The SPEAKER (09:31): On behalf of the Standing Committee on Appropriations and Administration, I present the committee's report No. 15: Budget Estimates 2018-19.

Report made a parliamentary paper in accordance with standing order 39(e).

Mr TEHAN (Wannon—Minister for Social Services) (09:32): I move:

That this bill be read a second time.

This bill will establish legislation for a national redress scheme (the scheme) for survivors of institutional child sexual abuse.

Children placed in the trust of our institutions were some of the most vulnerable members in our community. That any were sexually abused by the very people charged with their care and protection is a disgrace. No child should ever experience what they did. That is why it is time for all institutions and governments to take responsibility for what happened.

The establishment of the scheme is an acknowledgement by the Australian government and participating governments that sexual abuse suffered by children in institutional settings was wrong. It was a betrayal of trust. It should never have happened.

It recognises the suffering survivors have experienced and accepts that these events occurred and that institutions must take responsibility for this abuse.

The government acknowledged the need to provide public recognition of the suffering experienced by survivors and investigate the inadequate responses provided by institutions through the establishment of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (the royal commission).

The royal commission's Redress and civil litigation report recommended the establishment of a national redress scheme for survivors of institutional child sexual abuse. All governments and individual institutions were directed to make amends and take responsibility.

The royal commission estimates that almost 20,000 survivors were sexually abused in state and territory government institutions. The royal commission identified more than 4,000 institutions where sexual abuse took place.

The royal commission has clearly demonstrated that thousands of vulnerable children were subject to horrendous sexual abuse in institutions throughout Australia.

The psychological, physical and emotional injuries can affect a survivor for the rest of their life. In spite of the severity of these injuries, many survivors have not sought or obtained any kind of acknowledgement or redress for this harm.

I have met many in my time as Minister for Social Services.

The establishment of a national redress scheme acknowledges the abuse that occurred. It is the most significant step in addressing the wrongs of the past and providing a just response to survivors.

It is also an important step towards healing. It ensures governments and institutions take steps to safeguard against these crimes being repeated in the future.

This bill responds to the royal commission's redress recommendations and the Commonwealth government's commitment to establish the foundation for a nationally consistent redress scheme.

I commend the governments of New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory for their leadership in being the first jurisdictions to sign up for the scheme.

Should the bill pass, the participation of these governments will mean that, from 1 July 2018, the scheme will be available for over 9,000 people who were sexually abused in New South Wales government institutions, 5,000 people in Victorian government institutions, 200 people in Australian Capital Territory institutions and 1,000 people in Commonwealth government institutions.

Detailed negotiations with other state and territory governments and non-government institutions are continuing.

The establishment of a national redress bill will mean that these government and non-government institutions can be part of the scheme into the future.

The scheme will provide survivors with three elements of redress, comprising:

a monetary payment of up to $150,000;

access to counselling or psychological services; and

a personal response from the responsible institutions.

The scheme will adopt a survivor-focused and trauma-informed approach; access to redress will be simple, and support will be available throughout the application and acceptance processes.

The scheme is not intended to replace legal avenues to seek justice. It is intended to provide a survivor with a means to access a sense of justice, through monetary redress and through restorative supports.

It is intended to be faster, simpler and less distressing for survivors and to provide governments and institutions with the means to deliver justice to their survivors.

We consulted with, and listened to, a broad range of stakeholders in developing the scheme and this bill.

The bill aligns with the views of the Independent Advisory Council on Redress, which included many survivor groups, as well as the views of jurisdictions and non-government institutions.

Under this bill, redress will be available for survivors of child sexual abuse that occurred in Commonwealth and any participating state or territory government or non-government institutions.

For the Commonwealth, this includes situations where the minors were employed and where the Commonwealth delivered state functions in the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory prior to self-government.

Should the bill pass, the scheme will commence accepting applications from survivors of institutional child sexual abuse for which the Commonwealth and other participating governments and institutions are responsible from 1 July 2018.

The scheme will run for 10 years, with all applications to be finalised by 30 June 2028. The scheme can be extended if there is a need to do so.

For a person to be eligible for redress they must have suffered sexual abuse where a participating institution is responsible and it occurred when the person was a child before the scheme's commencement on 1 July 2018.

A person must also be an Australian citizen or permanent resident at the time they apply for redress, although it will be possible to deem additional classes of people eligible for redress.

While a person must have suffered sexual abuse to be eligible, the scheme will also acknowledge related non-sexual abuse, for example physical abuse. Sexual abuse rarely occurs in isolation and it is important to deal with the whole of the survivor's experience.

Applications for redress under the scheme are limited to one application per survivor, whether or not that person suffered sexual abuse in more than one institution.

This will ensure that survivors will only need to complete one form to cover all instances of child sexual abuse experienced in institutional contexts during their childhood, something the royal commission recommended to achieve equal or fair treatment between survivors.

Survivors providing the story of their experience in full will ensure the scheme can consider the totality of their experience.

In order to maintain integrity and public confidence in the scheme, there will be some limitations for people who have committed the most serious of crimes, such as homicide.

However, to ensure the scheme retains flexibility and is able to meet prevailing community standards, there will be a special assessment of applicants with serious criminal convictions.

If a person is convicted of an offence which received a custodial sentence of five or more years, the operator may determine that the person is entitled to redress if providing redress to the person would not bring the scheme into disrepute or adversely affect public confidence in the scheme.

When making this determination, the operator must take into account any relevant information such as advice given by relevant attorneys-general and the nature of the offence.

People will not be able to make an application for redress if they are in jail. However, the operator will have power to provide exemptions.

This restriction is necessary as the scheme will not be able to deliver many aspects of the scheme to incarcerated survivors.

People must be 18 years of age before the scheme sunset day to make an application for redress under the scheme. If a child who will turn 18 years of age before the scheme sunset day makes an application for redress, there will be a special assessment process.

For those eligible survivors, the amount of the monetary payment will be determined by looking closely at the circumstances of each person and applying consistent criteria. The maximum amount of redress payment available under the scheme will be $150,000.

The expected average payment will be around $76,000—$11,000 higher than that estimated by the royal commission.

The payment will not reduce the income support payments of survivors, will not be divisible property for bankruptcy and will be exempt from Commonwealth debt recovery.

A legislative instrument that details the different tiers of payments and how they work together will be publicly available and declared as an instrument to the legislation.

Eligible survivors will be provided with access to counselling or psychological services in addition to the assistance already provided by the Commonwealth through Medicare.

Depending on the residence of a survivor, they will receive either a lump sum payment to access counselling and psychological services privately, or will be given access to state or territory based services. States and territories will elect for survivors residing in their jurisdiction to either receive the lump sum payment or whether they will deliver counselling and psychological services to those survivors. Survivors residing outside Australia will receive the lump sum payment.

Responsible participating institutions will be liable for the same amount to support the delivery of counselling and psychological services. This will either be paid directly to the survivor or to the applicable jurisdiction delivering services to survivors.

These services are in addition to the redress support services and legal support services that will be available to applicants to the scheme.

Survivors will also have the opportunity to receive a direct personal response from the participating institution or institutions responsible for the abuse. A direct personal response is a statement of acknowledgement, regret or apology and will be delivered to survivors by the relevant participating institution after the survivor has accepted the offer of redress.

The response may be delivered through a range of mechanisms including a face-to-face meeting with an appropriate representative of the institution or through written engagement with the survivor.

The direct personal response will give the survivor the chance to be acknowledged and tell their personal story of what they experienced and how it has impacted them.

The aim of the redress scheme is to provide an avenue for survivors of child sexual abuse who have not been able to pursue, or have not been successful in pursuing, their common-law rights in order to obtain compensation for the damage and loss they have suffered.

Many survivors cannot successfully pursue their common-law rights because they do not have access to the necessary evidence, or because going through litigation processes would be overly traumatic for them.

Before a survivor receives redress, the survivor must accept their offer by signing an acceptance document. Accepting an offer of redress has the effect of releasing the responsible participating institution or institutions, and their associates and officials, from any future liability for all instances of sexual abuse and related non-sexual abuse of the person within the scope of the scheme.

This means that the survivor cannot bring or continue any civil claim against the responsible participating institution or institutions, and their associates and officials, in relation to the specific abuse once they accept the offer of redress.

The release will not release the perpetrators of abuse themselves, provide release in relation to any other abuse outside the scope of the scheme, nor preclude any criminal liabilities of the institution or alleged perpetrator.

The release from civil liability is an important incentive for institutions as without it, institutions may be required to pay compensation through civil litigation in addition to providing redress under the scheme. It will ensure greater coverage for survivors.

Any relevant prior payments made by participating institutions in relation to the abuse for which an institution is responsible will be adjusted to acknowledge inflation and then will be subtracted from the redress payment.

In essence, these survivors would receive a 'top-up' payment. If a survivor's monetary payment is reduced to nil as a result of past redress payments, they will still be entitled to access counselling and psychological services and the direct personal response under the scheme.

The rules will also specify that where a court has previously ordered a participating institution to pay a person compensation or damages for abuse, then that person will not be eligible under the scheme for that abuse.

Where a survivor has been successful in civil litigation, a court has already applied the higher legal liability test of the 'balance of probabilities' and found that the institution is liable to pay the survivor damages.

A survivor can still apply to the scheme for any other abuse they have experienced.

The scheme is based on the principle of 'responsible entity pays', a key recommendation of the royal commission. A participating responsible institution will be expected to pay for redress for their survivors, along with a proportionate share of the administration costs of the scheme. This is the best way to ensure fairness and justice for survivors.

For a participating institution to be responsible, the abuse must have occurred in circumstances where the institution was primarily or equally responsible for the abuser having contact with the person.

The scheme will have agreed categories of cases where responsible governments will share responsibility with an institution, as set out in the national redress scheme rules.

If a case falls into an agreed category, the relevant government will automatically be determined to be equally responsible and therefore liable for redress.

Participating governments have agreed to be responsible where abuse occurs in connection with a non-government institution, the state or territory government had parental responsibility of the child or the child was a state ward, and was responsible for the placement of the child in that institution.

In cases where a government is determined to be equally responsible, they may be determined to be the funder of last resort. This will only occur when the other equally responsible institution is a defunct non-government institution.

Where a funder-of-last-resort arrangement exists, the government that shares responsibility will pay the full amount of redress. The purpose of the funder-of-last-resort policy is to pick up shortfalls in funding where an institution no longer exists. It is not intended to pick up liability for institutions that have the capacity to opt in and choose not to.

In cases where a person has suffered multiple cases of child sexual abuse which occurred across multiple institutions, the scheme operator will decide what was the responsible institution in each case. Each responsible institution will contribute a share of the redress for the survivor. The redress contribution will be apportioned in accordance with the severity and impact of each instance of abuse.

The scheme will facilitate flexible arrangements to support the different structures of institutions opting in to the scheme. This is necessary as many institutions we think of as one institution can actually consist of different institutions and entities. It is in the interest of survivors for all of these institutions to opt in and participate as a single group. This will allow larger institutions to provide the funding for their lower level institutions that may not have their own financial sources to cover redress.

The scheme will allow two or more institutions to form a participating group, who will be 'associates' of one another. To be able to form a participating group, associates must have a sufficient connection with each other, appoint a representative, and have that representative be jointly and severally liable with each associate for funding contributions.

The bill includes provisions for the use and disclosure of information under the scheme. Information-sharing protocols have been balanced against the need for the scheme to have transparency and flexibility, with a survivor's rights to privacy and the need to protect children against future abuse. This will ensure all aspects of the scheme's ability to share and gather information is underpinned by law.

Information received by the scheme will be confidential and will not be able to be further disclosed or used for an unspecified purpose. Participating institutions will also be restricted in the ways that they can use protected information provided to them from the scheme operator. Misuse or unauthorised disclosure of scheme information may constitute an offence under legislation, with appropriate jail time or fines.

To support the scheme, the government has committed $52.1 million over three years to establish redress support services to assist survivors. Redress support services will be available to all applicants, including specialised support for Indigenous people, people with disability, and people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.

Support services will be available nationally, and use face-to-face, telephone, online and outreach services to ensure coverage.

The scheme will appoint experienced, independent assessors, known as independent decision-makers. Independent decision-makers will provide advice to the scheme operator on applications made to the scheme, and will not report or be answerable to government.

Independent decision-makers will be supported in their decision-making by a dedicated redress recommendation team.

In line with feedback from institutions, survivors and the Independent Advisory Council on Redress following the royal commission's recommendation, the scheme will provide survivors with access to independent and impartial internal review without subjecting them to potential retraumatisation.

The scheme will be reviewed after the second and eighth anniversaries of the commencement of the scheme to provide recommendations on all aspects of the future operation of the scheme.

Since taking on the responsibilities of Minister for Social Services, I've had the opportunity to meet with survivors of institutional child sexual abuse.

Hearing their compelling testimony, their stories, has made me more determined than ever to make this bill a reality.

It has meant that the passage of this bill has been my number one priority since I became minister.

As a nation, we owe the survivors who fought so hard and so long for truth to pass this bill and have the scheme operational by 1 July this year.

Debate adjourned.

Mr TEHAN (Wannon—Minister for Social Services) (09:56): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

This is a companion bill to the National Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2018 (the national bill), which will establish a redress scheme for survivors of institutional child sexual abuse.

This companion bill provides consequential amendments to Commonwealth legislation in light of the scheme. For example, amendments to the Social Security Act 1991 and Veterans' Entitlements Act 1986 will ensure the payments are not income tested and will not reduce the income support payments of survivors who receive payments under the scheme.

Amendments to the Bankruptcy Act 1966 will also ensure that the payments are quarantined from the divisible property of a bankrupt. This ensures that survivors can fully benefit from redress payments provided under the scheme regardless of their circumstances.

It also ensures that redress payments will be exempt from Commonwealth debt recovery and income tests relevant to other government payments.

This companion bill will also remove external review mechanisms under the Administrative Decisions (Judicial Review) Act 1977. These amendments will ensure the scheme remains survivor focused and trauma informed by being a non-legalistic process for survivors who have already suffered so much.

This companion bill will also allow the scheme to access the social security system information for ease of administration and make protected information exempt from the Freedom of Information Act 1982, ensuring the integrity of the scheme and that that privacy of survivors and institutions is protected.

In addition, this companion bill will exempt the national bill from the Age Discrimination Act 2004, which will allow the scheme to prevent children from applying if they do not turn 18 before the scheme's closure. This is to address the risk of children signing away their future civil rights when they may have limited capacity to understand the implications and to reduce the risk of monetary payments to minors being misused.

Debate adjourned.

Mr TEHAN (Wannon—Minister for Social Services) (09:59): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Australia has a long track record of helping those in need. On the latest available OECD figures, we outlay around 1.87 per cent of GDP on cash payments to families. This puts Australia in the OECD top 10 for payments to families.

This year the government will spend over $19 billion on family tax benefit payments to families and around $2.2 billion on the Paid Parental Leave scheme. To ensure our welfare system continues to help those in need, we must ensure it is strong and sustainable into the future.

These indexation pauses on higher income limits for family and parental payments will extend the current pause on indexation for a further year until 30 June 2021.

This will apply to the family tax benefit part A higher income free area, the family tax benefit part B primary earner income limit, the parental leave pay and dad and partner pay income limits.

In addition, the annual end of year family tax benefit supplement will remain at current levels for three years from 1 July 2018.

Annual indexation of the thresholds and supplements will resume on 1 July 2021.

Families with lower incomes will not be affected by the indexation pauses to income thresholds and limits.

Families with income under $94,316 will not be affected by the indexation pause to the FTB part A higher income free area.

Families where the main earner's income is less than $100,000 will not be affected by the indexation pause to the FTB part B primary earner income limit.

A parent with income under $150,000 will not be affected by the indexation pauses to parental leave pay. And dads and partners with income under $150,000 will not be affected by the indexation pause to dad and partner pay.

Maintaining the existing FTB part A higher income free area at $94,316 for a further year, will affect around 132,600 families with income above $94,316.

Of these, around 119,400 families will receive a reduced rate of FTB part A and around 13,200 families will no longer be entitled to FTB part A. Families who are no longer entitled to FTB part A would have a family income of more than $99,000.

The measure to maintain the FTB part B primary earner income limit at $100,000 per year will affect around 9,300 families. In these families, once the main earner's income increases to over $100,000 they will no longer be eligible for FTB part B payments.

Parental leave pay was introduced on 1 January 2011 and dad and partner pay was later introduced on 1 January 2013. Both payments currently have an income limit of $150,000. Indexation of these income limits has been paused since their introduction.

The family tax benefit part A end of year supplement is currently up to $737.30 for each eligible child in a family. The family tax benefit part B end of year supplement is up to $357.70. This bill maintains these rates for three years from 1 July 2018, with annual indexation to resume on 1 July 2021.

A family's fortnightly assistance will not change under this measure.

Pausing indexation is a lever that has been used by successive governments to ensure our welfare system remains sustainable.

The passage of this bill will contribute to the sustainability of the family and parental payments systems into the future, meaning we can continue to help those that need it most.

Debate adjourned.

Mr LITTLEPROUD (Maranoa—Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources) (10:04): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Before I start, I put on the record my appreciation and acknowledgement of the member for Watson for the bipartisanship which he showed in giving certainty to the two million Australians who live up and down the Murray-Darling Basin. That was real leadership and it should be acknowledged and put on the record. I also acknowledge the bipartisanship of the Australian Labor Party.

One of the key objects of the Water Act 2007 was to promote the use and management of the Murray-Darling Basin's water resources in a way that balances environmental, economic and social outcomes.

In 2007 the Water Act established the Murray-Darling Basin Authority as an independent expertise-based statutory agency responsible for preparing an integrated plan for the sustainable use of the basin's water resources: the Murray-Darling Basin Plan itself.

The Basin Plan involves the commitment of no less than four state, one territory and the Commonwealth governments, all working together to achieve the sustainable use of water across environmental, economic and social needs. Australia is envied around the world for its cross-jurisdictional water management arrangements.

The Australian government remains committed to implementing the Murray-Darling Basin Plan in full, on time.

However, basin states currently face serious uncertainty in achieving this milestone following the disallowance of the Basin Plan Amendment Instrument 2017 (No. 1) by the Senate in February of this year. This has also widely been referred to as the disallowance of the northern basin review amendment or the NBR instrument.

Turning now to this bill—the Water Amendment Bill 2018. The bill seeks to rectify the uncertainties that remain following the disallowance of the NBR instrument.

The bill will amend the Water Act to enable the NBR instrument to be remade and tabled again before parliament as soon as possible.

The bill will introduce a new directions power to the act. This power will enable the minister to direct the Murray-Darling Basin Authority to prepare an instrument that has the same effect as a previously disallowed Basin Plan amendment. The Murray-Darling Basin Authority may not propose amendments to the previously disallowed instrument if they have not gone through the extensive consultation process under the Water Act.

The Water Act already gives the minister the power to direct the authority in certain circumstances. The amendments to the Water Act contained in the bill do not grant the minister any extra powers in this sense.

The directions power will be subject to strict limitations, for instance the minister can only exercise the power within 12 months of disallowance.

The directions power will only be available for disallowed instruments that were prepared under subdivision F of division 1 of part 2 of the Water Act. This means, for example, that, if an amendment to adjust the SDLs (prepared, then adopted under sections 23A and 23B) is disallowed, it could not be remade using this new power.

Further, an instrument prepared by the authority under this new power must be the same in effect as a previously disallowed instrument. This also means that power is only available if the disallowed instrument has been through consultation requirements set out in the Water Act.

These limitations mean that the integrity of the consultation process that a disallowed instrument has been through is preserved.

Any amendment to the Basin Plan inevitably impacts a range of stakeholders. These limitations will ensure that the integrity of the public consultation process is maintained to best balance environmental, economic and social objectives.

The Murray-Darling Basin Plan is a critical reform which will help ensure the future of basin communities, farmers and the environment.

The disallowance of the NBR amendments in February of this year has caused significant levels of uncertainty for communities within and outside of the basin. It is essential that we find a path forward.

This bill will amend the Water Act to enable the outcomes of the crucial NBR amendments to the Basin Plan, disallowed by the Senate in February, to be given effect in a prompt manner. The February disallowance of the NBR instrument means we are facing increased time pressure to move forward with implementation of the plan. An instrument that gives effect to the outcomes of the NBR instrument could be prepared by the authority and adopted by the minister by mid-2018. This will provide certainty to basin states and communities as they prepare sustainable diversion limit (SDL) compliant water resource plans by 30 June 2019.

The amendments contained in the disallowed NBR instrument were based on the best available science and data. They were recommended by the independent Murray-Darling Basin Authority following a series of reviews (the Northern Basin Review, reviews of sustainable diversion limits in three groundwater areas, and the 2014 independent review into the Water Act), each of which involved significant consultation with relevant community members, businesses and community organisations.

Throughout the process of preparing the disallowed NBR instrument, the authority consulted at length with the Basin Officials Committee, the Basin Community Committee, Basin states, members of the public, including Indigenous groups, individuals, businesses and community groups.

The authority was required to consider any of their views during the consultation process.

Paving the pathway to full implementation of the Basin Plan, the bill contributes to achieving a key part of the government's six-point implementation agenda for the plan to deliver on the Northern basin review, including to reduce impacts on communities and support states to deliver environmental works and measures.

The bill provides an efficient way forward for the outcomes of the NBR instrument to be given effect. This will provide certainty for Basin states and communities as they work towards preparing SDL-compliant water resource plans by 30 June 2019. It is critical that the bill is passed urgently to enable the authority to prepare a new Basin Plan amendment instrument in time for these plans to be in place by 30 June 2019.

The bill contributes to the pursuit of delivering important outcomes for Basin communities, ensuring a sustainable future for the Basin.

Debate adjourned.

Mrs ANDREWS (McPherson—Assistant Minister for Vocational Education and Skills) (10:11): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Today I am introducing the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2018 (the bill) which amends the Australian Research Council Act 2001 (ARC Act) to ensure that the Australian Research Council (ARC) can continue to support Australia's best researchers to undertake the highest quality fundamental and applied research and research training.

The ARC's purpose is to grow knowledge and innovation for the benefit of the Australian community through funding the highest-quality research, assessing the quality, engagement and impact of research and providing advice on research matters.

ARC-funded research is delivering cultural, economic, social and environmental benefits to all Australians. For example:

Researchers at the ARC Industrial Research Hub for Transforming Waste Directly in Cost-effective Green Manufacturing, at the University of New South Wales, have custom designed a small-scale microfactory that uses breakthrough technology to recycle common waste plastics into new green materials;

Researchers at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Nanoscale BioPhotonics, at The University of Adelaide, have developed a revolutionary new 'smart needle' that lets surgeons see at-risk blood vessels to make neurosurgery safer.

ARC funding is awarded on the basis of a competitive peer-review process.

The ARC administers the National Competitive Grants Programs. The NCGP comprises two programs—Discovery and Linkage—under which the ARC funds a range of complementary schemes that provide funding for basic and applied research, research training, research collaboration and infrastructure.

The amendments through this bill are required because the ARC Act is the legislative basis that supports the financial operations of these grant programs. This bill will amend the ARC Act to update the existing funding caps and insert two new funding caps through until 30 June 2022 to allow continued funding of quality research in Australia.

The increase to the ARC's funding caps in this bill is in line with inflation and ensures that the government can continue to support thousands of research projects to grow knowledge and innovation for the benefit of the Australian community.

The government is making a significant investment in science, research and innovation—it spent approximately $10 billion across all portfolios in 2017-18 alone.

Demonstrating its commitment to supporting outstanding Australian research, on 10 November 2017 the government announced $333.5 million in funding to some of Australia's best and brightest researchers through the ARC's grant programs. The funding, provided to 859 new research projects, will increase Australia's research capacity by supporting groundbreaking research projects, expanding our research infrastructure and facilities, and supporting Australian researchers, including our early-career and Indigenous researchers.

In addition to this latest funding, in June last year, the government announced $170.6 million in new research funding to support 120 research projects that will grow new industry-research collaborations and support the training and upskilling of our next generation of researchers—including 17 new Australian Laureate Fellowships, 91 new Future Fellowships and 12 new industrial transformation research hubs and training centres.

In 2017, the government announced 117 new collaborative research projects under the ARC's Linkage Projects program. The projects total $46.5 million and support collaborations with 274 partner organisations, which, in addition to the government's funding, have pledged to provide $79.7 million to support those research projects.

The new linkage projects were selected under the new continuous application process introduced as part of the government's National Innovation and Science Agenda. Now in its second year, this measure is ensuring that researchers and businesses can collaborate as opportunities arise, improving the time line for translating research into broader outcomes for businesses and the community.

Australia must ensure we attract and retain world-class researchers and entrepreneurs and that is why we bring this bill to the House to ensure the Australian Research Council can play its role in supporting and expanding Australia's research strengths and support the many thousands of direct and indirect jobs that our research and scientific capabilities sustain.

I commend the bill.

Debate adjourned.

Mr COLEMAN (Banks—Assistant Minister for Finance) (10:17): I move:

That, in accordance with the provisions of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, the following proposed work be referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works for consideration and report: Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Defence Capability Facilities Project.

The Department of Defence is proposing to refurbish and construct new mask-testing facilities as well as logistical storage facilities that will support chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear defence training and capability at 14 locations across Australia. The 2016 defence white paper identifies the importance of providing Defence with enhanced domestic security capabilities, including its chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear defence capability, to help respond to the threat of complex terrorist attacks within Australia.

The project is expected to generate short-term employment opportunities predominantly in the building, construction and labour markets in each of the relevant locations. The project is also expected to provide opportunities for suppliers in the manufacture and distribution of construction materials and equipment. The estimated cost to deliver the project is $16.7 million, excluding GST. This includes construction costs, management and design fees, contingencies and escalation allowance. Subject to parliamentary approval of the project, construction is expected to be completed by late 2019.

I commend the motion to the House.

Question agreed to.

Mr HASTIE (Canning) (10:20): On behalf of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, I present the committee's report entitled ASIO's questioning and detention powers: review of the operation, effectiveness and implications of division 3 of part III of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Act 1979.

Report made a parliamentary paper in accordance with standing order 39(e).

Mr HASTIE: by leave—I am pleased to present the committee's report for its review of the operation, effectiveness and implications of division 3 of part III of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Act 1979.

Division 3 of part III allows ASIO, upon obtaining either a questioning warrant or a questioning and detention warrant, to question a person under compulsion in order to obtain intelligence that is important in relation to a terrorism offence.

I'll provide some background. ASIO's questioning and detention powers were enacted in July 2003 following lengthy debate in the parliament in 2002 and 2003. Their stated objective at the time was to strengthen Australia's counterterrorism capabilities.

The special powers were reviewed by the then Parliamentary Joint Committee on ASIO, ASIS and DSD in 2005 prior to their original sunset date of July 2006, and by the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor in 2012 and 2016.

The powers are currently due to sunset on 7 September 2018.

The committee commenced this review in February 2017.

In undertaking the review, the committee examined ASIO's ongoing need for a compulsory questioning power and concluded, on the basis of evidence received, that it is appropriate that ASIO retain this power.

On the question of detention, however, the committee has recommended that the provisions of the ASIO Act relating to questioning and detention warrants be repealed.

In reaching this view, the committee considered evidence about the constitutional and human rights implications of detention. It also noted the availability of a range of law enforcement mechanisms that did not exist in 2003. The committee concluded, on balance, that the current provisions are no longer the appropriate response to the threat of terrorism.

While the committee has recommended that detention warrants be repealed, it supports, in principle, an alternative apprehension framework that ensures attendance at questioning, prevents contact with others, and prevents the destruction of information.

Further, it became apparent to the committee that the existing legislation has become limited in its utility.

