely critical. All of our compassion, all of our concern, for people with disabilities, all of our aspirations for an NDIS, will be only so much warm thoughts and warm words if we cannot afford to pay for them. It has often been said that a vision without resources is nothing more than a hallucination. We cannot afford to fool ourselves about a reform of this scale.

This will be one of the great social reforms of our time—indeed, of any time. It has the coalition's utmost support. We are committed to it and we are, above all, committed to ensuring that if we are returned to government later this year the economy, the business of government, of this nation will be managed in a way that we can well afford to show in real terms—in financial terms—the backing that our compassion calls us to provide.

Mr IAN MACFARLANE (Groom) (13:22): I congratulate the member for Wentworth on his very well-chosen words in relation to the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. We have heard many eloquent and heartfelt speeches from both sides of the House attesting to the wide support for a national disability insurance scheme.

There is clearly wide acknowledgement in the community and in this parliament that we need a scheme such as the NDIS. That support is visible wherever you go. Everyone in this chamber will have spoken with people in their own electorates, as I have, who can attest to the fact that the current support system for people with a disability does not work. There are people in our local communities who are carers or who need support, but there can be no one rule that applies to everyone and that works with the same level of effectiveness—disabilities are so varied; families are so varied; the pressures on families are so varied; and the ability of families to deal with a child or children with a disability are varied. A lot of it equates to time; a lot of it equates to money; and some of it even equates to the ability to actually deal with the issue itself.

The level of support a person with a disability receives can therefore depend on a number of factors, both within the family and outside it. Some of those factors include where they live. Are they are on a rural property 60, 70 or 100 kilometres from the nearest town? Are they in a small town, perhaps in western Queensland or eastern Western Australia or some other isolated place where the level of support simply is not available? Is the disability congenital or was it acquired and, if so, when was it acquired? What was the person's position in terms of economic security when it was acquired? There is a whole range of factors. Of course, if the disability is the result of an accident there may be support mechanisms through workers compensation and motor vehicle insurance in some states.

So, again, the issue is not just the disability but how the disability occurred and whether or not the disability occurred as a result of an accident. Particularly if you acquire a disability later in life, the handling of the whole issue is much more difficult—you have to contend with the extra issues of queues and waiting lists. This results in many people with a disability being left without the assistance that they need. There is no doubt we need a new system of support based on need, rather than rationing of an entitlement for support spread across the disabled community. We need to ensure that we deal with this area better. The individual needs to be at the centre of the support. The individual needs to be in charge—to be able to pick the support, aids, equipment and service providers of their choice. This is the vision of the Productivity Commission's landmark report into the long-term care and support for people with disabilities. This is the vision of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

I grew up with a disabled brother. He has achieved far more in this world, because of the assistance and support he was able to get, than anyone probably thought possible when they looked at that five-year-old with cerebral palsy and wondered if he would ever be able to speak in a way which people could understand, to walk, and to be a productive member of the community. So when I talk about disability insurance and the need to support people with disabilities I think of my brother Neil. He has achieved an extraordinary amount in his life, for many reasons. The first is that he is one of the most determined and stubborn people I have ever met. When he was old enough to understand, he made up his mind that he would overcome his disabilities as best he could. He was able to do so because he was given the support he needed. Obviously, a great deal of that support came from the family. We are a determined family in our own way—I know people would be shocked to hear that!—and when we set our minds on achieving something we usually achieve it. The family has certainly been a great support to him, but, in the end, what really made the difference was the support and services that he got.

He was, of course, supported in another age—the age of institutions. They are out of favour these days—I think sometimes they are unfairly. The Spastic Centre has, in the past, achieved some phenomenal results, but sending children away to a centre like that is now not seen as socially acceptable, and that makes me wonder just how many people like Neil are currently missing out on the opportunities that he was given. The Spastic Centre at New Farm in Brisbane, with the support of our family and the determination of Neil, were able to produce an individual, an adult, who I taught to drive. He ended up getting married and having a child. He worked for most of his life as a public servant. Before that he was even more productive as a farmer. He is now retired. He has achieved a great deal. But, in all honesty, I have to say that Neil is the exception rather than the rule in terms of people with severe disabilities. When we look at people like my brother and what they have achieved, we also have to realise that we are a family who had the wherewithal to do what was needed, and that was in his favour.

The reason we need to look at what can be implemented in an NDIS is that, in the end, we need to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to achieve their maximum possible outcome in regard to their disability and their potential. So we need a scheme that, as I say, is individual in the way it operates—that is, not a one-size-fits-all scheme.

The coalition are committed to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. As the Leader of the Opposition said at the National Press Club recently:

The Coalition is so committed to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, for instance, that we've offered to co-chair a bi-partisan parliamentary committee so that support for it doesn't flag across the three terms of parliament and among the nine different governments needed to make it work.

Really, this is about being totally bipartisan. If this issue becomes political—if this becomes an issue which people try to gain votes or political points on—it will simply bogged down. The reality is that the government should accept our offer of a parliamentary oversight committee. The coalition intend to give the government, the Greens and the Independents an opportunity to accept our hand of cooperation by moving an amendment to this bill to establish a nonpartisan oversight committee. That offer should be accepted.

It is so important to note that every government in Australia and every opposition in Australia supports the NDIS, so the issue is not whether we should have an NDIS but whether we should make it happen now rather than haggle over the political issues and not see it happen anytime soon. People in our communities and community organisations are of that view as well. When I talk to the people in Toowoomba who run the Endeavour foundation or to the many other groups that deal with the enormous challenges faced in providing opportunity, care, therapy and treatment for people with disabilities, they are not interested in things that need to be argued about, detailed and sorted out; they just want to see it happen. Parents come to see me and talk about their children, some of whom are, literally, 55 or 60 years old. These parents wonder how their children will be looked after when they, the parents, are no longer around. They are not interested in the politics that often surrounds this place; they just want to see it happen.

Again I refer to my own experience and say that we were lucky in that we were able to do something, but parents with disabled children carry an enormous burden for the whole life of that disabled child. Things are different in a family with a disabled child. No matter how you adjust—and we adjusted pretty well—there are things that need to be done for that child which put pressure and strain on every member of that family, be they child or parent. We need to address this issue and soon. Parents are carrying an enormous weight out there. As I say, our family was fortunate. We banded together. Neil was determined and he has led a relatively normal life. I see families whose every waking moment, almost 24 hours a day, is spent caring for a disabled child. That is why it is imperative that we resolve this issue. That is why it is imperative that we get ourselves into a position where this scheme is affordable.

The member for Wentworth mentioned, and I support him 100 per cent, that the real issue here is that we move forward with our support for an NDIS and work out the implementation passage, but also that we have a government that can govern and provide the money to support the scheme. In the end, with all the intentions, good wishes and cooperation in the world, this will boil down to money and a serious amount of it. We need a government that can manage its budget, and that is part of the issue we are facing: no matter how well-intentioned we are in this House and no matter how much we agree, we are going to have to pay for this. And the problem we have at the moment is that this government is broke—absolutely stone motherless broke. It is broke to the point that it has borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars. So part of the challenge in making sure that this scheme comes about is getting a government that can run a budget in surplus.

As we look at the period ahead, let's hope that we do get that government, but in the meantime we all need to focus on ensuring that we continue to take this path to implement an NDIS. It will require cooperation, and the coalition has offered that. It will require bipartisanship, and the coalition has offered that. It will require that we all sit down around a table and, as we say, co-chair a committee to make this happen. The challenge for the government is to accept that and join with us in making this happen.

Dr SOUTHCOTT (Boothby) (13:35): I welcome the opportunity to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. This is a momentous overhaul of disability funding across Australia and represents a once-in-a-generation reform. The bill establishes the framework for the NDIS and the framework for the NDIS Launch Transition Agency. On average, every 30 minutes someone in Australia is diagnosed with a significant disability. There are 410,000 people across Australia who have a permanent disability that significantly affects their communication, mobility, self-care or self-management.

The current system of support for Australians living with a disability is not working. The level of support a person with a disability receives in Australia depends on a number of factors: what state they live in, what disability they have and how that disability was attained. While workplace and motor vehicle accidents are covered by accident insurance, those who are born with a disability or who acquire one later in life can be left without the assistance they need or be faced with waiting lists and queues.

The Productivity Commission found that, while there are pockets of successfully managed disability services in some states, no disability support services are working well across the board. I have seen, in my 17 years as a federal member, that families are often frustrated by the lack of support that they receive from state government disability services and by the fact that this support is rationed. We need a new system of support for those with disabilities that is based on need, rather than the current system of rationing on a budget allocation. The individual needs to be in control. The individual needs to be at the centre and able to pick the support, aid, equipment and service providers of their choice. This is the vision of the Productivity Commission report and it is the vision of the NDIS. It will work in a similar way to Medicare, a successful social insurance scheme.

The coalition has been an enthusiastic supporter of the NDIS at every step. We supported the Productivity Commission work, we supported the $1 billion in the last budget, we supported the five launch sites and we are supporting this legislation. We believe the NDIS can be delivered in the time frame recommended by the Productivity Commission. As evidence of our goodwill, we are willing to work with the government to see the NDIS delivered as soon as possible. This historic reform will develop over the life of several parliaments and needs to be the property of the parliament rather than of any one political party. That is why the coalition has called for the establishment of a joint parliamentary committee, to be chaired by both sides of politics, to oversee the establishment and implementation of the NDIS. This would provide a non-partisan environment where issues of design and eligibility could be worked through cooperatively. Unfortunately, those opposite have refused this by voting down Senator Fifield's motion in the Senate with the support of the Greens.

The bill establishes the framework for the NDIS and the NDIS Launch Transition Agency. The agency will be set up as an independent body separate from government to deliver and manage the NDIS. This will allow the scheme to be launched in five sites across Australia from July 2013. The first site is designed to benefit over 20,000 people with disabilities, their families and carers. The five launch sites are South Australia, the ACT, Tasmania, Hunter in the New South Wales and Barwon in Victoria.

An NDIS looks beyond just the immediate need of a person with disabilities and focuses on what that person will require across their lifetime. The scheme provides funding to help people with a disability to participate more fully in economic and social life by providing an entitlement that will allow them to organise aids, equipment, supported accommodation or personal attendant care. The NDIS, when fully implemented, will be available to all Australians who have a permanent disability that significantly affects their communication, mobility, self-care or self-management.

In my own electorate of Boothby there are many important sites where there are a number of people with a disability who will benefit from an NDIS. Bedford Industries, based at Panorama in Boothby since 1949 and originally founded in 1920, is an employment and training provider for people with a disability. It has an excellent reputation across the nation. Bedford supports almost 4,000 people with a disability or disadvantage. It employs 800 people with disabilities across South Australia in its furniture, horticulture, hospitality, packaging and other areas. Bedford provides living arrangements for almost 200 people up at its Balyana residences.

Minda, established in 1898, is South Australia's largest disability service provider. It offers support and opportunity to over 1,500 people in accommodation, supported employment, lifestyle services and respite. Minda has already received $30,000 in funding to prepare themselves for the NDIS through the NDIS Readiness Fund. The Suneden School, founded in 1943 and located in Mitchell Park, is a private school catering for children with intellectual and multiple disabilities aged between five and 21 years old. My electorate office has a number of artworks from the students of Suneden School, and their art show every year is always a highlight of the local community's calendar.    Suneden has close links with a number of external agencies to assist with their provision of programs, including Disability SA, Autism SA, Novita, Minda, Respite Services and various workplace providers, including Bedford Industries, Orana and Phoenix.

In conclusion, this is an important change that will help support those around Australia with disabilities. The coalition supports this bill, and we stand ready with the government to make the NDIS a reality.

Mr SECKER (Barker—Opposition Whip) (13:42): At short notice I come into this chamber to talk about a very important subject: the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. The following might be of interest to the member of Boothby, because in closing his remarks he talked about the Suneden School in Mitchell Park. I can inform him that my sister, who was mentally retarded, went to Suneden. She was there for quite a while. It was certainly a very important part of her life to visit Suneden. I know they use different terms these days than the one I use, but I grew up with my sister, who was about 20 months older than myself. She was the seventh-born in the family, and I was the eighth. My mother likes to dine out on the story that when I came along at least one person thought I was perfect; the doctor wanted to reassure my mother that I did not have any intellectual disabilities—although I am sure some people might disagree with that now!

But this is a very important subject, and there is no doubt in my mind that it is a very worthy one. I may speak later about some of the problems that may exist. There are some people who may not be covered who think that they will be covered. In fact, I had an email and a phone call only last week from constituents who were concerned, in one case, that once they reached 65 there would not be any coverage—and they were actually thinking about their son—and, in another case, whether blindness was actually covered by this. And I suppose that is the concern of some people: they might think they are being covered when in actual fact they will not be covered.

The concept of a national disability insurance scheme has gained momentum over the past few years. Whenever it has been brought up in this parliament I have been a very strong supporter. One of the reasons it has gained momentum is due to a very strong grassroots campaign by carers, Australians with disabilities and the organisations that support them. More recently, the Every Australian Counts campaign, chaired by John Della Bosca, has certainly made sure we have strong support in this chamber. It has certainly kept the National Disability Insurance Scheme in the public mind on behalf of all those disability organisations.

The NDIS concept was conceived by John Walsh AM and progressed by Bruce Bonyhady AM, President of Philanthropy Australia. It was first canvassed at the 2020 Summit in 2008. It is probably the only decent thing that came out of that 2020 Summit in 2008. In 2009—so we are talking about four years ago—the federal coalition supported the government's referral to the Productivity Commission for an inquiry into a national disability insurance scheme. A final report of the Productivity Commission inquiry was released on 10 August 2011. Anyone who has looked at that final report would be encouraged by the support given by the Productivity Commission and would confirm that the current system of support for people with disability is—in their language—'broken'. This conclusion was endorsed by the federal coalition in all of its jurisdictions. We are not playing politics with this. We totally support it and any suggestion otherwise is bunkum.

Agreement has been reached with five states and territories, including my own home state of South Australia, the ACT, New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania. Launch sites will commence in the states in July this year and in the ACT in July next year. In December 2012 the New South Wales state government and the Commonwealth government concluded an intergovernmental agreement for a full state-wide rollout of the NDIS beyond the Hunter launch site. Further expansion of the NDIS will be dependent on the Commonwealth negotiating and concluding further bilateral agreements with each jurisdiction. Queensland and Western Australia are not hosting launch sites but both have submitted proposals to the Commonwealth to be part of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and they are certainly part of the support.

The Labor government has sought to claim the NDIS as its own, rejecting bipartisanship on a number of occasions. That is pretty sad. This is too important to play politics with. This has the support of the whole parliament and it is not just them or us; we all support it. Our only concern is where the money is coming from. We are committed to finding that money. We certainly want to show that it does have very strong cross-party support at both federal and state levels.

This bill provides for the establishment of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Some people might ask: why has this taken so long? To be fair to the government and to everyone, this is a big decision by government and a big decision by this parliament. It will need a pilot scheme. The last thing we want is money just thrown at something without some sort of sensible pilot scheme to make sure that it works. It is important that we do this properly. That probably means we are going a bit slower than some people would like, but if we do it properly we will end up with a well-thought-out scheme.

The agency may provide general support for people with disability who are not participants in the NDIS, through information, coordination and referral activities. While most funding for NDIS participants will be in the form of individual support packages, the agency may block fund some entities that support people with disability. That is a bit like what we do with block funding in private schools: as a government, we do not get down to the nitty-gritty and saying, 'You do it this way.' For example, in my electorate, where the Lutheran school system is very strong, they get block funding and organise it themselves. In some ways I think that is more efficient than government bureaucracies trying to run it. We support that.

The eligibility provisions described in the scheme require that a person's impairment results in substantially reduced functional capacity affecting their communication, social interaction, learning, mobility, self-care or self-management. Eligibility includes early intervention to mitigate, alleviate or prevent the deterioration of a person's functional capacity.

As I mentioned earlier, people over 65 years of age at the time they request NDIS support will not be eligible. However, future participants can choose to continue with the NDIS once they turn 65. The assessment method will be in the NDIS rules. It is important that we have personal planning provisions which emphasise a person-centred and self-directed approach. A plan must include a statement of participant goals and aspirations prepared by the participant in the statement of participant supports to be approved by the agency.

I digress for a short period of time. Very early in my career as a member of this parliament, I was approached by four mothers in my electorate. I remember the meeting very well. They were concerned not so much about themselves and the work that they do as carers—they saw that as their duty and that was not a problem—but about what happens when they die. You hear that time and time again: 'Who is going to look after my children?' Obviously they will have grown up a bit more, but who will look after them when both parents are deceased? That was a real concern for them because they want to ensure that their offspring get the proper care that they need. I have heard that very often when other members speak on this bill.

Coming back to the bill itself, the plans will specify general support—and that is not purchased with individualised funding—and reasonable and necessary support. Of course, when we talk about 'reasonable', that is always a bit of a moot point: what is reasonable? Some people will want more than others think is reasonable, but in the end we will do our best, whether we are in government or in opposition, to make sure that they get that support. There will also be a review date and it will describe how the funds and other aspects of the plan will be managed. Managing the funding for supports under a plan can be done by a registered plan management provider, a nominee, the agency or participants themselves. Plan management involves purchasing supports, and receiving, managing and acquitting the funds.

Details about the process to become a registered provider of supports or a plan manager will be outlined in the NDIS rules. The agency may compel prospective participants to take action to obtain compensation for personal injury, and the agency is entitled to recover relevant portions of any compensation awarded to participants. These provisions are designed to protect the NDIS from cost-shifting.