The committee has therefore recommended that the government develop legislation for a reformed ASIO compulsory questioning power, and has made a series of findings that are intended to guide development of this legislation.

In reaching its views, the committee considered ASIO's preferred model together with the recommendation of former INSLM, the Hon. Roger Gyles, that a model based on that contained within the Australian Crime Commission Act be adopted.

The committee concluded that while there are many benefits to the Crime Commission framework, wholesale adoption of this model would see the removal of some existing safeguards. The committee also noted that ASIO has advocated for provisions that are, in the committee's view, strong and fairer than equivalent provisions under the Crime Commission Act.

Ultimately, the committee concluded that the existing framework should be modified, retaining some important safeguards and mirroring Crime Commission Act provisions where appropriate.

I will briefly summarise the committee's key findings.

First, the committee considers it appropriate that questioning warrants be authorised by the Attorney-General, as is the case for ASIO's other special powers.

Second, as I mentioned earlier, the committee supports, in principle, an alternative apprehension framework. However, an apprehension or compulsory attendance power should be limited to the power to compel the subject of a warrant to attend questioning. Any ongoing detention power must be subject to the discretion of the courts.

The committee also supports new provisions that would enable emergency authorisations, subject to certain conditions.

In relation to the examiner or prescribed authority, the committee sees merit in the creation of a permanent statutory examiner based on that in the Crime Commission Act.

The committee also finds that provision for the questioning of minors in relation to terrorism may be necessary, however additional oversight and safeguards are essential. Importantly, any compulsory questioning of a minor must be limited to those who are themselves the subject of investigation.

The committee considers access to lawyers should be facilitated in line with the Crime Commission model, and there should be a mechanism to enable a person to contact specified persons.

Importantly, all existing accountability arrangements in the ASIO Act and Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security Act should be retained.

On the question of whether the scope of questioning under a compulsory questioning warrant should be extended beyond terrorism offences, the committee has not stated a view. This is a matter that the government should consider in the development of legislation.

Finally, the committee considers that any proposed legislation should include an appropriate sunset clause and that this committee should conduct a further review prior to that date.

Given the impending sunset date of 7 September 2018, the committee has made the final recommendation that the ASIO Act be amended to extend the sunset provision by 12 months, to 7 September 2019. This should ensure that there is sufficient time for legislation to be developed and reviewed.

I commend the report to the House.

Ms BRODTMANN (Canberra) (10:26): As the very proud and privileged member for Canberra, I am pleased to speak on the Australian Capital Territory (Planning and Land Management) Amendment Bill 2017 today. When the average Australian thinks about this city's development, the following names easily come to mind: Charles Scrivener, Walter Burley Griffin, King O'Malley, Lady Denman and Sir Robert Menzies. But there are very few who know the story of how the National Capital Authority, responsible for the planning and management of Commonwealth land in the Australian Capital Territory, actually came about and why it has the responsibilities it has.

Following the Federation of Australia on 1 January 1901 and the eventual selection of the ACT to accommodate a capital city in 1908, surveyor Charles Scrivener was responsible for finding the city's specific site. Scrivener's selection of location, where Canberra is today, was guided by instructions to assess sites from 'a scenic standpoint, with a view to securing the picturesque and with the object of beautification'. With emphasis placed on the picturesque, it affirmed that the future capital's landscaping and aesthetics would be just as important as its functionality. It's therefore no surprise that these elements became the essence, the central theme, of Walter Burley Griffin's design for our beautiful nation's capital, our wonderful city of Canberra.

Burley Griffin's own design was strongly influenced by the design for Washington DC: Pierre Charles L'Enfant's 1792 design. L'Enfant's design included wide, tree lined avenues that would visually connect significant topographical sites over the city. This became an emerging theme within the new city of Canberra, with Burley Griffin's design combining aspects, including the bush, which is very much part of our national identity and very much part of our Canberra identity. It is the bush capital. It's part of our DNA. We take great pride in the fact that we have big, beautiful skies, big, beautiful sunsets and views of the Brindabellas—although the Brindabellas can get a bit cool in winter when they're snow capped. We love our bush capital and we love that it's part of our national capital identity and our Canberra's identity. There are also the wide, tree lined avenues.

Burley Griffin's design for Canberra became the cornerstone for planning and land management decisions, starting with the Federal Capital Advisory Committee in the early 1920s. The committee proposed developing the Burley Griffin plan in three stages: stage 1 would see the transfer of parliament and key administrative staff from Sydney and Melbourne to Canberra—ironically, it took until the 1990s for that to finally happen, and those opposite are doing their level best to deconstruct that; stage 2 would include the construction of railways in addition to other key buildings; and stage 3 would create character and permanence in the capital. While the first two stages were not achieved by the committee, the garden city aspects of Canberra were developed.

Soon after, the Federal Capital Commission was formed to construct and administer Canberra from 1925. In its first two years, the commission oversaw the completion of Old Parliament House; the Lodge; the beautiful Albert Hall; the Institute of Anatomy, which is now home to the National Film and Sound Archive; the Australian Forestry School; and Mount Stromlo Observatory. With the onset of the Great Depression, the commission was disbanded, and there was no central planning for Canberra's development until the creation of the National Capital Planning and Development Committee in 1938. The committee was intended to oversee the development of Canberra, ensure the implementation of the Burley Griffin plan and maintain the high aesthetics and high architectural standards worthy of the national capital.

After almost 20 years, a Senate select committee inquired into Canberra's development and replaced the National Capital Planning and Development Committee with the National Development Capital Commission. The commission was granted significant funding and authority to complete the establishment of Canberra as the seat of government and was led by none other than the founder of the modern Liberal Party, Sir Robert Menzies. Sir Robert Menzies took some time to warm to the idea of Canberra as a worthy national capital. He said:

I cannot honestly say that I liked Canberra very much; it was to me a place of exile; but I soon began to realise that the decision had been taken, that Canberra was and would continue to be the capital of the nation, and that it was therefore imperative to make it a worthy capital; something that the Australian people would come to admire and respect; something that would be a focal point for national pride and sentiment. Once I had converted myself to this faith, I became an apostle.

That was Sir Robert Menzies. Yet Sir Robert Menzies, through a series of bold and ambitious decisions, established Canberra as the thriving city we know it as today. Despite the fact he had that original reservation about Canberra, he became an apostle. He was converted to the faith that is our national capital—and it is a great national capital. He was also a very, very strong advocate of a consolidated Public Service here in the nation's capital, here in Canberra. I am sending this message to those opposite, particularly given that, as we heard on budget night, a number of government agencies and jobs are once again moving out of Canberra, our nation's capital. I again remind them of the Sir Robert Menzies's vision. I remind them to ensure that that legacy is upheld and that we have a consolidated Public Service here in the nation's capital, which was established to be the seat of democracy, and to have those servants of democracy based here in Canberra.

What did we get from the budget this week? We got more government agencies moving out of Canberra. The Inland Rail unit will be going to Toowoomba, Dubbo and Wodonga. The Indian Ocean Territories area of the Department of Infrastructure, Regional Development and Cities is going to Perth. The Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations is going to Darwin. The Unique Student Identifier Registrar is going to Adelaide. There are a range of government agencies—that's not the full list—moving out of Canberra and into other parts of Australia. Again, I remind those opposite that, despite the Menzies vision, only 38 per cent of the Public Service is actually based here in Canberra. The rest of it is scattered throughout Australia, despite Sir Robert Menzies's vision to consolidate the Public Service here. This is the centre of policy development, and only 38 per cent of the Public Service is based here. I ask those opposite: how much more of the Public Service do you want to move out of Canberra, despite the fact that it was actually established to be the nation's capital and the seat of democracy? How much more do you want to decimate our nation's capital?

We saw what happened with the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority. What a debacle, what a complete and utter debacle—that blatant and shameless relocation from Canberra of 200-plus people to Armidale to essentially shore up the election of the former Deputy Prime Minister. It was a blatant and shameless pork barrel. The government commissioned an independent review into it. What did the independent review find? It found that it was all cost and no benefit. Despite that independent review and despite the Senate inquiry, the government still went ahead with this absolutely ludicrous decision, and it's been a complete and utter disaster.

We've seen brain drain of epic proportions. We've seen hundreds of years of expertise and skill leave the agency. It's gone and it won't be coming back. We've seen APVMA approvals for agricultural pesticides plummet. We've seen industry associations completely opposed to it. We've seen public servants moving to Armidale to work from McDonald's, because there is no actual facility for them to work from. They had this thought bubble based on no evidence that it was going to work, and they didn't even have a facility for the people who went there. You can imagine what's happening in the APVMA: people are leaving in droves, there is a brain drain that will be very hard to replace for many, many years, approvals are plummeting, industry is opposed to it and people are working from McDonald's because there is no facility to work in. This is the government's vision for the agricultural industry in this country.

I remind those who are listening and those opposite that it was the then Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister for Finance who ordered this relocation, and the Deputy Prime Minister was, at that stage, the minister for agriculture. What sort of minister for agriculture decimates his own industry? That's what we've seen from those opposite. Their vision continues; the thought bubble continues. What is the cost-benefit analysis on moving these agencies and these jobs from Canberra to the regions? Where is the cost-benefit analysis? I haven't seen any cost-benefit analysis and I haven't heard of any. It was all news to me when I heard it on Tuesday night. I remind those opposite of Menzies' vision for this city, for this national capital. It was about consolidating the Public Service here, and it took a very, very long time. Some would argue that the project is still going, in that it took until the 1990s for DSD to finally come up here from Victoria Barracks. The project is still going on, and it's being deconstructed by those opposite, with this decentralisation nonsense.

I go back to the bill at hand. In terms of this bill, we're talking about the planning and land management of the Australian Capital Territory, our nation's capital. We saw those opposite do their level best to completely deconstruct Menzies' vision. In the budget we saw next to zero investment in infrastructure. We saw further cuts—another 3,500 cuts to the    Public Service, many of them here in the ACT—further attacks on our national institutions and, as I said mentioned before, decentralisation.

The NCDC was disbanded in 1989, after the ACT was granted self-government, and the NCA was established. Since self-government, the NCA has shared responsibility for planning and managing land with the ACT government. The NCA is responsible for managing the Commonwealth's interest in the ACT, which is generally the tracts of land and other major assets identified as being on Commonwealth land or in nationally important areas. The ACT government is responsible for day-to-day planning decisions affecting the majority of the Territory. The existing arrangements do not provide decision-making within the NCA with sufficient oversight and transparency, nor do they provide the necessary support for the minister.

The proposed changes in this bill will update the governance arrangements of the NCA. The proposed amendment makes the authority the accountable authority, enabling it to give directions to the chief executive and allowing it to become involved in NCA operations. The amendment clarifies the relationship between the authority and the chief executive in a similar way to other agencies, such as the Organ and Tissue Authority. In this case, the NCA's chief executive remains the head of the entity for the purposes of the Public Service Act, but the authority for persons appointed by the Governor-General would become the accountable authority for the purposes of the act. These amendments also clarify the minister's existing powers by including 'must comply' provisions. These provisions oblige the authority to comply with the ministerial directive, which must be general in nature and not specific to a matter under the authority's consideration.

With the improved governance arrangements, we will see an improvement in terms of the transparency and the accountability of the NCA. That's vitally important, particularly for the people of Canberra. I've recently had a number of people from the electorate contact me about some changes to draft amendment 89, which is in the Deakin Forest residential precinct. Despite the fact the NCA was engaged in an active conversation with a number of these residents in regard to changes to their planning plans and despite the fact that these planning plans were open for consultation, the NCA then sort of clamped down on making any further decisions, and these people, who were under the impression they were allowed to do a particular planning change, were then advised they couldn't do it, despite having engaged openly with the NCA for a very long time and despite the fact that the NCA had made that decision when the broader consultation process was still open. I encourage the NCA to use this opportunity, to use the changes from this bill, to actively engage in open consultation and not come to decisions on particular issues when they are still open to consultation.

Finally, I thank the NCA for the work it's done in the diplomatic enclave with 'use it or lose it'. It's been terrific work in terms of getting movement and development in the diplomatic enclave here.

Ms O'DWYER (Higgins—Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, Minister for Women and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) (10:42): Today the Turnbull government will ensure that the National Capital Authority is properly placed to uphold the Commonwealth's interest in our capital. The bill will enable the NCA to operate in a way that is more consistent with the government's expectations of a modern agency. The bill will also ensure that the NCA continues to operate efficiently and effectively in managing public assets in the planning of Canberra. I thank members for their contributions and commend the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ms O'DWYER (Higgins—Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, Minister for Women and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) (10:43): by leave—I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

Ms McBRIDE (Dobell) (10:44): I will pick up from where I left off yesterday in the debate on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the related bill, with just some of the 490 NBN complaints that my office has helped our constituents handle. Yesterday I mentioned the 'You're not on the map' NBN problem. Today I will start with the 'It's somebody else's problem' NBN problem.

Abigail is from Blue Haven and runs a mobile locksmith business with her husband. When they applied to have their business connected to the NBN, their landline was cut off before switching, resulting in missed calls and lost business. When they asked Telstra to fix the problem, Telstra advised that it was not their responsibility and referred them to the NBN. Guess what? The NBN referred them back to Telstra—back and forth, back and forth. Then there's: 'Oops! You need a landline to operate your medic alert.' This one is really serious. As a pharmacist who worked in a hospital, I understand it. Of particular concern to me is the case of an 85-year-old constituent who contacted me because her landline had not been working properly for six months. This was particularly worrying, because, like many older Australians, she had a medic alert system which operates through her landline. When she tried to get Telstra to fix the problem, Telstra claimed it was an NBN issue, and NBN told her it was a Telstra problem—and so it goes on.

It is not surprising, given that my office has handled over 490 NBN complaints, that yet again we hit the top of the league table in the TIO report. In the last six months of 2017, there was a reported 203 per cent surge in NBN complaints compared with the same period a year earlier and, all the while, the Turnbull government has been a bystander in my community. They simply don't care about people or small business owners who are struggling with this substandard service, particularly in regional areas. This is not acceptable for somebody trying to operate a small business. It's not acceptable for people relying on the landline to stay safe and connected in their homes. It is not acceptable for school students or people trying to do TAFE or uni. It just isn't working.

Normally, as a local member, I would be pleased to see a suburb in my electorate at the top of a league table, but, unfortunately, Toukley in my electorate is the top postcode in Australia for complaints to the TIO, and the main issue being complained about is unreliable landline services. That's not all. Wyong in my electorate, where I grew up, is also in the top 10 postcodes in Australia for complaints to the TIO. In this case, it is for delays in NBN connections. I will give an example. This is the case of Albert and Christine. This one is known—and some of you may know it—as the 'paperclip procedure'. Albert and Christine have had to endure the all-too-familiar ordeal of attempting to get answers from their service provider about the dropouts that result in missed telephone calls and crashed websites. They spent hours on the phone and were sent several new modems. They also became pretty handy at performing the paperclip procedure, which most of us know from being forced to reset modems over and over and over again. At least Albert kept his sense of humour throughout the whole ordeal, suggesting the NBN might stand for the 'No Bells Network', given their home phone rarely rang and most telephone calls would divert automatically to voicemail. While Albert and Christine's service was eventually restored, Albert noted that even the Telstra representative admitted to him that the copper network was so unreliable that he couldn't guarantee that it wouldn't happen again. This is what Albert had to say on the NBN:

It is a shame this current Government has virtually destroyed a brilliant idea but it is also extremely sad that the Post-Master General's Department was not re-established as the sole provider which would have been much better at organising a superior service for communications.

This can't go on, particularly in regional centres like mine where the NBN was meant to transform our community.

Labor is committed to a sustainable funding arrangement to support and improve NBN services in regional Australia. These failures of the current government have placed pressure on the sustainability of the future funding arrangements of the NBN. Labor supports measures that create a level playing field for competition in telecommunications. There were better and more efficient ways to achieve this than the bill currently before the House. However, we won't oppose the bill in the chamber today.

Ultimately, the Prime Minister owns this levy. It is for the Prime Minister to explain why the government wants to give big business an $80 billion tax cut while introducing a new telecommunications charge that will add $84 to the annual broadband bill of households on non-NBN networks. It is for the Prime Minister to explain why occupants of new homes on non-NBN fibre networks will eventually have to pay an extra $84 per year on their internet bill. It is for the Prime Minister to explain why it is always the Australian customer and the Australian taxpayer who foot the bill for his poor judgement and policy failures. Regional Australians know that, when it comes to broadband, only Labor will be there to consistently deliver on their behalf. As we've done for over a decade, we will continue to put regional consumers front and centre of our policymaking.

Dr MIKE KELLY (Eden-Monaro) (10:49): I'm proud to be able to support the amendment proposed to the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 by the member for Greenway and to follow on from my friend the member for Dobell, who has so eloquently expressed a lot of the issues that we've been experiencing, particularly in rural and regional Australia, over this disastrous management of the National Broadband Network. This government has completely destroyed the complete transition of what was a clear, consolidated and efficient process to deliver effective broadband services to this nation.

Let's have a little historical reminder of how we got to this point. We had 13 years of the Howard government where there were 18 failed attempts to do something about this issue, and nothing happened. Every year we slipped further and further behind not only our like countries in the OECD but also competitors, trade partners and countries in the region. If you look at the economic success story that South Korea has been, the almost 100 per cent fibre penetration of their industry and homes has meant a lot to their growth as a country. Here was an opportunity for us to achieve that final breaching of the tyranny of distance and overcome the final barrier towards the full economic realisation of the potential of this country, particularly in human resources in rural and regional Australia. So it was critically important. There were so many things that could have been spun off it—the benefits to education, the benefits to health for remote Australians, and, in particular, the ability for businesses in the new start-up space and innovators, who only needed good, sound broadband communications infrastructure, to be able to operate anywhere. That was the beauty of it. Particularly in a region like mine—sitting where we do and offering a wonderful lifestyle—if they had had that support, businesses could have been operating for the benefit of their families and local areas and not needing to be in one of our big cities.

A really wonderful example of that has been what Jane Cay has achieved with her company, birdsnest, in Cooma, because we have reasonable communications there. She established her company and grew from a very tiny operation. Now, she has been announced as No. 1 in the top 50 people in ecommerce by Internet Retailing in 2018 and winner of the Hot Innovator award at the Power Retail All Star Bash 2018. Birdsnest was voted as the fourth-best place to work in Australia for the over-100 employees category in the Great Place to Work awards 2017. She employs over 110 local women. There's actually only one bloke there. They have incredibly flexible, wonderful working arrangements, Google style, for women who have kids they have to take to school or who have something to do on the farm et cetera. It is a wonderfully inclusive workplace that encourages innovation and ideas from all of the workers. They're loving it there. Birdsnest was also a winner of the best online marketing initiative for their changing room service. If you haven't seen that, you should check it out—at least women should. It's has a wonderful set-up where you can go into a changing room and it has an iPad on the wall where you can mix and match your clothing and accoutrements. They'll then bring it out from the warehouse and talk you through it. Also, they were a winner of the best online customer service in the Online Retailer Industry Awards 2015-16. They show what is possible in a country town by taking advantage of good communications infrastructure. But that opportunity is sadly missing in the broader reaches of Eden-Monaro and, in fact, in large parts of our landscape. That was what the NBN offered us.

When we came into government, we had a very simple three-technology approach to this. There would be fibre to the premises where that could be effectively and efficiently delivered. In remote areas or if terrain issues were a problem, you would have a mix of either fixed wireless towers or the satellite service. Labor commissioned the two satellites that are up there now, but it had been Labor's plan to put a third satellite up. One of the issues you have with services on satellites is that volume has to be managed carefully. Large volume on satellites will slow down the service. But what this government tried to do was create a multitechnology Frankenstein's monster disaster, which created a whole range of extra expenses and costs in the system. This bill, in introducing this levy, is a bit of a confession note to that. When we came into office, they were running with this OPEL idea, which some might remember. For Eden-Monaro, they put out maps of how this completely wireless service was meant to support Eden-Monaro. The only problem with their maps was they didn't take into account mountains or vegetation. I don't know if people are familiar with the terrain of Eden-Monaro, but we do have one or two hills. In fact, we have the Great Dividing Range right through the middle of it, we have Australia's highest mountain and we have a hell of a lot of vegetation. These maps were complete rubbish, and within 48 hours they had to be taken off the web. So the OPEL offering for Eden-Monaro would not have worked; it would have been a disaster. Nothing that the coalition put forward worked.

When we came in, we had some major public policy issues to resolve. There was the structural separation of Telstra, something that should have been tackled long ago. We had to do the deals with Telstra and Optus on the arrangements for setting up a wholesale platform on which retailers could compete and the universal pricing policy approach to that, which was really going to benefit rural and regional people. On top of that, we had to ensure that there was a wider spread of fixed wireless towers so that there wouldn't be so much pressure on the satellite services and everyone would get maximum benefit from the new service. Obviously, the design of that system required building a slow development of productivity as that process got rolling. If it had been left in place, we would have been hitting high straps of productivity and speed right now, as we were really swinging into that. In addition to those big public policy challenges, we faced the discovery of asbestos in the pits around the country. That was no small matter. I personally know the hazards of asbestos, having worked with asbestos victims when I first came out of university. That was a massive challenge.

It is completely hypocritical and disingenuous of the coalition to have pointed the bone at us for any delays in establishing this massive new infrastructure project. It's been the largest in our history, but we got it rolling. There are so many problems that the coalition has created through its approach to this. One is that it severely underestimated the failings in the HFC capabilities that existed in the cities and the cost of even creating the software management of the system, across this Frankenstein's-monster mix. It's estimated to have cost well over $1 billion to address that issue. And how absurd and insane it was that they had to go out and buy another 15,000 kilometres of copper wire for this system—unbelievable, in the context of where the rest of the world is going!

The copper has been a huge impediment. I'm getting so much feedback from constituents that the fibre-to-the-node process is just not doing the job. The further you are from the node and the greater the number of people using it—it's like an elephant trying to push itself through a garden hose at the end of the node line. It's a disaster. Worse than that, there is now a digital divide in some places, like Queanbeyan, right across the border here. Half of Queanbeyan received fibre to the premises while large areas of Jerrabomberra ended up with fibre to the node. That has not only created poor services—and Jerrabomberra is a very tech-savvy community with a lot of small business people who would have made the most of those services. Not only are they missing out on that level of service; this digital divide has created a devaluation of their properties. People now come to Queanbeyan and say, 'Does this premises have fibre to the premises or is it on the node?' It is definitely having an impact on decisions people are making when buying homes in Queanbeyan. This digital divide has created inequity across so many levels through this crazy multi-technology mix that's been created by the coalition.

In addition to that, we're having issues with Sky Muster, as I mentioned. Every time I hold a forum in Eden-Monaro, we get a massive roll-up. This is something that's really burning in the bush, on top of the issues about the forced mergers that we've had. The anger in rural and regional communities over the coalition's attempt to protect the banks—rural and regional people were the ones who were most upset about this banks issue, and communications is right up there with those grievances. I would have 100 people roll up to a forum in Queanbeyan, and dozens and dozens of people in other towns around Eden-Monaro, to discuss these problems. There's a huge volume of correspondence, as the member for Dobell referred to; we've had the exact same experience.

In Eden-Monaro in 2017, 33 per cent of all premises were only able to connect to the NBN via Sky Muster. That was well beyond what was originally intended. With that, we've had people seeking clarification on how the NBN services were allocated to certain areas. They can't get answers to those questions, because the government hasn't allowed the information on how they've been allocated to be released. We've continued to call on the government to commission an independent expert review of the NBN satellite service to set the record straight and provide a clear plan forward.

One really good example of how this has played out, if you need further proof, is that of the Barton Highway—and I'll be happy to speak more on the Barton Highway as a major disingenuous infrastructure deception that the government's committing on the people of the Yass Valley. The Barton Highway in Murrumbateman is presenting a great divide in NBN services. Residents on the western side of the Barton Highway are able to connect to fibre to the node, while those who are on the eastern side of the highway are only able to connect to Sky Muster. There's absolutely no logical, technical reason people can see for that, and no explanation has been given by NBN as to why there would be such a difference in technology based on this road border. It's just crazy.

We also know in Eden-Monaro that we're under one of the busiest air routes in the world. They're offering up services under Sky Muster to those airlines, which is putting further strain on the services available to my community. It's been plagued with ongoing installation and reliability issues as well as higher costs compared to other NBN services. We had data limits as well, which had to be addressed. The feedback I'm getting from the community is continuing to pile up. If the government had stuck to our original plan of putting up three satellites, we would have seen a bit of an easing of the circumstances there, but we certainly need more fixed wireless towers to take the burden off the satellite.

We've seen the huge volume of complaints that have emerged in the TIO report in April. There has been a 204 per cent increase in complaints. Certainly I've been experiencing all of that, with people coming to me to try and get their matters sorted out. We really have to get this sorted out, because it's holding us back. Many small business people have also come to me about the limitations that have been placed on what they want to do as a result of confusion over communications infrastructure.

This is going to be a mess that Labor will be required to unravel, because it's very clear that, in all the history of the coalition's dealing with this, they just haven't managed to come to grips with it. I remember, vividly, Senator Helen Coonan. She was a wonderful lady, a decent person, but she'd been pitchforked into this issue at the end of the Howard government and she clearly didn't understand any of the technical aspects. It was a shock to watch her trying to explain the OPEL plan to my regional communities in Tumut and elsewhere. She left people completely unimpressed. This was in contrast to Stephen Conroy, who was well and truly over all the technical issues. In fact, my only issue with Stephen, when I took him to the communities, was to try to get him to tone down the technical language so that people could get their heads around it. He was completely across all this. If we'd stuck with the original plan, how much further ahead would we be now and how many gains would we have made?

I remember at the time that one estimate of the benefit of our original NBN plan to our economy was that it would have added $60 billion worth of value to the Australian economy. That's the kind of investment that we want to see from government to address our growth and our new economy issues. We've seen none of that imagination, none of that understanding out of this government. The only plan they've been able to put forward in all the five years they've been in government has been a tax cut to big business. That's it. Where's the imagination? Where's the creativity? Where's the approach to addressing the skills and workforce needs of this country to address the huge technology curve that's presenting this nation with problems?

Instead of understanding that challenge, what have they done, Madam Deputy Speaker Bird? They've cut TAFE spending. I know this is a great passion of yours and that you've put so much love and passion into it and understand how important it is, particularly to rural and regional areas. We've seen not only the $3 billion worth of cuts up until now but this extra $270 million hit. We are seeing all this when we in our region are facing the challenges of supporting Snowy 2.0, which is likely to be developed. This will see another 5,000 jobs, but we don't want them hived off to 457 visas or skilled migrants from overseas. Our kids in the region deserve to have those opportunities, and our workers, our kids and our entrepreneurs deserve good-quality communications to support and give flight to their imaginations and their business opportunities, to make rural and regional Australia grow. That's how we do it—not stupid decentralisation. (Time expired)

Ms McGOWAN (Indi) (11:04): I would like to endorse the comments of my colleague from Eden-Monaro. He absolutely understands the issues that we're facing. I rise to speak about the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017. I will be supporting this legislation in the House. If passed, these bills will establish statutory infrastructure provider obligations on NBN Co to support the ongoing delivery of superfast broadband services and will provide sustainable funding for NBN Co's loss-making fixed wireless and satellite services to regional areas through the Regional Broadband Scheme, the RBS. I welcome these changes.

As a member of the Joint Standing Committee on the NBN, I, along with many of my colleagues in the House, heard firsthand of the dissatisfaction with the rollout of the NBN. The dissatisfaction absolutely seems to be highest in regional communities. The purpose of the NBN rollout committee is very clear. Our job is to assess the rollout of the NBN and ensure that this significant infrastructure project for Australia is delivered in a way that delivers the social and economic benefits it promised.

My office, like those of many members in regional areas, is acutely aware of the gap between the promise and the reality of the NBN. The experience of one of my constituents from the King Valley, a wine-producing and agricultural region 300 kilometres north of Melbourne, is a clear indication of this. I would like to read this into Hansard because I think it encapsulates the enormous frustrations that we're experiencing, but before I do I'd like to acknowledge the Minister for Regional Development, Territories and Local Government, who's in the House. It's lovely to have you here, Minister. I know that you understand this more than anybody else. Through our work on the House Select Committee on Regional Development and Decentralisation you've just heard of the opportunities that we've got to face. I really look forward to working with you in your role to see what we can do about making sure all the regions and agriculture in particular have access to the internet that they need.

Here's a case study of a business in my electorate. They had NBN Sky Muster satellite installed in November 2016. The telecommunications office has had a case file on the complaints since mid-November 2016, with no resolution. NBN contractors have visited the property on six separate occasions to replace satellite dishes, NTD units and cables to the house. Each instance resulted in the technician reporting to NBN Co and Ericsson, the satellite provider, that there was no internet signal. NBN continued to close each case, and each time a technician went to the property a new case was opened.

Their ISP is iiNet. They have had two case managers at the TIO who have expressed their frustration in dealing with NBN Co. The assigned NBN Co case managers claim to have not had the emails sent by the TIO, even though the TIO have copies on file. The ISP seems powerless to pursue the case on behalf of the customer, even though NBN Co insists that the fault complaints have to come from the ISP.

The constituent has 4G with Optus, which they say works well. They want to keep a wireless internet arrangement at home using Optus, but they've been told that they have to be on satellite, which eliminates other options. NBN claims that they can opt to retain their legacy copper services as well as, or instead of, switching to NBN, as there are no plans to switch off the existing copper networks in these areas. That has been a hard-fought battle. But this particular constituent doesn't have fixed copper wire to their property, so it's not much help. They want the government to give the TIO more power to compel NBN to meet requirements. Despite the many fault lodgements to NBN, NBN continues to dismiss the issue.

There's not even the option to switch ISPs, because the fault continues with the satellite. There are only six providers to choose from, and my constituent believes that they've got dubious reputations. He tells me that the Sky Muster satellite ISPs do not include Telstra or Optus. The constituent tells me that he feels his hands are tied and he has been spun around like a yo-yo, with no resolution, as NBN refuses to admit that it cannot provide the capability for an internet service. This has affected the constituent's health and has been detrimental to the spouse's ability to work from home. They've agreed for me to put a ministerial into the system. They want the government to authorise on paper that he be allowed to continue to use his 4G for internet. It's just a comedy of errors—shock, horror! How could this be the case?

Sadly, it's not a one-off experience. My electoral officers constantly regale me with stories, saying, 'Guess what else has happened?' I know it's not new, but really we need to put energy into what we do about this. The strong message from my community is that the NBN is not delivering as promised. Their concerns and dissatisfaction with the rollout illustrate a lack of equity between metro and regional communities, particularly in relation to slow speeds. When people in my community try to address this, there is a lack of clarity of responsibilities between NBN Co and retail service providers. Ultimately, they turn to the office of their member of parliament for help.

As part of my role on the NBN rollout committee, we spent 12 months meeting with communities across Australia, talking to businesses and local and state governments and taking submissions. In total the committee took 191 submissions from a range of individuals and organisations, 39 of which were from my electorate of Indi. I thank those constituents for playing an active role in this process, for engaging with me and the committee and for building the evidence base so that the committee can make informed decisions and sound recommendations. I have here the list of the 39 constituents, which I was going to read to the House today, but I think that would use up some of my scarce time, and I have more important things to say. But I want to acknowledge every single one of those constituents for the time and energy they put into putting their concerns in writing. Many of them turned up to the inquiry and actually spoke to their own issues. We do get that you are busy people, and I really do appreciate the energy it takes to work with government, so to every single one of you: thank you. I look forward to continuing to advocate in parliament so that we get a better outcome.

I want to turn my mind now to the recommendations of the committee. There were 23 recommendations, but there are just a few I would really like to highlight, as I think they address the needs of rural and regional communities. I continue to call on the government to direct the NBN to establish a regional and rural reference group to support the rollout of NBN in rural and remote Australia. Minister, this is where you could really help me. When we put this recommendation up, the NBN said they didn't need a rural and remote reference group—that they knew about what was going on. Well, they might know about it, but I tell you what: their communication to the regions is not strong. I do acknowledge that they brought a roadshow bus to north-east Victoria and took it around many of the towns in my electorate, which was certainly a beginning, but there are so many issues that still need to be addressed, and communication back to my electorate and my constituents about how these are being addressed is really needed. So one of the recommendations is that we set up a reference group.

The committee has seen really clearly there needs to be greater consultation with rural and regional end users in the development of NBN user policy and NBN rollout plans. To the advisers in parliament today and to the people listening, I plead: this is really important and not an optional extra. Just saying that the telcos understand rural and regional Australia is not good enough, because we don't have evidence of that and we think it needs to be done much better. This recommendation was accepted by the majority report of the committee. It went to the government, who came back with, 'No, we're not going to do it,' for no good reason. So I reiterate that in my speech today.

I understand that, if you could set up such a reference group, the group would include consumer advocacy groups and departmental representation from the communications and regional development areas. It would be a really important step in improving the end user experience and increasing transparency. It's easily done, with huge output. I can't see why we wouldn't agree to it. When business decisions fundamentally change, the NBN experience for the end user in regional and rural communities should be referred to the reference group for consideration and analysis as to whether the decision will result in NBN not meeting its responsibilities outlined in the statement of expectations. When changes happen with NBN, you really need to consult with your regional users and say: 'How is this going to impact on you? Is this actually going to work, yes or no? What's a communication plan we could put in place to actually make it work better?'

We also called for a clearly identified complaint-handling process which would include complaint resolution processes and time frames and complaint acceleration processes, internal and external, and would meet Australian government accessibility guidelines. It should not be hard to do that. We've been hearing about the problems with the TIO. They say, 'It's not us.' Why couldn't we set up something very specifically to meet the needs for rural and regional Australia? You've heard today that we've got special and quite different needs to the city people. If we could have a process where our needs were met directly and quickly, I could say that you would be a friend of every single regional member of parliament, because it would take the huge workload off our officers and it would be really appreciated by constituents.

I know we have a helpline, but it's not targeted specifically to rural and regional, and we don't get a sense that our particular issues are being addressed in the right way. We have seen that there are significant inadequacies in resolving customer complaints—notably, a lack of direct access to the NBN and a gap in the knowledge of available avenues for complaints and dispute resolution. Whilst these issues cost wholesale and retail providers, there is a need for a single agency to provide this information to ensure the uniformity and consistency of messages and advice. If the minister and advisers would like to meet with staff in my department, I would be really happy to sit down with them and talk about the complaints that we get and how this recommendation could be worked to resolve some of the issues in a speedy way.

Before I get to the end of my talk, I would like to address my comments to agriculture and rural and regional development. In doing so, I want to acknowledge the enormous difference that the NBN has actually made to my community. My speech so far has mostly been about the problems, but, truthfully, it is a most wonderful, essential service that is going to be such a game changer for communities like mine. Where it's working—and working well—it has made a huge difference, so it's fantastic to have. I refer to an experience that the minister and I had as part of the inquiry into regional development. We went to Launceston, in Tasmania, and also to Geraldton, in Western Australia. We heard from both of these cities, which are gigabit cities; they've got infinite internet. The envy that it evoked in the rest of us, because we don't have that and we put up with such substandard—it was like dirt road problems. These two cities can advance because they've got the capacity to do it. It unleashed, I think, in all the people on our committee, an understanding of the opportunities from this technology for rural and regional Australia—and our frustration that we have to come to parliament and argue to get the changes made, as opposed to being on the front foot and being able to bring all our resources to work with the Department of Communications and the Arts, NBN Co and the TIO to actually sort out and solve the problems—because of all the benefit.

I know that the cities will benefit, but, in seeing what Launceston and Geraldton were able to do and the enormous optimism that those cities have because they've got such good internet, I could imagine that in my communities. We have so much potential to produce more. Fifty per cent of the water in the Murray-Darling Basin falls in my electorate. We could do so much. We could triple our agricultural production. We could triple our manufacturing. We're on a main transport route. We could do so much with 21st century agriculture if we could get hold of this technology. I've had the opportunity to go to Armidale, to the University of New England, to see what their smart farms are doing for agriculture. It is so exciting to see the research, but at the moment we can't bring that to our electorate. I can't bring that to my farming, manufacturing and stock and station agents, because we don't have the capacity. I'm here in parliament asking for basic services rather than being able to say, 'Let's work together to do what we can.' I'll be supporting this legislation. It is a good beginning, but we've got a long way to go. I offer the support of myself, my offices and my community to see if we can get over the hump and deliver what we know the potential of this technology is.

Ms O'NEIL (Hotham) (11:19): It is a great pleasure to contribute to the debate today on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017. I want to build on some of the comments the member for Indi has made. She is an incredibly passionate advocate for her community, as all of us in this chamber understand and acknowledge. She is talking about potential here, and that just frustrates me in this debate about the National Broadband Network, because in the electorate of the member for Indi and in the electorates of other members in this House, and certainly in my electorate, we know that we have businesses and innovative, smart people—scientists—who could be doing so much more, who could be taking their innovation and their knowledge right out to the farthest corners of the globe, but they're stymied, and it is frustrating. Deputy Speaker, I'm sure you experience this in your community when you talk to people there. I've spent a lot of time talking to farmers on this issue, and they tell you they could build much better and bigger businesses, but they can't upload receipts onto their computers so that they can pay their bills. I've talked to farmers who actually have to get up in the middle of the night to do their accounting, because that's the only time at which their internet will work fast enough for them to download the things they need for doing their accounting. Every time I engage in this debate about NBN, it is always in the context of missed opportunities. I'm happy to have a discussion today about some of the technical things. As the member for Indi said, we are talking about pretty basic standard services here.

It's disappointing for Labor MPs and other MPs to engage in this debate, because we know what could have been. The truth is that Labor had a better plan for this. That plan would have delivered fibre to the home to 93 per cent of Australians. That plan was going to cost a lot of money—no-one can deny that. I would point out that the coalition's plan—their half-baked effort—has cost a lot of money, too. Labor's plan would have cost a lot of money and it would have taken a long time to do, but, as our friend Tony Windsor says, 'You do it once, you do it properly, you do it with fibre.' We had a plan that would be coming to completion right now, and all of my constituents and almost all of the member for Indi's constituents—I'm assuming, as it depends on whether the satellite was going to be connected to her area—would have had a broadband connection. That broadband connection would have had a fundamental difference to the coalition's plan in the way it has connected Australians up to broadband—that is, it would have been futureproof.

We know that when we lay fibre under the ground we can continue to upgrade the technology that sits at either end, the technical electronics that help us to connect to the internet, but fibre is what's needed as a starting point. That's what we've missed out on. That's why the member for Indi's constituents, the member for Chifley's constituents and my constituents are not able to build the innovative businesses they could, because they are struggling with an internet that frankly is just not good enough for a First World country like Australia.

We are here to talk about some of the technical aspects of how the NBN is being regulated. I will go those issues, which are in the context of this extraordinarily frustrating public discussion on where we have ended up with a second-rate NBN. I feel that not a week goes by in which another scandal or another issue does not come up, whether it be about the fact that speeds are lower than expected, that the internet is more expensive or that it is less reliable. A lot of people in my community—and I will speak about their experiences specifically—are telling me that after signing onto the NBN they have an internet service today that is more expensive, less reliable and slower than it was when they had an ADSL connection. It's pretty frustrating.

I want to mention a recent report that I found incredibly disturbing. There are organisations that rank internet speeds around the world. The last report from one organisation, Speedtest, found that Australia has dropped to 55th in its global ranking of internet speeds. This is an incredible report and I would encourage those of you listening to look at it. The report lists countries like Lithuania, Latvia, Barbados, Thailand, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Moldova, Estonia, Czech Republic, Russia, Ukraine and Uruguay—I could list 56 countries before I get to Australia. We have an average download speed of 29.5 megabits per second. The fastest country in the world is Singapore, which has an average download speed of 174.94 megabits per second.

Mr Deputy Speaker, it is not a mystery as to why we are 56th in the world and Singapore is No. 1. Those of us who have been following this debate will be able to tell you why Singapore has a high internet download speed, and that is that Singaporean residences have fibre to the home. It is a real illustration of how badly wrong we have got this. We are seeing that the countries in the world that made the big one-off investment up-front in building fibre to the home are the countries that are leading the world in internet speeds, while the system that we've cobbled together with the different mix of technologies and the 'one street with one type of technology and the next street with another' approach is seeing us decline. We are getting worse over time, not better. There are all the other issues that I've talked about, as well as the expense and the issues around reliability.

I will speak briefly about the Statutory Infrastructure Provider scheme. The bill that is before us goes into a bit of detail about some changes that will be made. I've talked a lot about the government's failures on the National Broadband Network, but I'm happy to admit when the government gets something right. It's not all that often that I have to make that concession, so I'm happy to do so now.

Mr Husic: It makes a difference.

Ms O'NEIL: Exactly. I'm glad to see that the government will be putting the principle that all Australians should have access to a high-speed broadband connection into legislation, for what it's worth—as they say on the internet. It is a sensible extension of the reform that Labor started while in government, with the statement of expectations that we provided for the NBN Co. That statement required NBN Co to ensure that the network was available to all Australians, and the bill before us means that this principle will continue beyond the completion of work. It is a sensible reform, and I think the least we could expect. Given that we've got the NBN so badly wrong, we should at least have regulation that allows people to have that sense of certainty. It is a bit disappointing to see how long it took the government to get to this position and to realise that this was an important principle, but we've been campaigning for this for some time and it is great to see the government join us on that and we can have a bipartisan approach on at least this small element of the scheme. Perhaps it might be wishful thinking on my part, but if the government had moved ahead on this principle a little bit earlier then maybe we would have also seen them admit their mistake in trying to use old technologies for the NBN rollout, because that's the issue of controversy between the two big political parties in this country that needs us to get to a bipartisan position. We simply can't continue under the current constraints. It is not good enough for a First World economy, and we need to do better.

The Prime Minister and his government told us that they were scrapping the rollout of Labor's fibre-to-the home technology because it cost too much. That probably sounded like a good political exercise at the time, but I have to say today that I think most Australians would agree it would have been much more sensible, much more beneficial, to pay a bit more at the time and get internet that was going to last us beyond this current iteration of technologies. What we've also seen is that the cost of the Prime Minister's NBN has blown out to $4 billion more than the cost of Labor's fibre NBN. So we are back again at this incredible frustration—and I'm just reflecting what I hear from my constituents—of having thrown billions of dollars at this problem, but, because we've done it in this cobbled-together way, because we've had this irritating policy change between Labor and Liberal, we've ended up with an internet that is slower, more expensive and less reliable than it otherwise would have been. Indeed, a lot of my constituents are having slower, less reliable and more expensive internet than they had before their NBN was connected. You just can't believe how frustrated people are about this, Deputy Speaker.

I've spent a lot of time talking to my constituents about the issues that they are having, because my goal is that an incoming Labor government will try to do something to help fix some of these issues. I've got large parts of my electorate which have not been connected at all to the NBN and in the parts which have been connected there are huge complaints about what's going on. We have received so many complaints about the NBN that we have actually had to set up a survey to collect them all. I want to talk about some of the comments that I've received from my constituents. The first is from Debra in Moorabbin. She said:

We've gone backwards in this house for speed and connectivity. NBN often drops out and speeds are sometimes like old dial up. It's so frustrating. We rarely do work at home as a result.

Tracey in Dingley Village describes Turnbull's NBN as 'an exorbitant waste of money invested in backward technology'. I couldn't agree with you more, Tracey. Andrew from Oakleigh South, like many, has had problems with the installation process. He said:

NBN have damaged my house … and they also managed to stuff up the installation in my elderly neighbour's property at well … All this hassle for obsolete technology.

Stephen in Hughesdale said:

This is the worst and slowest internet I have had in a long time.

Paul in Keysborough said:

The NBN is no better than what I had before, in some ways it is worse.

Joanne in Clayton South said:

Australia is so far behind when it comes to the internet. This is outdated technology. If the government wants to spend tax payers money, give us something to be proud of and that is useful. Not this crap.

Excuse my French, Deputy Speaker. That was a direct quote, telling it like Aussies do. I'll end with Matthew in Cheltenham, who said:

I can't say anything nice so I won't say anything at all.

I can assure you that these comments go on and on and on. Among the many people who responded to our survey and those I have talked to about their NBN, I would say there is almost universal frustration and dissatisfaction with the service that is being provided. In the survey work that we did in my electorate, we found that 77 per cent of those connected to the NBN in Hotham are either dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with the network. Of those not yet connected to the NBN, 84 per cent don't want the old copper and cable technology that's planned for them; they want Labor's fibre connection straight to their home. In Hotham—and no surprise here—the vast majority of people connected to the NBN who are unsatisfied have HFC or FTTN. Those are the Prime Minister's old technologies that he cobbled together. It's meant to be called 'broadband'; they call it 'fraudband', and this is why.

But it's not just people in my electorate who are upset and frustrated by this. Poll after poll and survey after survey show us that Australians are fed up with the inferior NBN. They're fed up with the customer service that they're receiving from the organisations. They are fed up and frustrated with the poor speeds. They are fed up with poor reliability.

The Prime Minister's NBN is a failure. He should have done it once and done it with fibre. He could have done that. As a country we are paying a colossal price for the mistake that was made in choosing to cobble together technologies instead of doing it properly with fibre. We don't want a second-rate NBN that costs more and does less. I think it's time that the Prime Minister listened to the public and started to make a concerted effort to try to actually fix the mess that he's created, rather than going ahead as he had planned. Broadband isn't a luxury; it's a critical public service that needs to be done right. It's essential for the people in my electorate, it's essential for our local economy, and it's the least we could do as a government to provide them with this basic service. Many countries that have a much lower GDP per capita are finding parts to give their constituents much better services than we've been able to do. So I regard it as a failure of the government in a most profound way.

We are now having to deal with the consequences of these actions. One of the concerns I have is with the implementation of an internet tax on 400,000 residential and business services on non-NBN networks. These are the same networks that the Prime Minister, when he was in the Communications portfolio, encouraged. It is the constant failures with the NBN that have led us to this debate in this place. You are going to have member of parliament after member of parliament getting up and telling you the same thing, Deputy Speaker. We have the same message for the Prime Minister: the technology that you have chosen and the way that you have decided to do this are wrong. It is not taking us in the right direction; it is taking us backwards.

As I said at the beginning of my remarks, every year I get sick of having to look at survey after survey telling us that Australia, instead of leaping forward as we rightly should be doing with all of the incredible assets that we have in this country, is slipping further backwards on this fundamental technology. We had a so-called 'infrastructure budget' announced by the government a couple of days ago. What do you think matters more? Is it building a road or is it giving us a highway that is going to provide a foundation for the future growth of our economy? They can't get that right. I don't think that anyone looking at their record on the NBN would trust them to do any of the other things that are in that budget. It's good to have the opportunity to express the frustration of my constituents, and I've been pleased to do that today on behalf of the people of Hotham. Thank you.

Mr HUSIC (Chifley) (11:34): At the outset, what the coalition should do is rename the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017. They should be renamed 'the coalition's chickens coming home to roost'. The particular bill we are debating right now represents all the failures of the coalition accumulated and rolling into this. When you get to a point where you need to charge up to 500,000 Australians up to $84 a year more on their broadband, that represents the combined policy failure of the coalition. We've gotten to a point where our download speeds in Australia are slower than in Kazakhstan. We have Borat broadband in this country. Kazakhstan is beating Australia. We fall behind the world standard. How did we get to this spot? How did we get to the spot where Borat beats us on broadband? I'll tell you how.

On this side of the chamber, early on we didn't need to legislate the importance of broadband, because it was in our hearts and in our heads. We looked at the coalition under John Howard—in the 19 times they tried to get broadband plans in place, they couldn't get it done. What did we have? It was patchy in terms of the rollout back when John Howard was the Prime Minister and Helen Coonan was the communications minister. It was patchy. It was dollar driven in that if you got good broadband it was because you were in a richer area rather than the general metropolitan area. If you were in regional areas you could forget about getting good broadband. There was no national network; it was all cobbled together based on a profit-driven approach of Telstra, back in the day of Sol Trujillo—a name we have forgotten these days. Telstra would put up plans for broadband rollouts with a rate of return way higher than the ACCC could stomach.

It took Labor to say: 'No, enough's enough! We will put in a national network. We will make sure 93 per cent of homes are fibred up. The other seven per cent will get it through either satellite or mobile broadband—that's how they'll get their internet. We'll put that into place. Forget the almost 20 instances of failure from the coalition; we're going to do it right the first time with fibre.' Malcolm Turnbull, now Prime Minister, then shadow communications minister, knew he couldn't beat that model the way it was. The then opposition leader, Tony Abbott, had one objective: destroy the National Broadband Network. But Malcolm Turnbull, as shadow communications minister, knew he couldn't do it.

So all they did was engage in political product differentiation to come up with a version of the NBN. They could try and slap the sticker on it to say that it was the NBN, but they knew it was a dud. They called it the multi-technology mix, which is now dubbed 'Malcolm Turnbull's mess', because that's exactly what's happening. They moved from fibre. They rely on HFC, the cable broadband network that everyone was telling them was going to cost a bundle to upgrade to get even remotely near what expectations would be. They relied on that.

The coalition always cheer mobile broadband blackspot programs as if that is the substitute for having fibre to the premises in regional Australia. They cheer because regional Australians will have access to data that is more expensive and not as universally reliable as that fibre connection. That's what they cheer on, but they don't cheer on rolling out fibre to the premises. We have seen this embarrassed, cowardly crawling. They said they would not support fibre to the premises, so it was fibre to the node, then it was fibre a bit further away from the node, and then it was fibre to the driveway—all inching closer to the homes. We said, 'Just do this right the first time,' and they refused to. They put in place this system that is turning out to be a mess.

I remember the Prime Minister, when he was communications minister, teasing both me and the member for Greenway, saying he'd visit Blacktown, which is in part of the electorate I represent and part of the electorate the member for Greenway, the current shadow communications minister, represents. He was saying: 'Look at this! There are these HFC networks that exist—these cable broadband networks that exist—and these members of parliament want to push for fibre when they could just use the cable broadband network.' As my constituents say to me, the cable broadband network works fantastically at 4 am. That's when it works best. If you have a lot of people on it, it slows down—exactly what we constantly told the coalition when we were in government. This network is affected by volume, it degrades and it costs a lot of money to bring it up to speed.

Because the coalition, like I said earlier, wanted product differentiation—they wanted to say that they were doing something different to Labor—they put this forward. So now we are debating a levy that will be placed on Australians to cover the cost. Why? The shadow minister in her contribution outlined why. It is because just to operate this inferior technology mix that has been foisted on us by the Prime Minister, who was then the communications minister, and championed by the coalition, will cost $200 million more each year and it will generate less revenue—$300 million less revenue. So straightaway you have a gap of nearly half a billion dollars—again this reflects the deliberate decisions made by the coalition on how they would mutate the National Broadband Network into this MTM, this multi-technology mix, that would fail to deliver for Australian consumers.

On top of this, in August last year roughly 300,000 homes—220,000 of which would have been revenue generating—literally disappeared off the NBN plan. The capital expenditure forecast for the rollout is up nearly $1½ billion from the year before. Another $140 million in revenue is not coming back. So this levy is reflective of those failures that had been enacted by the coalition. That's what has happened. This is the coalition's chickens coming home to roost, and that is why this legislation should be renamed in that way.

The coalition told us that they would deliver 25 megabits per second download speed for all households by December 2016. The minute they were in office, the minute they won the election, they said, 'We can't make that promise,' and they tried to blame us for it. Everyone was telling them it wasn't achievable but they still pressed ahead with it. They knew they could not do that. They knew that they couldn't deliver their NBN for $29 billion by the end of 2016. They knew that. So we now have a nearly $50 billion multi-technology mix, and questions are being raised about how much extra it's going to cost to build and how much less revenue it's going to generate. In the meantime Australian consumers suffer and wonder whether it would be better to go on the soon-to-be-rolled-out 5G wireless network. They're actively contemplating spending more on data through another system rather than use this mess of a broadband network championed by the coalition.

That raises further questions about whether the network itself will face more of this slow drift away from it. People who should be using the National Broadband Network will be using a 5G network. The revenue forecasts of the Prime Minister's network will slip even further, so now they need to put this type of levy in place. If they don't, they'll be in a world of pain. The parliament has been put in a terrible position as a result of the mess championed by the Prime Minster when he was the communications minister. If we don't support this, it will put the NBN in a worse position. As much as we are uptight about the fact that people will be paying nearly $100 more a year for their broadband in those areas that are not on the NBN, to not support this would put us in a worse position. The coalition forces the parliament to support this because no commonsense proposition would have you put this network, which is already in a bad way, in a worse position.

Every single person who is upset about this rollout should direct their anger to the coalition for the way they have done this.

Mr Stephen Jones interjecting—

Mr HUSIC: Absolutely. Consumers should turn the coalition into a pinata, as the member for Whitlam rightly observed, because they have been let down. The speeds aren't as fast; the network's costing more; it's not rolling out in the way that they promised; it's not delivering the speeds that they promised—and now we have to pay more for it through a consumer levy.

In the architecture of what Labor put together, we had a universal pricing approach that would have seen the cities of the nation cross-subsidising the rollout and the way that the service was delivered into regional Australia. You know what? Australians wouldn't mind that whatsoever. They support the notion that, if you're in the city, you can support regional areas getting this rollout. They get it. It was ticked off. The ACCC ticked off on it. When it was ticked off, no-one ever thought in their wildest dreams that, after having that universal mechanism in place, we'd have to come back and put a levy on top of it. No-one would have thought that. But, because we have Borat's broadband being championed by the Prime Minister, that's what we face.

On top of that, what does it do in terms of the economy? Last month NBN Co released a report. They got a bunch of consultants in to bring together a report called Connecting Australia: the impact of the NBN on Australian lives and the economy. It was breathlessly reported. Guess what? Everyone in the country knew what having a modern broadband network would do for the general community and for business. NBN Co have to put these reports together, but not to convince everyone who's already aware of that; this report seemed more likely to be used to convince the government of the value of the network. We all know.

I point out that you, Madam Deputy Speaker Bird, chaired the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Infrastructure and Communications. I was proud to be on the committee that you chaired at that point in time, when we visited the country and we heard directly from regional Australia in particular, who said what mobile broadband networks do and the value they create for the digital economy—for which I'm the shadow minister with portfolio responsibility—in this country. Everyone knew that, but now NBN Co has to spend good money putting these types of reports together to convince the coalition that getting this right makes a lot of sense from the economy's perspective and from the community's perspective.

From people in the electorate I represent—Woodcroft had been stuck for ages. We finally were able to get them on the NBN rollout plan, and then that plan was torn up by the then communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull. It then got put back on, but only half the job got done because the rest had cable broadband—and they're now complaining about the fact that they have that. In other parts of the electorate I represent, like Glendenning, constituents are telling me that they're getting one-megabit-per-second download speed—in some cases, half. They were told that cable broadband would work and are constantly frustrated by it. Rooty Hill and Mount Druitt residents are telling me that they're experiencing this.