There will have to be review processes. Information on review rights must be given to participants when reviewable decisions are made. Reviewable decisions cover eligibility support plans, provider registration, and nominee determinations. And, like many parts of legislation from this parliament, the legislation provides a further avenue of review to the all-important Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

Governance will also be important. The agency will have a board consisting of a chair and eight members who collectively will possess an appropriate balance of skills, experience or knowledge in the following fields: provisional use of disability services, operation of insurance, compensation or long-term liability schemes, financial management or corporate governance. The Commonwealth minister will appoint the chair and must obtain the approval of a majority of jurisdictions before those members are appointed.

The legislation also establishes an independent advisory council that will include at least four people with disabilities; at least two carers; at least one person with skills, experience or knowledge in the supply of equipment or provision of services; and up to five more members. The legislation provides for an independent review of the act after two years.

I pay credit to my elder sister who was a nun with the Josephites. She set up the first lance society in Australia. She was awarded an Order of Australia medal for her work there. Our family experience was of a child with a mental disability and it has certainly been a very strong part of my family's upbringing. (Time expired)

Mr BUCHHOLZ (Wright) (13:57): I rise to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. There are not many in this House that do not have some understanding of the hardship families experience in caring for those with a disability. My electorate of Wright is quite remote. It starts at the top of the Toowoomba Range and borders Robina on the Gold Coast. In an area like that we do not have an enormous amount of infrastructure to help or support families. As a rural and regional community we rely heavily on neighbours, friends and family to support those people in their hours of need.

We will not be opposing the National Disability Insurance Scheme. I remind the House that we support this bill, as we do 83 per cent of legislation when we come into the House. This government would have you believe there is a relentless negativity from the opposition. That is factually not true. Public documents from the Parliamentary Library state that we have supported over 83 per cent of bills that have come before this House. What may not be known to those in the gallery today is that the coalition has requested a bipartisan committee to be formed on the National Disability Insurance Scheme so that we can move forward collectively with this. But no—as we move through, they will continue to take the single headline, the single grab, that 'the coalition are opposed to this' and that it is only Labor that will provide and deliver an NDIS. I say to you, Madam Speaker and those in the gallery, that nothing could be further from the truth. There are no lows to which this government will not go to hide the truth when it comes to the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

I also take the opportunity to acknowledge where the pilot projects are being rolled out at the moment, in Victoria, New South Wales, Tasmania, South Australia and the ACT—

The SPEAKER: Order! It being 2 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 97. The honourable member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.

Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler—Leader of the House and Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) (14:08): by leave—I move:

That the order of the day be referred to the Federation Chamber for debate.

Question agreed to.

Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler—Leader of the House and Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) (14:15): by leave—I move:

That the order of the day be referred to the Federation Chamber for debate.

Question agreed to.

Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler—Leader of the House and Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) (14:19): by leave—I move:

That further statements by indulgence in relation to the death of Peter Harvey be permitted in the Federation Chamber.

Question agreed to.

Mr FITZGIBBON (Hunter—Chief Government Whip) (15:16): by leave—I move:

That the bills be referred to the Federation Chamber for further consideration.

Question agreed to.

Mr ADAMS (Lyons) (16:37): On behalf of the Standing Committee on Agriculture, Resources, Fisheries and Forestry, I present the committee's advisory report, incorporating a dissenting report, on the Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Legislation Amendment Bill 2012, together with the minutes of proceedings.

In accordance with standing order 39(f) the report was made a parliamentary paper.

Mr ADAMS: by leave—The Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Legislation Amendment Bill was referred to the Standing Committee on Agriculture, Resources, Fisheries and Forestry by the Selection Committee on 29 November 2012. The committee subsequently called for written submissions and a public hearing was held in Canberra on 4 February 2013 with a range of stakeholders. The bill seeks to make reforms to the approval, registration and reconsideration of agricultural and veterinary chemicals, commonly referred to as 'agvet' chemicals. The bill aims to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the national registration scheme for agvet chemicals and products overseen by the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority.

The committee heard a range of views from stakeholders. Most stakeholders supported the need to modernise the regulation of the sector and in doing so increase regulatory efficiency and effectiveness. However, several stakeholders also expressed their concern that some aspects of the bill would negatively impact the agvet chemicals sector. Stakeholders highlighted areas including the proposal for a preliminary assessment process and also the proposal for a system of mandatory re-registration and re-approval for agvet chemicals and products.

The committee found that the proposed preliminary assessment process has been designed to increase the quality of applications provided to the APVMA. The committee acknowledges the concerns that this process may create some costs for applicants for re-registration of agvet chemical and products. However, the committee felt that overall the process would allow the APVMA to concentrate its resources on providing more timely assessments of applications and reduce delays in evaluating deficient applications.

Over the course of the inquiry, the committee heard that some agvet chemicals and products had been in use in Australia for well over 40 years. The committee was concerned that many of these chemicals and products had not been tested against contemporary standards for human, animal and plant health and safety. This underscores the importance of modernising the agvet regulation scheme, and the need for regular but balanced requirements for re-registration and re-approval based on the risk profiles of each chemical or product. Australia needs to have a robust, systematic and efficient system of agvet chemical and product regulation. This is important not only domestically, but also to ensure Australia retains its international competitiveness in the agvet sector.

In presenting the report, I am grateful to staff at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority who appeared at the public hearing and also provided valuable clarification on a range of complex issues in the report. I am also extremely grateful of the time and effort spent by industry and environmental stakeholders who participated in the inquiry. I commend the report to the House.

Mr TEHAN (Wannon) (16:41): by leave—I rise to give a perspective from the coalition members of this committee. Those members were: Mr Alby Schultz, the member for Hume; Mr Rowan Ramsey, the member for Grey, who is here beside me; Mr George Christensen, the member for Dawson, and me. We issued a dissenting report and I would like to briefly summarise why. As we saw it, the bill as drafted provides a substantial increase in regulatory burden and costs that will have a negative impact on the industry without significantly improving the efficiency of regulation and the re-registration process will slow down, rather than increase, the review of suspect chemicals. Of particular note, we were extremely concerned that there was not a proper cost benefit analysis done on the financial impact that this could have on the industry. We would call on the government to do this cost benefit analysis properly so that we have a real idea of the impact and red tape burden that this will have on industry. We have two recommendations, which we have put in our dissenting report: remove the re-registration process from the bill and set up a troika taskforce of industry, the department and the APVMA to urgently evaluate and improve the internal systems of the APVMA to increase its efficiency, effectiveness and the speed of review of at risk chemicals.

Mr MELHAM (Banks) (16:44): On behalf of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, I present the committee's advisory report, incorporating a dissenting report, on the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012, together with the minutes of proceedings.

In accordance with standing order 39(f) the report was made a parliamentary paper.

Mr MELHAM: by leave—The Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012 introduces a suite of measures in response to seven recommendations of the committee's report, The 2010 federal election: report on the conduct of the election and related matters. The bill:

sets out the procedures to be followed when a ballot box is opened prematurely;

removes the requirement for an applicant for a prepoll ordinary vote to complete and sign a certificate;

provides that prepoll voting cannot commence earlier than four days after the date fixed for declaration of nominations;

brings forward the deadline for applications for postal votes by one day;

provides for further fixed periods of time to complete inquiries into objections against a proposed redistribution of electoral boundaries;

allows the Commissioner of Taxation and other taxation officers to provide some forms of taxpayer information to the Australian Electoral Commission to maintain the veracity of the roll of electors; and

makes other minor and technical amendments to the Commonwealth Electoral Act and Referendum Act.

In referring the bill, the Selection Committee wished the Electoral Matters Committee to further scrutinise its amendments and ensure consideration was given to any unintended consequences. During the committee's inquiry, issues arose regarding the exclusion of ballots, the new prepoll voting arrangements and the ability of the Australian Electoral Commission to use taxpayer information to update the electoral roll.

The bill provides that prematurely opened ballots must be excluded from the count. At the 2010 federal election, ballot boxes were opened prematurely due to an official error in two prepoll voting centres. Due to the legislative ambiguity regarding the appropriate response to these breaches, the Australian Electoral Commission sought legal advice. The advice was that it would be prudent for these ballots to be excluded. The commission subsequently recommended to the committee that the appropriate action be clarified in the Electoral Act and that votes should be reinstated if the incident proved to be an official error.

The bill does not contain a vote savings provision and the committee did not support one in its 2010 federal election report. Having carefully considered the evidence in this inquiry, however, the committee took the view that votes should be reinstated if a ballot box is handled unlawfully by any person but no tampering of ballot papers has occurred. The committee's view is that this balances voter enfranchisement and electoral integrity. The committee recommends that the vote savings procedures proposed to this inquiry by the Electoral Commission be incorporated in the bill.

I want to acknowledge that Mrs Bishop, who is at the table, was the one who pursued this in the public hearings. The committee were unanimous in the view that we should support the approach she proposed in relation to that matter. I think it needs to be acknowledged that, but for the member at the table's persistence in this matter at the public hearings, the committee may well have maintained its earlier view. This issue is about enfranchisement and the member is to be commended for her pursuit of this matter.

The committee heard also that the Electoral Act lacks clarity on whether the penalties faced by an electoral official who deliberately and unlawfully interferes with a ballot box or ballot papers are the same as the penalties facing a member of the public for this offence. The committee recommends that the bill be amended to clarify this in the legislation.

The removal of the requirement for a prepoll ordinary voter to complete a certificate will provide efficiencies in polling place management and align the Commonwealth with a number of state and territory jurisdictions. Moving the commencement of prepoll voting back by one day will allow sufficient time to print the many millions of ballot papers required for a federal election. Moving the deadline for postal vote applications forward by one day will reduce the chance that postal votes will be received too late. Increasing the fixed periods of time to inquire into further objections to a proposed electoral boundary redistribution will provide the Electoral Commission with valuable additional time to conduct these inquiries. Allowing the Electoral Commission to use certain taxpayer information to update the roll of electors is a logical extension of existing continuous roll update processes and direct enrolment using third party information. The committee is satisfied that this will not undermine roll integrity.

These provisions of the bill were recommended in the 2010 federal election report of the committee and continue to be supported by the committee.

On behalf of the committee, I thank the organisations and individuals who assisted the committee during the inquiry through submissions or participating at the public hearing in Canberra. I also thank my colleagues on the committee for their work and contribution to this report and the secretariat for their work on this inquiry. I commend the report to the House.

Mrs BRONWYN BISHOP ( Mackellar ) ( 16:52 ): by leave—There were serious differences between the government and opposition on the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012 referred to the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters. These differences are ongoing. They relate to the protection of the integrity of the roll. In many of the dissenting reports we have written since the government introduced automatic enrolment, we have made the point—and we continue to make the point—that we believe it destroys the integrity of the roll.

We object to the proposed changes which allow the Australian Taxation Office to give material to the Electoral Commission not only because they put at risk the integrity of the roll—it is utilising material which has been developed for another purpose and the accuracy of which cannot be vouched for—but because people's individual details in tax office material have always been regarded as sacrosanct. There have always been serious penalties for anyone in the tax office who divulges such information. The proposed changes to the act will in fact remove penalties for any officers involved in such behaviour.

With regard to the proposed changes to the Taxation Administration Act, we point out in our dissenting report, as we do quite often, that a 1999 report by the House of Representatives Committee on Economics, Finance and Public Administration, Numbers on the run: review of the ANAO audit report No.37 1998-99 on the management of tax file numbers, found that there were 3.2 million more tax file numbers than there were people in Australia at the then most recent census, that there are potentially 185,000 duplicate tax records for individuals and that 62 per cent of deceased clients were not recorded as deceased in the sample match. It was again pointed out in evidence given at the public hearings initially, dealing with automatic enrolment, that a single roll that may be given to the Electoral Commission is in fact a composite of a lot of other sources, all of which are not checked either. If we look at another example of inaccuracy of government-held information, in this case the integrity of the Medicare enrolment data, the ANAO audit report stated:

ANAO found that up to half a million active Medicare enrolment records were probably for people who are deceased.

I cite those examples just to show that the integrity of the roll is very much at risk. When the bill comes up for debate we will be able to deal with these matters in more detail.

We also think it is still necessary for someone who is exercising a prepoll vote to sign a certificate. We are against the concept of an election period which equates election day with a period of up to 19 days if the amendments go through, and we feel that that is bad on two counts: 19 days is too long—it should be restricted to 12—and also to not have a requirement to sign a declaration as to how you are complying with the act in seeking a prepoll vote is again to denigrate election day in favour of an election period.

We then came to the opening of a ballot box prior to the closing of the poll on election day. I will deal with this more in my speech in the second reading debate on the bill itself, but there were enormous concerns shared by the committee as a whole—and I am grateful to the chairman of the committee for acknowledging that I did pursue the matter vociferously. To me it is unconscionable that votes which people have cast in good faith can be excluded from scrutiny because a box has been opened prematurely. We needed to have a saving clause, and I am very grateful that we reached agreement on many of those principles—where we disagreed was on the question of account. I will deal with that in the second reading debate.

At all times there has been a profound disagreement between the government and the opposition about the integrity of the roll. I cite very often the legal precedents which say that you cannot go behind the roll—once the roll is established, you may not challenge who has gone onto it. Therefore, you have to be able to vouch for the integrity of who goes onto it—and it seems to me, in a land where we value the right to vote, that the requirement that you as an individual when you reach 18 or become a citizen to fill out a form to become a citizen enrolled to vote is not very onerous. I think that philosophical divide will continue and, should we be successful in being elected at the next election, it is certainly a matter we will address.

Ms OWENS (Parramatta) (16:56): On behalf of the Standing Committee on Economics, I present the committee's advisory report, incorporating a dissenting report, on the Tax Laws Amendment (Countering Tax Avoidance and Multinational Profit Shifting) Bill 2013, together with the minutes of proceedings.

In accordance with standing order 39(f) the report was made a parliamentary paper

Ms OWENS: by leave—The Tax Laws Amendment (Countering Tax Avoidance and Multinational Profit Shifting) Bill 2013 makes a number of amendments to the tax law. Schedule 1 amends part IVA of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 with the aim of ensuring that the act continues to counter schemes that comply with the technical requirements of the tax law but which, when viewed objectively, are conducted in a particular way mainly to avoid tax.

Schedule 2 of the bill aims to modernise Australia's transfer pricing rules and provide a new, comprehensive and robust transfer pricing regime that is aligned with internationally accepted principles. The objective of these new transfer pricing rules is to ensure that an appropriate return for the contribution of Australian operations of a multinational group is taxable in Australia for the benefit of the broader community. Both schedules were the subject of prior public consultation by the Treasury.

On 1 March 2012, the government announced that it would introduce amendments to ensure part IVA continued to be effective in countering tax avoidance schemes. The government's announcement was made after reviewing a number of judicial decisions. The government was concerned that some taxpayers had argued successfully that they did not get a tax benefit because, absent the scheme, they would not have entered into an arrangement that attracted tax, because they would have entered into a different scheme that also avoided tax, or because they would have deferred their arrangements indefinitely, or because they would have done nothing at all.

Schedule 1 amends part IVA to address weaknesses that have come to light as a result of judicial decisions in determining whether there is a tax benefit in connection with a scheme and what that tax benefit is. Schedule 1 provides that the Commissioner of Taxation may use either of two alternative approaches to cancel a tax benefit obtained by a taxpayer in connection with a scheme that was entered into for the sole or dominant purpose, objectively ascertained, of avoiding tax.

These alternative postulates are an annihilation approach, whereby the scheme must be assumed not to have happened but all other events that actually happened must be incorporated; and a reconstruction approach, which must represent a reasonable alternative to the scheme but disregard any potential tax costs. The result of either of these postulates will be that the tax effect is less advantageous to the relevant taxpayer than that secured by the taxpayer in connection with the scheme.

It was claimed in some of the submissions that the amendments in schedule 1 are unnecessary as the court decisions are reasonably unique and of limited application. There are further claims in some submissions that it is not clear how the alternative postulates will operate. However, it is the committee's view that the amendments in the bill are a measured response to exposed weaknesses in the operation of the tax benefit concept.

The Treasury emphasised in its submission to the committee that the annihilation and reconstruction approaches are clearly intended to operate as alternative bases for identifying tax benefits and will not lead to more income tax being payable than results from the ordinary operation of the tax law.

Schedule 2 of the bill is vital to modernise Australia's transfer pricing rules and bring these into line with accepted international arm's length principles recommended by the OECD. Transfer pricing refers to the prices at which an enterprise transfers physical goods and intangible property or provides services to associated enterprises in different tax jurisdictions.

The arm's length principle is the international standard that OECD member countries have agreed should be used for determining transfer prices for tax purposes. This principle is that each enterprise within a multinational enterprise should be treated as a separate entity and it should be determined what independent entities would have done in the place of the parties. This provides a broad parity of tax treatment for members of multinational groups and independent enterprises.

The committee notes claims in some of the submissions it received that the bill is not consistent with OECD transfer pricing guidelines and that schedule 2 goes beyond the exceptional circumstances specified by these guidelines for a tax administration to disregard the structure adopted by a taxpayer for a controlled transaction.

It is also proposed in several submissions that the seven-year limit for a transfer pricing adjustment to be made by the Commissioner of Taxation is too long and should be four years only, as applies to general income tax assessments.

However the application and effect of the proposed reconstruction rules are clearly based on the language used in the OECD guidelines and the bill also contains a guidance provision that requires the relevant rules to be interpreted consistently with these guidelines. The Treasury also asserts that a four-year limit to conduct transfer pricing adjustments would not provide the commissioner with adequate time to conduct transfer pricing audits.

It is clear that the OECD transfer pricing guidelines are currently the 'best thinking evident in transfer pricing'. The committee considers that reconstruction powers in exceptional circumstances are a core part of modern transfer pricing regimes and that the bill implements these powers consistently with the OECD guidelines.