The reason why I have a problem with that is that businesses in the CBDs of the electorate I represent in Western Sydney rely on a modern broadband network just as much as they'd rely on having a good connection to gas, water and electricity. A modern broadband network is fundamental for a business to run—and run at less cost—to thrive, to put people on and to create new business opportunity, which we see occurring when you do have a modern network in place.

Some of the other legislation that's before us is all straightforward. Of course, the way in which you relate or deal with developers in the infrastructure rollout and some of the stuff that's embedded in this legislation makes perfect sense. The thing that drives us crazy is not only that there's been a distortion of what we thought could be achieved, what was possible and what should have been rolled out. Now, because of the deliberate mess made by the coalition on broadband, we pay for it economically because the country's denied opportunity; we pay for it socially because communities are frustrated by the lack of the network; and we pay more for it as consumers through the levies that are being advocated by the coalition. It is a complete mess. As I said before, it's not the multi-technology mix; it's the Malcolm Turnbull mess. We are paying for it, and these bills represent that failure. The chickens are coming home to roost as a result of those bad decisions made by the coalition.

Mr BANDT (Melbourne) (11:49): I'd like to make a few remarks on behalf of the Greens about some of the technical aspects of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017, but I'd also like to share with the House the impact on my constituents of the Liberal government's complete botching of what had been a good plan that was going to deliver some of the infrastructure that this country needs. Of course, Melbourne, being a capital city electorate, is home to many universities, knowledge centres and businesses, which are now suffering as a result. As to the bills specifically under consideration, there are some brief remarks I want to make here that will be expanded on when the bills proceed to the other place.

Firstly, we would make the point that, if and when the bills go to the other place, they should be considered separately. We welcome the introduction of the statutory infrastructure provider obligations, which are set out in schedule 3, because they will start to ensure that all people have access to high-speed broadband. In our view, these requirements seem to be consistent with the Productivity Commission's review of the telecommunications universal service obligations. We broadly agree with the amended network rules set out in schedules 1 and 2. We strongly support the rollout of the NBN to rural and regional Australia and acknowledge the need to cross-subsidise non-commercial services. But, certainly at this stage, we do not support the implementation of the Regional Broadband Scheme as proposed in schedule 4. We would recommend splitting schedule 4 of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017 and introducing them separately. As I said, that matter will be pursued further—not here by way of amendments, but it's certainly something that we'll want to address if and when it goes to the other place, because it's clear that these two pieces of legislation in that sense are not related and don't need to be considered together. And it's important that we have the opportunity to debate them separately because of what's at stake.

I now want to share with the House the impact that the botching of this scheme is having in my electorate of Melbourne. Fast, reliable and affordable internet should be a right for everyone in Australia. In 2018, people shouldn't be left wanting quality internet for use at home or in a business. But our internet is lagging behind the rest of the world under this government. Our internet is slow. In 2017, Australia was ranked 50th in the world for internet speeds, according to the Akamai State of the Internet report. This puts Australia behind nearly all other wealthy countries. Our internet speeds are less than half the speeds of leaders like South Korea. Not only is our internet slow; it's expensive. The Digital Australia: State of the Nation report ranks Australia 57th in the world when it comes to the affordability of fixed broadband. That's why we need to invest in a quality NBN that uses the right technology. We think the previous government had the right approach to this. That's why we supported it not only when we were in a power-sharing arrangement but also in the Senate.

But this Liberal government has botched the NBN, and, what's more, it has done so knowingly. What makes me really angry is that we know what needs to be done. Experts and the community are crying out for fast internet and a rollout of fibre-to-the-premises technology. The Greens have gone to election after election with clear policies that would deliver fast broadband for everyone. With political will, we could've already been rolling out high-speed, affordable and reliable internet to everyone in Australia for years. But this government has deliberately chosen to cut corners and use second-rate, outdated technologies. The government knows what would work; it has just decided not to use it.

The previous speaker made a very good point: why have they done it? They've done it for almost no other reason than for the sake of political differentiation; they wanted to be seen to be doing something different to what the previous government had done. As a result, they have completely botched it. They've taken a plan that could've worked and decided to botch it for no other reason than political differentiation, and it should be remembered that the current Prime Minister was the architect of that—destroying something that could've worked and, instead, turning it into something else, solely to put a different party's sticker on it. As a result, people in Australia and in my electorate of Melbourne are suffering. They are suffering as a result of the government playing politics with something that should be seen as an essential service and should be rolled out for the public good.

In today's Australia, just as we rely on being connected to our electricity networks and to our water and gas, we should also start looking at internet and telecommunications as an essential service. That's the way it has been approached for many, many years in the past. It's the way that we should continue to approach the question of internet access. But this government did not approach internet access as a question of the common good. Instead, it put politics above the public good and, as a result, we are all suffering. What the government has done will leave people around Australia, people in my electorate of Melbourne, worse off into the future. Because of this government, my constituents will lose out—and I say that's not good enough. Because of this government, many suburbs in Melbourne and elsewhere are only getting a fibre-to-the-node connection, meaning slower internet speeds and more cost to residents to connect. Upgrades can only be done at extra cost to residents. So the cost has been pushed downwards, and people are having to pay more out of their own pocket as a result of what this Liberal government has done.

Because of this government, in my electorate—bearing in mind that my electorate is one of the smallest in the country—there are now a variety of forms of internet connection within a very small defined geographical area. So, across the road in some places and across some suburbs in my electorate, they're only getting HFC technology, which was used for people to get Foxtel back in the 1990s. That's what they're getting, that's what they're being sold, instead of having fibre to the premises. Because of this government, most suburbs in my electorate have been left waiting for connection. Residents in Ascot Vale, Flemington, Kensington, North Melbourne, East Melbourne, Collingwood, Abbotsford and Fitzroy North have been told that, because of this government's botched job, they'll face another six- to nine-months delay in getting connected. And, when they are connected, for most of them it will be a connection to an outdated HFC technology that will just not stand the test of time.

This would all be bad enough if it only affected residential internet use, but the government's failure to properly invest in the NBN is going to harm employment too. Quality technology is critical to so many businesses, industries and employers, and nowhere is this more apparent than in inner Melbourne. Places like Richmond, Collingwood and Docklands are increasingly home to innovative industries, tech companies, start-up spaces and social innovators who depend on reliable and fast internet. If the NBN is slow or unreliable or it takes too long to get connected, employers will suffer or they will leave. This Prime Minister, who loves to talk about innovation and being agile, is on the verge of kicking out employers from places like Melbourne in the very industries that he purports to support, because they can't get decent, fast and affordable internet.

The government simply has not been accountable for any of these failures. Despite requests, I can't even get a map of the suburbs that have been hit by delays. My office has been contacted by Melbourne constituents who have had to wait for weeks or months without internet due to installation problems, and they've had to come to their local MP because there was nowhere else to go to get it fixed. You ask for a map about what's happening across the whole suburb and you don't get one. You have to piece it together by asking individual by individual, suburb by suburb, area by area and street by street.

I am furious that my constituents and the businesses that operate in my electorate have been left in the lurch by this government. It is not good enough. This government is actively blocking the sort of NBN rollout that would bring us into the 21st century, especially in a vibrant capital city area like Melbourne. Imagine if we had governments that had the vision to invest properly and continue investing in this key infrastructure and provide it publicly. In the 20th century, governments built transport, sewers and utilities because they knew it was in the public good. In the 21st century, the government should be investing in the NBN in the same way, not making a complete hash of it like the Liberals are doing.

Ms CHESTERS (Bendigo) (12:00): Oh, the NBN and the way in which this government has spectacularly failed to roll out the NBN, particularly to regional Victoria and my constituents in the Bendigo electorate! The Prime Minister really needs to wear how he has failed. He turned up in Bendigo when he was the shadow minister for communications and he promised Be.Bendigo, the Bendigo chamber of commerce, that we, across the Bendigo electorate, would have the NBN sooner, faster and cheaper. Well, on all three promises the Prime Minister failed, first as the communications minister and then as the Prime Minister. There is his arrogance when listening to the people in the bush, engaging with the people in the bush and learning from the experiences so we can fix the rest of the rollout going forward. It is so disappointing that we continue to have delays and we continue to have problems with the NBN rollout.

I will give people in the chamber a bit of background about the diversity of the NBN experiences in my electorate, the Bendigo electorate, and why Labor support some of the reforms but we want to see others heavily scrutinised. We have quite a significant fixed wireless network in the Bendigo area. In the south of the electorate we have a number of towers and in the north of the electorate we have a number of towers, but the towers are not keeping up with the growth of Bendigo. The rollout under this government was so bad. Early on, Julia Gillard was the Prime Minister when towers were built in the north, around Huntly and around Junortoun, but these towers were not switched on until the 2016 election. People were trying to access the network. Retailers would sell people a product and then they tried to connect, but there was no connection—no connection whatsoever; they weren't able to connect. Only after it was made an election issue were the towers switched on. But it was a short-term fix and the service is very slow. Why is the service slow? A tower was due to be built at Mount Camel, near Heathcote, and it was never built, so the government is trying to link nine relay towers to one tower in Bendigo South. So, the further you are from the tower in Bendigo South, the slower your service.

We have been inundated with complaints from people around Huntly and around Junortoun who have a slow and inferior service through the fixed wireless network. One particular resident—and I shouldn't laugh, but he laughed with me about this—actually has a tower. He hosts a tower—it's on his property—but he can't get access to the fixed wireless service when it's on his property. So that people understand the close distance I'm talking about: Huntly and Junortoun are suburbs of Bendigo; they are five kilometres from the CBD of Bendigo. I cannot believe that the government is still saying to businesses and households less than five kilometres from Bendigo—the second-biggest regional city in Victoria—that you have to cop slow, fixed wireless services or, worse, compete with farmers and compete with really remote and regional Australia for Sky Muster. It's unbelievable that the government is still not listening to people in the regions. It would just make sense to roll out more fibre to the kerb and fibre to the premises in places like Bendigo. With more customers on the fibre network you would have fewer customers on the fixed wireless network or on Sky Muster.

I want to take the opportunity during this debate to raise a couple of other examples. When I stand up and raise examples in this place, NBN Co is actually listening. I will log a few service calls in the hope that NBN is listening and that they will actually act on a few of these. When I've had the chance to raise questions in parliament, when I've had the chance to raise issues on this floor, that's how I seem to get a reaction out of NBN Co, and that's definitely how to get a reaction out of the minister's office.

This one will be of interest to people: La Trobe University. We are trying to be a university city. In the suburb of Flora Hill there is a blackspot, and they're told there is no allocation of any kind of NBN at all. It starts at the edge of the university—can you believe it—runs through Flora Hill and takes in a couple of streets. There is no node to be built, there is no access to fixed wireless and there is no access to satellite. It's where people studying at the university live. It takes in part of Keck Street and part of Curtin Street, and it runs all the way to Somerville Street. It's right next to this blackspot next to Bendigo South East College. If there is ever a place in Bendigo that needs access to fibre to the premises and to fast internet, it's right near the university. Yet it is in the too-hard basket for this government and it is sitting to the side.

Then we have Bendigo Fireworks, a small business being run from somebody's home. Peter Daley has spoken to me and spoken publicly about the pushback that he constantly gets about trying to connect to the NBN. Unfortunately his experience hasn't been resolved. He can't get access to decent internet, and it means the end of his business. He's been told by NBN Co that the soonest he can be connected is 2020. Now, he is not that far. Bendigo is a regional seat. He is in Strathfieldsaye, a growing suburb. His house is before the shopping centre in Strathfieldsaye, and he cannot get access to fast broadband. It has been a failure of this government not to run fibre to the premises, fibre to the kerb or even fibre to the node in his part of the world, and it will mean the end of his business if NBN Co doesn't step in and fix this. There was a response from NBN Co in April 2018. They said, 'Look, he could have access to fixed wireless, planned to be available in January to June 2020.' It is still not good enough. This business needs access to the internet right now. It's not that hard. Peter is in a regional city and can't get access to the NBN.

Another constituent complaint that I've had is from Kelly Howard, who is running a business, Accountable Bookkeeping Solutions, from home. If we want to encourage women back into work, to be entrepreneurial and to set up businesses, they actually need fast internet to do it. NBN Co have said in relation to Kelly's case:

It appears the reason for the delay relates to a physical network shortfall. At this stage, it has been identified in the field that the network design is incorrect—

and that there needs to be a change. It's not good enough. If you know it's a problem, get the technicians out there and get it fixed. Kelly Howard and her business need it now. It shouldn't have to be up to me to raise this in parliament for NBN Co to employ people to fix it.

David has fixed wireless with unsustainable, slow speeds. He is one of our people living in Redesdale. He is living a little bit further from Bendigo, but, in saying that, he is living between Bendigo and Melbourne. He is less than 50 kilometres away—not that far from Melbourne at all. It takes him about 50 minutes to drive to Melbourne.

We are talking about people in Woodend. A tower is not being built in Woodend. As a result of this government not building a tower in Woodend, the poor businesses and households of Spencer Street continue to have multiple versions of technology rolling out. Spencer Street is one that I do wish to highlight. There are some people on ADSL2, some people on ADSL1, some people who have been told to use satellite and some people who have been told to use a dongle. They will have absolutely no access to the internet. This is one street in one part of my electorate, only 45 minutes by V/Line to Melbourne. It's faster for them to go to Melbourne to do their work than to wait and sit at home and do it on their computers. That is the disgrace of this government when it comes to rolling out the NBN.

I could speak for hours in this place about this government's failure to roll out the NBN across Bendigo. There are problems in Golden Square. There are problems in Eaglehawk. I am disappointed that this government will not listen to the community of Bendigo and our businesses and the fact that its rollout is now starting to cost us jobs.

One of the businesses that I have raised in this place is Industrial Conveyancing Australia. The response from NBN Co was just unacceptable. They design systems. They are an advanced manufacturer. They've had contracts with Coca-Cola and with Qantas. When you drive to their place, when you turn left at Howard Street, you drive past housing estates that have either fibre to the premises or fibre to the node, but all this government can offer them is fixed wireless. If this government were serious about supporting our manufacturers, if it were serious about supporting regional Victoria and helping to unlock its potential, then there would have been funding in their budget for NBN Co to roll out fibre to the premises to every single one of our industrial estates and to every single one of our businesses.

We are a smart city that wants to engage more. We want to build up advanced manufacturing, but, under this government, we are unable to. Quite simply, under this Prime Minister and this government we have an inferior NBN. It's cost $4 billion more to build than what was originally committed. It's delivered slower speeds—and I've highlighted some examples in my speech today. It is less reliable. Dropouts are constantly occurring. It is costing more to maintain. The skill level of some of the contracted technicians coming out is below standard. It's exposed more competition for more wireless. The cost of upgrading is greater. It's generating less revenue from those willing to pay. This is a real problem when it comes to what's in the bill that is in front of us, the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017: because the government have rolled out an inferior NBN, the NBN is not going to make the money that was first forecast. If we had rolled out fibre to the premises to begin with, the original Labor plan, we wouldn't be in this situation.

We hear report after report of NBN Co having to write down its expected revenue. We know that there are problems with the product that retailers are selling. We know that people aren't getting the speeds that they're trying to buy, and yet this government continues to do too little. This bill was late in coming to this place, and it needs more work to ensure that people in the regions will get access to the internet. It's really easy for a Prime Minister living in the inner city of Sydney and for metro based MPs to just dismiss this, but it is a real issue in the regions. In the regions, where people have no access to the internet other than Sky Muster or fixed wireless, we need to ensure we end the digital divide that exists.

I do want to acknowledge that, after I raised a question in this place, the minister's office and NBN Co did fix the issue for our 76-year-old friend who lives in Castlemaine. I want to repeat this story because it's one of hundreds across my electorate. Our friend is 76 years old. When the NBN Co contractor came out, they ran the cable for her new NBN connection over the fence, across the yard, under the bushes and through her bedroom window and basically put everything into the bedroom. She contacted my office because she could no longer lock the window. The NBN Co contracted technician left. After I raised the issue in question time, NBN Co did react, and they sent out a directly employed NBN Co technician, who had the skills and qualifications, who was able to do the testing and to fix the problem—and it was fixed within a couple of hours. It shouldn't take a question to the Prime Minister in question time to get an issue fixed. That was one of hundreds of complaints that I've received, and they are ongoing. There is a skill problem with the technicians and the contractors that NBN Co have engaged. There are people being exploited, working in these jobs, and the government needs to address this.

Quite frankly, what this government needs to get serious about and fund is decent NBN technology in the regions. We need to start fixing these problems. There are far too many problems sitting in the too-hard basket. The levies, the charging, and how the government is trying to make the numbers stack up will not make up for the fact that we have areas around the university that have no access to NBN and that we have businesses who are being told they will get Sky Muster and not fibre to the premises. This government is killing productivity and connectivity in Bendigo in central Victoria, and it needs to step up.

Mr DICK (Oxley) (12:15): I know members of the government don't like it when we talk about the problems with the NBN. I know from when we moved detailed amendments to this legislation, the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017, as the shadow minister has done, that members of the government really would have preferred that the NBN would just go away. It gives the government no joy and it gives them no great headlines. Really, they are like the rest of Australia: it gives everyone a headache.

In addressing the bill I will first address the amendments proposed by the member for Greenway. After almost five years in power, it's absolutely crystal clear to everyone on this side of the chamber, and perhaps everyone in Australia, that this government is a complete and utter failure when it comes to the NBN rollout in this country. We know that the government has form when it comes to the delivery of projects and delivery of services, whether it be ripping $17 billion away from our schools and the education of Australian students, cuts to Medicare and hospitals and the rebate freeze, including $600 million of cuts in my home state of Queensland, or the attacks we are seeing over and over again on vulnerable pensioners across Australia. I don't have time in this debate today to talk about the $80 billion tax handout to big multinational businesses and the banks, which is the government's top priority. But, if there is one thing that leaves us in no doubt as to this government's level of incompetence, it is the NBN.

We heard from the member for Bendigo and other speakers in this debate today, and my office is no different to theirs and to other electorate offices in Australia, because I'm pretty confident residents would be sending letters and emails to every MP's office—every government MP's office as well—or would be visiting their offices or stopping their elected representatives in their local communities to show not only their anger but also their disappointment. I would say that it is a community at breaking point, frustrated at the second-rate NBN being delivered by the Turnbull government, which simply is failing them and their families.

I know this firsthand because last year my local community in the south-west of Brisbane was at breaking point when it came to dealing with the NBN. Since I became the member for Oxley—since July 2016—I have conducted a number of public meetings and public forums across a range of portfolio issues of direct concern to local residents. The crisis meetings I conducted around the issue of the NBN were without doubt the largest of those meetings—some 500 people attended forums and meetings. I note the shadow minister, the member for Whitlam, at the table. He was able to attend a meeting of concerned, frustrated people from across the south-west of Brisbane who, on a winter's night, packed out a venue at the Jindalee Bowls Club. When I put on a meeting, I expect to put out a couple of dozen chairs and that I will get a little advert in the paper, perhaps. This meeting was like nothing I have attended as a member of parliament—350 people crammed in. They were worried and concerned and basically had had a gutful. They wanted answers. To their credit, the NBN turned up. I don't blame the professional officers of the NBN—certainly the middle-ranking officers, who are doing very, very well under very constrained circumstances. They are not the people making the decisions. My criticism today is not of the frontline workers; it is of the elites and the executives of NBN who, quite frankly, deserve a lesson in customer service.

I want to put on record that, after that meeting, I wrote to the former co-CEO, Bill Morrow, on behalf of the community. It was one of the outcomes from that crisis meeting, because a delegation of businesses wanted to meet with him to discuss the frustrations and to work out a proactive way to fix some of the problems. Now, I'm a bit old-school. If the buck stops at the top then you are never too good to not meet with your shareholders or, in particular, your customers. So I formally wrote to Mr Morrow to say that I would organise an onsite meeting. Businesses members in my local community were prepared to pay for themselves to fly down and meet with the NBN CEO, to discuss these issues in person, to have a constructive meeting and to iron out some of these problems. They are reflective of businesses right across this nation. They are busy people, building capital and wanting to employ people, but they are failing to meet their deadlines, to meet their obligations, because they don't have a fast and reliable internet service. The was no response from Bill Morrow—nothing; no response from the NBN. When I followed up, there was no response. Either they were not interested or they did not care. Unfortunately, one of the spokespersons at the meeting said to the public: 'We don't talk to residents. We don't talk to the public.' They actually said that to a room of what I would say were 350 irate, angry people. It was probably not the right tone to take, I would suggest.

As I said, they are hardworking individuals. So, following that one meeting, I wrote to the minister, Senator Fifield, to say: 'I would like to meet with you to raise these issues. I would like to talk to you in person about a constructive way forward to deal proactively with these issues.' I give credit to the ministers of the Turnbull government who I have arranged to see on behalf of constituents to resolve situations. I acknowledge those ministers and their staff who engage with both sides of politics—but not this minister. That is not the case with this minister at all. I would be interested to see if this minister has actually met with any members of parliament—quite frankly, on both sides of politics. That's the kind of contempt I think this government has when it comes to rolling out the NBN, dealing with problems and constructively working as a community together. Maybe that's indicative of what's wrong with the NBN. When you have a minister and senior bureaucrats who are refusing to meet with Labor or opposition members of parliament, that's fine, if that's their strategy. They're not interested—fine. But not to meet with a delegation of businesses or even acknowledge them as a courtesy to say, 'Look, I'm terribly sorry, I've got a large number of commitments, but I'll make alternative arrangements'? I can tell you now that a lot of those small businesses were very disappointed in the way that they were treated.

There were community halls being packed out with story after story of residents just wanting basic answers, basic information. So let's just pause and take a look at some of the cold, hard facts when it comes to this government and how it has stuffed up the NBN rollout. What we know was supposed to be an innovative, nation-building rollout under Labor was immediately scrapped by the government, and, as we know, the cost to the Australian public continues to be damning. We were first told that the bill would be $29.5 billion. That increased to $41 billion in 2013. It then increased from $41 billion to $49 billion in August 2015, and then taxpayers were forced into a $19.5 billion loan after the NBN Co failed to secure private debt funding. Now we are here with this bill, with the introduction of an NBN levy. The government is leaving consumers to pick up the tab. It is telling that in the week of the budget this government is seeking to introduce a new broadband tax that is expected to raise nearly half a billion dollars over the next decade. This levy is expected to add $84 to the annual broadband bill for the homes and businesses on non-NBN networks that are subject to this tax. Estimates of the number of services that will be affected by this levy range from 240,000 homes to 450,000 homes. I don't blame anyone else but the government for this increased tax burden on Australians, but I am surprised that the so-called party of lower tax, the party that wants to get rid of taxes, is now introducing a tax on a service.

When given the choice—and why would Australians choose to sign up to the Prime Minister's second-rate broadband if something better is on offer? In the Prime Minister rejecting fibre—as we have heard from the member for Bendigo, the previous speaker—we have seen a digital divide not only in regional Australia but right across the country, including in the south-west of Brisbane in the Oxley electorate. I know residents in my electorate in Mount Ommaney, Jindalee, Sumner, Forest Lake, Springfield and Redbank have had an absolute gutful of this Prime Minister's second-rate, second-class NBN service. I place on the record again: why should residents have to put up with slow speeds, dropouts or simply no connection at all because of the incompetence of this Prime Minister and the NBN mess he has given to almost every home in this country?

We are now here with this government shafting Australian homes and leaving, with this bill, a new NBN levy. The proposed levy before this parliament is a direct consequence, I believe, of the repeated failures of this government. But don't take my word for it; this is what the former head of NBN Co had to say about the state of the project, particularly when it came to speed and faults:

The first and most notable consequence is the maximum speed limitations of copper versus the previous fibre-based model.

The use of copper in the last [approximately] 1 kilometre of the network is the increased fault rate and operating costs versus the all-fibre alternative.

Despite the government promising users a minimum download speed of 25 megabits per second, Mr Morrow said that this would not be possible during the coexistence period, when other services like ADSL are still running. It's here in black and white from the former NBN Co chief himself.

This charade must end. We need some certainty when it comes to the rollout. We need better standards for those businesses and residents who have attended the crisis meetings I have held, the forums and the public meetings. If the government would just look at the feedback from residents—we know that the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman shows a more than 200 per cent increase in complaints. It would be a bit different if we could have some humility or contrition from the government, if they could say: 'We know there are problems. We know we've got a long way to go. We know we're going to work through these systematically.' Instead, it's always the same when it comes to the NBN: 'Nothing to see here,' 'Pretend it's all okay,' 'Ignore the complaints,' and, 'Don't buy into it.'

I can tell you about a great small business in my area, a pest control business run by a husband and wife. He is looking at moving house because he can't do his books. His wife was studying and she had to go to the McDonald's cafe to access the internet so that she could do her online coursework. This is happening 13 kilometres from the CBD of Brisbane. When you ask for it to be investigated, the government says: 'There's nothing we can do; just put up with it,' or the normal rubbish that this government goes on with: that somehow Labor, within the first month of announcing the NBN, didn't connect every single house in Australia! That's the only response from this ridiculous government when it comes to dealing with the NBN. It never actually acknowledges the problem, let alone fixes it.

The member for Bendigo was right. When it comes to fixing NBN problems, I've had the most success stories not from writing to the minister and not from writing to the former CEO of the NBN—do you know how? When you get a story in the local paper, magically the problem is fixed. It takes a little bit of embarrassment for the government. If you put the minister's name in a press release and bag them out, hey, presto, the problem's fixed. I'm not joking. If I am not accurate then I'll sit down now and members of the government can say that that's not the case. Time and time again, all we're seeing is spin over substance, residents being ignored and complaints through the roof. The evidence is simply overwhelming.

As the member for Oxley and as one of the representatives for one of the fastest-growing corridors in this country, I know that access to quality broadband services is essential. It is critical for education purposes, health service delivery and making sure that people are connected to the businesses that they want to build and grow in the south-west of Brisbane. This is an issue that is not simply going to go away for government. This is not an issue about which the government can simply say, 'It's all too hard. Hopefully some other crisis will engulf us today and we can move on to something else.' I won't be letting this go. We will make sure that we deliver a proper NBN for this country.

Ms SWANSON (Paterson) (12:30): I rise today to speak to the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017. We find ourselves in an era that none of us could have foreseen. We can order our children's lunches from the school's canteen via a smartphone app; most of our bills are paid online rather than going to the post office, as we used to do; we can check the surf conditions through a webcam without even having to drive to the beach; and we can turn the heater on at home without even being there. It is indeed a time of wonder and innovation. I think back to my dad bringing home his pay packet, mum tearing it open and the money being there. It's just not like that anymore. It is a time of wonder and innovation bound by one common thread, and that is the internet—more specifically: high-speed, reliable internet.

With each day that passes, education, health, our businesses and transport all become more heavily reliant upon this invisible wonder web that connects us all, unless, of course, you are one of the 60 per cent of Australians using the National Broadband Network who reported issues with the service within the last six months—that's according to Choice, the consumer organisation—or you're part of the 44 per cent who experienced very slow speeds, the 42 per cent who reported disconnections, dropouts and performance issues, or the 31 per cent who had problems in connecting altogether. We find ourselves in difficult times, attempting to keep ahead of the global technological wave while being weighed down by Prime Minister Turnbull's inferior NBN.

We are here today to consider two bills before the House: the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017. Labor supports the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and its establishment of a statutory infrastructure provider, known as SIP. A SIP would ensure that all Australian homes and businesses are guaranteed access to high-speed broadband. This may be provided through NBN Co or an alternative provider. This bill will enshrine in legislation Labor's long-held commitment to providing NBN services in regional Australia: the universal service obligation.

In my electorate of Paterson, we have a depth and breadth of industries—some pushing innovation with emerging technologies, others re-examining their ways of working to stay relevant in a rapidly changing world. In each instance, the internet is the enabler. It's the connectivity, the thought-sharing, the fingertip access to a wealth of research. When you take all that away, the costs are far more reaching. Let me tell you about Bohemia Interactive Simulations. They're a small software business located in Williamtown, in our major defence tech park in my electorate of Paterson. The ability to both upload and download software is imperative to the operations of this software business. To do so in a timely and cost effective manner is crucial to what they do. To be able to grow and expand their operation, businesses need reliable, affordable and fast internet speeds, yet Bohemia cannot get access to the NBN.

Bohemia are paying five times more by connecting through a private operator than they would via the NBN. This money should be spent on employing people, but they've got to pay more to do business because the NBN is not up to scratch. Ryan Stephenson is the director of Bohemia, and he says Bohemia cannot expand their operations because the speed of the internet just won't support it. He says Bohemia cannot employ more staff because more people using the internet would slow it down even more and make day-to-day operations even harder. What irony—not being able to employ more people in an internet software business because the internet's too slow! This is an example of how a substandard NBN rollout is stunting Australian small business. It's absolutely slaying that growth and innovation that our very own Prime Minister crowed and trumpeted about and told us we all needed to embrace. Well, it's a little bit difficult to embrace something that you can't even get hold of in the first place. And Bohemia's situation is in no way unique.

Clearly I'm outraged that innovative, world-class entrepreneurs and industries that choose to come to my electorate of Paterson, which is at the absolute vanguard of defence technology, are faced with an archaic stumbling block that has the potential to jeopardise their entire operations. It is clearly not good enough. Bohemia's experience is the result of Prime Minister Turnbull's inferior NBN, which, incidentally, has cost Australian taxpayers $4 billion more to build. It delivers slower speeds than were promised. In fact, the technology is so substandard that in many cases it's incapable of delivering at the level it was sold at. It's less reliable. It's so unreliable that the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman has experienced a 160 per cent rise in complaints. That's 160 per cent! To put that in perspective, the banking and finance industry received four times fewer complaints—and there have been a heck of a lot of complaints about the banks.

Unsurprisingly, many of the NBN complaints came from regional Australia—well, there you go. They didn't just come from businesses; they came from individuals, families, schools, even medical practitioners unable to connect with patients. In this era of technological advancement, a great many students are learning in a bring-your-own-device environment. Their homework is issued online, it needs to be completed online and it needs to be submitted online. What happens, then, if a child lives in an area that has substandard connectivity? How does it impact their grades and, indeed, their potential, and what of study?

I can speak of my own experience. My daughter did the HSC last year. We used to have a family round table each week to look at what assessments were due, what was coming up and who would use which internet, because we're too far from the exchange to get ADSL and we haven't got the NBN where I live. We had to borrow dongles and figure out who would use what on the internet just so my daughter could achieve her Higher School Certificate. Clearly, this is not about me, but I'm just another example of the many people in my electorate and across Australia more broadly who are facing this problem. They're laughing—well, they're not laughing; I think they're completely dismayed.

The thing that adds injury to insult is the way the Prime Minister, who you'd be forgiven for thinking had invented the internet himself—and I'm sure he's quite capable in terms of things technological—was so caustic about Labor's plan to deliver fibre to the premises and how his model would be so superior, so much faster, so much cheaper. Well, none of this has been borne out. If he'd only had the decency to say, 'I'm sorry, but I really made a mistake on that, and we want to get it fixed up for you as quickly as we can.' But there's been no such backdown from the Prime Minister; we just see this arrogance.

Almost a decade ago Labor initiated an important reform that led to a statement of expectations issued to the NBN board. This statement of expectations required that the company ensure all Australians had access to the NBN. It was fundamentally about the equality of opportunity for which Labor proudly stands. It was about making sure every Australian could access high-speed broadband, no matter where they lived or worked. It was a fundamental part of this new and brilliant technology, a little bit like the telephone when it came along. I am proud to be part of a party that fought to ensure we reached the point we have now, where the fundamental reforms of the statement of expectations become legislation.

Even with the passage of this bill, however, we remain in a mess. Prime Minister Turnbull's NBN bears little resemblance to that which Labor planned. Fibre's been abandoned, and in many instances we have a $49 billion multi-technology mess. It costs more and does less, and it's four years behind schedule. In no way is the Turnbull government's NBN a first-class fibre network. The long-term economics of it are decidedly unsound. We have missed the greatest opportunity, and I weep for future generations, who really could have had something exciting—what this could have been, rather than the miserly expression of what it's become.

In 2013 the coalition committed to deliver the NBN for $29.5 billion and have it completed by 2016. What a load of rot—a bit like the rotting copper you've relied on. Between now and then, the cost has blown out from $29.5 billion to $41 billion to $49 billion, and the completion date has blown out from 2016 to 2020. Seriously, you should all hang your heads in shame. I don't know how you can come in here and gloat about it.

As Deputy Chair of the Select Committee on Regional Development and Decentralisation, I must impress upon the Prime Minister and his government the importance of ensuring every Australian home and business has access to high-speed broadband. We cannot sacrifice the rights of our regional, rural and remote Australians, and that's why my colleagues and I today stand here to support the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017. The companion to this proposed legislation, the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017, is in some ways the bandaid that the Turnbull government is proffering to fix the broken economics around its NBN rollout. There is no substitute for the first-class fibre NBN supported by sustainable funding mechanisms that ensured sound long-term economics. However, schedule 4 of the bill is a way of ensuring that the NBN competes on a level playing field. This is an important market mechanism and can only benefit everyday Australians.

The upshot of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 is that the Turnbull government will introduce a telecommunications levy. The Regional Broadband Scheme levy will add $84 a year to the bills of up to 400,000 consumers and businesses on non-NBN networks. That equates to $7.10 a month. The cost will rise to $7.80 by 2021. This is, in Labor's view, a regrettable choice. There were better and more efficient ways to achieve a level playing field. Under Labor's plan, high-speed broadband would have been extended to unprofitable areas through a universal wholesale pricing scheme. NBN users in cities, who generally receive higher wages, were better placed to pay more and would have helped cross-subsidise services in the regions, which incur a higher cost.

With Turnbull's second-rate NBN, nearly one in two customers on the copper NBN were paying for plans the network could not deliver. They've been compensated but will not be able to achieve those high speeds or pay for them under the existing technology. But the government's economic plan assumes uptake of and payment for those high-speed plans, plans that would require an upgrade from the current copper footprint for which—surprise, surprise!—there is no funding set aside.

Prime Minister Turnbull's decision to bet on copper has undermined the entire economic plan of the NBN. It's been a liability for broadband consumers and for Australian taxpayers. This places pressure on the sustainability of the funding arrangements for the NBN. That in turn has the potential to jeopardise the services that NBN Co can provide to Australians.

As you know, Mr Deputy Speaker Hastie, NBN Co is required to provide broadband in areas that are unprofitable to service. No other provider shares this obligation. That means NBN fixed-line competitors can target low-cost, high-profit areas in the NBN footprint, in places like apartment buildings and central business districts, and leave the tough stuff—the regions—to NBN Co.

As I said earlier, Labor considers it essential that all Australians have access to fast, reliable broadband. Considering all that is at stake, we support the Regional Broadband Scheme. We consider it to be appropriate that the costs of regional broadband are shared among companies who choose to compete directly with the NBN. But make no mistake, this entire NBN mess will go down as one of the great travesties and shames of this time in Australia.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Hastie ): I remind members, in accordance with standing order 64, to refer to members by their appropriate title. The previous speech should have referred to 'Prime Minister Turnbull', not 'Turnbull'.

Ms MADELEINE KING (Brand) (12:45): I'm glad to rise to speak today on this particular set of bills, the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017, and the proposed amendment. I'm always happy to speak on the NBN, as members in this House would well know. The NBN has, sadly, been a source of constant anguish for my constituents. Whether it's trying to force 21st century technology down 1950s and 1960s copper wiring in the suburbs of Rockingham, Shoalwater and Safety Bay, trying to fix a botched installation down in Port Kennedy or even just trying to get a signal out in Baldivis, in the east of my electorate, my constituents are always very happy to give feedback to Prime Minister Turnbull on his government's 'fraudband' rollout, just as I'm always happy to rise in the parliament to speak about it. Indeed, my colleague and friend the shadow minister for communications, the member for Greenway, had a chance last year, on one of her many visits to Western Australia, to hear from residents in my electorate on their concerns about the National Broadband Network and the rollout in their district. It would appear, from piles and piles of correspondence to my office on this issue, that residents in Brand would do just about anything to be able to access the internet.

In 2018, internet access is as much a universal right as the right to education or the right to social equality. Indeed, access to the internet and its services bridges the gap between rich and poor, the haves and the have-nots, and is responsible for so much of the world's technological advances over the past 20 years. Everyone in my electorate, indeed Australia-wide, deserves to be able to use this technology and access the internet safely and reliably. To this end, we'll be supporting these bills. I'll support anything that seeks to improve the services available to my constituents. However, I will also be supporting the amendment of the member for Greenway.

Turning to the substance of the bills, we can see their necessity, as well as the necessity of other amendments. The Telecommunications (Consumer Protection and Service Standards) Act 1999 established a universal service obligation that nailed down the need for an easily accessible standard telephone service for all Australians. The problem with that is the date—21 years of technology growth, expansion and innovation has outgrown the act and its perfectly well-meaning intentions. Consumer needs have shifted dramatically away from a basic phone service, moving instead towards internet connectivity, although a basic phone service is essential for many in our community—and I will reflect on an instance I have witnessed myself of the inability of our providers to provide even a basic phone service to the elderly. In this digital age, it's perfectly reasonable that many services have gone online. You can pay car registration, power, insurance and other bills online. Gone are the days of going into an office or even ringing up your insurance company or utilities provider to pay your bill. But we must be mindful that this digital transformation does not move too fast and leave the most vulnerable behind, particularly the seniors in our community. Universal access may be a right, but so is the right to be included, the right to be educated and the right to transition at a reasonable pace. Others can transition as fast as they like, but we must ensure that those who find it difficult to cope with new technologies are helped along the way.

Labor understands these needs, which is partly why the NBN was envisaged in the first place, the other part being, of course, that former Prime Minister John Howard had no foresight on broadband policy, and the Nationals, as usual, achieved very little in this regard. When it was first established under Labor, the NBN was the first initiative of any Australian government that provisionally guaranteed universal broadband access. This was implemented through a statement of expectations issued to the NBN board at the time. Whilst this was a good start, we have seen that since Labor left government much of this goodwill has unfortunately been sucked down the drain of political pointscoring by some who choose to cut corners in the name of cutting costs and lowering expectations in a policy they never truly believed in. Despite this, it is good to see the bill presented as another step in the right direction as it seeks to establish a Statutory Infrastructure Provider regime that makes sure that all Australian premises are guaranteed access to high-speed broadband through NBN or another infrastructure provider in certain circumstances. This places universal broadband access into federal legislation and helps provide certainty to metropolitan and regional consumers beyond the scope of the initial NBN broadband rollout. This is sorely needed in my electorate.

I have heard terrible stories about the lack of access in my electorate and how it is impacting on the daily lives of the decent, hardworking people across Rockingham and Kwinana, as well as many others around Australia. There are people like Mr Dewald Pretorius, who works from home in his own small business and requires the internet to do so. Mr Pretorius told me that he had better internet connections in Africa than he does in Baldivis. How is that possible in a purportedly modern Australia and in an outer metropolitan area of Perth? It's unacceptable. Another is a doctor in Port Kennedy who works from home in the area of aged and palliative care. He looks after 200 residents in aged-care facilities. His practice is fully computerised, relying on internet connectivity to ensure communications, medication orders and test results—to name just some areas of his work. But how can these services be met and dealt with in an accurate and timely manner when he doesn't have access to a guaranteed stable internet service? In fact, according to the official NBN rollout map, some parts of Port Kennedy, which is in the southern part of my electorate, will not be connected to the broadband until June 2019—more than a year from now. This is just another example of how denying the right of access to internet service can impact on other rights, like the right to health care and health services.

I have quite often stood in this place to question the government on their approach to the whole National Broadband Network project. They have been there five years and have failed to make much progress. To say that they are delivering when they simply are not is ridiculous. The appalling and inadequate rollout of the NBN has reached such dire proportions that now, just like walking through a clean house with muddy shoes, someone has to go back and mop it up. This mop and bucket takes the form of a new broadband tax of $7.10 per month. It will apply to services on non-NBN networks. This charge is due to increase by $7.80 by 2021. The government's internet tax, which they are cleverly calling a 'levy', is expected to add $84 to the annual bill of up to 400,000 residents and business services on non-NBN networks. Let us be clear about this: the only reason we find ourselves at this point is the Prime Minister's poor judgement at every turn in this very important policy area.

Regional and remote coverage of the NBN was an important Labor initiative when the NBN was started. It was a decision to extend high-speed broadband to unprofitable areas and fund it through a universal wholesale pricing regime across the country. This meant that NBN users in the city could help cross-subsidise higher-cost services in the regions. There was no contemplation of having a universal wholesale pricing regime and a levy. It was supposed to be one or the other, but not both. The decision by the Turnbull government to slug consumers with a new internet tax is both poorly designed and clearly a stopgap solution. The $49 billion 'multi-technology mix' has cost more and achieved less. It doesn't even generate as much revenue as the original plan. The coalition had a 2013 commitment to deliver the NBN by 2016 at a cost of $29.5 billion. What a joke that commitment was! In late 2013, this blew out to $41 billion and in 2015 by another $8 billion. It's now 2018 and the project isn't slated to be completed until 2020, at a cost of $49 billion to the taxpayer. That is $20 billion over budget and four years behind. It's hard to fathom how the promise of the now Prime Minister when he was Minister for Communications could go so wrong, but it has gone wrong.

In 2017 many Australian retail service providers were caught selling speed plans that the NBN could not possibly deliver with a high percentage of copper in the general infrastructure. This resulted in nearly one in two consumers who were on the copper NBN paying for the top speed tier and having their speeds downgraded. They were compensated as a result of the inquiry via the ACCC and assisted by the NBN parliamentary committee. In that regard, I would like to thank the now former member for Fremantle for his diligence on the issue while sitting on the committee. As he points out, Western Australia will continue to receive the bulk of the rotten multi-mix technology this government is pushing out. It was reported that one in three homes on copper cannot achieve 50 megabits per second, and three in four cannot achieve 100 megabits per second, which is far below what was promised by NBN under this government. And yet we have also learnt that no funding has been set aside in the government's NBN business case out to 2040 to upgrade its copper footprint.

I will turn for a moment to a pretty personal story about the NBN and the problem with the copper wiring, its current rollout and the fragility of the infrastructure we had in place. On 22 April, there was a storm in Western Australia. It was a pretty minor storm. There were some lightning strikes. That was a Sunday. I went to visit my mother. I rang her before I got there, and she didn't answer the phone. The phone rang out. I thought: 'That's pretty unusual. Mum's usually home on a Sunday.' She lives in Shoalwater Bay, so I just rocked up at her house. 'Mum, why didn't you answer the phone?' I asked her. She said, 'Well, the phone didn't ring.' I said: 'I rang it. It should have rung.' So we tested it with my mobile—she doesn't use her mobile. It rang on my phone, and rang out, but it was not ringing physically. She could not hear the phone ringing in the house. No-one could hear it. The phone was not working. By all accounts, the same thing happened for the whole street. It is an elderly community. They talk to their neighbours—most Australians do talk to their neighbours—and we quickly found out that, overnight, four or five houses on that street had all lost their landline. They'd all converted to the NBN maybe six months before.

Then the process started. We couldn't ring NBN on a Sunday—well, we could, but we couldn't get any help and we certainly couldn't make any appointments for a technician—so we started this on Monday, 23 April. On behalf of my mother, I rang the NBN, because she didn't have a phone. We had to charge up her rudimentary mobile that she hates to use, like many elderly in the community, but was forced to use. It's a good thing that she was forced to use it, because, if she hadn't made herself use it, she would have been without any form of telephone communication for over a week. We rang NBN on the Monday. We could not get a technician appointment to come and confirm what was happening until Friday, 27 April. My mother has a medic alert because she's quite elderly and has false knees—although they get her around quite well—so falls are a hazard for her. An elderly neighbour had a technician come a day earlier. The other neighbour also had a technician come a day earlier. Everyone was told, 'Your Telstra modems have been shorted out by the storm.'

So I rang NBN and said: 'All the neighbours' modems have been blown out by the storm. How about you get your technician to bring a modem over, just in case, so we can do it all at once and Mum can be back on the phone within a quick four days?' They said: 'No, that is certainly not the case. That is not going to happen. No-one will bring a modem to your mother until it's confirmed that the NBN is not at fault, and then we can dial up Telstra and get them to sort that out.' The technician comes on the Friday and says, unsurprisingly, 'Yes, it was the modem that's blown out; you need a new modem from Telstra.' So we rang them up and they said: 'That's true. We won't be able to get your mother a modem until 2 May.' Okay, that's how it is.

So then I ring and say: 'Can your technician come and install the modem, because I won't be around to help her. How is she going to have a landline and how's she going to get a medic alarm on?' They said, 'You'll have to call when the modem comes and wait another three to five business days for someone to come and connect your mum to a landline.' So, overall, it was going to be anywhere between 15 and 19 days that my mother would not have a phone. She lives on her own. She's an elderly woman in Shoalwater Bay. She has lived in this house, as has my family, since 1959—I kid you not. It is an old, copper-wired house. She has not been without a phone for more than a couple of hours in a big storm, and then, last month, she lost it for nearly 10 days. It is absurd and obscene that people can be put through this.

I rang the NBN every single day. It's not the fault of the operators on the end of the line. We know that. They're just doing their job. But it certainly is unfair on the elderly in that street. They'd all lost their phones for anywhere between four and 10 days. The only reason my mum got her phone connected more quickly is that as an MP—as all my colleagues in this House know—I have priority access to some of the providers and also have a bit of a platform on social media to complain, and that pushed the service forward. On Monday she did get reconnected, but, if I had not been able to use that privilege, she would not have been connected to a landline until today.

Another thing is that triple 0 calls in Western Australia were not working this week. How is it that Telstra can fail to have an adequate triple 0 service to St John Ambulance across Perth because a cable is hit by lightning in New South Wales?

I call on this government to do something, anything—something productive would be best—to fix the communications nightmare you have put the Australian people in, and, most upsetting for me personally, the nightmare you put my mother through last week, because of this rubbish NBN system you have presided over. You should hang your heads in shame.

Mr BRIAN MITCHELL (Lyons) (13:00): Madam Deputy Speaker Claydon, I seek leave to continue my remarks on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017. I was most egregiously cut off by a faulty clock in the Federation Chamber yesterday, and I must give the parliament the benefit of the rest of my speech.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms Claydon ): It was a challenging day in the Fed. Chamber yesterday. I understand leave is granted, so you can proceed with your five minutes additional speaking time.

Mr BRIAN MITCHELL: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was saying yesterday that further north in Lyons, in the township of Westbury, another of my constituents, Graham, had been advised by NBN Co that he could commit to the NBN network. He signed up to receive the service. His business, home and fax lines were disconnected from the copper network so he could be connected to the NBN via fibre to the node, which had been run out through Westbury. It was only after he was disconnected from the copper network that Graham was told he could not commit to the NBN because his home was too far from the node. As we know, copper can only go a certain distance with data transmission before it degrades. This is not a problem that would have occurred under Labor's fibre to the premises. If the government had stuck with Labor's fibre to the premises, there wouldn't have been this problem. So no-one told Graham he could not get connected, until it was too late. His phone and fax lines were gone—phone and fax lines vital to his business.

Graham spent weeks trying to get some sort of service connected. Finally, in complete desperation, he contacted me to voice his concerns and frustration and to let me know his accountancy business was in danger of closing—in danger of closing!—after many years, all because essential services were being denied to him, through no fault of his own. Once again, Margaret, in my Perth office, who's just a wonder, was instrumental in getting Graham's phone and fax and ADSL internet reconnected. Unfortunately, the months had taken their toll, and Graham still lost a considerable amount of business that he's now trying to make up for. He was on the brink. So much for a government that likes to brag that it is pro business. And we have heard plenty of evidence today from the member for Bendigo and the member for Oxley about the impact of this government's substandard NBN on businesses in their electorates.

The service is poor; the rollout is patchy. People are being disconnected from their old internet, even though they can't connect to the NBN. In some cases, people on the NBN are not even getting the same speeds that they used to get on ADSL and ADSL2. I know because I'm one of them. At home I'm on a fixed wireless tower. Now, that was fine when the tower went up six years ago. I live on an old sheep paddock. I don't expect to have a fibre connection to my place; I'm out in the sticks. I've got no problem being on the tower. When it was built six years ago, I had good service. But now, at peak time, it's hopeless—a two- or three-megabits-per-second service at peak time. And why? It's because developers have built new housing estates nearby, and, instead of providing the infrastructure to connect those homes to fibre to the node, they've left those homeowners to be connected to the tower. So there are hundreds more people accessing the signal than there should be, which is crunching down the speed.

I must mention here that, under Labor, Midway Point, which is near me, was one of the first places to get fibre to the premises. These new estates in Midway Point were meant to get fibre to the node, but, because of some loophole that allows developers to not necessarily provide the infrastructure that is required, these homes are ending up on fixed wireless instead.

The people of regional Australia know they are being left behind by the widening digital divide between city and country. Before I get to that, I just want to say that I've dealt with Telstra and NBN Co over my particular situation, but I never tell them I'm an MP. I think it's important that I get the same service as everybody else in the community. The way you have to deal with these companies drives you mad, including the long waiting times that Australians have to put up with to get simple resolutions. I've had four modems offered to be sent to me, even though I know it's not a modem issue. I had to move heaven and earth to get a technician to come to my premises and confirm: 'No, it's nothing to do with your technology. It actually is an overloaded tower.' Now we have to deal with NBN Co to see whether they will upgrade it.

This is part of the digital divide that people in the country face every day compared to those in the city, and that's a digital divide that Labor sought to narrow, not widen. It was no mistake that some of the first places to receive fibre to the premises under the original NBN were in regional Australia, including my electorate, because Labor believes that every Australian deserves quality internet, not just those who live in Wentworth and other wealthy, leafy, inner-city suburbs.

Mr FLETCHER (Bradfield—Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) (13:06): The government's telecommunications reform package is good for consumers, good for industry and good for regional Australia. The passage of these historic reforms will mean a more efficient and competitive telecommunications sector. The Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017 implement a coherent three-part package to improve the regulatory framework for the supply of high-speed broadband by amending separation rules and creating new supply and funding arrangements. These bills will improve the provision of high-speed broadband in Australia by making carrier separation rules for high-speed residential networks more effective but also more flexible and giving carriers greater scope to invest in superfast networks and compete. They will improve it by introducing new statutory infrastructure provider obligations on NBN Co and others to support the ongoing delivery of high-speed broadband services. They will also improve it by establishing the Regional Broadband Scheme to provide equitable long-term funding for NBN Co's satellite and fixed wireless services for regional areas.

Telecommunications carriers and consumers will benefit from the changes of separation rules. They will improve competition and investment in the telecommunications market. Consumers will also benefit from the statutory infrastructure provider measures, which will ensure everyone in Australia will be able to access high-speed broadband services upon reasonable request. The rules set out baseline standards for these services: peak downloads of at least 25 megabits per second and peak upload speeds of at least five megabits per second. These services also need to support voice communication on fixed line or fixed wireless networks. Additionally, the minister will be able to make service provider rules, dealing with consumer issues like the handballing of disputes between wholesale and retail providers. Consumers will have clear information on why any reasonable request for connection has been refused and by whom, enabling them to pursue redress with the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman or the regulator.

Consumers in regional Australia will benefit from the Regional Broadband Scheme, which establishes an equitable, long-term funding arrangement for NBN Co's fixed and satellite networks. We promised to speed up the rollout and deliver broadband upgrades as soon as possible, and that's exactly what we've done, to deliver fast broadband sooner, at less cost to taxpayers and more affordably for consumers. NBN Co is using the technology best matched to each area of Australia. The government requires NBN Co to ensure upgrade paths are available under its statement of expectations. NBN Co also plans to launch new products and additional features over time in a series of product releases to improve the range of products with which broadband retailers can serve consumers and businesses. By 2020, 90 per cent of premises in the fixed line footprint will be able to access download speeds of 50 megabits per second.

It's instructive to remember Labor's record. Labor promised the world and yet delivered service to just 51,000 premises by September 2013 after six years in government and after spending $6 billion. It was a sorry tale of incompetence and abjectly poor performance. By contrast, under the coalition, the National Broadband Network is over half complete and is extending its reach to towns large and small right across Australia. In September 2013, fewer than three per cent of Australian premises could obtain a service on the network. Today, over half of Australian premises—over 7.6 million homes and businesses—are in ready-for-service areas, and there are more than 3.8 million active users.

The opposition's stated approach of supporting fibre to the premises would have made NBN Co completely uncompetitive. Everyday Australians would have paid more for their internet, and the price of internet bills would have risen by over $500 a year. Reverting to an all-fibre-to-the-premises approach would have seen the NBN completed nationwide six to eight years later than it is being delivered under the Turnbull government and at a cost of an extra $30 billion. The delayed rollout would also have reduced NBN's revenue and made it less competitive. By reducing costs, accelerating the rollout and earning revenue sooner, the government has put the NBN business model on a more sustainable basis and made it more competitive. Under the Turnbull government, NBN's annual revenue has grown from a paltry $17 million in the 2013 financial year to close to $2 billion for the 2018 financial year, and we are on track to have eight million paying customers in 2020.

This package includes a range of measures to improve competition because we know that wholesale market competition will result in better outcomes for consumers and the economy. The Regional Broadband Scheme places NBN Co on an even footing with its competitors by ensuring all carriers, not just NBN Co, play a role in contributing to the cost of delivering broadband in regional and remote Australia. This scheme will require all fixed-line carriers to contribute $7.10 per month for each premises on their network that has an active high-speed fixed-line broadband service. NBN Co will continue to pay around 95 per cent of the total cost, compared to the 100 per cent it pays today.

I want to emphasise that the Regional Broadband Scheme will not result in price rises for the eight million—the 95 per cent of consumers—expected to be connected to NBN by 2020. Consumers using the NBN are already paying for the costs of the fixed wireless and satellite networks, which are built into NBN Co's existing pricing model. In fact, under the Regional Broadband Scheme, high-margin networks supplying to big business and enterprise customers will, for the first time, in many cases, contribute to the cost of regional broadband. It is only fair that these NBN-comparable carriers contribute to Australia's investment in serving the one million Australians who are able to access the fixed wireless and satellite networks and the over 320,000 Australians who are already connected.

The government has included provisions in the Regional Broadband Scheme to help small infrastructure providers, like those servicing greenfields areas, to transition to contributing to the cost of regional broadband. These transition measures include an exemption for the first 25,000 residential and small business premises on their networks for the first five years. They also include implementing a cap so that the monthly charge amount cannot be raised above $10, indexed annually to the consumer price index. They also include a statutory requirement for a policy review within the first four years of the Regional Broadband Scheme to assess its scope as technology and market conditions change.

I do want to comment briefly on the sanctimonious, Uriah Heep-style handwringing amendment from the Labor Party. The suggestion in this amendment that this issue is all due to the coalition is entirely and absolutely wrong and also, frankly, historically ignorant. It was squarely part of the policy approach of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government that the National Broadband Network would be a national network and that profits in metropolitan areas would cross-subsidise loss-making services in regional areas. Of course, the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government failed to deliver the policy framework to achieve that outcome in the face of competing networks being rolled out in metropolitan areas. This bill is yet another example of the Turnbull government having to fix up the chaotic mess we inherited in this policy area.