In conclusion, the bill will enable the Commissioner of Taxation to objectively and reasonably enforce tax avoidance measures and collect revenue to which the Commonwealth is entitled under the law, and the bill should pass.

On behalf of the committee, I thank the organisations that assisted the committee during the inquiry through submissions. I also thank my colleagues on the committee for their contribution to the report, and I thank the secretariat, who have worked in what is a very complex area of tax law. I commend the report to the House.

Mr CIOBO (Moncrieff) (17:02): by leave—I am pleased, on behalf of the coalition, to raise some of the objections put forward in the dissenting report by coalition members with respect to this so-called inquiry—predominantly because there was no inquiry. The Tax Laws Amendment (Countering Tax Avoidance and Multinational Profit Shifting) Bill 2013 was a bill which was referred for inquiry to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics for which there was no inquiry. Liberal members were particularly concerned because it did not provide us with an opportunity to test the information that was provided—to test, not only in terms of public opinion but also with a number of key and specialist stakeholders, a number of the assertions that were made by various parties and of course by the government in relation to this bill.

With respect to questions about the financial impact of this bill and specifically how schedule 1 applies to part IVA of the Income Tax Assessment Act, the explanatory memorandum to the bill states:

The amendments are expected to prevent the loss of over $1 billion a year.

But the reality is that there was very little detail provided as to how this amount had been quantified. Also, it would have been prudent to confirm whether there was any financial impact from the changes put forward in schedule 2 of the bill, relating to the modernisation of transfer pricing rules, despite the fact that the explanatory memorandum stated that the impact would be nil. On those two principal bases alone, we as coalition members of the Standing Committee on Economics have sincere and grave concerns that we did not have the opportunity to inquire into this bill.

Specifically, with respect to schedule 1, coalition members have legitimate concerns that the drafting of this schedule may once again be an overreaction by this Labor government with respect to the operation of part IVA of the Income Tax Assessment Act. There have been a number of instances over the past several years with respect to part IVA where the Commissioner of Taxation has lost high-profile court cases, and there is a real risk, frankly, that the government, via these amendments, is overreacting and giving the commissioner too much power to raise tax and penalties in the context of alleged income tax avoidance. I note that this is a view that seems to be held and shared by, among others, the Tax Institute, the Corporate Tax Association and the Law Council of Australia.

With respect to schedule 2, the modernisation of transfer pricing, the reality is that Australia's transfer pricing regime has stood the test of time. But the committee, as a consequence of not holding hearings, was unable to look at whether or not the new proposals that have been put forward, the amendments encapsulated by this bill, will in fact achieve the same longevity as the previous framework did—and, again, we do not know whether or not this has the full support of stakeholders. For example, many submissions, including from the Corporate Tax Association, PricewaterhouseCoopers, KPMG and the Tax Institute, all shared our concern about ensuring that it was robust and workable and will stand the test of time. But, as I said, without the opportunity for a public inquiry, we do not know whether or not that is the case. I note that the TI—that is, the Tax Institute—said on page 7 of their submission:

… we are concerned that the Bill as currently drafted will not yield many of the lauded simplicity and certainty benefits and will increase the compliance burden especially and disproportionately on small to medium enterprises.

Now, that is something that resonates with coalition members, because this side of the chamber understands small business; this side of the chamber has a background of small business. And, frankly, it stands in stark contrast to, firstly, the government's lack of understanding on small business and, secondly, the sometimes hollow safeguards or guarantees the government put forward with respect to the application and consequences of bills that are introduced. So, for those reasons that I have outlined, we dissented from the main report.

I want to thank the committee secretariat for their assistance to the government members and to some extent, albeit minor, to the coalition members! But it has ever been thus and, I suspect, always will be thus. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to speak.

Mrs BRONWYN BISHOP (Mackellar) (17:07): In speaking to the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012 I will be drawing on the dissenting report which the opposition members of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters wrote and which was tabled in this House only some minutes ago.

I begin by saying that this administration bill contains two provisions on which there is agreement between the government and the opposition. The first is that which brings forward the deadline for applications for postal votes by one day—that is, from the Thursday before polling day to the Wednesday before polling day. We think that this is a sensible move because, as the legislation currently stands, people who get their postal vote application in at the last minute are very likely not to be successful in having it in in time. We think that the Wednesday is a more realistic deadline. The second is the provision which provides for further fixed periods of time to be provided to the augmented Electoral Commission, as defined in section 70 of the Electoral Act, to complete its inquiries into objections against proposed redistributions in electoral boundaries. Basically the new provision deals with the situation where a redistribution is on foot when an election is called, and this part of the act, as it stands, certainly needs to be tidied up.

I said earlier in making remarks on the report of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters that the integrity of the roll, on the one hand, and the wish to put as many people on it as possible, on the other hand—which is the government's desire—constitutes a great gulf between the government and the opposition. Unfortunately, the Australian Electoral Commission also seems to be dead keen on just sticking people on the roll willy-nilly without having to honour the Electoral Act in its current form—that is, to require people, when they turn 18 or become citizens, to fill out a form and become an enrolled voter. We think that in this country, where we have compulsory registration, it is not onerous to ask somebody to value their vote sufficiently to go to the correct place and fill out a form so there is a record of their signature which can be checked if necessary.

There have long been debates in this place about electoral fraud, and I have no doubt in my mind, having looked at the facts, that it exists. But it has never been pursued. With the coming of technology, however, we ought to be looking at being able to link the rolls in the polling places for each electorate so that, when somebody's name is marked off on one roll, it can be automatically marked off on all the others. I understand that this practice has been trialled in Victoria and worked very successfully, and I am sure that it is not beyond the wit of the Australian Electoral Commission to bring it into operation federally. Doing so could get rid of the difficulty we have with multiple voting, which was done in the last election by, I think, some 18,000 people.

However, the day on which the integrity of the rolls is opened up through automatic enrolment will be a very sad day for our system of voting. I said in my earlier speech that the accuracy of government data which is held is very suspect. I cited the number of tax file numbers that were found in 1999, the last time there was a review of tax file numbers. There were 3.2 million more tax file numbers than there were people in Australia at the census prior; there were 185,000 potential duplicate tax records for individuals; and 62 per cent of deceased clients were not recorded as deceased in the sample match. It was pointed out to us in the committee, when we took evidence on the concept of automatic enrolment, that, for instance, a Centrelink roll, which the AEC now uses, is in fact a composite of anything up to 100 other lists that are brought together, that there is no check-in and that the AEC has no ability to check.

So we support the idea of now introducing legislation which will authorise the tax office to give material, the giving of which by a tax official to any other agency or person was previously proscribed an offence, to the Australian Electoral Commission. This legislation will remove the penalty from the Taxation Administration Act in order that the material may be given to the Electoral Commission by a tax officer.

We feel very strongly about the legal decisions that have already been brought down when there have been challenges to election outcomes—and very often less than 1,000 votes can determine whether a seat is won or lost—and about returning to the roll its integrity, and people's confidence in it, by having people go themselves to become an enrolled voter.

This legislation will also do away with the need to have a certificate signed by a person wishing to exercise a prepoll vote. I hear creeping into the language, both from the Electoral Commission and from others, expressions of the idea that we have an election period. We do not; we have an election day. We have many regulations that say when you can have electronic advertisements—up to what date and so on—and speeches formally launching their campaigns are, for a variety of reasons, given by the leaders ever closer to election day. But a whole host of people can be voting before the speeches are made and before the manifestos, if you like, of the parties are put. This means that people who vote before election day are not given all the information which is given to people who are voting on election day.

This is why we feel so strongly about the maintenance of our system of postal votes and of allowing political parties to be part of that process so that they can send out information informing postal voters of what the political parties' attitudes are. We feel that they need to be placed in a similar position to that of someone who is voting on election day and who is able to hear all the arguments and look at all the printed material prior to casting a vote. So we feel that this lessening of the deterrent that exists for people to turn up on election day—where anybody can just turn up to a prepoll because it is easier; they cannot be bothered on election day; or whatever it is—is not in the interests of someone who is considering the vote that they cast on election day. I can see, however, that it is going to be quite important for prepoll if we are to have an election on 14 September, as that will be Yom Kippur for Jewish members of the Australian population, and they feel very sensitive about the way in which that date has been set with no consideration for their very important religious day.

We oppose doing away with the certificate that is presently needed, even though we acknowledge that the nature and character of a prepoll vote has been changed from being a declaration vote to an ordinary vote. This in itself has led to the great difficulty that was encountered in the last election, when the opening of ballot boxes containing prepoll votes prior to the close of the poll at 6 pm on election day became an improper practice when previously it had been a quite proper practice. The reason is that just before the 2010 election the government changed the law so that a prepoll vote, which was previously a declaration vote and therefore could be opened prior to 6 pm on election day, became an ordinary vote so that it would be counted on election night and we would get a quicker outcome. But the problem was that adequate information was not given to all of the electoral offices right across the country, and so they did not know that the change had been made.

We had two instances, one in Boothby and one in the seat of Flynn, where it was picked up scrutineers that the ballots looked orderly, particularly in Boothby, when they should have all been crumpled up and looking a bit disorderly, as they are in an ordinary ballot box. Consequently, the Electoral Commission was tasked with the difficulty of making a decision as to what happened to those ballot papers. They did seek advice from the Australian Government Solicitor, who knew how many votes were involved. They knew that in neither the case of Boothby nor the case of Flynn would excluding those ballot papers from the scrutiny make any difference to the outcome of the declaration of those two seats. But we on the committee did request—and I do acknowledge that the chairman was strong in backing up my request—that the legal opinion which the AEC had sought be made public.

It is quite unusual for government advice from the AEC to be made public, but it was very important in properly considering the question of the AEC's recommendation that, where there was an opening of a ballot box other than in conformity with the act prior to the close of the poll, all those votes should be simply excluded from the scrutiny. It seemed to me to be an appalling proposition because these were people who had cast a vote in good faith and, through no fault of theirs, their vote was to be made informal; their vote was not to be counted. Voter entitlement and voters being confident that their vote, properly cast, would be counted are a very important principle.

The Australian Government Solicitor gave some extraordinary advice. It said: 'In the present circumstances, we consider that the better course of action is not to include the ballot papers in the count and to quarantine those papers, although, for the reasons we discuss below, it is possible that a court might take a different view.' In the case of Mitchell and Bailey, which involved the seat of McEwen, the Federal Court held that a ballot paper must be included in the count if it was a formal vote. It said: 'If a ballot paper is not informal, the officer conducting the scrutiny will have no legal basis for rejecting it. An implied obligation to admit such a ballot paper to the count thereby arises. Once it is admitted, it must be counted.' The advice went on to try and distinguish that case as not being relevant in a way that I do not think is in any way convincing. I found that the subsequent recommendation of the AEC that those votes should be just simply excluded from the scrutiny was a very—dare I use the word—sloppy way of dealing with the problem.

We did take evidence from others who shared our view. The result is that the report recommends that there should be saving provisions. Having done that, the chair went back to the AEC and the AEC came back with another set of saving provisions which it thought might be adequate for the purpose. As I said, the main question that remains between the government and the opposition is that of when the count is conducted. If the votes are not counted on the night and are simply parcelled, sealed and sent off to the DRO and then somebody else does a count, you are going to have a problem with the tally on the night, but, more importantly, it enshrines the principle that citizens have the right to have their vote counted where the error is not theirs.

It is also very important that we maintain the identification of those ballot papers which are at risk. The reason that we are talking about both ballot papers and envelopes is that the box concerned can have a mixture of ballot papers and envelopes—now all ordinary votes but categorised differently in the mode in which they go into the ballot box. I think this question is an important one because it brings out another question which is yet to be dealt with and for which there is no provision in the act at this stage. The first count of the night is put into plastic bags, not boxes, and sealed up. If someone tampers with those, there is still no provision in the act for what happens to those, so that remains a problem for another day.

On the question of the proposal to allow prepoll to occur up to 19 days prior to election day, we on the opposition side have recommended that it should be no greater than 12. It is up to 19 because of the leeway that exists for when the close of nominations takes place. We are concerned that, again, it is lessening the importance of election day. Every day by which prepoll is longer means that the importance of election day itself becomes lesser. Although we can see the need for having a prepoll, and indeed we are very supportive and have always been supportive of it, we do think that restrictions on it need to be put in place. We think that the amendment that would allow up to 19 days is sending the wrong message, and we feel it should not be allowed to stand unchallenged.

I go back to the question of the opening of the box containing the prepoll ballots. In the review that was done by a former Electoral Commissioner, he made it quite clear that there was not sufficient information given to electoral staff. The fact that it was picked up in only two divisions I think was really good luck rather than good management. To my way of thinking, it is true to say that that same error could have occurred all over the country, and we just did not know about it because there was no scrutineer or other official there who picked it up at the time. The provision that is going to be put into the act will, I hope, state that you have to be careful to comply with the law as it stands and that there is an obligation on the AEC to make sure that all of its people who are in charge of the various stages of elections are properly informed and have all the information. Otherwise, it could happen again.

Another curious thing in the act says that if a box is prematurely opened by an official then their penalty for so doing is less than that for an ordinary punter who also prematurely opens a ballot box. We have recommended that that be the same penalty for both. It is a fairly serious penalty. It can be six months in jail.

There are bits of the Electoral Act where there are serious messages sent out that getting anything wrong with the handling of an election incurs a serious penalty. Yet, at so many turns, we now seem to be loosening the requirements, which makes it easier for what we might say are inappropriate things to happen in the election process, all in the name of it being allegedly simpler to administer.

The opposition feels very strongly about all the amendments that are being brought in by the government, whether it is initially automatic enrolment, automatic so-called updates or changes of address, or letting criminals vote. There are many things that are being done to alter what we consider to be the integrity of the process, which, should we be elected, we will certainly be addressing. I foreshadow that I will be moving amendments in the consideration in detail stage of the debate. I presume that, should the government accept some of the recommendations made by the report, it may be introducing some of its own amendments. Presumably it too will circulate its proposed amendments when we move to the consideration in detail stage.

There has been a lot of strong language used in some of our hearings. Issues have been fiercely pursued, and I am certainly one of those who have fiercely pursued many of the issues. Because we have now had several inquiries into pieces of legislation, as well as the initial report on the 2010 election, I think there is now a greater awareness by many people, who raise the question of electoral matters with me. This simply would not have happened before we embarked on this process of having a greater scrutiny over the process of proposed changes to the Electoral Act.

In conclusion, I would like to say that, when we make changes to the act, there is a huge obligation on the Australian Electoral Commission to make sure that their operatives—the people who are carrying out duties pursuant to the act—are well-informed and that they are carrying out the changes that are made by the parliament in a way which the parliament intended. Perhaps I will just mention one place where that clearly did not occur, which was after the government of the day, the Howard government, had put in place provisions for having oversight—I will use to the word 'audit' in its looser sense—of associated entities and how not one trade union was in the sights of or audited in that way by the Australian Electoral Commission. When we asked the question about why, the answer was given that: 'We were not given any extra resources and we thought Fair Work Australia could carry out some of that duty.' That is not so; if it is in the Commonwealth Electoral Act, it is the Australian Electoral Commission's responsibility.

This is a very serious business. It is a very serious act. It has very strong provisions in it, even though some of them have now been lessened over time—presumably to make it easier for it to be administered. I will just repeat that the opposition, should it be in government, will take a totally different attitude to maintaining the integrity of the roll and to ensuring that citizens who have obligations in fact meet those obligations.

Mr MELHAM (Banks) (17:31): I rise to support the bill before the House. It is a bill which arose out of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters inquiry into the 2010 federal election. A number of recommendations were made. In particular, this bill implements the government's response to recommendations three, nine, 10, 11, 15, 29 and 30 of the report. I note that recommendations 15 and 29 were unanimous recommendations of the committee. I did table earlier today a copy of the advisory report on this bill to the House. I think it is important to acknowledge—as I did in tabling that report—the role played by the member for Mackellar in the public hearings, because she quite actively pursued a particular angle which changed the views of the committee. I think the views of the committee swung around unanimously to those of the member for Mackellar.

Indeed, the committee's report has made two recommendations to the government to make changes to the bill. I will read them: On page 30, it says:

…a vote savings measure to the procedures to be followed if ballot boxes are opened prematurely. This vote savings measure should incorporate the elements proposed by the AEC to this inquiry and provide that ballot papers that have not been tampered with in any way must be reinstated to the count but otherwise excluded. This savings measure should apply at any stage of the scrutiny to a ballot box that has been unlawfully handled by any person…

Also, as the member for Mackellar pointed out, we recommended an amendment:

…explicitly stipulating that any electoral official who deliberately and unlawfully interferes with a ballot box or ballot papers be subject to the same penalty as any other person who commits this offence.

The current bill contains the earlier recommendations of the committee, which were based on submissions. But I understand that there will be some government amendments, which have been given to me as chair of the committee and, as I understand it, have been given to the shadow minister—the member for Mackellar. They will pick up the committee's unanimous recommendations in the advisory report. The important thing is that, until the member for Mackellar pursued it, the votes would have been not included in the count. I have great confidence in the Electoral Commission—I always have had. That is not to say I have a blind confidence in them. I think the robust interaction over the years between members of the committee and the commissioner has proved very worthwhile.

One of the things that the member for Mackellar pointed out in her second reading speech was that I supported her, and the committee supported her, on tabling the government's legal advice in relation to this area of votes that were excluded as a result of possible tampering or whatever. The Electoral Commission did produce the advice. That is appendix D of the report that we tabled. It is important to read parts of that advice and to see that what the Electoral Commission did was faithfully follow the legal advice that it was provided. Of that, there can be no doubt. This was advice to them of 30 August 2010. This was advice from Bridget Gilmour-Walsh, senior general counsel. But at paragraph 15, it also says:

Mr Peter Lahy, Deputy General Counsel, has read and agrees with this advice.

The summary of the advice is also worth quoting, which is on page 70 of our report:

In the present circumstances, we consider that the better course of action is not to include the ballot papers in the count and to quarantine those papers (although for the reasons we discuss below, it is possible that a court might take a different view)…

… If the discarded votes could affect the outcome of the election, we think it would be appropriate for the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) to file a petition disputing the election in the court of disputed returns as permitted by s 357. We cannot see any other way of correcting the errors and consider that there is real doubt as to whether s 285 is available in the present circumstances.

All counsel from the Australian Government Solicitor and the commission can consider is the act as it currently stands. The report says later on—and this is independent of the Electoral Commission and it actually verifies this independently to us as members of parliament—that the commission was faithfully following the legal advice that is was given. And they do seek to distinguish the matter of Mitchell v Bailey, which was in relation to formal ballot papers and challenges to the formality of ballot papers.

What happened at the last election, in two divisions, was the premature opening of postal votes. The committee is at one with the member for Mackellar that, unless tampering can be shown, those votes should go in. There is a slight difference between the member for Mackellar, me and others in relation to whether these votes should actually be counted. The only votes that we say should be counted are those that are included in the count. The others should be parcelled up, separate and identified, but they should not be included in the count unless the Court of Disputed Returns or the Australian Electoral Office rules otherwise. And, even if the Australian Electoral Office rules they are inadmissible, those votes are protected and the secrecy of those votes is paramount. The argument, and general electoral practice, is that, if you are not disputing the informality but you have got ballot papers inside postal vote applications and things like that, their secrecy is preserved unless they are ordered in.

I think it is worth putting into the debate that the proposed section that will deal with this is that the AEO must decide that a ballot paper is to be included in the scrutiny under part 18 unless the AEO is satisfied that the ballot paper has been fraudulently altered or otherwise interfered with so as not to reflect the voter's intention. I think that adequately picks up the concern of the member for Mackellar and the concerns of the whole of the committee. What it would mean is that, if there is inadvertent error, the votes go in unless you can show that they have been tampered with or altered. I think that is a vast improvement. What it shows is that, despite the fact that we do not agree on other aspects, when it comes to enfranchisement and a whole range of other things, the committee have managed to reach agreement on other aspects of this legislation and in our report and in previous reports.

Some of the differences we have are philosophical differences. For the life of me, I was gobsmacked when the member for Mackellar said we should have prepoll polling for only 12 days, not 19 days. Prepoll voting is overtaking postal voting as a preferred method of voting for those people who are not around on election day. It is like expanding the vote of the day to a longer period to allow more people to utilise it. Seven fewer days could result in a lot fewer people having the vote. As I said, it is like an election day exercise except that it is not on election day. I cannot understand this obsession of the member for Mackellar and some others with having that much less prepoll voting.

The recommendations that we made and that the government has endorsed off the back of some submissions from the commission to do with not having prepoll voting before four days and one less day on postal voting are to allow a better process for the election situation. In other words, instead of having handwritten ballot papers because someone rolls up a day or two after nominations close, the Electoral Office will be able to circulate the ballot papers for all of the electorates, for all the subdivisions and particular places, over the weekend, amongst other things. There will not be an argument towards the end of the situation—and I can tell you that a lot of postal vote applications come in after the event and they are lost in the process. By tightening those timetables a better processing situation occurs and there is more urgency from the political parties, the Electoral Office and a whole range of other things.

The other thing I really want to counter—and again I am really gobsmacked—is the obsession with not allowing information to be passed from the tax office to the Australian Electoral Office. I refer members to page 38 of the report, which details in its conclusions what this is all about. It is about maintaining the integrity of rolls—checking information and comparing information. When you listen to the member for Mackellar and those opposite who rail against this position, you would think that the ATO does not share any of its information with anyone, that it is sacrosanct and 'don't go there'. Let me read from the report:

2.73 The committee maintains the view it expressed in its 2010 federal election report that the ATO should be permitted to provide relevant data to the AEC for the purposes of facilitating enrolment. This is a logical extension of existing continuous roll update processes and direct enrolment using third party information which the committee has supported in previous bill inquiries. In addition, these proposed amendments have been discussed and agreed with the ATO and the Treasury.

2.74 The Electoral Commissioner outlined to the committee that a number of government agencies have access to data from the ATO and provided examples. The list of government entities that can receive protected information from taxation officers for specific purposes (defined in Section 355 of the Taxation Administration Act) includes, but is not limited to:

the Health Secretary

the Education Secretary

the Repatriation Commission

the Child Support Registrar

the Superannuation Complaints Tribunal

the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority

the Australian Securities and Investments Commission

the Secretary of the Department of the Treasury

a State taxation officer, or a Territory taxation officer

the Development Allowance Authority

the Defence Secretary

an authority of a State or Territory that administers a workers’ compensation law

the Environment Secretary

the Clean Energy Regulator

the Australian Statistician

the Chief Executive Officer of Customs

the Immigration Secretary

the Fair Work Ombudsman

the Attorney-General of a State or Territory.

2.75 The addition of the AEC to this list for the specific purpose of maintaining the veracity of the electoral roll is appropriate and will not undermine roll integrity.

That is something I assert very, very strongly: we want integrity in the electoral roll and we have integrity in the electoral roll. And when you turn around and talk about multiple votes, I would say that I have been on this parliamentary committee on and off for the 23 years I have been in the parliament, so I have heard a lot of allegations. I have heard about multiple votes. Each time we looked at multiple votes—indeed, the last two times—we heard that about 80 per cent of them were elderly people, a lot of them in nursing homes, who had voted when the mobile polling booth had come. Their children and other relatives had gotten them postal vote applications, thinking that they had not voted. That is going to continue under whatever system you have while you have mobile polling voting occurring in aged-care institutions, and postal voting situations. So it is not directly related to the concerns that the member for Mackellar has. There have been people in the past who have been prosecuted, and they should be prosecuted if there is an attempt to manipulate. It has been a long time since—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop: No-one has been prosecuted; not one.

Mr MELHAM: Well, it has been a long time since. And if you have sufficient evidence and you can get the conviction, then do it. The problem has been that, in effect, the Electoral Commission has to work off the act, which we the politicians design. So you can look at these things, in a number of other instances, in a bipartisan way, in a way in which we might create creative instances. What I like about the advisory report that we tabled earlier this afternoon is that we picked up the suggestion of the member for Mackellar, as well as another suggestion. We did not just sit back and say, 'Rubber stamp this bill' or 'No changes' or whatever. So, I commend her in relation to that.

Regarding the other matters we are talking about, there is an ideological divide. But, as for this obsession that the ATO should not provide any information, I just do not agree with her on that. And, as I just demonstrated, they provided in a number of other instances that the Australian Electoral Commission is going to be better served if they can access those records. I commend the bill to the House. I think it is a balanced bill. It will improve integrity on the roll.

Mr McCORMACK (Riverina) (17:46): It is a pleasure to follow the member for Mackellar and indeed the member for Banks on this most important piece of legislation, the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012, because voting is at the very heart of our democracy. There can be no greater privilege in this great country of ours than to actually cast a vote in a free and democratic election process. I would urge all young people out there to make sure, once they turn 18, that they enrol so that they are able to take part in this very function which, as I said, is at the very heart of our democracy.

It is interesting to hear the member who spoke previously actually praising the member for Mackellar on the initiatives she has put forward and the changes Labor has indeed made, just this afternoon, to this particular piece of legislation, because there are elements of it that are not correct; there are elements of it that need tweaking. While there might not be many speakers on this particular piece of legislation, it is, as I said, at the very heart of our democracy, and it is a most important piece of legislation.

I note that the Electoral Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill is not the government's first attempt at changing the rules to suit itself at future elections. We know that on 30 January this year the Prime Minister called a 14 September election—and, if I might say, that day cannot come soon enough. We know changes this government is trying to make to electoral administration must always be viewed with some degree of scepticism, I daresay. This is something that the Special Minister of State has tried to implement on multiple occasions, trying to make Labor's prospects of re-election that much better, that much brighter. This attempt follows a report from the Join Standing Committee on Electoral Matters that this bill seeks to implement recommendations 3, 9, 10, 11, 15, 29 and 30 made by that particular committee.

It is important that we work towards reforming some elements on electoral administration in this country, and there are tenets of this bill that address that very need for clarity. It is a shame, however, that this bill also includes the adoption of recommendations that are unnecessary and that in some cases jeopardise the integrity of the Australian electoral roll—a roll that cannot be in any way, shape or form jeopardised, because, as I say, this is just too important to get wrong. It is too important to have voters not be able to vote in a particular way, or voters who do cast their vote not to have those votes counted.

At the outset it is important to note that the Liberals and the Nationals have provided a dissenting report on the recommendations of the standing committee. As such, the coalition is opposed to recommendations 3, 10 and 11, which relate to the Australian Taxation Office and the arrangements for the extension of dates for pre-poll at federal elections.

Firstly, I would like to outline what the government wants to achieve through the introduction of this bill. The explanatory memorandum which accompanies the bill explains the bill's intention to: set the procedures which must be followed when a ballot box is prematurely opened; remove the requirement for an applicant for a pre-poll vote to complete and sign a certificate, as they are currently required to do under the Commonwealth Electoral Act and Referendum Act; change requirements that pre-polling cannot commence any earlier than four days after the date set for the declaration of nomination for election or by-election; bring forward the deadline for applications for a postal vote to the Wednesday before the date set for the election rather than the current convention of the Thursday before election day; grant further fixed periods of time to the augmented Electoral Commission to complete its inquiries; and change the Taxation Administration Act to allow the Commissioner of Taxation and other taxation officers to provide forms of taxpayer information to the Australian Electoral Commission for the purpose of administering the Commonwealth Electoral Act and Referendum Act.

There are elements of these recommendations which the coalition agrees with and is therefore keen to see enacted, and I will highlight those in greater detail in a moment. As I have stated previously, it is important we achieve electoral reform in some of the key areas this bill sets out, and the coalition indeed supports some of the committee's recommendations. The Liberals and Nationals agree with several recommendations—namely, those relating to the committee's recommendations 9, 15, 29 and 30.

Firstly, recommendation 9 pertains to the amendments to the convention regarding cases where a ballot box has been opened prematurely. I note that the government has indicated changes to its position on this, which are in line with what the coalition was arguing for in its dissenting report to the committee. I commend the member for Mackellar for her work in that regard.

Secondly, we agree with the proposed amendment, in recommendation 15, to the deadline for the receipt of postal vote applications to 6pm on the Wednesday, three days before the date set for the election. Having an additional 24 hours to process postal vote applications will further enable people who are unable to attend a polling station on the date of the election to have their application for a ballot processed in time for the date of polling. This is something the coalition supports.

Further, the coalition agrees with recommendation 29, which suggests amendment to section 72 of the act and any related sections pertaining to cases where an augmented Electoral Commission has formed an opinion in which it has proposed a redistribution which is significantly different to the Redistribution Committee proposal. We agree with the recommendation that a further fixed period should be provided, during which the actions required by subsection 72(13) of the act are to be undertaken.

The coalition is also in support of recommendation 30, which would seek to amend the act so that, in cases where a further fixed period is provided during which the actions required by subsection 72(13) of the act are to be undertaken, the number of days specified in subsection 72(13) of the act also be increased by the same number provided for in the further fixed period.

While electoral reform is important—indeed, vital—it is critical we use this opportunity to get it right. Recommendations 9, 15, 29 and 30 will seek to do that. In saying this, however, the coalition has significant reservations about three of the standing committee's recommendations, which we therefore cannot and do not support.

Firstly, the government is seeking, in recommendation 3, to remove the current restriction of the Australian Taxation Office to provide information to the Australian Electoral Commission for the purpose of automatic enrolment. Under the current Taxation Administration Act 1953 it is an offence for the Australian Taxation Office to disclose protected information, and the coalition firmly believes this convention should stand. The coalition does not believe granting the Australian Taxation Office such an ability is in the interests of maintaining people's right to privacy. Convention ought to stand on the manner in which people enrol to vote in Australia. Such a move to grant the Australian Taxation Office this ability does not have our support.

Further, recommendation 10 of the committee is that the requirement, at section 200DH of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, for an applicant for a pre-poll vote to sign a certificate be repealed. The coalition, in its dissenting report to this committee, stipulated that the move to repeal the requirement for a pre-poll applicant to sign a certificate:

… will increase the likelihood of voter fraud and threaten the integrity of the Electoral roll.

We cannot and must not let that happen. It is not necessarily an onerous or difficult task for an applicant at pre-poll to provide a signature when casting their vote at a federal election. Surely that is not too much to ask. The coalition members of this committee have said that not only is there no fathomable reason for the requirement of a signature to be repealed but also that we have significant concerns that such a move could lead to an increase in fraudulent voting.

Thirdly, the coalition does not support recommendation 11—that an application for a pre-poll vote cannot be made prior to the Monday 19 days before the current date set for the election. This proposal is an increase on the current 12-day convention, which the coalition believes is sufficient. The date for an election for the federal parliament is set for a reason, and that is when the Liberal and National parties think that the majority of votes ought to be cast. We need to have a polling day, not a polling period. Currently it is 12 days. The other side wants 19. We feel 12 is satisfactory. The current convention of pre-poll voting opening 12 days prior to the election gives voters who cannot attend a polling station on the date of the election a sufficient window of opportunity to cast their vote. A move to increase this by a week may well take the focus off polling day, and we believe it is unnecessary. The coalition therefore stand opposed to this recommendation.

I reiterate the importance of achieving electoral reform in some key areas, which this bill has the potential to achieve. While such reform is important, there are recommendations put to the House through this bill which are unnecessary, such as the recommendation to give the Australian Taxation Office the ability to give private details of people in order to enrol them automatically.

This bill is not alone in being an example of the Labor Party trying its best to improve its standing at the next election by changing electoral processes. We know Labor could amend its policy on introducing the carbon tax we were promised would never happen under the government this Prime Minister leads. Instead, Labor seems hell-bent on introducing electoral reform to make its re-election prospects better. The member for Mackellar has informed the House before of attempts by the Labor Party and its former coalition partners, the Greens, to ensure their survival at the next election. I recall the debate on maintaining addresses and the speech the Hon. Bronwyn Bishop gave on Tuesday, 20 March last year about the Labor Party getting so desperate it tried manipulating election laws to enable prisoners to vote. The member for Mackellar highlighted in that speech the fact that the former Liberal-National coalition removed the right of prisoners to vote. The good old Labor Party, in the depths of its desperation for votes at the next election, amended that to enable people who are sentenced to prison for less than two years to vote. I share the member for Mackellar's concerns about the number of people who have been convicted of a crime and sentenced to prison for less than two years having the ability to vote. While there are aspects of this bill which are worthy of support, it is essential that we take the government's attempts to reform electoral procedures with a grain of salt, with scepticism.

This bill, which seeks to implement recommendations 9, 10, 11, 15, 29 and 30 of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters report into the conduct of the 2010 federal election and related matters, has some good ideas for electoral reform. Unfortunately, they are cloaked in the move to implement some unnecessary changes which jeopardise the integrity of the electoral roll. It is because of this that the coalition only supports recommendations 9, 15, 29 and 30 of the joint committee's report. I thank you, Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, for the privilege of speaking on this very important matter.

Mr GRIFFIN (Bruce) (17:59): I will not take too much of the House's time today because, as has been clear from earlier speakers, there is a lot that can be said but it tends to be a bit repetitive. The fact is that what we are dealing with here are basically predominantly relatively minor reforms on what is, as earlier members have said, an excellent electoral system. It is an electoral system which has served us well for many years now. It is an electoral system which is international renowned. It is an electoral system that is independent. And it is an electoral system which is organic—it has evolved when change has been required. It has taken into consideration the nature of the changing patterns of the way society organises itself, the way technology has developed and the way people wish to exercise their democratic rights on an ongoing basis. For those reasons it is not unusual for us to be here in this House once again debating amendment of the acts that are involved. But in doing so we are building on a system which is, frankly, the envy of the world.

Having said that, because it relates to the very issue of how we achieve our arrival here and maintain our careers here, it is an area which is often subject to partisan comment—partisan comment from the coalition and, at times, from the Labor Party. I have certainly been part of that over the years. As a former shadow minister, in relation to the electoral area, I have had some impassioned debates about elements of our system, particularly with the member for Mackellar amongst others—

Mr Danby: And some on your own side!

Mr GRIFFIN: And some on my own side, indeed, and it has always been in good spirit. But the good thing about it is that we are always arguing about tinkering, in a situation where overwhelmingly it is a good system.

And so to the tinkering that we are dealing with today. As was outlined by the previous speaker, there are a number of recommendations which came from a report of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, of which I am a member, as to the conduct of the 2010 federal election. The amendments are, in my view, best categorised as being about making it easier and better for people to be able to exercise their democratic rights—easier to exercise their democratic rights with respect to enrolment, and easier to exercise their democratic rights in terms of their vote.

We do sometimes find ourselves in a debate in this area around that question of ensuring we have a vibrant electoral system that gives people the opportunity to participate, versus the question of the what-ifs—what might happen in certain circumstances if people should endeavour to commit electoral fraud. I stand very firmly on the side of the debate that if there is a choice between giving someone the right to exercise their vote and not, then they should be given that right. I stand very firmly on the view that our system should be encouraging rather than discouraging participation.