There is a suggestion in the motion put forward by the shadow minister that the Regional Broadband Scheme imposes a charge per line on fixed line carriers as a consequence of the multi-technology mix introduced by the coalition. That is squarely and factually wrong—wrong, wrong, wrong. It is a design feature of the National Broadband Network as introduced by the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government that there would be a cross-subsidy from metropolitan services to regional and remote services.

Of course, a key fact about which Labor is completely silent is that the multi-technology mix will reduce capital costs of the NBN by about $30 billion, in turn reducing the amount of that necessary cross-subsidy. But it is hardly surprising that our innumerate and managerially incompetent political opponents would fail to understand this basic point.

In conclusion, these bills create more opportunities for competition at the network and retail levels, while providing consumers across Australia with confidence that they will have access to the high-speed broadband services they need to participate in today's digital society. These bills have been the subject of extensive consultation. They are strongly supported by consumer groups and regional stakeholders, including the Regional, Rural and Remote Communications Coalition and the National Farmers' Federation. I commend these bills to the House.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms Claydon ): The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Greenway has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The immediate question, therefore, is that the amendment be agreed to.

Question negatived.

Original question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced.

Mr FLETCHER (Bradfield—Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) (13:18): I present a supplementary explanatory memorandum to the bill, and I ask leave of the House to move government amendments (1) to (13), as circulated, together.

Leave granted.

Mr FLETCHER: I move amendments (1) to (13), as circulated, together:

(1) Schedule 4, item 13, page 187 (line 14), omit "November 2017", substitute "the applicable reporting period".

(2) Schedule 4, item 13, page 187 (lines 18 and 19), omit "month of November 2017", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(3) Schedule 4, item 13, page 187 (line 30), omit "month", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(4) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 5), omit "month of November 2017", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(5) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 10), omit "month", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(6) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 14), omit "month", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(7) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 18), omit "month", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(8) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 21), omit "month", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(9) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 24), omit "month", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(10) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 27), omit paragraph 102ZF(2) (d), substitute:

(d) do so within one month after the end of the applicable reporting period.

(11) Schedule 4, item 13, page 188 (line 31), omit "month of November 2017", substitute "applicable reporting period".

(12) Schedule 4, item 13, page 189 (after line 19), at the end of section 102ZF, add:

Applicable reporting period

(7) For the purposes of this section, applicable reporting period means:

(a) the second month that began after the commencement of this section; or

(b) if a later month is specified under subsection (8)—that later month.

(8) The Minister may, by legislative instrument, specify a month for the purposes of paragraph (7) (b).

(9) A month specified under subsection (8) must not be later than October 2018.

(13) Schedule 4, item 13, page 191 (after line 21), after subsection 102ZFB(3), insert:

(3A) If:

(a) notice of a motion to disallow the determination is given in a House of the Parliament within 15 sitting days of that House after the copy of the determination was tabled in that House under section 38 of the Legislation Act 2003; and

(b) at the end of 15 sitting days of that House after the giving of that notice of motion:

   (i) the notice has not been withdrawn and the motion has not been called on; or

   (ii) the motion has been called on, moved and (where relevant) seconded and has not been withdrawn or otherwise disposed of;

the determination is then taken to have been disallowed, and subsection (3) does not apply to the determination.

To explain to the House these amendments: the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017 and the Telecommunications (Regional Broadband Scheme) Charge Bill 2017 implement a coherent three-part package to improve the regulatory framework for the supply of high-speed broadband by amending separation rules and creating new supply and funding arrangements.

The amendments that I am moving on sheet LC109 to schedule 4 of the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Competition and Consumer) Bill 2017, concerning the Regional Broadband Scheme, would implement the recommendation of the Senate Environment and Communications Legislation Committee to align the Regional Broadband Scheme with standard disallowance procedures and provide more time for carriers to prepare for the initial reporting requirements.

Proposed amendments (1) to (12) on sheet LC109 delay the timing of the initial report by carriers to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and introduce deemed disallowance provisions for certain ministerial determinations. As currently drafted, carriers must give a report on the number of premises on their network that had a fixed line broadband service during November 2017 to the ACCC before 31 December 2017. Those dates, of course, have passed. Therefore, the government proposes, with these amendments, to update these reporting dates and to provide more time for carriers to prepare for the report. These amendments require carriers to report to the ACCC by the end of the third month after the bill commences for the period of the second month after the bill commences. The amendments also enable the Minister for Communications to further delay the required reporting period by legislative instrument. However, the latest month the minister may specify is October 2018, with the report to be provided by the end of November 2018.

The government also proposes, by amendment (13) on sheet LC109, to modify the proposed disallowance provision applying to ministerial determinations that relate to exempting a class of carriage services from the charge in determining what is and is not a premises. By this amendment, the relevant instrument would be deemed to have been disallowed if a notice or motion to disallow it had not been withdrawn or remained unresolved in either house of parliament by the end of the usual disallowance period. This amendment aligns the Regional Broadband Scheme more closely with the usual disallowance procedures in the Legislation Act and implements the recommendations of the Senate Environment and Communications Legislation Committee and the Senate Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Bills. I commend the amendments to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill, as amended, agreed to.

Mr FLETCHER (Bradfield—Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) (13:23): by leave—I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

Mr FLETCHER (Bradfield—Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) (13:25): I present a supplementary explanatory memorandum to the bill and move government amendment (1) on sheet HV220, as circulated:

(1) Clause 19, page 15 (after line 9), after subclause (3), insert:

(3A) If:

(a) notice of a motion to disallow the determination is given in a House of the Parliament within 15 sitting days of that House after the copy of the determination was tabled in that House under section 38 of the Legislation Act 2003; and

(b) at the end of 15 sitting days of that House after the giving of that notice of motion:

   (i) the notice has not been withdrawn and the motion has not been called on; or

   (ii) the motion has been called on, moved and (where relevant) seconded and has not been withdrawn or otherwise disposed of;

the determination is then taken to have been disallowed, and subsection (3) does not apply to the determination.

This amendment makes a minor adjustment to the bill, to enhance parliamentary scrutiny of the Regional Broadband Scheme. The government proposes, by amendment (1) on sheet HV220, to modify the proposed disallowance provision applying to ministerial determinations that relate to changing the charge amount. By this amendment, the relevant instrument would be deemed to have been disallowed if a notice of motion to disallow it had not been withdrawn or remained unresolved in either house of parliament by the end of the usual disallowance period. This amendment aligns the Regional Broadband Scheme more closely with the usual disallowance provisions in the Legislation Act 2003 and implements the recommendation of the Senate Environment and Communications Legislation Committee and the Senate Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Bills. I commend the amendment to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill, as amended, agreed to.

Mr FLETCHER (Bradfield—Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) (13:27): by leave—I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms Claydon ) (13:28): The Speaker has received advice from the Chief Government Whip nominating a member to be a member of the Standing Committee on Communications and the Arts.

Mr FLETCHER (Bradfield—Minister for Urban Infrastructure and Cities) (13:28): by leave—I move:

That Ms Flint be appointed a member of the Standing Committee on Communications and the Arts.

Question agreed to.

The SPEAKER (14:00): I inform the House that today I have received letters from Justine Terri Keay, resigning her seat as the member for the electoral division of Braddon; Joshua Hamilton Wilson, resigning his seat for the electoral division of Fremantle; Susan Lamb, resigning her seat for the electoral division of Longman; and Timothy Jerome Hammond, resigning his seat as the member for the electoral division of Perth. Consideration is being given to possible dates for the by-elections, and I'll begin consulting with party leaders in the normal way. I will inform the House in due course of the dates which I have fixed for the by-elections.

Mr THISTLETHWAITE (Kingsford Smith) (16:21): The Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Integrity and Other Measures) Bill 2018 contains four tax integrity measures. Schedule 1 goes to toughening the multinational anti-avoidance law; schedule 2 goes to improving the integrity of small business capital gains tax concessions; schedule 3 is about fintech and venture capital amendments; and, finally, schedule 4 goes to tax exemption for payments made under the Defence Force Ombudsman Scheme. Labor supports schedules 1 and 4.

I move:

That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

"whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes the Coalition Government's failure to ensure tax integrity by improving tax haven transparency".

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Hogan ): Is the amendment seconded?

Ms Chesters: I second the amendment and reserve my right to speak.

Mr THISTLETHWAITE: In terms of schedule 1, regarding toughening the multinational anti-avoidance law, the bill amends the Income Tax Assessment Act to ensure that the multinational anti-avoidance law applies appropriately to artificial and contrived arrangements involving trusts and partnerships entered into by multinational entities to avoid the taxation of business profits in Australia. We note that the schedule implements a technical integrity measure underpinning the multinational anti-avoidance law.

The Turnbull government has regularly made much of statements that Labor voted against the multinational anti-avoidance law, but this is simply not true. In this House, Labor supported that bill and, in the Senate, Labor voted against a government-Greens amendment. Yes, that's right: the government teamed up with the Greens to water down the tax transparency law and reporting requirements for large companies. The effect of that amendment—which was ultimately successful through the Greens and the coalition government—was to reduce the number of Australian companies who were required to report their tax arrangements each year. Some of those big companies were raking in revenue close to $16 billion but were paying no tax. The government wanted to reduce the number of those companies that were required to report every year, and guess what? The Greens teamed up with them and allowed that to occur. Labor ultimately facilitated the passage of the multinational anti-avoidance law in both houses, but we did that over protestations about reducing the exposure and the scrutiny that was allowed by that law by reducing the number of companies subject to it.

The fact is that the Turnbull government have been a light touch and have had a hands-off approach when it comes to big business and those at the top end of town, and we've seen this over the past couple of years with their approach to the banking industry. The fact is that for 600 days they avoided and actively opposed a royal commission into the banking sector in Australia. Labor's been proven right, once again, in the evidence that's come out of that inquiry—there was systemic and substantial rorting by this industry, undermining Australians' finances, and it needed to be looked at, and that's what's occurring at the moment. We welcome the fact that the commissioner's doing a fantastic job, and we await the outcomes of his interim report in September and ultimately a final report in February next year. This is a reflection of this government's ideological emphasis: checks and balances on government power but no consideration given to the checks and balances on the power of big businesses and the wealthy to avoid their community obligations, particularly when it comes to paying their fair share of tax.

The fact is that the Turnbull government, from the top down, including the extreme free-market fringe, are more concerned with so-called red tape and the banks' cost of doing business than with appropriately regulating them. They see tax and the collection of tax revenue as the biggest cost of doing business. They call it a tax grab. But we know, of course, that one in five of Australia's biggest companies have paid no tax for at least the past three years. That's no taxation revenue that could have been used for funding important social resources like health, education and infrastructure. Over a series of decades what we've seen is a number of these corporations being very adept at using accounting practices to make loans to subsidiaries in other countries, to transfer funds to subsidiaries in other countries where there is a lower corporate tax rate, and to avoid paying their fair share of tax in Australia. It was only when Labor began to highlight this—and, indeed, when these practices were highlighted through international bodies such as the International Monetary Fund and the OECD—that we began to get action from this government. This is despite tax transparency laws that show just how much the people of Australia are losing through this light-touch approach to collecting their fair share of taxation. Yet the Prime Minister and the Treasurer have still given priority to big business over reining in some of that taxation revenue to ensure we have a fairer budget balance from the corporate sector. We all know that, in the budget that was released just a couple of days ago, there remains the $80 billion tax cut for the biggest businesses in this country. Don't worry about actually getting what's owed to the Australian people. This government, as part of the trickle-down economics philosophy, is more intent on providing a tax cut to the big end of town.

Over the course of the past week some very interesting research has been released in the United States about the effect of the first round of corporate tax cuts in America, and—surprise, surprise!—what that research has uncovered is where that first round of corporate tax cuts went. Guess where the benefits of those corporate tax cuts went? Well, they didn't go into the pay packets of the workers of those corporations, I can tell you that; they went into profits and to the shareholders through increased dividends. It's clear, based on studies like that and a litany of others throughout the world, that this trickle-down approach to economics of cutting taxes for corporations in the wish and the hope that they will pass them on to their workers and employ more people is complete rubbish. It doesn't happen. These studies that have been released in the United States prove that. Cutting penalty rates for workers who work on weekends in the hospitality industry only makes things worse. These are the reasons why people's real incomes have not been increasing in Australia over the last decade, why families are feeling the pinch and why workers are feeling the pinch and feeling left behind by this government.

Many of these matters involve deliberate tax evasion, often through the use of overseas tax havens or complex corporate structures to avoid detection and recovery. Tax havens have been estimated to hold $7.5 trillion of the world's financial wealth, costing the global economy $200 billion in lost taxes every year. The strategy of choice used by those deliberately evading their fair share of tax is a clear and present threat to Australia's taxation base. When tax revenue gets lost to tax havens, Australians ultimately have to pay higher taxes or suffer cuts to those vital services and shared social resources that I referred to earlier, particularly health, education and infrastructure.

In 2017, Labor announced a comprehensive tax haven transparency package. The policy includes tax domicile disclosure for government procurement tenders, whistleblower protections and even rewards for reporting of tax haven exposure to shareholders, and public reporting of just how much tax is paid in jurisdictions where these firms operate. Yet this light-touch, hands-off government has been backtracking on a beneficial ownership registry—another Labor policy that we announced in 2017. This registry would help identify the ultimate owners that sit behind some of these shell companies. It's about improving the transparency that is there with regard to the operation of these companies and, ultimately, being able to hold someone accountable when they do use these tricky taxation and accounting measures to transfer profits overseas to avoid paying tax.

This government also commissioned an unrelated secret Board of Taxation review on the 2016-17 budget measures and the OECD proposals for mandatory disclosure of taxation information. Of course, we only know that because of Senate estimates. The report was released only days ago because Senators Ketter and McAllister were able to get that via the Senate estimates process. The government didn't even want to release this report and what was actually going on in terms of some of the taxation transparency measures in the Australian economy.

The fact is that the Treasurer doesn't want to close a lot of these loopholes. Of course, we heard absolutely nothing from him about cracking down on tax havens in this budget. We know that the introduction of public reporting of country-by-country reports, as suggested by Labor, could help stem the flow of missing money that should be flowing to the Australian people. Corporate profits are soaring and, while Australia's company tax rate places us in the middle of the G20 pack in terms of competitiveness and the actual rate of taxation for corporations, the only policy that this government has had in this area is to cut corporate taxes and to give those companies a big advantage.

Labor knows what needs to be done—and, if we're elected, we're willing to do it—to crack down on multinational tax avoidance. We have announced a plan to close those loopholes and attack the deliberate use of tax havens, first, by tightening debt deduction loopholes used by multinational companies to improve their budget by billions over the medium term.

The second element of our plan is introducing the public reporting of country-by-country reports. We need to see the high-level tax information about where and how much tax was paid by large corporations.

Third is providing protection for whistleblowers who report on those entities evading tax to the Australian Taxation Office. Where a whistleblower's information results in more tax being paid, we should allow them to collect a share of the tax penalty with a reward of up to $250,000.

Fourth is introducing a publicly accessible registry of the beneficial ownership of Australian listed companies and trusts. This approach will allow the public to find out just who really owns companies and who is behind these corporate and accounting practices of setting up different shell companies to avoid the scrutiny of the public. It's clear that shareholders shouldn't be able to use complex structures and sham ownership arrangements to avoid complying with corporate transparency rules.

Fifth is introducing mandatory shareholder reporting of tax haven exposure. Companies must disclose to their shareholders, as a material tax risk, if the company is doing business in some of these tax havens. Unfortunately, that is not occurring at the moment.

Sixth is appointing a community sector representative to boards of taxation to ensure the community sector's voice is heard in tax design and review processes.

Seventh is introducing public reporting of Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre, or AUSTRAC, data and requiring the annual public release of international cash flow data.

Eighth is requiring government tenders to disclose their country of tax domicile.

Ninth is developing guidelines for investment by superannuation funds. This should be done by the Australian Taxation Office in collaboration with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission and the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority.

The final element of our plan requires the Australian tax office's annual report to provide information on the number and size of tax settlements.

I want to make some comments in respect of schedule 2 of the bill, which goes to improving the integrity of small-business capital gains tax concessions. These changes include additional conditions that must be satisfied to apply the small-business CGT concessions to capital gains. The amendments implement the measure announced in the 2017-18 budget as 'Tax integrity package—improving small business capital gains tax concessions' and apply to CGT events that occur on or after 1 July 2017.

However, we note that the original 2017-18 budget proposal is vague in its details. Many tax professionals and stakeholders have said that it would not be until the release of the exposure draft legislation that those affected would become aware of just how they were going to be affected by this legislation. These stakeholders make the reasonable claim that, due to a lack of detail, taxpayers who have conducted their tax affairs in good faith could be caught by changes that go beyond what was flagged in the previous budget. They argue that, to help prevent adverse consequences for taxpayers who have been acting in good faith but couldn't reasonably be expected to foresee the detailed amendments finally unveiled in the exposure draft, the implementation date should be changed from 1 July 2017, as per the original budget announcement, to 8 February 2018. That's the exposure draft release date. In light of those stakeholder concerns, Labor supports the start date being 8 February 2018, as proposed by the tax professionals community.

In terms of schedule 3, which goes to fin-tech and venture capital amendments, these amendments in income tax law and the Venture Capital Act ensure that venture capital tax concessions are available for investments in fin-tech businesses. This schedule partially implements a 2016-17 budget measure, the National Innovation and Science Agenda, as it expands the new arrangements for venture capital limited partnerships.

Labor notes that the main observation following consultation with key stakeholders was the timing of the concessions proposed in this measure. They still leave some uncertainty about the long-term eligibility for concessions in the commercialisation process. This has led to some uncertainty about whether investment decisions will actually be improved. Labor, again, has requested that the minister instigate a look at the impact of investment on the venture capital concession provisions overall, including the measures in this bill, to ensure that they are operating as intended. To provide an added layer of certainty, the amendments should allow Innovation and Science Australia to make public and private findings on assessments.

In conclusion, once again, Labor support the tax integrity measures in this bill, but we are somewhat sceptical about and somewhat dismayed by this government's light-handed approach when it comes to tackling tax avoidance in Australia. This particular coalition government has been very sloppy in its approach to key stakeholders on important tax matters—namely, those that go to the notions of transparency and accountability by corporations when it comes to taxation, how much they're paying and where they're paying it. Labor have laid out a clear plan of improved measures that would bring greater transparency and accountability to this industry. We commend that approach to the government and we hope that it sincerely looks at adopting some of those amendments.

Mr FALINSKI (Mackellar) (16:39): I rise today to speak on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Integrity and Other Measures) Bill 2018. As I am Chair of the House Committee on Tax and Revenue, this bill is close to my heart. Yes, there is a beating heart at the core of all good tax legislation. This bill fulfils the Turnbull government's commitment to ensure Australians can have confidence in a fair and equitable tax system whereby everyone plays by the same set of rules and pays their fair share of tax. This government, more than any other government in the past, has legislated tough laws to crack down on tax avoidance across the entire tax system and across all sectors of the economy.

This bill makes a number of key changes across four schedules that all work to make our tax system fairer, more cost-effective and efficient and to ensure that everyone plays by the same rules. Firstly, schedule 1, better known as MAAL, makes technical amendments to ensure that the government's multinational tax avoidance law operates as intended. As a result of this amendment, multinationals will no longer be able to use corporate structures with foreign trusts and partnerships to avoid the application of the MAAL. These changes were announced in last year's budget as part of the government's commitment to ensuring that multinational entities pay their fair share of tax.

The OECD has estimated that, globally, between US$100 billion and US$240 billion of corporate tax revenue is lost annually due to base erosion and profit-shifting strategies developed by tax lawyers in new tax jurisdictions, like Liechtenstein and the Bahamas. As part of the global effort to combat multinational tax avoidance, the OECD G20 base erosion and profit-shifting project has delivered a number of recommendations to strengthen countries' tax integrity rules and ensure that the international tax system works as intended. Since 2015, Australia has implemented a range of such actions. The government has also taken additional action on multinational tax avoidance beyond the OECD recommendations, including implementing the multinational anti-avoidance law and the diverted profits tax, both of which discourage large multinationals from artificially diverting profits offshore.

The MAAL, which took effect from 1 January 2016, prevents multinationals from escaping Australian tax by using artificial or contrived arrangements to avoid having a taxable presence in Australia. The ATO has observed a significant change in how multinational companies are approaching their Australian tax obligations as a result of the tough new anti-avoidance laws put in place by this government. The ATO estimates that more than $7 billion in sales revenue annually is already being added to the Australian tax base as a result of the government's MAAL. Already we have seen 38 multinational entities changing, or they are in the process of changing, their tax affairs to bring their Australian sourced sales back onshore in compliance with the MAAL, including Google and Facebook. This is also competitively neutral, putting foreign multinationals on the same level as Australian owned and run businesses.

Secondly, schedule 2 of the bill improves the integrity of the small business capital gains tax concessions, in line with the measures announced in the 2017-18 budget to improve integrity and ensure that small business CGT concessions are appropriately targeted. Currently, some taxpayers are able to access the small business CGT concessions for assets that are unrelated to their small businesses. The proposed amendment applies to CGT events that occur on or after 1 July 2017. This application is consistent with the 2017-18 budget announcements to ensure that small business CGT concessions can only be accessed in relation to assets used in a small business or ownership interests in a small business—for instance, by arranging their affairs so that their ownership interests in larger businesses do not count towards the test for determining eligibility of the concessions. The proposed amendments are needed to improve the integrity of the concessions and ensure that they are appropriately targeted for the benefit of genuine small businesses. The small business CGT concessions provide taxpayers with full or partial relief from taxation on capital gains on the disposal of assets related to their business.

There are four existing small business CGT concessions. The first is retirement exemption—lifetime limit exempting $500,000 of capital gains from disposing of active assets on retirement. If the taxpayer is under 55 years of age, money from the disposal of the asset must be paid into a complying superannuation fund or a retirement savings account. There is a 50 per cent active asset reduction—a 50 per cent reduction in the capital gains made from the disposal of an asset used in a business. There is a 15-year exemption—a 100 per cent exemption for active assets owned for at least 15 years where the taxpayer is over the age of 55 and is retiring or permanently incapacitated. And there is the rollover deferral of all or part of a capital gain for two years or longer if the taxpayer requires a replacement asset or incurs expenditure on making capital improvements to an existing asset. These concessions help small businesses grow and reinvest their profits as well as contribute to their retirement savings through the sale of their business. This is about ensuring that these concessions continue to benefit those who need them most—hardworking small business owners.

The proposed amendment will mean that small business CGT concessions can only be accessed in relation to assets used in small business, or ownership interests in a small business. As a result of the consultation process, amendments to the exposure draft were made to streamline the operation of the integrity rules surrounding the use of cash and financial instruments as part of the business. The requirement for cash and financial instruments to be inherently connected with the business will continue to apply. An additional integrity rule is also being introduced to ensure that there is no incentive for taxpayers to enter into artificial arrangements for the purpose of meeting this test.

For the purpose of testing the size of an enterprise or company or trust being disposed of, an entity is treated as controlling another entity if its interest in that entity is 20 per cent or more. This means that more entities will be considered to be connected with each other and will need to include their assets or turnover for the purpose of this test. The lowering of this threshold to 20 per cent is a necessary tightening to ensure the concessions can only be accessed in relation to genuine small businesses. Importantly, these tests apply on an entity-by-entity basis. The taxpayer at the top of a chain of companies or trusts may not qualify for the concession in respect of shares or interest it holds—for example, because that chain includes an indirect interest in a large business. However, another taxpayer in the same chain of companies or trusts may qualify for the concessions in respect of shares or interest it holds in a small business.

Let's take a tradesman in my electorate as an example—say, John the plumber. He started his plumbing business at the age of 25 after receiving all of his qualifications, building his business over 30 years to be a modestly successful entity, employing apprentices and becoming a local household name—in the area, of course. John, now in his mid-50s, can no longer do the arduous work he previously did over the past 30 years. John decides to sell his business and retire. This is what the Liberal Party has given John, a person who has risked going out on his own to start a business, has put his home on the line, has put his hand in his own pocket, has employed apprentices and has contributed to our community and the wider economy: he can now retire without having to pay capital gains tax, rebalancing the risk-for-reward equation.

The Turnbull government is committed to supporting small businesses through tax relief and initiatives such as the $20,000 instant asset write-off, which was extended for a further 12 months in Tuesday night's budget as outlined by the Treasurer. These small business CGT concessions assist owners of small businesses by providing relief from CGT on the disposal of assets related to their business, helping them to reinvest and grow, as well as contributing to their retirement savings through the sale of the business—but, above all, by encouraging entrepreneurship. The concessions themselves are not changing and will continue to be available to genuine small businesses and taxpayers with an aggregated turnover of less than $2 million or business assets of less than $6 million.

Key features of the new law include: limiting the size of the company or trust being disposed of, to ensure that it is a genuine small business; clarifying that a taxpayer is required to be a small business entity at the time they dispose of their interests in the company or trust, to ensure that taxpayers do not benefit from the concession where the relevant business activities are too remote; and modifying the active asset test so that it looks through shares in companies and interests in trusts to the activities and assets of the underlying entities, which will prevent the concessions from being available where most of the value of the company or trust is unrelated to the small business activities.

Additional integrity rules also apply to ensure that the new tests cannot be manipulated or avoided. Schedule 3 of this bill delivers on a key commitment in the government's fin-tech statement, removing ambiguity from the tax law and clarifying that early stage venture capital limited partnerships and venture capital limited partnerships can invest in innovative Australian fin-tech businesses. This bill builds on the government's $1.1 billion National Innovation and Science Agenda and highlights our commitment to support innovative—

Mr Husic: All front; no form.

Mr FALINSKI: The member for Chifley seems surprised to hear these things. The bill highlights our commitment to support innovative businesses in Australia and to build a culture of entrepreneurship and risk taking. The member for Chifley should take advantage of these great new programs that we're introducing. This will improve access to venture capital for fin-tech start-ups and assist these businesses to start, innovate, grow and succeed.

I have many fin-tech companies within my community. Unifii, for example, is a company based in my area that has developed a digital transformation platform that enables large corporate and government enterprises to create and deploy powerful business applications that in hours or days completely eliminate paper processes. Unifii has developed all the intellectual property here in Australia, and every line of code has been written by Australian software developers based in Warriewood, in Sydney. With over two million users already on the platform, the company is delivering enormous economic benefit to Australian businesses and government agencies, and it is expanding internationally to major markets. Unifii is a great example of local talent delivering enormous value to the Australian economy, with very significant export potential.

Schedule 4 of this bill amends the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 to continue to exempt from income tax the payments made as reparation to victims of abuse in the Australian Defence Force. Unlike compensation, a reparation payment represents an acknowledgement by Defence that the abuse suffered by the complainant was wrong, that it can have a lasting and serious impact and also that in the past Defence was not positioned appropriately to respond to abuse in many cases. The recipient of a reparation payment should receive the full benefit of that payment and, as such, the payment should be exempt from income tax.

Previous reparation payments made under the former Defence Abuse Response Taskforce were tax exempt. The task force concluded on 31 August 2016, and in the 2017-18 budget the government announced it was expanding the Defence Force Ombudsman's role to make recommendations on reparation payments in relation to complaints of abuse in Defence. The Defence Force Ombudsman may make recommendations in respect of historical cases of abuse occurring on or before 30 June 2014.

Tax systems at their best should be broad, even and fair to everyone. They should encourage entrepreneurship and allow it to be rewarding. They should recognise the great risk that people undertake, and with that great risk should come equivalent rewards. This bill does that, so I commend the bill to this House.

Mr KEOGH (Burt) (16:53): This Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Integrity and Other Measures) Bill 2018, which deals with tax integrity and the euphemistic 'other measures', actually covers the great areas of tax havens and multinational tax. When I talk to members of my community, the taxation issue that they raise with me most after WA's distribution of the GST is the lack of a crackdown on multinationals who don't pay their tax. That is the No. 2 taxation issue that members of my community raise with me on a regular basis. I think that's a very useful point to make. It's a useful point to make because it points to the priorities of ordinary Australians. The reason they raise the need for us to ensure that multinational corporations pay tax and don't offshore tax or minimise tax is that they understand that, in order to ensure their access to the essential services they need from government, we need to be able to properly fund our education system, our health system, defence and everything else that the Commonwealth government does—as well as not giving away masses of money to the big banks—and part of that is making sure that there's some integrity to our tax system so that the money that should be paid in taxation is actually paid.

Tax havens threaten Australia's tax base. When our tax revenue gets lost to tax havens, Australians ultimately have to pay higher taxes or, as many constituents in the electorate of Burt realise, suffer cuts to vital services. For example, the Cayman Islands has been criticised by the OECD and by the tax commissioner for its excessive secrecy. There are more companies in the Cayman Islands than people. A single building in the Caymans, Ugland House, is apparently home to over 18,000 companies. The tax commissioner has said in a speech to The Tax Institute:

Many of these matters involve deliberate tax evasion, often using overseas tax havens or complex corporate structures to avoid detection and recovery.

The shock waves from the Panama Papers and similar scandals involving corporations and high-net-worth individuals aggressively minimising their tax are felt around the world. Other governments have been jolted into action on transparency measures since the public outcry over the Panama Papers. The Turnbull government, however—wait for it—has done virtually nothing.

With rising inequality and rising government debt, the time for acting on tax havens has not only come; it's almost gone. We need to get started on this. We need to make sure there's real action. Tax havens have been estimated to hold $7.5 trillion of the world's financial wealth, costing the global economy $200 billion in lost taxes every year. Labor announced, back in 2017, a comprehensive tax haven transparency package, including tax domicile disclosure for government procurement tenders; whistleblower protections and rewards; reporting of tax haven exposure to shareholders; and public reporting of how much tax is paid in jurisdictions that a firm operates in, along with related materials. Meanwhile, what's the government been doing? It's has been backtracking on a beneficial ownership register and it's commissioned an unreleased, secret Board of Taxation review into the 2016-17 budget measure on OECD proposals for mandatory disclosure of tax.

Why has it backtracked on these measures? One in five of Australia's biggest companies have paid no tax in at least the last three years, but the priority of the Prime Minister and the Treasurer is still to give over $80 billion in tax cuts to big business. We know that Australia is missing out on billions in tax revenue thanks to the loopholes that continue to exist in our taxation system and which the Turnbull government refuses to properly close, despite Labor saying that we will cooperate with them in this area. The introduction of public reporting of country-by-country reports, as suggested by Labor, could help stem the flow of this missing money. But the Treasurer doesn't want to close those loopholes. Despite soaring corporate profits and the fact that Australia's company tax rate places us in the middle of the G20 pack, the only policy this government seems to have is a big company tax cut.

Labor has a different plan, and I've outlined some of the parts of Labor's plan. The point here is that, unlike the many criticisms that we, on all sides, receive in politics that government and opposition can't work together, this is an area of law where we could be working together better to create better law to make sure we have more integrity in our tax system, instead of doing what the government is doing: continuing to bring forward piecemeal pieces of legislation so that it can say it's working on tax integrity and on closing down multinational tax loopholes—which it does frequently say—while in actual fact leaving loopholes open and not doing the full work, even some of the work it said it would do, to close these loopholes. These are the things that need to happen, but the government refuses to do them, which is really quite disappointing. As I said, this is the second biggest tax issue that people in my community raise with me. They know that if we don't get this fixed it results in cuts to their services.

There are other parts of what I referred to as the euphemistic use of 'other measures' in this bill. We see the improvement of tax integrity not only by looking at tax havens and other areas of multinational taxation but by looking at improving the integrity of the small-business CGT concessions. There are some amendments Labor thinks should be made in this area. One of the things that stuck out for me when I looked at this part of the bill was that, despite the fact that it was only on Tuesday—only two days ago—that the government handed down their 2018-19 budget, this is a measure from the 2017-18 budget. The government are really running the parliament well; we're still getting around to trying to deal with issues from the last budget measures, and they've just handed down the latest budget. Maybe we need to include other categories in the forward estimates: one saying, 'This is what we think we're going to do in the next financial year,' and another saying, 'These are the things we might get around to doing, but we don't really know if we'll include it, and hopefully we'll be able to work it through parliament.' These are the areas we actually want to agree with them on. These are areas we want to help them on.

It brings to mind other areas of legislation that are in this space—things like working with the fin-tech sector, which is the other part of schedule 3. Again, this is a measure that is from the last budget that we are only just now getting around to dealing with in the chamber of the House of Representatives.

Mr Husic: It's from 2016-17.

Mr KEOGH: Thank you. I refer to the member of Chifley's very eloquent point—this is from two budgets ago. I wasn't even in the parliament when they budgeted for this. I've had to come into the parliament—the people of Burt had to elect me—so we could get on with this. I thank the people of Burt for doing that. Imagine how far behind we'd be otherwise.

This is a bit like the NBN under this government. It almost goes backwards. It is amazing we have a fin-tech sector in this country, given the way the government goes around legislating for it. It's a bit like a sandbox it tried to create—despite the fact that we highlighted some of the issues that it would have with it—and realised that it doesn't actually work and now it has got to fix it again.

It's a bit like when we tried to create a better way for start-ups to raise capital online. That is another piece of legislation they put into parliament about which we said: 'This is great and we're happy to move on this. By the way, there are a few things you'd better fix up because we think it's probably not going to work the way you think it's going to work.' Then, 12 months later, they said: 'You're right about that. We'd better fix it up; we'll bring in legislation'. We are nearly 12 months past that point, and they haven't even gotten it through the parliament yet—in fact, they haven't even brought it on for debate in the Senate yet.

This really comes back to the point on the concerns we have about this piece of legislation. This is good legislation in theory, but there are things in schedules 3 and 4 in particular that we say need to be improved or fixed up. We are a party that wants to work with the government on making sure that our tax laws have integrity, that we capture multinational tax loss and that we provide an effective system of taxation and an effective regulatory environment for our fin-tech sector and start-up sector. We want to make sure we get it right. I don't want to find myself back here in six months time debating more legislation to fix this legislation, when it's taken two years to get around debating it in the first place.

Whilst overall we support this legislation and the intent of the legislation, as I said before, what it really highlights is that what we really need is Labor's plan to deal with multinational taxation to make sure we actually fix the issue of companies and high-net-wealth individuals being able to offshore their profits and their high incomes to avoid paying tax in Australia, which is where it's needed, so we can provide the services that ordinary Australians rely on. The Liberal government, when it comes to this area, are all light and mirrors. They make it look like they are doing something, and they say they are doing something, but in reality it's a half-baked approach.

It's a bit like their half-baked approach of looking at the financial sector and the big banks in this country. On one hand, they say, 'We're going to give you a big tax cut.' On the other hand, they say to the public—kicking and screaming, I might point out—'We'll hold a royal commission.' Then they look at some of the things that come out of that royal commission and say: 'Look at that bad behaviour! We'll throw the book at them. We'll make sure they get tough penalties. We'll make sure any criminal behaviour gets investigated and looked into.' Then, lo and behold, they hand down a budget, and when we go through the detail to see what's happening with ASIC, $20 million or $30 million is disappearing from ASIC, the agency that would be investigating and enforcing against the banks and our financial sector. Nearly $2 million was ripped out of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, the agency that would be prosecuting them. What we see is a continuation of the protection rackets for the big banks and the financial sector in Australia. Here it is again. It's almost a protection racket. The government will say, 'We are fixing up multinational taxation,' but at the end of the day it's all smoke and mirrors.

Mr HUSIC (Chifley) (17:04): I think you'd be aware, Deputy Speaker Goodenough, as many others would: in this place, you can't even scratch yourself without running into a 'parliamentary friends of' group. These groups are doing some really good work, but there are a lot of them that seem to pop up with a great degree of frequency. I have a recommendation for the coalition: given how much they talk about this sector, particularly the fin-tech sector, and their inability to get anything done, I think they need to create the 'faux friends of fin-tech'.

The coalition talk a lot about how close they are to the fin-tech community. They talk about all this legislation that they're putting forward. They're always there with the media release. They're always there with the announcement. They're always there to try to claim some credit and show that they've got a fin-tech community. The Treasurer brings together the fin-tech community in his little consultative group and says, 'We're going to be putting these things forward.' Then, when you match the words against reality, you find a massive gulf. This is definitely the case with elements in this bill.

I will restrict my comments to the venture capital component, but I think that it is telling, particularly with this section, which should be relatively straightforward—but then you realise the enormous gestation period, the time it took to get to this point, which reflects that, while the coalition talk a big game on fin-tech, they don't deliver. This schedule would give the appearance of being fairly straightforward when someone reads the explanatory memorandum and understands what's going on. It allows for early stage venture capital limited partnerships and VCLP arrangements to change the way in which they can, where they've been prohibited before, back investments in the banking, finance and insurance areas—all straightforward. But what I have been finding out when talking with stakeholders about this is how long it took to get to this point—how long it took for this straightforward move to happen.

FinTech Australia—and I went and checked this out—put out a policy paper on this very issue in February 2016. The government, in its 2016-17 budget—May of 2016—said: 'Yes, we're going to do this. We'll move ahead on this.' And it was not until October 2017 that the government, through Treasury, started to consult on amendments to allow this to happen. So from February and May 2016 we get to October 2017. Again, they make the big announcements, claim the credit and, when the hard work needs to be done, are nowhere to be seen—they drag it out. The sector and people in the sector have raised with me that they're not entirely happy with what's been put forward in this bill. Again, it's a straightforward measure, but they still don't think that it's picked up their concerns. For example—and I had highlighted to me—in 3.26 of the explanatory memorandum it states that a fin-tech may be eligible for the tax concession when developing its technology. However—and this is what has been raised with me—it then goes on to say that when a business is commercialising the technology it would no longer be eligible. As has been raised with me: 'This hardly seems like a certain, longer term platform for a venture capital firm to make an investment in a fin-tech, given that the VC is only making the investment because it's hoping the fin-tech will be able to commercialise and profit from the technology.' This is what they're raising with me, and I'm sure they have raised it with Treasury.

It's another bit of legislation after some of the other stuff that was being done in this space to reform the VCLP and ESVCLP arrangements that we've already—we haven't even debated the regulatory sandbox and the other measures that were contained in there as it pertains to venture capital. The government hasn't even bothered to bring that debate in here. We're still having those concerns, and that they're not being taken seriously, raised with us. We are going to be moving an amendment that this be reviewed so that we can see if it's actually successful, because here are some firms that simply, in the banking, finance and insurance space, if they develop their product, can provide a competitive alternative to existing arrangements. The banks are so fearful of things like opening up banking data not because of a new-found commitment to protecting certain consumers or a new-found love of privacy after some of the breaches we've seen in the last few weeks. What they're really scared witless of is the fact that the fin-tech community, particularly in Australia, will offer a very strong and competitive alternative to what people have had to cop from the banks and financial services sector in times past. We should be encouraging them. We back the government's commitment, but what we really back is concrete reform.

As I said, we have this legislation that we've already picked up stakeholder reticence about because it doesn't necessarily pick up all their concerns. They are concerned, for example, about going through with Innovation and Science Australia and expecting some of the rulings, even though admittedly this legislation is supposed to provide a bit more certainty through the public and private ruling mechanism. But there are people concerned that they can't get the green light from ISA to go ahead and then get the investment that's required. They are obviously going to be concerned in the longer term, when the broadening of the definition plays out, about how long it might take to see things happen there. So there are concerns with that.

We are not even debating the regulatory sandbox changes that need to happen. Again, the government said that this is really important, and it is important because they stuffed the first version. They had only four fin-techs go through their regulatory sandbox—less than half a dozen—and they need to fix that up now with a series of changes that still haven't been put to the parliament. The other thing that is just staggering for a government that says it is pro fin-tech—as I said, faux friends of fin-tech—how come they haven't had the wherewithal to bring in the final lot of changes through the Senate on equity crowdfunding?

Last year, when they rammed through this place the changes that we said would be overly bureaucratic, would not deliver the benefits they said would happen, and would not allow smaller firms to access the level of capital raising required to help those firms grow, they still put them through. At the time, I labelled it 'ScoMo's dodo', because we knew it was heading for one thing and one thing only—extinction—because it had to have a whole new set of changes put to it. That's what they did in September. They brought another round of legislation in to fix up the fatally flawed legislation that they had in March. They introduced it in this place in September last year and then it didn't go in through the Senate at the end of the year. We then waited for February for it to come in, and they didn't debate it then. Then we got to March and it still didn't get debated, and then we had the long break before the budget. Now it's come in, in the first week in May, and they haven't put it through the Senate. Mind you, this is after the opposition has offered every assurance that we will work with them. We want to see the time frame for the introduction shortened. We've said to the government continually that we will work with them on this—just bring the framework in. And they couldn't get it into the Senate this week. What does that mean for the fin-tech community or others in the early-stage innovation space? You now will not see this legislation debated until three-quarters of the way through June. The government has baked in a delay of six months from royal assent before the new regime takes place, which means it would be December of this year, notionally, before it comes in.

To their great credit, the government agreed with us to shorten that period of time. We wanted it even shorter. We wanted it introduced right from the start of the new financial year, but they still won't agree to it, because they're worried about ASIC, and ASIC is playing ping-pong, saying, 'It's up to the parliament to determine what happens.' They didn't even know at estimates that there was this six-month period.

But, again, ScoMo's dodo, now the 'go-slow by ScoMo', is going to create another dodo, because equity crowdfunding is now being overtaken by an alternative financing vehicle in the form of initial coin offerings, using cryptocurrency as a way to generate capital for early-stage innovators. So this is now just taking place on its own and it threatens to potentially outstrip what could be raised through equity crowdfunding anyway.

The bigger story in all this is that we've been debating this since May 2013. We made the reference to the Corporations and Markets Advisory Committee in May 2013 to set up the framework. The coalition government got the report in May 2014, but by 2018 we still don't have the actual framework in place. It has been five years—four under your coalition government, where you say that you're pro innovation, you say you're pro fin-tech sector, but you can't even get the reforms in. You drag it out so long that alternative vehicles for capital raisings emerge, which, I have to say, are less informative to investors and will require much more sophisticated investors to understand and interpret what's going on. It's been dragged out. You're either fair dinkum about encouraging fin-tech and the emergence of a stronger fin-tech sector in this country, or you're just fake friends of the sector, only wanting to be there for the click of the cameras and the writing of the stories. You're not there to actually put it through, and this is even when we're prepared to work with the coalition on this. It is a disgrace. This shouldn't happen. If you were pro business, if you were truly pro opening up alternative pathways for capital raising, you would have got it done, but you haven't.

It's just the same as the concerns we have with what's contained within schedule 3 of this legislation. Based on what we're hearing out of the fin-tech sector and what stakeholders are raising with us, you still haven't cleared it up. If the Treasurer's too busy, he has an assistant minister. Assign him to make sure this happens. He has enough space to be able to make this happen. I'm sure he wants to cut his teeth on this legislation—he'll do the summing-up in a few minutes time. So why don't they take the steps, task up the proper people, make this happen, get the legislation through and prove that they are more than words, that they are action, as opposed to what we're seeing right now?

Mr SUKKAR (Deakin—Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) (17:16): In summing up the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Integrity and Other Measures) Bill 2018, I will say that this further delivers on this government's agenda to address multinational tax avoidance, ensures that the small-business capital gains tax concessions are appropriately targeted, ensures that we have the policy settings in order to foster innovation and makes the taxation of Defence abuse repatriation payments fairer. Schedule 1 of this bill demonstrates again our ongoing commitment to tackling multinational tax avoidance by further preventing large multinationals from avoiding tax on their Australian business profits through artificially structuring their affairs, which ultimately amounts to taxable income not being captured in the Australian tax net. The amendments contained in schedule 1 ensure that the multilateral anti-tax-avoidance law, which targets these egregious practices, will continue to operate as intended and deliver on the government's commitment to improving the integrity of Australia's tax system, which ultimately benefits all Australians.

Schedule 2 of the bill amends the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 to improve the integrity of the tax system and ensure that the small-business CGT concessions are appropriately targeted. These amendments give effect to the government's 2017-18 budget announcement that, from 1 July 2017, the concessions can only be accessed in relation to assets used in a small business or ownership interests in a small business. The key feature of the amendments is to test the size of the business being disposed of, to prevent inappropriate access to the concessions for assets unrelated to a small business. This ensures that these important concessions continue to benefit those who need them most, which are hardworking small businesses.

The government is committed to establishing Australia as a leading global fin-tech hub. When I spoke at the fin-tech futures forum in Melbourne last week, the government were certainly congratulated on the work and support that we're providing fin-techs. Therefore, schedule 3 of this bill builds on our work to ensure that we have the policy settings best in place to foster this sort of innovation. Accordingly, schedule 3 amends the early stage venture capital limited partnership, venture capital limited partnership and tax incentives for early stage investor regimes of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997. This clarifies that early stage venture capital limited partnerships and venture capital limited partnerships can invest in innovative fintech businesses, removes ambiguity from the tax law, and provides certainty for venture capital investors. Again, we believe that this demonstrates the government's continuing commitment to promoting a culture of entrepreneurship and risk taking in Australia and will help ensure innovative Australian businesses have access to the capital and, importantly, the expertise that they need to grow and succeed in this very competitive area.

In the 2017-18 budget the government announced it would expand the role of the Defence Force Ombudsman to make recommendations for reparation payments. All complaints about abuse in the Defence Force made to the Defence Force Ombudsman will now include an assessment for a reparation payment. Similar reparation payments were previously administered by the Defence Abuse Response Taskforce, which concluded on 31 August 2016. Reparation payments made by the Defence Abuse Response Taskforce were specifically exempt from income tax. Schedule 4 of this bill therefore ensures that the new reparation payments recommended by the Defence Force Ombudsman are exempt from income tax. Reparation payments are not intended to be compensation, and complainants will not be required to release the Commonwealth from any liability. Schedule 4 ensures the recipient of a reparation payment receives the full benefit of the payment and, importantly, is free from the obligation to pay income tax on it. Therefore, I commend this bill to the House.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Goodenough ): The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Kingsford Smith has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The immediate question is that the amendment be agreed to.

Question negatived.

Original question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Mr SUKKAR (Deakin—Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) (17:22): by leave—I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

Ms MACKLIN (Jagajaga) (17:25): I'm speaking tonight on the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Drug Testing Trial) Bill 2018. This bill reintroduces a controversial 2017-18 budget measure to establish a two-year trial of drug testing for 5,000 recipients of Newstart allowance and youth allowance (other) in three locations: Canterbury Bankstown in New South Wales, Logan in Queensland, and Mandurah in Western Australia. Here we are, a year later, debating this proposal from this government yet again.

This bill was scrutinised in a Senate inquiry that reported earlier this week. Of course, we all recall that the Turnbull government previously introduced this measure in a different bill in September last year. Labor opposed the drug-testing trials the first time they were introduced into the parliament, and we will oppose them again. The drug-testing trial measure was subsequently withdrawn from the welfare reform bill due to a lack of support in the Senate. The government continues to pursue this policy, which is completely devoid of support in the medical, health and community sectors. There is no evidence, none at all, that this approach will help anyone with a drug addiction.

Labor spent a considerable period of time listening to expert advice from health professionals before we ultimately came to our position to oppose this trial. It is very rare that the medical and community sectors speak in unison on an issue, but they have spoken out strongly against this drug-testing trial. There is a clear consensus that this trial will not work. It is not based on evidence and, in fact, this trial could make the situation worse for some very vulnerable people. We have listened to the experts; plainly, the government has not. We know the government didn't even consult its own drug and alcohol advisory group, because, of course, they didn't want to be told that it wouldn't work and that it was a waste of money. In fact, when asked, the government can't name one expert who thinks that this trial will work. It can't name a single person, a single expert, who supports it, despite the fact that this measure has been proposed now for 12 months.

We, of course, do acknowledge that drug addiction is a very significant problem in many, many parts of Australia and that more needs to be done. But our response in this parliament has to be based on the evidence; it needs to be based on what works. Let's just be very clear about the complete lack of support that this policy proposal has from the experts, and I've got a very long list. The trial is opposed by the Australian Medical Association, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians, the Australasian Chapter of Addiction Medicine, the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists, St Vincent's Health Australia, the Rural Doctors Association of Australia, Harm Reduction Australia, the Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation, the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, the Penington Institute, the Kirby Institute at the University of New South Wales, the Victorian Alcohol and Drug Association, the Australian Council of Social Service, UnitingCare Australia, Homelessness Australia, St Vincent de Paul Society, the Wayside Chapel, Anglicare, Catholic Social Services Australia, the National Social Security Rights Network, Odyssey House, Jobs Australia, Community Mental Health Australia, the Public Health Association of Australia, and the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services. What an extraordinary list of experts, all of whom oppose this legislation.

There was an open letter to the Prime Minister from 109 addiction specialists, 330 doctors and 208 registered nurses, calling on him to stop this drug-testing trial. The Australian Medical Association described this measure as 'mean and stigmatising'. It went on:

The AMA considers substance dependence to be a serious health problem, one that is associated with high rates of disability and mortality. The AMA firmly believes that those affected should be treated in the same way as other patients with serious health conditions, including access to treatment and supports to recovery.

Associate Professor Yvonne Bonomo, the director of the Department of Addiction Medicine at St Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne, said:

International experience shows when you push people to the brink, like removing their welfare payments, things just get worse …

There will be more crime, more family violence, more distress within society … Had [the government] spoken to the various bodies who work in this area and know about this work, we would have been able to advise them this is not the right way.

One article reported:

Pennington Institute chief executive John Ryan has called for the bill to be scrapped.

'These are people who rely on these social security payments for the bare necessities and this plan risks pushing them into crime or homelessness,' he said.

The recent Senate committee inquiry heard from a number of witnesses that there is no evidence to suggest that testing jobseekers for drugs will assist them to find work or encourage those who do live with drug dependence to access treatment. Professor Adrian Reynolds, an expert in addiction medicine, said that the drug-testing trial is 'unlikely to bring about any sustained changes in patients' drug use behaviours and may even be counterproductive'. Additionally, Professor Reynolds said:

… this drug testing trial is clinically inappropriate and not designed in a way that will address the issues of substance dependence.

A leading researcher in the area, Professor Lisa Maher, explained further:

… the proposed measures are inconsistent with evidence based approaches to public policy … the Australian National Council on Drugs, concluded that there is no evidence that drug testing welfare beneficiaries will have any positive effects for those individuals or society and some evidence indicating that such a practice could have high social and economic costs.

So there has been a resounding rejection of this trial by the medical and drug treatment experts. The government, of course, is totally ignoring each and every one of them.

I also want to talk briefly about the current problem with current waiting times to access rehabilitation services. Right across Australia, it's estimated that there are approximately 1,500 publicly funded drug and alcohol rehabilitation beds, dealing with more than 32,000 requests. Often waiting lists become so long that applicants are no longer accepted onto the waiting lists. If this government were serious about addressing drug addiction in the community, it would do so much more to address this problem.

So how does the bill say that this trial would work? Newstart and youth allowance recipients in the three trial locations will be randomly selected and notified of a requirement to attend an appointment with the department. At this appointment, they'll be notified of a requirement to provide a sample of saliva, urine or hair for the purposes of a drug test. Addiction medicine specialists have raised serious concerns about the technical aspects of this part of the trial. With lower cost tests, there is a risk of false positives—for example, if a person is taking antidepressants, they could test positive for amphetamines. Reliable tests can be extremely costly and are likely to be unaffordable. For instance, according to the RACP, a best-practice urine test costs between $550 and $950 to administer.

Recipients who test positive to the initial drug test will be put on income management for a period of 24 months. Jobseekers will have the option to dispute the result of a positive test and to request a retest. If the retest is also positive, the jobseeker will have to repay the cost of the test. Jobseekers who return a positive test result will be subject to a second drug test within 25 working days. If the jobseeker tests positive to the second test, they will need to repay the cost of the test and will then get access to treatment services.

Professor Alison Ritter of the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre gave a damning view of this policy. She said:

… the bill is not written like a research trial; it's written as policy by stealth … and if this is about introducing new policy, then … it misunderstands the nature of drug problems and drug dependence …

A number of people have also raised the concern that this testing process will likely encourage people to use less traceable drugs, such as synthetic cannabis, or move to using alcohol or cocaine, which are not being tested as part of the trial.

Drug testing of income support recipients has been tried in several countries and there is no evidence from those trials to suggest that it's effective. In New Zealand the government tried a drug-testing program among welfare recipients in 2015. The results? Out of the 8,001 participants tested, only 22 returned a positive result for illicit drug use. In Utah in the United States, 838 of the state's 9,552 social security applicants were screened, with just 29 returning a positive result. These were very costly experiments that showed that this approach is not worth pursuing.

We know from the Department of Social Services that the estimated number of people that they expect to test positive on the second test is just 120. So the department estimates that just 120 of the 5,000 people tested will actually end up in treatment. But based on the experience in New Zealand, where only 22 people tested positive out of 8,001, you'd have to think that 120 second positive tests out of 5,000 people is a very optimistic estimate.

It's not just health and medical experts who oppose this controversial measure. One very prominent critic is former Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police Mick Palmer. Mick Palmer was the man who headed John Howard's so-called war on drugs in the late 1990s and early 2000s, so he's not someone who can easily be dismissed as some sort of softy—far from it. Mick Palmer has raised very serious concerns that this trial could see an increase in crime in the trial communities. Mr Palmer said:

It certainly hasn't got much chance of reducing crime. It does have the potential in some cases to aggravate it—

and he means crime. He said:

All of my experience tells me that this won't work. Really what it will do is create more damage, and most damage and most harm to those people who are most vulnerable and most in need of support and protection …

He went on to say:

It's pretty stark that this can only aggravate an already pretty serious problem and make more vulnerable people who already need more help than they're now getting.

So this trial could actually see an increase in crime.

These concerns are being raised by a former Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police. They should be taken seriously. I urge the Senate crossbench to listen to all of the experts and to listen to Mr Palmer's criticisms and oppose this bill. Labor shares the concerns expressed by Mr Palmer. We are very concerned that this policy will result in increased crime, increased poverty and increased homelessness. We are very concerned that people suffering from addiction will turn away from the social security system entirely, opting for crime as a way to get money to abuse drugs.

It's also apparent from the Senate inquiry that local community support for the trials is not evident. The Mayor of Canterbury Bankstown, one of the trial sites, said:

... by using our city as the trial site, the government is further stigmatising and discriminating against our local community …

The cities of Logan and Mandurah also told the Senate inquiry that they believe they were being unfairly targeted by being named as a trial area. The Deputy Mayor of Logan said:

Unfortunately for Logan we tend to get targeted for all these sorts of things, and this was just another arrow in the bullseye ... and we seriously get a bit tired of being targeted.

The City of Mandurah explained to the committee:

...we have some concerns that the rationale or justification behind Mandurah being chosen as a site doesn't clearly indicate that Mandurah exclusively has a greater problem than perhaps some of our other regional counterparts.