If we look to the last election, one of the things that was quite disturbing was that we had one of the highest informal voting figures since Federation—in fact, it was the second highest, with the previous occasion being, I think, in 1984 when some changes had been made to the voting system for the Senate. That led to a situation where one could vote above the line—which meant that you only had to put a one in a box above a line for senatorial voting—and unfortunately part of the advertising campaign confused people around the question of what was a legitimate vote in the lower house. So, other than that occasion, the informal vote at the last election was the highest.

Also, in terms of the question of electoral turnout: the turnout at this last election was in fact the lowest turnout since the first election where we had compulsory voting, back in the 1920s. So during the time when we have had compulsory enrolment and compulsory voting, this was the lowest percentage.

This highlights some key points around the need to ensure that our rolls are capable of being updated easily and to ensure that, in the process of doing that, you do not throw the baby out with the bathwater and you still have a system of integrity. One of the key things around the changes that are being proposed, of which elements are in this bill, is ensuring that you are able to cross-reference data and ensure that there are checks and balances. I might add that, although this relates particularly to the Australian Taxation Office, the systems that have been developed with respect to several state jurisdictions actually involve a similar approach around the question of cross-matching of data in order to ensure that people are given the maximum opportunity to ensure they are on the electoral roll. I think that is an important principle.

So, to those who would argue that automatic enrolment opens a door to fraud, I would say it opens a door to greater levels of participation by people who are fully entitled to do so. It gives them the opportunity to take part in the democratic process. The previous speaker, the member for Riverina, raised some points about the question of this being an evil plot by the Labor Party to ensure that, through changes to the electoral roll, we would increase our capacity to be elected at the next election. There has been comment on this publicly. Frankly, what is really clear is that, when it comes to the question about any impact some of these changes might have on any electoral result, it is absolutely minimal, but it does take into account that key point around the issue of ensuring that all Australians have the right to participate in our democratic system.

I will speak briefly about a couple of other points that were made about some of the amendments that are here. As I said, I do not think there are a lot of matters here of great significance—and certainly of partisan politics—but I mentioned one. The other couple I will mention go to the issue of the signing of pre-poll certificates by voters, which, again, was mentioned by a previous speaker as having the potential for voter fraud. Frankly, it is about removing unnecessary processes that cause greater administrative difficulties with the whole question of the conduct of these ballots. Frankly, it will not have an impact with respect to fraud. It is part of a wider argument that is often raised around the issue of the potential for multiple voting. Time and time again, the Australian Electoral Commission has produced detailed research showing that, for all of the huff and puff that goes on from some about the potential for this to occur, it just does not. The fact is that our system is one we can all be very proud of.

On the issue of applications for pre-polls and the fact that there would be a longer period to allow pre-polling to occur, and the question of what has been occurring in more recent times, it is a recognition of the fact that more and more Australians are availing themselves of the opportunity to vote in the lead-up to election day rather than on election day. To be honest, I have some concerns about that, in terms of the question of how you conduct a campaign and ensure that you give people the opportunity to have the information before them to make a decision before they cast their vote. The more people who exercise that right prior to polling day the more people might be in a situation where they are not always in possession of all the facts. Having said that, it is a fact of modern Australian society that the mobility of people and the circumstances of their health have led to a situation where more and more people are availing themselves of that opportunity. In those circumstances I really do not see what the problem is.

We have a good system, a system we can all be proud of. We are in a situation where this legislation is part of an ongoing process that all governments engage in with respect to the finetuning of an electoral system that is the envy of the world. We ought to be proud of it. We ought to be proud of being part of the system and what it produces. We should pass these amendments because they are part of making sure that the system keeps pace with the times.

Mrs PRENTICE (Ryan) (18:08): There is nothing more fundamental to democracy than elections, and there is nothing more important to proper, honest and fair elections than the integrity of the electoral rolls, the very rock upon which our electoral system stands. Today's bill includes provisions that represent a further attack on the integrity and accuracy of the electoral roll. It is for that reason that I rise to speak today on the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012.

This bill seeks to implement seven recommendations contained in the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters report following the 2010 federal election: The 2010 federal election: report on the conduct of the election and related matters. The bill was first introduced on 29 November 2012 and was referred by the selection committee to the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters for further scrutiny, through which the committee released its report on 27 February 2012, with the coalition providing a dissenting report to note its opposition to some components of the bill. Specifically, the coalition opposes recommendations 3, 10 and 11. Recommendation 3 includes further changes as to how information is added to the electoral roll by allowing the Australian Taxation Office to share information with the Australian Electoral Commission.

I have previously spoken in this House about my commitment to the integrity of the electoral roll, a system whereby each individual elector acts on their own initiative to comply with the responsibilities that come with being a resident of Australia. In March last year the government passed in the House the Electoral and Referendum (Maintaining Address) Bill and the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Protecting Elector Participation) Bill, which allowed automatic enrolment based on an elector changing their address with the Department of Human Services, state and territory motor registries or Australia Post. This has created the potential that at no stage is the actual elector involved in changing their electoral address. Instead, if they change their address with the previously mentioned bodies the AEC will post a letter to their proposed new address to confirm the change. If they do not respond, the AEC will go about changing their address anyway. This is a serious concern because we know that only 20 per cent of electors respond to letters from the Electoral Commission. Even more alarming is that last year's changes mean that now someone can be added to the electoral roll without their prior knowledge and without their consent. There is no signature required, and not even a required acknowledgment that the elector understands the rights and responsibilities that come with being on the electoral roll. They might simply get a learner's permit from a convenient motor registry and then, without their knowledge and without their consent, a public servant sitting in Canberra comes across their information and puts them on the electoral roll or changes their enrolment details.

One particular argument often used in the defence of making voting compulsory in Australia is that voting should be considered to be not merely a civil right but also one's civic duty. The argument maintains that it is the responsibility of every single person capable of casting a vote at an election to educate themselves about the issues and to vote accordingly. Indeed, it is technically compulsory in this nation for someone to not just attend a voting booth but to specifically mark their preference on their ballot paper, thereby making a deliberate informal vote illegal—although of course there are ways around that obligation. If we were to accept that argument we must also accept that attempts to reduce or remove the responsibility of Australians to engage with the electoral process must not occur. Yet this is exactly what automatic enrolment does. It takes the responsibility away from the elector and places it in the hands of a public servant.

Automatic enrolment and the further dilution of the integrity of the electoral roll will be a huge problem, potentially, for thousands of students who reside at the 11 colleges at the University of Queensland. Just last Friday my office dropped off forms so that more than 2,000 students in St Lucia can ask to check their enrolment status. Many of those students may reside at the college while their electoral address may be thousands of kilometres away. With automatic enrolment their address may be changed, as I have said, without their consent and without their knowledge, so they may show up on election day having no idea that their electoral address has changed, which could impair their ability to cast a formal vote at their correct address in the correct electorate.

This bill adds further ambiguity to the electoral roll because it includes legislative changes to the Taxation Administration Act, which governs the protection of personal data collected by the ATO. This means that the ATO will be allowed to provide personal information and data to the AEC for the purposes of automatic enrolment. The coalition has warned this government previously about what damage could occur if the AEC uses information from the ATO to update the electoral roll, because there are very serious questions about the accuracy of the data it keeps.

We know that there was a very extensive and thorough review in the Australian National Audit Office report on the management of tax files numbers considered by a House Standing Committee on Economics, Financial and Public Administration in 1999. From that report the House discovered that there were 3.2 million more tax file numbers than people in Australia when compared with the most recent census. There are 185,000 potential duplicate tax records for individuals and, very alarmingly, 62 per cent of deceased clients were not recorded as deceased in a sample match. There is no reason to suggest that in 2013 the records of the ATO are any more accurate.

The government majority report maintains that the AEC should be able to use a so-called 'trusted' data source and that the AEC by itself can declare whether or not it thinks a data source is trustworthy. However, when there are so many gaps and mistakes, which I have just mentioned, we must question the very integrity of that data and whether the ATO can be considered to be a trusted data source. As the coalition's dissenting report noted:

The inclusion of such data, if erroneous, would be extremely damaging to public faith in our electoral process.

In simple terms, where there are such examples of inconsistency in Commonwealth data, there cannot be sufficient faith in this data being used to automatically add people to the electoral roll.

Furthermore, there are very important privacy concerns that this change introduces. Previously, the ATO has always claimed that it maintains the highest level of confidentiality when it comes to a taxpayer's personal information. With today's proposed changes, the ATO will be able to pass on confidential information to the AEC without the individual taxpayer's knowledge or consent. This is a dangerous path that the Labor government is following. Bit by bit, the Labor Party is increasing government scope in our lives—and not only in the electoral process. With so many other regulations and policies, it proposes to increase taxes on families to regulate what we can or cannot say and to regulate what we can and cannot see in the media. With these changes to the Electoral Act, the Labor government is sending the message that your personal, private information is not your property because, once it ends up in the hands of a government bureaucrat, they can do whatever they want with your information.

Therefore, the coalition remains opposed to automatic enrolment and the provision within this bill which provides for the Australian Taxation Office to release a taxpayer's personal data for the purpose of automatic enrolment. What the AEC should be concentrating on is continually checking the accuracy of the roll and advertising to ensure that people are aware of their obligations to properly enrol initially and to then advise the AEC of a change of address, should it occur.

This bill also enacts recommendation 10, reducing the responsibilities of an elector should they complete a pre-poll ordinary vote. Currently, if someone wishes to complete a pre-poll vote, they must complete and sign a certificate declaring their identity. This bill removes that requirement. It is not an onerous task for an elector to provide a simple signature so that the AEC can ensure that fraudulent and multiple voting does not occur in elections. Given the inherent difficulty for the AEC to successfully prosecute a case where they believe someone has engaged in fraudulent or multiple voting, which has been previously noted by the committee, we must not introduce changes which make that activity easier or more likely to occur. We do not want the onerous requirement of someone, for example, having to prove their identity with a drivers licence—I am not suggesting that—but it is not onerous for someone to sign a form so that the AEC can protect against voter fraud. Therefore, I oppose removing the requirement for electors to sign a certificate when they cast a pre-poll vote.

The coalition further opposes the provision in this bill which adopts recommendation 11 of the electoral matters committee report to provide that pre-poll voting cannot commence earlier than four days after the date fixed for the declaration of nominations for an election. This would allow for pre-poll voting to occur on the Monday 19 days prior to the general election date, a change from the current practice of opening pre-poll voting on the Monday 12 days prior to the election date. There are significant concerns about this change being implemented as it would take the focus away from the polling day itself. Ultimately, while pre-poll voting is an important way through which those with health issues or those who travel can be engaged with democracy and vote at an election, we must also accept that the appropriate day for the overwhelming majority of votes to be cast is the declared general election day.

Finally, the coalition does support those parts of this bill which relate to four recommendations of the original Electoral Matters Committee report—firstly, recommendation 9: to amend the act where appropriate 'to specifically provide that a ballot box containing votes cast by electors may not be opened before the close of polling other than in accordance with the relevant provisions of the act'; secondly, recommendation 15: to amend the act to provide 'that the deadline for the receipt of postal vote applications be 6 pm on the Wednesday, three days before polling day'; thirdly, recommendation 29: to amend the act to provide 'that, where an augmented Electoral Commission has formed an opinion that its proposed redistribution is significantly different to the Redistribution Committee proposal, a further fixed period be provided during which the actions required by subsection 72(13) of the act are to be undertaken'; and, fourthly, recommendation 30: to provide that 'the number of days specified in subsection 72(2) of the act also be increased by the same number of days provided for in the further fixed period' in the case that an individual or an organisation makes a further objection. The coalition supports these necessary changes.

I would like to again thank members of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters for their commitment to the electoral and referendum acts, and particularly thank the member for Mackellar for her decades-long commitment to the integrity of the electoral roll.

At the end of the day, it is inconceivable that the government cannot be alert to the real issues raised by these amendments. Our concerns are born of a genuine belief that something so fundamental as the integrity of our electoral system must be protected by legislation which reflects that importance—legislation that secures that integrity by spelling out in the clearest terms how it is to be protected, and legislation that acknowledges that a flawed protection of our electoral rolls must inevitably lead to the wrong candidates being elected. It is as stark as that. Any attempt to reduce the integrity of our electoral roll—a cornerstone of our democracy—must be opposed, and that is why I oppose this bill in its current form.

Mr DANBY (Melbourne Ports) (18:22): I want to congratulate the Special Minister of State for bringing the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012 forward. Like Work Choices, it corrects one of the great conservative overreaches made when, in their hubris, the previous government had control of the Senate. This bill gives effect to recommendations made by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, which I had the honour to serve from 2001 to 2010, part of the time as deputy chair, when we were in opposition. As a result of that committee experience, I am very familiar with the issues and the government's wider project of electoral reform.

Australia has one of the best electoral systems at the federal level in the world. The combination of single-member seats in the House of Representatives, proportional representation in the Senate, preferential voting in all elections and compulsory voting is uniquely Australian. It gives stable majority government most of the time in the Lower House, and there are occasional hung parliaments, as we have at this time. It gives minor parties a voice in the Senate without allowing them to destabilise governments and it ensures that every Australian citizen participates in our democratic process so that every citizen shares responsibility for the outcome of elections. But our system is not perfect. It requires regular updating to ensure that we maximise electoral participation.

I believe that in the period of the previous conservative government a deliberate tactic was entered into where slowly, salami style, various categories of Australians were excluded from the roll. It is not good enough that we have as a result of that process an estimated 15.7 million Australians eligible to be enrolled but only 14.2 million actually enrolled. If we are to make voting compulsory—and I strongly believe that we should; that is our system and we are all, on a non-partisan basis, committed to it—we need to ensure that, logically and rationally, every Australian has the ability to vote by being enrolled. At the moment we are clearly not doing enough to ensure this.

I might point out that this is in part a problem we have created for ourselves. As I said, I think part of it was a deliberate tactic by the previous conservative government. Over decades people were taken off the electoral roll and very happily not put back on. In the previous system with snail mail only 20 per cent of people responded to changes of address inquiries by the AEC and gradually we have had this problem of 1.5 million Australians being off the electoral roll.

In 1987 the Hawke government proposed the Australia Card as a solution to identity problems and actually won a double dissolution election on this issue but, because of obstruction in the Senate, the proposal was never put into effect. We are now paying a price for that failure with over one million eligible Australian citizens not on the electoral roll.

The government has recently legislated to move to automatic enrolment. Recent amendments to the Electoral Act allow the AEC to enrol an unenrolled person without a claim being lodged by that person and to update or transfer a person's enrolment without an application from that person provided that the AEC is certain, on the basis of available information, of that person's current address. This will enable the AEC to place most of those people who are currently unenrolled on the rolls.

The member for Ryan painted this as some kind of Labor conspiracy, whereas in fact the government of New South Wales does this. Are they part of some Labor conspiracy? Has Barry O'Farrell's mind been colonised by Minister Gray? Of course not. This is not a conspiracy. This is a reaction to modernity when people travel and are not available on the day and when people do not respond to snail mail. Very few people make the deliberate decision not to enrol to vote. Most of those who are not enrolled have failed to enrol out of ignorance or forgetfulness, as we can see from the rush of last-minute enrolments that we always get when an election is announced.

The previous speaker, the member for Ryan, said that using the tax office was some kind of socialist conspiracy to steal people's rights. Of course, all previous conservative governments since the early 1980s have used the Transport Accident Commission and many other databases in order to do the continuous roll updates that form the basis of them writing letters to people to seek their enrolment.

This legislation refines the process of enrolment. The bill facilitates automatic enrolment of eligible people by allowing the Taxation Commissioner to disclose information to the AEC for roll update and maintenance purposes. Only information obtained by the Taxation Commissioner on or after the day this bill is assented to can be disclosed to the AEC. What that means in short is that the AEC will be able to determine a person's current address by, amongst other things, accessing information held by the ATO. Of course, no other taxation information can or will be disclosed.

The way the highly competent Electoral Commission organises this is to correlate various databases, so the ATO information will not be the only information that it correlates. Since most people pay their taxes—even those who have forgotten to enrol to vote—this will enable the AEC to gradually put more people on the rolls over the years.

Another section of this bill deals with procedures for people casting their vote at a pre-polling place—that is, at a place which is open before polling day. This is an increasingly urgent question. As I said, it is a question of modernity, not of conspiracy. Due to changes in people's work and leisure habits, it is no longer convenient for every Australian to vote on the Saturday in the traditional way. An increasing proportion of voters cast postal votes or a pre-poll vote.

In my electorate of Melbourne Ports at the 2010 election 5.5 per cent of people cast a pre-poll vote while 11 per cent did a postal vote. It is very interesting that this inner-city electorate cast that many postal votes, as the number was competitive with some of the more remote electorates in Australia that had a very high number of postal votes but obviously for very different reasons. It is international context rather than conspiracy. Twenty-five per cent of people at the recent United States election for the presidency of the United States voted before election day. This is the future. This is how Australia, too, has to move. That is why these moves on prepolling are very au fait with the way modern society is moving.

In my electorate, as I said, a total of 16.7 per cent of people, the highest in Australia, either cast a prepoll or postal vote. The reason for that is not like, say, in the electorate of Maranoa where geographic remoteness causes people to cast a postal vote. It is that we have a very large percentage of Jewish Australians who do not vote on a Saturday and seek to vote by prepoll or by postal vote. They do not do this to pull some kind of trick; it is because of their cultural or religious observance. Yet the Electoral Act as it stands treats prepoll voters with unjustified suspicion by requiring them to fill out and sign a form stating that they are eligible to vote before they can be given a ballot paper. It seems to me to be insulting to these voters that the Electoral Act makes it more difficult to cast a vote on the Wednesday before an election than on the Saturday of an election itself.

As I have said many times in debates of this sort, we have not only one of the best but also one of the cleanest election systems in the world. Numerous inquiries by the joint standing committee have shown that there is no evidence whatever of any significant level of electoral fraud or malpractice in Australian federal elections. There is therefore no justification for putting obstacles in the path of Australian citizens who want to cast their vote by prepoll. This bill does away with the requirement for prepoll voters to sign a declaration and I know many people in my electorate will welcome that.

In the years between 1990 and 2012 there were six electoral events, including a referendum, at which 72 million Australians voted. The Electoral Commission at the end of the day referred to the police 72 cases of electoral fraud in those six electoral events—one case per million people. The member for Mackellar goes on and on about the integrity of the electoral roll, but we have integrity in the electoral roll. What we have is the democratic problem of 1.5 million Australians not being on the roll because they have been deliberately excluded by a Tory plan that took a number of years to get into practice.

It is very unfortunate that the opposition is opposing aspects of this bill. It is unfortunate but not surprising, because the whole trend of Liberal and National Party policy in this area has been to restrict rather than enhance the right and ability of Australians to enrol and to vote. The Howard government in its last term passed amendments to the Electoral Act that made it significantly harder for people who did not have drivers licences or passports to enrol and cast a prepoll or postal vote. There was a scandalous growth in the number of people between the 2004 and 2007 elections who applied for provisional votes on the day and were excluded because of the restrictive requirements that were put in by the Howard government. I suspect it was because many of those people lived in apartments, were more mobile and were younger and the Howard government suspected that they might vote against them. All Australians have the right to vote and these provisions between 2004 and 2007 saw the number of people having their provisional vote submitted go down from 80 per cent in 2004 to, in 2007, in many cases less than 50 per cent.

One must ask why the opposition, when they were in government, moved to make it harder for Australians to enrol and to vote, and why now, in opposition, they are resisting our moves to make it easier to enrol and to vote. The answer is quite simply that they believe it is in their political interests to do so. They calculate that the voters they disenfranchised through their restrictive measures, and whose re-enfranchisement they are now opposing, are more likely to be Labor voters than conservative voters. The member on our side who previously spoke believes that it is neutral, but I think there is probably some truth to the idea that younger and more transient voters may vote for us.

In going down this anti-democratic path, however, the opposition is once again following their mentors, the right wing of the US Republican Party. All through last year we saw attempts by Republican governors to make it harder for people in their states to register to vote and to cast their votes. They did this in a blatant attempt to rig the electoral system against the President of the United States, President Obama, and in favour of Governor Romney. Fortunately, most of their efforts were overturned in the courts. Last November, we saw where all of these Republican attempts to deny people the right to vote finished up. In fact, it was a cause celebre in the United States that people were faced with these electoral restrictions and more people turned out—and more people turned out early, I would suggest—as a result of these attempts to change the electoral system. I suggest the same thing will happen to the opposition in this country unless they change their tactics.

The issue addressed by this bill is the real issue of democratic deficit in Australia—that is, is the 1.5 million Australians disenfranchised by the continuous restrictive elements that were put into practice by the previous conservative government between the time of their election in 1996 and 2007. Enrolling people with the proper integrity is the great democratic purpose of this legislation and I commend it to the House.

Dr LEIGH (Fraser) (18:36): The Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Administration) Bill 2012 is the third bill on which I have spoken regarding reforms to the administration of our electoral system. I have a great passion for expanding our democracy. That passion is shared by a great number of electors in Fraser. At last count, we had 131,000 electors in Fraser. That compares to an average of 94,000 electors per electorate at the last election. Mine is either the largest or the second largest electorate in Australia, and I welcome more people onto the roll in the ACT.

Before this bill, the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Improving Electoral Procedure) Bill, the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Protecting Elector Participation) Bill introduced important amendments to enhance voter participation and update the electoral roll. We have introduced this suite of changes because, unlike our conservative counterparts, we understand how crucial inclusion and participation are to our system of democracy. That passion for expanding access to democracy is centuries old. It goes back to the times when William Wentworth, a conservative, campaigned to maintain the property qualification for voting. It goes back to those conservatives who stood against expanding the suffrage to women in Australia. It goes also today, in Queensland, to those members of the Queensland LNP who are campaigning to get rid of compulsory voting. At every turn you see progressives wanting to expand the franchise and conservatives opposing expansion and wanting shrinkage of the franchise.

This is fundamentally part of a fair go. I want people on the electoral roll regardless of how they vote because I believe the very act of participating in our democratic process is an important one. I will often urge young people who are interested in politics to get involved in political parties. It is great if they want to get involved in my political party, but if they want to get involved in another political party that too is a good thing.

This bill introduces administrative procedures to assist the Australian Electoral Commission in producing a more inclusive electoral roll and timely processing of postal vote applications. That will include bringing forward the date to dispatch voting materials for postal votes. It will include allowing the Australian Electoral Commission to receive certain information from the Taxation Office for enrolments and updating enrolments. In themselves these are small steps, but they are part of that bigger story of democracy, civic engagement, inclusion and using the role of government to strengthen our great democracy.

Today is Canberra's birthday. It is appropriate to acknowledge the words of Walter Burley Griffin, who said that he was designing a city for a nation of 'bold democrats'. Bold democrats should want everyone to participate in our electoral process and that means administrative amendments that expand the franchise.

The number of eligible voters who are not on the electoral roll has risen significantly since 2001. Without the administrative changes introduced to enhance electoral procedures and voter participation, on average 10,000 eligible voters per electorate would have been unable to cast their votes later this year and to exercise their right to elect their political representatives.

There are only a dozen or so nations around the world that have compulsory voting. We have compulsory voting because we believe that with rights come responsibilities, that it is the responsibility of everyone to have their say in the democratic process. Indeed, as a Centre for Independent Studies report pointed out a number of years ago, getting rid of compulsory voting would lead to a bias in those who remain. In which way would it bias? It was quite clear from the authors, Derek Chong, Sinclair Davidson and Tim Fry, that getting rid of compulsory voting would advantage the conservative side of politics and it would do so not in a fair manner because those who voted under voluntary voting would be unrepresentative of the Australian population as a whole. As a social laboratory for the world, we have been a world leader in implementing compulsory voting and it is a good and important reform that ensures inclusion. It ensures that those of us in this place are an accurate representation of the political views of the Australian people. Voluntary voting would breach that guarantee.

In opposing these reforms, the opposition is again demonstrating a preference for political gain over the national interest, the democratic interest, of all Australians, over the right to vote and the right to ensure that our parliament is representative of the population as a whole. Why won't it support these amendments? Part of the answer is in a November 2011 radio interview from the opposition leader. He said that only the right kids should stay on at school beyond year 10. He said, 'It's all very well and good keeping kids at school past year 10 but they've got to be the right kids.' It appears here that that is the approach the opposition is taking to electoral reform: 'We want voters but only the right sorts of voters.'

The coalition attempted to block a bill that would make it easier for Australians to vote by lowering the provisional age at which young Australians can register to vote. When that bill came before the House in 2010, the member for Eden-Monaro correctly stated, 'I think that Tony Abbott needs to explain to the Australian people why he does not want to make it easy for them to enrol and vote in the forthcoming election.' We know the answer, as the member for Melbourne Ports has pointed out. Statistically, it is likely that, as you increase the number of younger people on the rolls, they will not be natural supporters of the coalition.

The principle here is the principle of expanding the franchise. We need more civic engagement. And that is in the face of a decline in civic engagement. In my book Disconnected, I charted not only the collapse of Australian political party membership right across the spectrum but also a decline over recent decades in the share of Australians casting a valid vote. What do you have to do to cast a valid vote? You have to do two things. You have to show up to the polling booth and not spoil the ballot paper. Despite an increase in education levels in Australia, we have seen a decrease in the share of electors casting a valid vote, with now a 10th of the citizenry effectively failing to participate in the poll, either by not turning up or by spoiling the ballot paper. In that environment it is absolutely critical that we expand the democratic process, that we ensure that more and more people can be engaged.

It was somewhat surprising recently to see defence of an inclusive democracy and election system coming from an unlikely source in Queensland. In January this year, the Newman government released a discussion paper that raised the prospect of scrapping compulsory voting in state elections. Clive Palmer responded to the proposal with the following tweet:

Qld govt plan to scrap compulsory voting shows it's panicking about loss of support. Compulsory voting a feature of our democracy.

And in a media release he made the perfectly sensible point:

The more people who participate in a democracy the better and it is good for the whole country if citizens accept the responsibility to vote.

If you want to see a preview of what Australia might look like were the Leader of the Opposition to move to this side of the House then you only have to look at the Newman government in Queensland. It is, frankly, a shame that some of the LNP in Queensland do not understand, as it turns out Mr Palmer does, that participation in the democratic process is essential to a fair society.

Minister Gray argued earlier this year that Australia's electoral system should not be changed for the sake of protecting partisan political interests. He correctly identified concern about the increase in informal voting and the need to address this. While I am not sure Minister Gray would regard Clive Palmer as being his natural ally, the point is indeed clear. As the minister has said:

Our system has delivered stable government and a custom and practice which means voters at federal elections are most likely to know how to … make their vote count. Voting systems should not be changed for short-term partisan advantage.

The Australian Electoral Commission received over 800,000 postal vote applications at the 2010 election. It is an increasingly popular way to cast a ballot. This bill will amend the Commonwealth Electoral Act and the Referendum (Machinery Provisions) Act to remove the requirement for a prepoll ordinary vote applicant to complete and sign a certificate. The Australian Electoral Commission will be assisted in processing the applications for postal votes by bringing forward by one day the dispatch of postal voting materials. The bill clarifies that prepoll voting can only commence on the fourth day following the declaration of nominations. In addition, a small amendment to the Taxation Administration Act allows certain personal information collected by the Australian Taxation Office to be received by the Electoral Commission. This information, obtained from a credible government source, will enable the commission to update the electoral roll so that it is as inclusive as possible, demonstrating a commitment to ensuring that as many Australians as possible can have their say in our great democracy.

The progressive tradition of supporting democratic participation is a fundamental Labor value. Labor believes that every Australian should have their say in the future of Australia. We are committed to ensuring that everyone who is eligible has a say in the nation's future, because we are the party of democracy and of the franchise. The right role of government is to protect the rights of Australians to put their mark on the ballot paper and make it possible for them to do so. The right role of government is to ensure that we get those estimated 1½ million voters who are off the electoral roll involved in elections. That comes from fundamental values which are not just Labor values; they are Australian values—equity, fairness and participation. People who are voting for the first time should be encouraged to get on the roll. That means all of them—not just what the Leader of the Opposition might call the right voters but all voters.

These administrative changes are part of a larger story, a story central to Australia. They are part of an Australia which has always believed in inclusion, civic engagement and democracy. It is an Australian tradition which does not look at politics through a partisan lens and recognises that we must always welcome greater participation and ensure that those who move are able to stay on the electoral roll, that young Australians are encouraged to join the electoral roll and that new citizens are able to join the electoral roll. It is always a great pleasure and a privilege to speak at citizenship ceremonies, to speak to people who are joining the Australian project for the first time. I often say at those ceremonies that the new citizens are now part of a larger Australian project, a project which stretches back generations. It is not just a project run by politicians; it is the job of all of us to leave Australia a little better than we found it. The way in which new citizens so often look to do that is by getting on the electoral roll and getting involved in elections.

These democracy-enhancing reforms are fundamentally about ensuring that movers, young Australians, new citizens and, frankly, those who are just a little bit forgetful do not get left out of our great democracy. Just because you forget to update your details to the Australian Electoral Commission it does not mean that we should not help ensure that you have your say in our nation's future. Australia's democracy is too important to be left to a small portion of Australians. The job of Australia's democracy falls on all of us, and that is why we must do all we can to expand the franchise. I commend the bill to the House.

Debate adjourned.

Mr SIDEBOTTOM (Braddon—Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) (20:16): by leave—I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

Mr SIDEBOTTOM (Braddon—Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) (20:18): by leave—I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

Ms JULIE BISHOP (Curtin—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (20:19): At the outset, I must say that the coalition has grave reservations about the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013, but, due to the disastrous budget mismanagement of this government, we do not believe that we can oppose this bill, which is principally designed to cut the level of funding for the Export Market Development Grants Scheme, because this is a savings measure. However, we do condemn the government for this outcome, and I will be moving a second reading amendment which notes that the coalition, should we be elected to government, commits to reviewing the changes in this bill to establish their true budgetary and administrative impact on business, especially small and medium enterprises, who need the support of this scheme in order to grow their export oriented businesses.

The changes proposed in the bill are to implement the recent Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook decision to deliver annual savings of $25 million. That is how dire the budget situation has become. This government, which has run up over $260 billion in gross debt, now has to look for savings in the order of $25 million a year out of this scheme. The EMDG Scheme, administered by Austrade, partly supports the export promotion expenses of eligible enterprises in order to boost exports, to grow our economy in Australian produced goods and services. Claims are reimbursed retrospectively for expenditure incurred in the previous financial year pro rata up to the cap. My understanding is that about 5,100 enterprises per year apply for grants. Prior to now, the scheme has been capped for many years at $150 million per annum, except in 2008-09 and 2009-10, when a $200 million cap applied.

According to the government, the changes in this bill will better help Australian exporters maximise the potential of the Asian century by increasing the number of grants available in East Asian and frontier and emerging markets from seven years worth to eight years. The government believes that this offers Australian small- and medium-sized exporters a slightly longer and more commercially realistic period to become established in these markets. However, to offset the additional grant expenditure associated with an increased number of grants to East Asian and emerging and frontier markets, the number of grants to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union is to be reduced. I believe that the 21st century should be known as 'the global century' and that Australia, as a global nation with global interests, should not only be looking to East Asia but also be continuing to pursue opportunities for our exporters in established markets. The government argues that in those markets the Australian brand is already well known and accepted and small businesses would typically face fewer barriers to doing business.

The bill provides for the reduction in the number of grants for these markets from a maximum of seven years of annual grants to only five years. So, in effect, the Minister for Trade and Competitiveness is telling Australian exporters that he knows how to run their businesses better than they do. He knows through who knows what business experience that the US market is bad but the Asian market is good. The fact is that the minister for trade does not have a clue. If the minister for trade thought the Asian market was so vital, why did he do virtually nothing to stop the government's disgraceful ban on live cattle exports to Indonesia? The government claims that it is seeking to introduce this bill now to avoid creating considerable uncertainty for small businesses as they adjust to the new arrangements which become operational on 1 July 2013.

The coalition has consulted key stakeholder groups, including the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Export Council of Australia—both oppose the expenditure cut and have asked that the coalition oppose the bill. We have agonised over this decision because we agree with them that the EMDG scheme under a competent government is a fine scheme and it has helped Australian exporters over many decades, and we believe it should not be cut in this way. However, recognising the dire state of this government's upcoming budget, recognising the dire state of the debt situation that this government has plunged Australia into and in the interests of our wider budget management policy, it is felt that we cannot oppose the expenditure cuts. But we note that this is yet another blow to business caused by the budget mismanagement and fiscal recklessness of the Gillard government.

When in doubt a Labor government will default to kicking the business community. The former trade union bosses and their lawyers who form the Labor Party just do not get business, especially small business. Labor cries crocodile tears about job security, but does not acknowledge or appreciate that it is the business community that is the engine room for job security—the businesses that take the risks to find new markets to grow their businesses. It is business that employs workers and creates and provides jobs. So, this blow to the EMDG scheme is just another example of Labor not understanding business and its needs. It is fair to say that since 2007 Labor has made a complete mess of the EMDG scheme. Soon after taking office Labor expanded the scheme by lowering the eligible expenditure threshold from $15,000 to $10,000, increasing the number of grants from seven to eight and increasing the maximum grant from $150,000 to $200,000—all well and good, if you can believe them. The cost of these changes was estimated at $50 million a year, but then—and this is the key—Labor increased funding only for the year 2009-10. So, in June 2010 Labor then amended the scheme to essentially reverse the 2008 implementation of its election commitments. Why should we have been surprised?

In the past the coalition has made commitments to increase the funding levels of the EMDG scheme. We believe it is a good scheme. While this remains a long-term goal, we believe the export sector would benefit more from a coalition government making its first priority the abolition of the carbon tax, then the mining tax, the reduction in Labor's debt and the reversal of Labor's fiscal mismanagement. In terms of the detail of the legislation, I am advised that industry representatives have various concerns about the potential exclusion of some types of activities—for example, the promotion of musical concerts. While these are a matter for debate, the bottom line is that many of these exclusions would appear to have been made because of cost cutting. The principal change that has attracted most attention is the cutting of grants available to established markets like the United States, the United Kingdom, European Union and Canada with some of the savings used to fund increased grants, principally in the East Asian region. The rest of the savings go to consolidated revenue, although we do not have a breakdown on the composition of that—so, again, another warning sign.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry argues that there is no credible commercial analysis provided that shows that the EMDG money spent on established markets is any less valuable than that spent in emerging markets. I agree and the coalition agrees that it should be up to Australian business to exploit markets according to commercial realities, rather than bureaucratic whim. The minister who introduced this bill, the Minister for Trade and Competitiveness, has one of the worst track records of any trade minister in modern history in terms of achieving for exporters. There has barely been any progress at all in trade negotiations by this minister. He has cut the vitally important EMDG scheme. He stood by idly when the Gillard government trashed our trade relations with Indonesia over the live cattle export fiasco and trashed our reputation as a trusted and reliable trading partner. The Australia-China Free Trade Agreement has barely moved from the starting point of negotiations that occurred under the Howard government in 2005. New Zealand also started negotiations with China in the same year and concluded their free trade agreement by 2008. In particular there has been stalled progress with respect to the free trade agreement with South Korea. Again, where is the practical concern with boosting our trade with Asia, when the government cannot finalise an agreement with one of our friendliest trading partners?