On the issue of cost, this government still refuses to reveal the total cost of this trial. They do refer to a $1 million evaluation and to $10 million in treatment services, but they refuse to say how much the trial will actually cost taxpayers. So a year after this was first proposed, they still cannot, or perhaps do not, want to tell us, don't want people to know, how much this will actually cost taxpayers.

The Senate inquiry heard from Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, who said:

… cost of drug testing, doing it properly, would be anywhere between $500 and $900 per test.

Professor Adrian Reynolds told the Senate hearing:

… it is roughly $100 per drug class tested for a urine test. For hair testing, it is around $180 per class tested... if you want month by month it can be triple that.

Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones from St Vincent's Health explained further that, in order to ensure the validity of positive tests, it would be necessary to undertake a confirmatory test, which was likely to greatly add to the cost. He said:

It's important to distinguish the difference between the screening test and the confirmatory test. The screening test, which might be of a salivary sample or for a urine-screening drug test, may be reasonably cheap...but, if you then return a positive test, that is required to be confirmed with a confirmatory test which might be a very expensive process.

The Prime Minister has said that this policy is based on love, but not one of the doctors who treat people with addiction every single day agree with him—not one of these doctors. This policy is not based on love. It is based on the continued demonisation of Australians who rely on our social security system. It is based on a very crude political calculation that there are votes in yet another crackdown on welfare recipients. It is not based on love at all. The experts say that the changes fail to recognise the complex nature of substance abuse as a health condition. It fails to recognise that this issue should be treated as a health issue, not a welfare issue.

Unlike those opposite, I've actually gone out and spoken with people in the drug rehabilitation centre, Odyssey House, in my electorate. They made it patently clear to me that taking away control over people's money won't trigger them to stop using drugs. I sat down and talked to people who are undergoing rehab at Odyssey House, and many of them told me that they abused drugs to mask terrible pain or trauma that happened in their lives, often abuse that they experienced as a child. The motivation to mask that pain and suffering means that they'll find a way to get drugs. In fact, the other thing they said to me was that the trigger that made them seek treatment for addiction was that they were worried about the effect their behaviour was having on their family and the people they love. We've listened to all of these people—the experts who know about how to treat people with addictions, the police, the people themselves affected by drug addiction.

In conclusion, I want to particularly acknowledge the contributions that have been made in this debate over recent months by the member for Barton and the member for Bruce. Addiction has touched the lives of the people they love very deeply, and I know this debate has not been easy for them. But, equally, they understand that this is bad policy and something that must be opposed.

I want to finish by saying that Labor, of course, is always open to considering genuine attempts to help people into treatment—attempts that are designed by people who understand addiction and have their best interests at heart. But these proposed changes will hurt people with serious illness, pushing them further into serious financial hardship and crime, and we will not support it. We want to see a genuine attempt to address the very serious problem of drug addiction in our community. It must be based on the evidence and it must be done with the support of the medical, health and community sectors.

Mr LLEW O'BRIEN (Wide Bay—Deputy Nationals Whip) (17:47): I rise to support the government's reforms to social welfare. I listened carefully to the speech from the member for Jagajaga before me. It was quite interesting. She pinpointed some statistics, particularly around international trials of this nature, where many, many thousands of people on welfare have been drug tested. I think the numbers she came back with were that 29 in one country and 22 in another country were detected. All I can say is: what an amazing preventative measure this is. If it is stopping people from taking drugs—because they know there is a drug-testing regime—to the point where we are getting such low numbers returned, I see that as a great success and another reason why we should support the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Drug Testing Trial) Bill 2018 and make sure that it happens.

Another point the member for Jagajaga made was that, unlike her, people on the other side—I think those were her words—hadn't been to Odyssey House and spoken to those who are addicted. I must say that I haven't been to Odyssey House, but I did spend 17 years as a police officer dealing with drug-addicted people. I saw people in terrible situations addicted to drugs, and they were on welfare. They were some of the most horrible circumstances you can imagine. There were mothers prostituting themselves. I saw kids abused in the most disgraceful way. I saw the absolute lowest standards of living because of drug addiction, and these people were on welfare. And do you know what? They had slipped through the cracks. This bill is about finding those people and helping them. This is not about punishing them. To say that it's too expensive or too hard, as I heard before, is just a disgrace. We have to do everything to help these people. That's what this bill is about. This bill, through the drug-testing trial, will help people take control of their lives. It's aimed at identifying people who need help to break the cycle of addiction and welfare dependency so we can help them into work. This is targeted at Newstart and other welfare designed around employment.

We all know that the best form of welfare is a job. The best way to ensure that people receiving welfare make it into the workforce is, first, to ensure the economy has jobs for them to take and, second, to ensure that they're able to perform those jobs. This means helping those people to have the capacity and the desire to get into work. Australia's annual welfare budget is around $160 billion, accounting for about 35 per cent of the budget. There is no doubt that society needs a social security safety net, and we should be proud of the one that we have in Australia. It needs to be able to help and sustain people who, for whatever reason, need support to get a job, but there also needs to be a degree of mutual obligation.

Like any other major cohort in Australian society, people receiving welfare are, in the main, very decent, contributing citizens, genuinely trying to live a productive life. But, like in other areas of society, there are some who are caught in a vicious cycle of substance abuse—who spend their money on illicit substances which, in turn, prevent them from getting ahead. The cycle of abuse can destroy lives. We need to take action to stop the cycle and put services in place to help people get their lives back on track. It's a sad reality that drugs are a scourge within many of our communities. Illicit amphetamine use is reaching frightening levels in some places. Over the last decade, drug convictions have increased by some 330 per cent. Tragically, the number of Australians killed by methamphetamine use has doubled in the past six years, with nearly half of those deaths in regional Australia. Illegal drugs are tearing apart families and destroying our communities. What's more, in most cases, behind these victims of drug addiction are those seeking to profit through the production, supply and trafficking of drugs to these vulnerable people. The scum of society are predominantly members of organised crime or outlaw motorcycle gangs, which are really one and the same.

Substance abuse has many contributing factors. Welfare dependency is just one factor, but it is one that government is able to influence but has neglected for some time. In society, drug addiction can contribute to a cultural dependence which, when passed on from generation to generation, becomes a difficult cycle to break. There are around 100,000 people receiving welfare support who have breached their mutual obligation tasks. If drug dependency is the cause of this, we need to identify it and we need to help these people. There is considerable research which shows that substance abuse does prevent some people from working and contributing to society. The data shows that in 2017 there were over 4,850 occasions when jobseekers cited substance dependency as an excuse for not meeting their mutual obligation requirements. In September of last year, around 5,200 people were temporarily exempt from their mutual obligation because of drug and alcohol dependence and abuse, an 86 per cent increase since 2011. Is what has been identified the tip of the iceberg? That's what we need to know. How many more of these 100,000 people need our help desperately?

I'm very pleased that the government has responded to these challenges by establishing the drug-testing trial for 5,000 new Newstart and other youth allowance recipients. They will be in three discrete locations: Canterbury Bankstown, Logan and Mandurah. These locations were selected on the basis of thorough research which examined crime and drug-use statistics. As part of the new package worth $10 million, jobseekers who test positive will be helped by being placed on income management and given essential support to deal with their substance abuse. For the first time, substance abuse treatment will be an approved activity within welfare recipients' job plans, giving them an incentive to get treatment, rehabilitate and find a job.

If someone refuses to take the test, the government's response is very clear: they will not get the benefit. This is not about cutting the social security safety net. Jobseekers who return an initial positive test will continue to receive the same amount in welfare payments. It's about giving those who do test positive the tools to take control of their lives and once again be productive members of society.

Tests will be carried out by contracted drug tester providers, and jobseekers will have the right to dispute a positive return and request a retest. After the two-year trial, a thorough evaluation will be conducted with stakeholders and experts, and this will inform the government on the possibility of rolling out the testing more broadly in high-risk areas. I believe in evidence based policy. While I do not want to second-guess the outcome of this two-year trial, there's no reason not to give it a go. It's incumbent upon us to try and save vulnerable people, for their own sake and for their family's sake. As a policeman, I know too well the scourge of drugs in regional communities. If the trial gets even one young person off these destroying poisons then it's worth doing.

The trial comes in addition to a suite of reforms to social services payment agreements, including the introduction of a demerit point style system to target people that game the system. These measures will return welfare to the support system it was designed to be—for people looking for a hand up rather than a handout. This is all part of the coalition's comprehensive plan to reduce drug and alcohol abuse, providing $689 million since 2016, including almost $300 million over four years as part of the National Ice Action Strategy.

It's disappointing that our political opponents are more supportive of raiding superannuation accounts of pensioners and senior Australians than supporting a program that will help to prevent taxpayer funds being stripped from the addicted and going to criminal motorcycle gangs. The Labor and Greens approach encourages those addicted to drugs to avoid identification, keeping them in the cycle of unemployment, poverty and abuse.

As far as I'm concerned, if you're being paid by the taxpayer to look for work or do a job, they have every right to know what's going on and whether you're fit to do that task. When I was a policeman there was, rightly, a drug and alcohol testing regime, and I didn't hear any civil libertarians jumping up and down about how unfair that was. As a member of parliament, I'd have no problems with or reservation about submitting myself to a drug and alcohol test at any time, and I wouldn't have any problem with seeing these tests extended to the judiciary as well.

I thank Minister Tehan and the Attorney-General for spearheading these innovative reforms to the welfare system. I look forward to working with them in the future to reduce the impact of drugs in regional communities. The government knows that there is much more needed to reduce drug use and get unemployed Australians back to work. But the first step has to be an acknowledgement that people have to take responsibility for their own actions. This trial will help them do that and, together with adequate support, it will help them end their dependency and become productive members of society.

Debate adjourned.

Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Leader of the Opposition) (19:31): My fellow Australians, as I listened to the government's fifth budget on Tuesday night, I knew immediately we can do better than this, the people of Australia deserve better than this and a Labor government will deliver better than this—better than 10 years of cuts to schools and hospitals in exchange for $10 a week. Ten dollars a week! That's all that the Liberals think it will take for you to forgive and forget. They think that for $10 you'll forget they tried to put up your taxes last year, that for $10 you won't care about the cuts to your child's school, that for $10 you'll forgive waiting for elective surgery at Australia's hospitals and that for $10 you won't mind if your Internet's no good or your local TAFE is closing or your daughter can't find a place at uni. They think that, if you get $10 a week, you won't notice that you're losing $70 in penalty rates from your Sunday pay. This Prime Minister is so out of touch. He thinks that, if you get $10 a week, you'll be fine with the banks getting a $17 billion giveaway.

The Liberals desperately want you to believe that this budget is fair, but here's what the Prime Minister isn't telling you: his $715 million cut to hospitals is still in the budget; his $17 billion cut to schools is still in the budget; and his $80 billion handout to big business, banks and multinationals is most certainly still in the budget. This budget still cuts money from our universities, and it contains a sneaky new $270 million cut to TAFE. The Prime Minister's still cutting $14 from pensioners every fortnight. He's cutting dental care for veterans. He's cutting the ABC, yet again. He's keeping Medicare frozen for specialist visits. He's even keeping the GST on tampons. And he is still increasing the retirement age to 70. So tonight Australians should ask themselves: if your family relies on any of these services, what kind of future is this Prime Minister really offering you?

My fellow Australians, I'm here to outline Labor's plan to bring the fair go back into the heart of our nation, a plan to properly fund health and education, a plan to boost your wages and a plan for real tax cuts to help you with your family budget. It's a plan that we can afford, because we are not going to spend $80 billion of tax expenditure on big business and the big banks. It's a plan that will work, because Australia thrives when middle- and working-class Australians can get ahead. Tonight is about a fair go for everyone who wants the best for their kids and their future, a fair go for every part of our nation, from bush to coast, from growing cities and suburbs right throughout the country, a fair go for the real forgotten people: working families, pensioners, and Australians doing it tough.

Our plan begins with a better and fairer tax system. After years of flat wages, rising power bills and increasing health costs under the government, it is a time for a fair dinkum tax cut for middle-class and working-class Australians. I've already said that Labor will support the government's modest tax cuts, starting on 1 July this year. But tonight I'm pleased to announce that a Labor government will go further and do better on tax cuts for working-class and middle-class Australians. Tonight, I'm pleased to advise that in our first budget we will deliver a bigger, better and fairer tax cut for 10 million working Australians—almost double, in fact, what the government offered on Tuesday. This is our pledge to 10 million working Australians: under Labor you will pay less income tax because I think that you are more important than multinationals, big banks and big business.

In our first term of government, a teacher earning $65,000 will be $2,780 better off under Labor, an extra $928 each year. A married couple, one serving in our defence forces earning $90,000 and the other working in aged care on $50,000, will be $5,565 better off under Labor, a combined $1,855 extra each year under Labor. We can afford to do more to help these 10 million Australians because we are not giving $80 billion to big business and the big four banks and because we have already made hard choices for budget repair: creating a level playing field for first home buyers by reforming negative gearing and capital gains; cracking down on tax minimisation by eliminating income splitting in discretionary trusts, without affecting our farmers; and ending unsustainable tax refunds for people who currently pay no income tax, while protecting pensioners and charities.

At the next election there will be a very clear choice on tax: 10 million Australians will pay less income tax under Labor, and we can afford to cut the taxes of 10 million Australians without cutting services, because unlike the Liberals we are not wasting $80 billion on a discredited corporate tax giveaway to the top end of town.

Labor's plans mean that we can deliver a winning trifecta in government: a genuine tax cut for middle-class and working-class Australians; proper funding for hospitals, schools and the safety net; and paying back more of Australia's national debt faster. There was a time, I remember, when the Liberals ran around saying that a national debt of $227 billion was a budget emergency. There was a time, I remember, when they were first elected, that they said that every man, woman and child owed $9,000. But on Tuesday night I do not remember hearing the Treasurer admit that national debt has more than doubled under the Liberals. I do not remember him admitting that it's now $21,000 for every man, woman and child in Australia. I do not remember him admitting that next year total interest payments on national debt will pass $18 billion—$18 billion every year, Treasurer; that's what you've achieved. It is more than the Commonwealth spends on the NDIS, or aged care, or child care. It's about twice as much as Australia spends on our public schools.

But the Liberals' only strategy is to cross their fingers and hope. This is not good enough in a time of trade conflict between America and China, in an age of soaring global debt and rising US bond markets. No Australian government can prevent global bad news, but good governments prepare for it. It may not be politically fashionable but it is time to be responsible. Labor's economic reforms put us in a much stronger position to cope with international uncertainty over the coming decade. We can pay down national debt faster because we're not giving $80 billion away to multinationals and because we have made the tough decisions to reform our taxation system.

On Tuesday night we discovered that the Liberals are planning to radically rewrite the tax rules of the nation, and the more that Australians learn about this latest scheme, the less they like it. How on earth can it be fair for a nurse on $40,000 to pay the same tax rate as a doctor on $200,000 or for a cleaner to pay the same tax rate as a CEO? How can it be fair that, under this tax experiment, the doctor earns five times as much as the nurse but his tax cut is 16 times bigger? Today, new research has revealed that, under this plan, $6 in every $10 will go to the wealthiest 20 per cent of Australians. Very quickly, this is looking like another mates rates tax plan from the Liberal Party. At a time of flat wages, growing inequality and a greater sense of unfairness in this community, when too many jobseekers are stuck in poverty, when children go to school hungry, when women fleeing family violence cannot find safe accommodation, people are worried that this plan is neither fair nor affordable. Frankly, Australians are entitled to be pretty sceptical of the whole thing and to wonder if this 'come and talk to me after two elections' plan, this promise on the never-never, will ever happen. My team and I are ready to vote for tax cuts for working families. We will not allow the Prime Minister to threaten to block tax cuts for 10 million Aussies unless the parliament writes a cheque for high-income earners seven years hence.

Every Australian understands that wages have grown by just two per cent in the past year, slower than the price of things you need to buy, way less than your bills. Yet this government in its budget is pretending that wages will increase by over 13 per cent in the next four years. We know that the Liberals haven't the slightest idea of how this will be achieved. And, when the current wages system is demonstrably not delivering for workers, they are dreaming if they think that same system will magically deliver much better outcomes. Tonight, Labor have shown that we are a party of lower taxes for working and middle-class families, and for more than 120 years we have been the party of higher wages for workers. We have a real wages policy. Our wages policy will restore Sunday penalty rates. We will crack down on wages theft, the abuse of labour hire where companies shift their permanent jobs onto labour hire jobs just to cut their pay. We will get enterprise bargaining off life support and employees and employers back to the negotiating table for more productive workplaces, more profitable enterprises and higher wages. We will lead a new push to deliver genuine pay equity for Australia's working women. Labor's wages policy is better for workers; our income tax policy is better for households; and both are better for the economy.

We've also got real plans for job creation. We are committed to a tax cut for every Australian small business, for 93 per cent of all Australian businesses. We will provide tax incentives for companies who invest here in their own productivity, in new plant and equipment—new utes for tradies, new software, new technology—and our advanced manufacturing future fund will ensure that auto firms abandoned by the current governments in South Australia and Victoria can adapt and modernise. Our commitments to defence, manufacturing and local procurement, to agriculture, science and research, to tourism and renewable energy and to a better NBN are all about creating the jobs and industries for Australia's future. We can afford to invest in small business, productivity and growth because we choose Australian small businesses and Australian jobs over tax giveaways for multinationals, big banks and big business.

In the past couple of days, we've heard the government boast about record funding for hospitals. Let us take a closer look at this record. The cost of seeing a doctor is the highest on record. The average wait time for elective surgery is the longest on record. The number of hospital beds available for elderly Australians is the lowest on record. The number of people presenting in emergency departments is the highest on record—and yet one in three patients considered urgent don't get seen on time. But, in this budget, the government locked in a further cut of $2.1 billion to hospitals across every part of the nation. The health of Australians should never take a back seat to a hand-out for big business. Tonight, I'm pleased to announce Labor will reverse the Prime Minister's cuts to hospitals and create a $2.8 billion better hospitals fund. We'll put more beds in emergency departments and on the wards so we can reduce the wait for people sitting in emergency rooms, worrying about a child or a loved one who's hurt or unwell. Our fund will launch a blitz on waiting lists for elective surgery so people can get that knee replacement to walk without pain, or have their cataracts removed so they can watch their grandchildren grow up. We'll start in Tasmania, which has the worst waiting times in the nation—a year waiting for cataracts and up to 435 days for a knee replacement. And our fund will upgrade emergency department facilities in the suburbs and the regions, including better security measures for staff and patients to handle the scourge of ice.

If someone you love has cancer, it consumes your whole world. It is a terrible disease. Chloe and I have been through it with dear friends. My own mum battled breast cancer for many years. As everyone who has been part of the fight knows, there are endless scans and tests involved. For too many people outside our big cities, either their hospital does not have an MRI machine or it's not covered by Medicare. If you live in Emerald, you have to drive three hours to Rockhampton, or you have to pay hundreds of dollars out of your own pocket each time. Cancer does not care where you live or who it strikes, and you should never have to worry about where to go to get the treatment that you can afford. Health care should just be there for you when you need it. That's what Medicare's all about. Tonight I'm pleased to announce that Labor will provide new MRIs to 20 hospitals and imaging centres in the regions and outer suburbs so Australians have a better level of care, and we will make sure that every one of these machines is covered by Medicare. And we can properly fund our hospitals, reverse the cuts of the government and invest new money in Medicare because we've made hard choices on tax reform and because we're not wasting billions on big business and big banks.

I also believe every government has a responsibility to leave the nation better than we find it. That is why we will create a national integrity commission, a federal ICAC, to improve accountability of politics and public life. And we will do the right thing by people who've been let down by social institutions—national redress for the courageous survivors of child sex abuse, and new healing initiatives for the stolen generations and to reduce the shocking number of Aboriginal kids growing up away from country and culture.

We will ensure justice for people who have been ripped off by the banks. The banking royal commission has lifted the lid, at long last, on a pathology of exploitation. After years of trying to stop the royal commission, in this budget the Prime Minister is giving the big four banks $17 billion of taxpayer money, but it's cutting money from ASIC, its tough cop on the beat. This is a disgrace, it is immoral and Labor will have no part of your actions. The government tried talking tough on this, but wagging your finger in the banks' faces means little when you're giving them a tax cut with your other hand, and upping penalties will do nothing if corporate criminals with deep pockets and big legal teams know they can outspend the government. That is why tonight I announce that Labor will create a special task force inside the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions to see justice done. We will deliver $25 million in funding to make sure that public prosecutors have the resources to follow through on the work of the royal commission. In this fight, as always, we stand on the side of ordinary Australians.

Every budget should strive to deliver Australians a better deal today, but I understand that so many of the sacrifices people make are about tomorrow, about passing on a better set of opportunities for their children. But this budget does nothing for the next generation; it betrays them. Young Australians always get a dud deal from a conservative government. Young people volunteer, give back to our community, work to support their studies, pay their GST, are funding Medicare and contribute to super from their first day on the job. In return, the Liberals are cutting school funding, closing off university opportunities, taking us backwards on climate change, locking first home buyers out of the market and making it harder to get an apprenticeship or go to TAFE. Young Australians deserve better, so tonight I promise young Australians: Labor will create a level playing field for first home buyers, because I don't want us to live in a country where your only chance of owning a home is to inherit one. We're serious too about tackling climate change and helping the environment: 50 per cent renewables by 2030, a 45 per cent cut in emissions by 2030 and zero net emissions by 2050. I promise young Australians: we will not leave you a ruined reef and rivers and oceans choked with waste, and we will always invest in your education—schools, TAFE and uni—because we know that when you get opportunities Australia gets opportunities. When you succeed, Australia succeeds.

My twin brother, Robert, is here tonight, so happy birthday for Saturday. He knows that our mother sacrificed everything for our education, and it changed our lives. If I'm elected Prime Minister, I'll make it my mission to ensure that every Australian child gets the life-changing opportunity of a properly funded, quality education: reading and writing, maths and coding, science and languages, individual attention in the classroom and protection from bullying, be it online or in the schoolyard. I want children to discover and fall in love with what they're good at, and I want every public school to be able to offer music, drama, sport and camps. This government can announce as many education reviews as it wants; everyone knows that cutting school funding does not deliver better results. That is why Labor will put back every dollar the Liberals have cut from schools. The government's cuts have hit public schools and their 2½ million students the hardest. It's public schools that will benefit the most when we invest and restore the extra $17 billion over the next 10 years. It's our public system teaching 82 per cent of Australia's poorest kids, 84 per cent of Indigenous kids and 74 per cent of children with disabilities. We want the same when it comes to schools, the very best. So, when it comes to schools at the next election, the choice is simple: Labor will put $17 billion back into the schools and the Prime Minister will put $17 billion back into banks.

Nine out of 10 new jobs created in the next four years will need either a university degree or a TAFE qualification. It's why Labor believes in quality universities and strong public TAFEs, working side by side, equal partners in our nation's future. Yet, in this budget, the Liberals are cutting more money from university and TAFE. In government, Labor uncapped degree places and opened the doors of university to a new generation. Tens of thousands of students became the first person in their family to go to university. That's the fair go in action. But the Liberal freeze on university funding means 10,000 fewer places are available next year. By 2032, over 200,000 people will miss out. Millions of families in our regions want their child to go to an Australian university. They understand what it means to hold a degree from our country. The government's freeze won't affect them. No, it will simply lock out working-class kids and students from regional Australia. So tonight I am pleased to announce that Labor will restore funding certainty to our universities and we will uncap places, providing our nation with more than 200,000 university graduates. Under Labor, a university education is not a privilege you inherit; it's an opportunity you earn. We will always choose better university opportunities over better tax breaks for the big end of town.

Labor's plan for training is crystal clear. We will stop the slide to dodgy private providers and back public TAFE all the way. We'll renovate the campuses and rebuild the workshops. We'll ensure that, as a minimum, two out of three of our training dollars go to public TAFE. We will invest in programs to help older workers retrain in later life. We already know the expertise our nation will need in the next decade: more workers for the NDIS and in aged care; more construction workers for national infrastructure and housing; and more programmers and technicians for the digital age. I don't want Australia to meet these needs with skills visas; I want to train our people for these jobs. There is no excuse for a skills vacancy to last one day longer than it takes to train an Australian to do that job. So tonight I am pleased to announce that a Labor government will cover all up-front fees of 100,000 TAFE places in our first term in high-priority sectors from ag and engineering to disability and plumbing. We would expect at least half of these opportunities to go to the women of Australia. We'll get jobs like carpenters, cooks and bricklayers off the national skills shortage list and we will keep them off it. Instead of looking overseas or relying on temporary visas, employers will have a skilled local workforce ready to go. And we can make this happen because we put 100,000 TAFE places ahead of $80 billion of corporate tax giveaway.

This budget falls hardest on the young and the old. The Prime Minister is still cutting $14 a fortnight from pensioners, still telling Australians to work until they're 70, with no idea what it means to people who've spent their lives doing jobs that are hard on their bodies and tough on their backs. But I actually think that one of the sneakiest tricks in this year's budget is the fraud perpetrated on Australians in need of aged care. Around 105,000 older Australians are waiting for homecare packages. Despite all the hype, the government is offering only 14,000 places over the next four years. That's 14,000 places in four years, when 20,000 people joined the waiting list in the last six months alone. Worse still, in question time today we learned that there is no new funding here. They're simply taking the money away from residential care places and putting it into homecare places—nothing new. The people who raised us, cared for us and loved us deserve so much better than this money-go-round in aged care, cuts to their energy supplement and the world's oldest retirement age. If I'm Prime Minister, tackling dementia and delivering better aged care will be a national priority backed by real resources, because we know that giving older Australians the security and dignity they deserve matters more than an $80 billion corporate tax cut.

The same Liberal accounting trickery is at work in infrastructure. Across the four years of this budget, Commonwealth investment in infrastructure projects actually falls from $8 billion to $4½ billion. For the Western Sydney rail link, there's only money for a study—a report. The same goes for the train to Tullamarine—not a single dollar for construction. Apparently, this government can do it for free! Only Labor believes in nation building and in good public transport projects, like Cross River Rail, in Brisbane, or the Western Sydney rail line. When we invest in tourism infrastructure in northern Australia and Tasmania, when we improve the Bass Highway in Tassie, when we expand the Mitchell Freeway to cut congestion in WA and when we deliver long-overdue upgrades to the Bruce Highway, in Queensland—when we fund and build these projects—we'll prioritise Australian-made steel, we'll prioritise local workers and we'll require that one in every 10 people employed is an Australian apprentice. Labor can put real dollars into Australian infrastructure because we are not going to give $80 billion to multinationals and big corporations.

So, in conclusion, my fellow Australians, here is what the fair go means under a Labor government: rescuing hospitals and reinvesting in Medicare; proper funding for schools, TAFE and university; and a bigger, better income tax cut for 10 million working Australians. This is our plan, and this is my challenge to the Prime Minister: if you think that your budget is fair, if you think that your sneaky cuts can survive scrutiny, put it to the test. Put it to the test in Caboolture. Put it to the test in Burnie. Put it to the test in Fremantle and in Perth. I will put my better, fairer, bigger income tax cut against yours. I'll put my plans to rescue hospitals and fund Medicare against your cuts. I'll put my plans to properly fund schools against your cuts. I'll put my plan to boost wages against your plan to cut penalty rates. I'll put my plans for 100,000 TAFE places against your cuts to apprenticeships and training. I'll fight for the ABC against your cuts. House by house, street by street and suburb by suburb, my team and I will make this a referendum on your $80 billion corporate tax giveaway to multinationals, big business and the big banks. This nation needs a leader that gets it; it needs a party with a plan for the future; and it needs a government that will deliver a fair go for all Australians. That is what we deliver. That is our promise.

Debate adjourned.

House adjourned at 20:0 5

Thursday, 10 May 2018

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