The National Farmers Federation has been particularly vocal about this export issue. Last week, along with representatives of the Cattle Council of Australia, the Australian Meat Industry Council and the Australian Lot Feeders Association, the President of the National Farmers, Mr Jock Laurie, said:

Australian beef producers stand to miss out on $1.4 billion in exports to Korea because of our stalled free trade agreement.

He went on to say:

… the threat to other agriculture exports like wheat (around $350 million) and dairy (over $100 million) was also pronounced.

Further he stated that:

Total losses to Australian agriculture could run into the multi billions of dollars. Australian farmers are losing out in a major way while ever we don’t have an FTA with Korea and our major competitors like the USA do.

The beef industry provides a classic example. The National Farmers Federation notes that:

Under the current arrangements, Australia’s $645 million annual beef trade with Korea is subject to a 40 per cent tariff.

However, after signing a Korea-US FTA, United States beef is subject to only a 34.6 per cent tariff, 5.3 per cent less than Australian beef. But the differential will become massive as time goes by since US beef exports to Korea will be completely tariff free by 2026.

This government has publicly admitted that a key sticking point is its unilateral veto of what are called investor-state dispute settlement clauses. The Howard government used the potential inclusion of an investor-state dispute settlement clause as a negotiating position for bilateral agreements and so such clauses were included in some of Australia's FTAs concluded under the Howard government, as well as in the one with ASEAN and in the free trade agreements with Chile, Singapore and Thailand. But they were not included in others—for example, the FTAs with the United States and New Zealand. Inclusion of such clauses should be considered on a case-by-case basis.

It is true to say that the Australian business community does not have a united view on the matter. However, in 2011 the Gillard government stated that they were opposed to investor-state dispute settlement clauses, despite the previous inclusion of such clauses in the Chile and ASEAN agreements finalised since 2007. In contrast, the coalition remains open, as a negotiating position, to including ISDS clauses. The fact is that the EMDG cut is just another blow in the general mismanagement of our export trade.

We are also concerned by the extra regulatory burden which will be placed on exporters by the changes to the EMDG scheme. Should we be elected to government, we are determined to cut red tape and overregulation. This bill is just another example of this government making changes which will lead to additional red tape and regulation.

In conclusion, therefore, 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:

(1) condemns the Government for breaking its 2007 election promise to increase spending on the Export Market Development Grant (EMDG) scheme and instead cutting the program over the course of the last 5 years;

(2) notes that the cuts to the EMDG scheme:

(a) are directly due to the budget mismanagement of the Government and its wasteful expenditure policies; and

(b) represent further evidence of the Government’s inability to understand the plight of Australian exporters as they meet huge challenges in the quest to build their international markets;

(3) expresses concern that the Government has introduced increased red tape in the administration of the EMDG scheme when what is required across the Government is a reduction in red tape; and

(4) recognises that the Coalition, when in government, commits to reviewing the changes in the bill to establish their true budgetary and administrative impact on business, especially small and medium enterprises.”

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Hon. BC Scott ): Is the amendment seconded?

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop: I second the amendment.

Mr ZAPPIA (Makin) (20:33): I support the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013. Having listened to the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party's arguments and her reasons for putting forward her amendment, I am not at all persuaded by them nor do I believe they are worthy of the support of this House.

The Export Market Development Grants scheme is an Australian government financial assistance program which assists and encourages small- and medium-sized Australian businesses to develop export markets by reimbursing up to 50 per cent of eligible export promotion expenses above $10,000, provided that the total expenses are at least $20,000. To date, the program has provided up to seven grants to each eligible applicant. To access the scheme for the first time, businesses need to have spent $20,000 over two years on eligible export marketing expenses. To be eligible, the Australian business must have income of not more than $50 million in the grant year and must have promoted the export of goods—most services also qualify—the export of intellectual property and know-how, inbound tourism or conferences and events held in Australia.

There are eight key provisions of the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013. The first is to increase the maximum number of grants to eight. The second is to exclude expenses relating to the promotion of sales to the markets of the USA, Canada and the European Union in grant years six, seven, and eight for all applicants except approved bodies. The third key provision is to remove the limit on administrative expenditure from the legislation and introduce a power for the minister to set the limit on administrative expenditure by determination. The fourth is to prevent further approval of joint ventures after 30 June 2013. Fifthly, the provisions of the bill remove event promoters from the EMDG scheme. Sixthly, the provisions of this amendment bill prevent the payment of grants engaging an EMDG consultant who has been assessed to be not a fit and proper person. The seventh change will enable a grant to be paid more quickly where a grant is determined before the l July following the so-called 'balance distribution date'. Lastly, the bill will require applicants to acquit claims by individually paying for claimed expenses.

The government's white paper, Australia in the Asian century, makes very clear the importance of Asia in Australia's future and the opportunities that Asia's development in the 21st century holds for Australia. In recent years the pace of growth and change in the Asian region has been nothing short of phenomenal. According to the white paper, in the past 20 years China and India have almost tripled their share of the global economy and increased their absolute economic size six times over. By 2025, the region as a whole will account for almost half of world output.

The white paper also takes a close look at what Asia's future means for Australia and at the opportunities for us in the years ahead. As an advanced economy with expertise in so many areas, including education, construction, business, entertainment, tourism, health and the environment, Australia is extremely well placed to strengthen its ties with Asia. It is in Asia and developing countries in other parts of the world that our future markets lie and that is where Australia should focus its efforts. The government recognises that and so do Australian businesses—it is an obvious reality—and that is exactly what this legislation seeks to do.

Asia has a population of around four billion and it is already a market we should be tapping into much more than we have done to date. We have good links with Asia, established as a result of not only our proximity to many Asian countries but also the links that we have formed with many Asian countries—links that will hold us in good stead when we want to do more business with them in the future. These links result in two-way trade, and they are links that the Asia white paper quite properly says our future should be based on. Our future lies in Asia and the emerging countries, because the people of those countries are wanting to bring their standard of living into line with those of advanced economies. That is where the opportunities will lie. Those countries are the ones that will be wanting to tap into the expertise that already exists in Western countries and in particular the expertise that exists in friendly Western countries like Australia.

This is well understood by business in Australia. In my own electorate, I frequently speak to business people who are already doing business in Asian markets but who are looking to expand their business. On many occasions they have come to my office to seek assistance to further their business in Asian markets and in the Asian countries we have relationships with. For many small- and medium-size businesses, who do have great ideas and who see obvious opportunities in Asia, without assistance their ideas will never be put into practice. Many of the people I speak to need assistance and they come to my office to see what assistance is available from the government. The Export Market Development Grants Scheme is an ideal way of providing that very assistance so that they can bring their initiatives to fruition.

I have no doubt at all that this legislation, and the scheme more broadly, has been welcomed by the business community. Those who say that it is wrong for us to cut back the focus on the USA, Canada and Europe are short-sighted. The reality is that business in Australia today has limited opportunities in those places, for many reasons and not the least of which is that those countries do not require the kinds of services that I alluded to earlier to the same extent as the emerging markets do—and those emerging markets are best located for us in the Asian area, as well as other places in the world where developing countries are looking to prosper.

The amendments contained in this legislation ensure that the Australian people—Australian businesses—get the best return for the public funds provided by the government under this program. The Australian people will get the best returns because the best return for their funds is gained by focusing on the emerging opportunities in the Asian market. As I said a moment ago, this focus will benefit the very businesses that are seeking to access those funds.

My understanding is that there will be a saving of about $25 million per annum as a result of these changes. Frankly, the government is responsible for the expenditure of public funds and it ought to use those funds prudently. If we can manage funds better and still support business, then quite frankly we should be doing so. Reviewing legislation such as this on a regular basis is simply part of being a prudent government. I understand that in 2012-13 over 3,000 claims have been made under this scheme, and I understand that about $125.4 million has been allocated in the current budget. Those are not insignificant amounts of money, and those funds will assist Australian businesses.

In more recent weeks I have spoken with businesses in my electorate who have brilliant ideas—in some cases they are brilliant inventions—and they are simply seeking some support and assistance to get those ideas and inventions out to the wider market. These are inventions that will be embraced and adopted particularly in those countries that we refer to as the emerging or developing countries. Yet, these businesses are quite often restrained by a lack of financial support. This program is the kind of program that provides them with the right sorts of support and certainly it is the kind of program that will enable them to send their ideas offshore. The people offshore also benefit because they are the beneficiaries of intellectual property, knowhow or whatever it is that is brought to them as a result of someone's idea here in Australia.

Lastly, the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party in her remarks alleged that these amendments mean more red tape. As I said earlier on, it is incumbent on any government to ensure that public funds are spent wisely, it is incumbent on any government to ensure that no-one rorts the system and it is incumbent on any government to ensure that taxpayers get the best possible value for their dollars. Cutting out people like promoters—promoters of entertainment events; concerts and the like—is quite reasonable. Promoters are not, in my view, the beneficiaries for which this fund was set up. As a result of promotional activity you might get some economic benefit through the impact on tourism and the like, but, frankly, I believe there are much more worthy and much more deserving areas where these grants should be applied, and the decision by the government to tighten the rules in respect of some of those matters is quite appropriate. I commend the legislation to the House.

Ms MARINO (Forrest—Opposition Whip) (20:45): I rise to support the amendment moved by the shadow minister for trade, the member for Curtin, to the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013. It has long been said that Australia is an exporting nation, and this has never been more obvious than in Western Australia. According to state government figures, Western Australia contributed $122 billion of Australia's merchandise exports in 2011-12, a rise of five per cent on the previous year. This equates to 46 per cent of this nation's exports, which exceeds the combined contribution of New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland. So it is a significant export effort. Trade accounts for 53 per cent of Western Australian's gross state product, with the great majority, over 90 per cent, coming from the mining sector. However, the state is also a major agricultural exporter. In 2010-11, Western Australia produced over $6 billion of agricultural, fisheries and forestry merchandise, and, of this, $5 billion worth was exported. The vast majority of these products are going to Asia, due to Western Australia's natural geographical competitive advantage—its proximity to those Asian markets. With these key figures in mind, it must be obvious even to the most parochial eastern state members in this House that Western Australia is in fact an export powerhouse.

It is for this reason also that export assistance needs to have a Western Australian focus and create further opportunities. It is easy to be fooled into thinking that the west has only large multinational mining companies which are readily able to do their own marketing. Indeed, it might seem that our mining companies actually sell themselves—I know that some on the other side think this. There are, however, many smaller players, in a range of industries, that certainly deserve the support of the government.

The south-west of Western Australia, in particular, is an area of innovation and industry. Whilst we have a number of those same large exporters, such as Worsley Alumina, we also have a broad range and a large number of small suppliers exporting a wide variety of products. As I know well, the south-west, with a $16.8 billion regional economy of its own, is an economic engine room for the whole nation. The region derives most of its wealth from the mining and manufacturing sectors, which, latest figures show, produce $1.6 billion and $2.7 billion respectively. It is also a major exporter of agricultural products, as I said, from beef and dairy—some of the best dairy products in the world—to the finest of Margaret River and Geographe region wines. Some of these have found niche markets for their high-quality products, and it is this group that needs and deserves support. They are out there doing the hard yards. They are small businesses, frequently.

I note that the explanatory memorandum to this bill tells us in the outline that the bill 'helps achieve savings of $25 million per year'. However, the explanatory memorandum also notes, under 'Financial Impact':

Expenditure under the Act is set through annual Appropriation acts. A capping mechanism ensures that expenditure under the scheme is limited to the amount appropriated.

They are conflicting statements. That really tells us, the readers, that the government has once again engaged in what you could only call a surreptitious slashing of funds—and this time it is actually of industry support to those same small businesses that are seeking an export opportunity.

As was acknowledged at Senate estimates, this is another attempt by the Gillard government to hide the real budget position it will face in May. It is duplicitous of the government to attempt to hide this slashing of funding and to sanitise the explanatory memorandum. This bill is not about enhancing exports. It is not. It is about saving the government dollars at the expense of those same very innovative and keen Australian exporters that just need a bit of a hand along the way. This is at a time when the world remains almost on the edge of an economic precipice and when the value of the Australian dollar is crucifying Australian exporters. It is tough out there, and I do not know what the Australian government expects. If you are an exporter, it is a tough market. If you are an agricultural exporter, it is an even tougher market.

I saw some recent forecasts about the future of agriculture and agricultural exports, and they predicted even tougher times than we have now. I am concerned, as you would be, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, for the future of a lot of those exporters and the growers that supply them. I also noticed last week the economic forecasting by the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences that indicated the Australian dollar is expected to stay at current levels—a particularly high level of at least US104c—and not return to parity until 2018. If that is not a great example of the pressure that Australian agricultural exporters are under, I do not know what is. Everyone in this House needs to think again, including the government, because, if this scenario proves to be accurate, the export sector in Australia is in for very rough times until 2018. The ability of both Europe and the US to survive their respective impending debt disasters will also have long-term impacts on the value of the exchange rate.

Now, there are optimistic economists demonstrating perhaps a bit of hubris at the moderate improvement in budget deficits in both of those areas, but the realist economists still recognise that those budgets are not actually in surplus but just a little bit less in deficit. This is the reality, and that tells us that the Australian dollar is not likely to weaken anytime soon. It is also a reality that this global generation generally continues to almost binge on debt. Those on the other side do the same thing. We heard today, in the debate on the MPI, about the government's $300 billion debt—the debt ceiling. Let us wait and see what is in the next budget. Government spending is increasing the burden on the next generation—spending today is taxing tomorrow. This government is leaving debt and deficit for the next generation. The next generation in Europe and the US will have to pay off the debts of their parents or simply pass them on with their own added debt to some future generation to take care of. In this parliament there has also been a passing on of intergenerational debt, perhaps for the first time in this nation's history. That is an indictment of this government.

Australian exporters may recover if the US dollar improves, but there is another element of the export debate that needs to be addressed here in the House today. It is the failure of the government, through Austrade, to adequately enhance the export capacity and opportunity of Australian manufacturers and producers. It should be core business for Austrade to help our small businesses into the markets. Austrade has a number of workers both domestically and overseas who are struggling with poor resourcing—and poor leadership, in some senses. The bill before the House does not improve this situation; it makes it worse. Another $25 million cut from services currently provided is part of the government's death by 1,000 cuts of export innovation, and it is death particularly to small exporters. I—like, I would bet, just about every member in this House—have had such exporters at my door saying: 'All we need is a hand. We need to get into these markets, but we are a relatively small business and we are doing it tough on the ground.' I think it entirely escapes this government how tough it is on the ground, particularly for food manufacturers and exporters and even more particularly for those in the agricultural sector.

Austrade appears to be too bogged down covering for the government's incompetence to do its own job properly. It might surprise the Prime Minister and the trade minister to learn that the role of Austrade is to promote Australian exports, not to promote the Prime Minister and the minister for trade. Austrade needs to promote small to medium enterprises—and even some of the bigger enterprises—not only in my electorate but also around Australia. Such businesses are investing their own money and their own expertise, and they are working overtime not just for themselves but also for their communities, for the regions and for our economy. They are alive and well in our part of the world but are doing it exceptionally tough, and often all they need is a small hand up.

A refocusing of Austrade is really urgent and essential so that our own exporters, rather than this government, can become the main agenda again. Austrade should be focused on our small to medium exporters who are out there wanting to get into the markets and provide some fabulous niche products. This refocusing is so urgent and essential because of the difficult economic times in which Austrade is operating. Austrade's job has got far harder since 2008. Things are also harder for our exporters, and we should all acknowledge how much harder they have got. The difficult economic times make it all the more important for our businesses to work smarter and to invest more wisely, and to do so some of them need assistance. Now is not the time to hang our exporters out to dry. Look at the terms of trade, look at what is happening on the ground, look how hard exporters are working and look how hard it is now that we do not have the numbers of tourists that we used to have coming to our part of the world. That is why it is important for Australian businesses to have access to export markets.

But the government is hanging exporters out to dry. It will probably take the election of a coalition government to end the rot and develop a focus on exports to assist small to medium enterprises and some of the bigger businesses. A coalition government will seek to look after the interests of exporters and innovators. We need to celebrate and support what they are doing, not celebrate and support the failing government we have here. The coalition will work for enhanced access for Australian businesses to world markets. We in the coalition understand very directly the importance of doing this work. If we are elected, we will do this work in conjunction with the private sector, and the private sector will also focus, I have no doubt, on marketing and market access.

In some sectors, both sides of the public-private partnership have abandoned the field. Both need to re-engage, and we in this place need to be part of the re-engagement. Nowhere will re-engagement be more important than in the agricultural sector. When you get out into the wheat belt in Western Australia, you see how tough farmers are doing it. There are the same challenges in my electorate. Right across Australia I see the same challenges. Farmers are finding it extremely difficult to remain viable. It is a huge challenge, as is the challenge of keeping enough young farmers coming through who have the knowledge, expertise and passion to continue doing what our farmers do so well.

We need to know what the Asian market is looking for. We know that we can produce the best quality food products in the world—we are good at it—but we also need to make sure that we have the capacity to deliver what established and emerging Asian markets are looking for. A coalition government would make sure that it sufficiently developed and supported access to these markets for Australian exporters.

This government has repeatedly failed farmers in Australia. This fact is as tangible as it could be. One of the main examples of the government's failure would have to be its actions on the live export trade. The impacts of the government's actions are being felt all up and down the chain in each state—and certainly in my electorate in south-west Western Australia. The impacts of the government's actions are major, even though the government chooses to ignore them. If you want to talk about impacts on exports, just look at the live cattle export debacle. It is just one example of how this government has failed farmers in Australia. It has also failed our food producers and food manufacturers. Australian farmers are certainly capable of delivering the products that the market not only demands but also deserves. Now is not the time to abandon Australian farmers.

Mr McCORMACK (Riverina) (20:59): Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, you come from Maranoa and know how important the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013 is to you. I am interested that the Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry is at the table, along with the former Speaker, the member for Scullin. I also note that the member for McEwen, who is another regional member, is sitting in the chamber, listening intently to my words. I also acknowledge the member for Wright, as well as the shadow parliamentary secretary for regional health, who is also sitting at the table. He was in Wagga Wagga just last week and would have no doubt heard many farmers complaining about how difficult the terms of trade are for them at the moment. It is always wonderful to follow the member for Forrest, Nola Marino, because she is so passionate and feisty about all of these important issues, which are central to trade. I know that the members in the House at the moment all appreciate just how important trade, agriculture and Australia's future food security are.

I note how few Labor speakers are on the speakers list. That is a shame, because perhaps if we were talking about unions or public servants at risk of losing their jobs—one of those sorts of issues—the speakers list would be full. It is just a shame that the speakers list is not full with government members talking about this very important issue, because we have just heard the member for Forrest talking about just how hard and how tough our agriculture producers are doing it at the moment. The shadow minister for agriculture, the member for Calare, told us yesterday in our party room that producers are doing it tougher in some circumstances than they were at the height of the drought—and that is a problem. And it is not just a problem for them; it is a problem for the regional communities that their hard work underpins. It is a problem for our nation because we cannot sell the amount of food that we rely on to help our balance of payments figures, our balance of trade.

We cannot continue to operate this way. Those farmers, let us face it, were once the backbone of this economy, and they still keep it going. Agriculture is still such an important component. Mining may well be one of the big dollar earners, but agriculture helps our balance of payments no end, and we all like to eat food. Only last week I spoke to representatives from the Leeton citrus growers. This organisation has been going since 1942. They are doing it really tough at the moment. They have lost 150 growers in less than a decade. That is the loss of 300 wages. Their costs are now going through the roof. Their power costs are exorbitant and are not helped by the carbon tax. Their wages have not become any cheaper. The high Australian dollar is really killing them, as well as so many other agriculture producers. Bad water policy is just another thing which they are trying to contend with.

I note that the member for Wills is now the Parliamentary Secretary for Trade and has been since 4 February 2013. It is an interesting position which the member for Wills finds himself in, given the fact that he was so stridently opposed to the live cattle export trade to Indonesia when that particular issue blew up after a Four Corners program. It was policy from this government based on a television program. It was a very savage knee-jerk reaction to a television program that saw the live cattle trade stop forthwith—bang—just like that, with no thought given to the cattle producers of Australia's west or north. Indeed, as the member for Forrest just indicated, the shock waves reverberated right throughout the cattle-producing industry and even beyond it. The markets in Wagga Wagga and elsewhere in the Riverina were affected because of it. There was a fear that they would not be able to export a lot of their cattle overseas and they would see them brought south. The people who built stock crates were also affected because orders were stopped.

I am pleased to say that the shadow minister for agriculture visited Indonesia last October, along with the opposition leader and the shadow foreign affairs minister, Julie Bishop, who has an intense interest in trade and certainly in helping our trading neighbours. The highlights of that trip were the sheer untapped potential, the member for Calare said, for our farm exports—and not just those of Northern Australia. The coalition took the extraordinary step of sending a delegation of senior shadow ministers to Indonesia because of the importance that this side of politics places on our northern neighbour as a valued trading partner—not somebody to whom we can just say, 'No more cattle.' They are not somebody whom we can just bring the gate down upon with our live exports but rather somebody whom we need to be friends with, somebody who is important to us, somebody whom we need to treat like a friend. You do not treat friends in the way that the Prime Minister did when she stopped the live cattle trade.

Indonesia has been vastly undervalued as a trading partner. While every nation across the globe is trying to capitalise on the Asian boom, there are a number of obvious reasons why Australia should be trying to make the most of the opportunities that exist within the Indonesian economy. Indonesia is not in great need of our coal because it has large deposits of its own, and some people foolishly dismiss Indonesia as a trading opportunity because of this. Australia has a unique opportunity to bolster our farm sector with Indonesia. It has 237 million people literally on our doorstep. It has a booming middle class of around 50 million strong and a high propensity for consumer spending. In short, it is an ideal destination for our farm produce. Our farm produce, as you know, Mr Deputy Speaker, as the member for Maranoa, is the best in the world bar none. I do not mind saying that. I am sure the parliamentary secretary for agriculture, who is sitting at the table, would agree with me.

Mr Sidebottom: Hear, hear.

Mr McCORMACK: 'Hear, hear,' he says. Certainly that is the case. We have the best in the world and we need to protect and preserve it.

The changes proposed in the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013 are to deliver on the recent Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook decision to concentrate the Export Market Development Grants Scheme more on small businesses exporting to East Asian and frontier and emerging markets. The MYEFO decision and associated policy changes in this proposal will deliver annual savings of $25 million.

Labor calls them savings. They really are cuts and taxes. Failed policy is what it really is, and it is having an effect in this particular instance on our trading relations. This is not the first time I have spoken today; I have spoken a number of times, and a number of times I have spoken about particular bills as being cost savings—as in the baby bonus, on which I spoke earlier this evening. Again, these are to try to help the Treasurer, our failed Treasurer, to try to balance his books. And it is not working. The Australian public are not fools; they are not buying it. The fact is that this government cannot properly fiscally manage our economy. And so many people I speak to cannot wait for the next election.

The EMDG Scheme, administered by Austrade, partially supports export promotion expenses of eligible enterprises in order to boost exports of Australian-produced goods and services, which are, as I say, so important for our balance-of-trade figures. The EMDG Scheme reimburses up to half of eligible export promotion expenses incurred by small- to medium-sized enterprises, and then the claims are reimbursed retrospectively for expenditure incurred in the previous financial year pro rata up to the particular cap. Around 5,100 enterprises per year apply for these grants. Prior to now, the scheme has been capped at $150 million per year since 1997, except in 2008-09 and 2009-10, when a $200 million cap applied.

The MYEFO decision late last year and associated policy changes in this bill are designed to deliver annual savings—again, that word 'savings'—of $25 million. According to Labor, the changes will better help Australian exporters maximise the potential of the Asian century by increasing the number of grants available in East Asian and frontier and emerging markets from seven years' worth to eight years. We all know that this is not right; this is just typical Labor spin—typical Labor claptrap. This is more policy on the run. We cannot afford, as the member for Forrest indicated, to hurt our exporters—particularly at this time, when our balance-of-trade figures are not that good, and particularly at a time when our budget is so much in the red.

To offset the additional grant expenditure associated with an enlarged number of grants to East Asian and frontier and emerging markets, the number of grants to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union are to be reduced. The government argues that in those markets the Australian brand is already well known and accepted, and small businesses typically face fewer barriers to doing business—and that may be so. But, even though the Australian brand may well be known, why not promote it even more? Why is it necessary to keep cutting, to keep cost-shifting, to try to balance the Treasurer's failed books? And why is it that all the time the ones who are getting hit in the neck the most are Australian farmers, Australian exporters—the people who put food on our plates and on the plates of so many foreigners as well?

The government argues that the increased focus of the EMDG Scheme on emerging and frontier markets brings the EMDGS into closer alignment with Austrade's broader trade priorities following its review in 2011 and the government's Asian century policy agenda. I will just repeat that: 'Australia's broader trade priorities'.

As to what our trade priorities are or should be: the Prime Minister only last year, in quite a groundbreaking speech, actually, in Melbourne, talked about promoting and strengthening irrigation so that we could grow more food to tap into those Asian markets, but every single policy initiative by her side of government, the government that she leads, does just the opposite. I cannot understand it, nor can the citrus growers and cattle producers, nor can those wonderful lamb producers in the Riverina, who grow the best lamb in the entire nation. They cannot understand it.

They simply cannot understand why this government is doing everything in its power to just stymie them whenever they try to develop export markets, to stymie them whenever they try to have the ability to grow more food to feed our nation and others. It is hurting our balance-of-trade figures. It is hurting our ability to do business in export markets such as Indonesia. And it is hurting our farmers' and agricultural producers' ability to make a profit.

And, when the farming sector is doing it tough, regional towns are doing it tough. You do not have to go too far into my electorate to see how tough they are doing it. Farmers are having to work at two jobs—they are having to source off-farm incomes—simply because there has been bad water policy enacted by this parliament. This government is just so bogged down in green tape. I know there has been a divorce between Labor and the Greens, but still they seem to be in cahoots with one another when it comes to policy, because so much of the policy that we see from that side of government is bogged down in green tape and so often we hear the Greens leader, Senator Milne, make the catchcry and Labor just follow suit. Their policies just follow suit, and it has to stop.

It has to stop because our farmers are the world's best. Our farmers are not asking for a handout; they are just asking for a hand up, a bit of assistance, a bit of an even go, a bit of a level playing field—something that I am sure that the parliamentary secretary for agriculture knows also. I know he has offered to come to my electorate, and I will welcome him soon to come and see for himself and to talk to the sorts of people whom I talk to, because I know he would be interested. I serve on the Standing Committee on Regional Australia, and I know the good work that he did there as the deputy chair. I know he certainly has his heart in the right place. I would certainly welcome him to come to the Riverina to hear firsthand from people. This piece of legislation is not good, and it will hurt our exporters. They are extremely valuable people. I will certainly welcome the member for Braddon to come to my part of the world, hear the sorts of complaints people have and hear of the sorts of ways forward they believe we should be adopting and the sorts of policy initiatives that his government could also be implementing to help them to make ends meet and to help them not just to survive but indeed to thrive as they should. Thank you for allowing me to make those comments, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Mr CRAIG KELLY (Hughes) (21:14): I rise tonight to speak on the Export Market Development Grants Amendment Bill 2013 and also to support the amendments moved by the deputy leader and member for Curtin. Just by way of background, the export market development grants scheme is administered by Austrade and it partly supports export promotion expenses of eligible enterprises in order to boost the exports of Australian produced goods and services. It is a scheme that reimburses up to 50 per cent of eligible export promotion expenditure incurred by small- and medium-sized enterprises. Claims are reimbursed retrospectively for expenditure incurred in the previous financial years, pro rata, up to the cap. Around 5,100 firms applied for grants.

The basic provisions of this bill—and what it actually does—exclude expenses of export promotion for grant years six, seven and eight for the major markets of the USA, Canada and the European Union. It makes a tokenistic adjustment by increasing the number of grants by one year—just one year against eight—to countries of East Asia. First and foremost, this bill is simply confirmation of yet another broken promise by this Labor government. We can add this one to the long, long list of broken promises by this government. It is just another reason why the public no longer believes a word that they say and why the public has lost complete trust in anything that comes out of the mouth of any member of this government.

We will go back to 2007: this Labor government, then in opposition, promised hand on heart that they would increase—that is right: increase—funding for the export market development scheme. They told us how they understood this scheme, how it was vital for small business and how they were really going out there to help small business with their exports. In the last year of the Howard government, 2006-07, the export market development scheme was funded to the tune of $154.4 million—it was $154.4 million back in 2006-07. Come to this financial year, and we have a government that told us they would increase funding. They have not only been too lousy to maintain real expenditure, they have actually slashed the expenditure by $25 million. So this financial year, the expenditure is down to just $125 million.

This is the lowest amount of expenditure under this scheme for over two decades. It simply shows that Labor cannot be trusted with their promises, but not only that: whatever they promise, we see them doing the exact opposite. We saw them promise, 'No carbon tax.' We not only ended up with a carbon tax, but we ended up with the largest carbon tax in the world. They promised to stop the boats and we have ended up with an absolute explosion of boat arrivals. They promised to return the budget to surplus, but we just get larger and larger deficits. Here we had them promising to increase expenditure for the export market developments and what do we see? It is being slashed—slashed to the lowest levels in decades.

It is not only that, it is the hypocrisy that we have had from this government. On this bill, we have had one measly speaker from the government. I see the member for McEwan over there. Perhaps he is going to stand up and make a contribution to this bill.

Mr Mitchell: You are hopeless!

Mr CRAIG KELLY: I think he is perhaps too embarrassed to walk around the exporters in his electorate and have to tell them that his government is cutting the funding for export development grants. What we have seen is not only the hypocrisy, it is the spin. They do not come in here and just be truthful, and say: 'Look, we have stuffed things up. We have wasted billions of dollars and we have to make some cuts.' Instead of saying that, what we get is this spin with the bill being dressed up as somehow tied to promotion in the Asian Century.

As ACCI have argued, there is no credible commercial analysis that shows export development grant money spent in the USA, Canada or the EU is any less valuable than that spent in East Asia, Africa or South America. It should be up to our Australian businesses to decide where they should spend their export marketing dollar, but those decisions are now going to be distorted by this government. It is not based on good policy or sound logic, but simply on spin. I would say, however, that there is perhaps one area in the world in which we as a nation need to increase our export marketing expenditure; that is Indonesia, following the debacle of this government's cut to the live cattle exports. Overnight, without any warning at all, they simply cut off the supply of live cattle to Indonesia. That has done almost irreparable damage to our relationship with Indonesia. If we are looking to increase our export marketing expenditure, Indonesia is perhaps one of the first places where we should start.

Not only is this spin, bad policy and broken promises: it is simply bad economics. Austrade undertook a study about the benefits of such schemes. They found that firms benefiting from export market development grants spent more on export promotion than did other exporters. In fact, they estimated that the grants payment of $156 million resulted in those exporters spending an additional $147 million on marketing. What they estimated is that that extra marketing expenditure resulted in an extra $1.4 billion of export sales. For $156 million worth of expenditure under this scheme, we were able to achieve as a nation an increase in our export sales of $1.4 billion.

But it is actually better than that because, you have to remember, the grants are taxable. When you look at the net cost after the tax subsidy comes back, you are looking at a much greater multiplier. Austrade worked out that, in most industries, a mature exporter will generate in additional exports 15 to 25 times the grants paid to them. If we want to increase the revenue of this nation—if we are looking at how we are going to pay back this mob's debt, how we are going to fund the NDIS, how we are going to fund the extra expenditure for schools and how we are going to fund the extra expenditure for hospitals—we should be increasing the expenditure under this scheme, not cutting it back to record lows as this government is doing. This mob simply does not get it.

Also, we should be out there trying to create a culture of exporting and exporters. I know from my own experience. Before entering parliament, I had travelled and exhibited at trade shows in Singapore, Malaysia and Dubai. One thing I found at those trade shows was how generous other countries are, compared to Australia, and how small our scheme is. At these trade shows we were able to find out that, rather than being given 50 per cent of their expenditure by their government as Australian firms were, the companies from the UK that we were competing against were getting the whole lot subsidised by their government. So the scheme we have is very modest to start with, and this mob is just cutting it back again.

This government is also kicking exporters when they are down. Australian exporters are currently struggling with the high level of the dollar. And they were promised a tax cut by this government, funded by the mining tax. We know where that has gone.

Government members interjecting—

Mr CRAIG KELLY: You have not got any money for it; that is the reason. You have not got any money to fund it; you have wasted it all. It was a concocted mining tax. You blokes were played off the break. It was a complete embarrassment to your lot. So not only were our exporters promised a company tax which has not eventuated but many of them are facing downturns in our export markets. And they are also struggling with the world's largest carbon tax. Under this Labor government, energy costs for Australian firms have risen faster than just about anywhere else in the world. This is putting Australian industry, and our exporters, at a competitive disadvantage. This is the very worst time to be cutting back their funding—and that is exactly what this government is doing.

We have to ask ourselves: why are they doing this? Why are they cutting back? Why are they slicing back money for export market development? It is because of their waste and mismanagement. This mob has run up the four largest deficits in our nation's history. To spin their way out of it they came up with the line 'returning the budget to surplus'. And one of the cuts they came up with was to cut back this very important scheme which we need to keep our economy going—a measly $25 million. It is interesting to see what industry experts say about these cuts. Warren Cross, a legal expert and director of a firm called Export Incentives, is quoted in Smart Company magazine as saying, 'It's frustrating and disappointing this scheme has been put on the chopping block again by Labor,' and he argues that the trade minister, Dr Emerson, 'does not have a clue'. I could not agree more. He also says of our trade minister: 'He has never been interested in the scheme from day one, so this isn't a surprise. They've been cutting this grant back for years.' That just about says it all.

But we should look at the important amendments moved by our deputy leader. Those amendments clearly denote the problems with this bill. We need to have another review of this scheme and, if the funding is available, we need to try and help develop our culture of exporting. The coalition in the past has funded this scheme at far greater levels than what the current government are doing. When the coalition government left office we had $150 million in the scheme. The current government are reducing that to $25 million. Again, that is the complete opposite of what they promised.

If we are going to move our country forward, if we are going to start paying the debt, a debt that we have to pay back, with interest, it is going to cost this nation $267 million a week, every week of the year, for the next 20 years. That is the funding that we have to find. We are looking at trying to find $8 billion to $10 million to fund the NDIS, which this mob on the other side loves to talk about but does not have a clue how we are going to fund. And we talk about the Gonski education reforms. To fund these things, we have to encourage exporters, we have to get our exporters out there. We make great products in Australia. That is the reason this scheme works. We want the government to encourage firms to get out there and get involved in exporting. We should not be cutting this scheme back. To cut the number of years back for the USA, for Canada and for the EU is completely the wrong direction. We should be looking at uncapping years. You cannot have just five years for marketing a product overseas. And we have to remember that these grants are not given per product, they are given per firm. (Time expired)

Debate interrupted.