Senator CORMANN (Western Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (13:07): I move:

That these bills may proceed without formalities, may be taken together and be now read a first time.

Question agreed to.

Bills read a first time.

Senator CORMANN (Western Australia—Minister for Finance, Vice-President of the Executive Council and Leader of the Government in the Senate) (13:08): I move:

That these bills be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speeches incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speeches read as follows—

FUTURE DROUGHT FUND BILL 2019

The Liberal-National Government is focused on helping farmers and communities prepare for inevitable future droughts.

The Future Drought Fund is a long-term investment to build drought resilience, including preparedness and recovery in our most drought affected communities. It will enable farmers and their communities to fulfil their potential as productive and profitable contributors to the Australian economy by improving the performance of the agriculture sector.

Healthy farming landscapes with innovative farming techniques will contribute to a drought resilient and sustainable agriculture sector. The Future Drought Fund will be available to support research, development and innovation. It will also support the delivery of infrastructure projects, promote the adoption of technology and deliver improved environmental and natural resource management to enhance sustainable agricultural practices. The Future Drought Fund will provide farm and community support to bolster drought resilience across Australia's rural and regional communities.

This Bill establishes the Future Drought Fund and provides an initial credit of $3.9 billion. The Government intends to grow the Fund until it reaches $5 billion, while at the same time drawing down $100 million per year from 1 July 2020 to build drought resilience across Australia. Once established, the Future Drought Fund will provide a new, secure, predictable revenue stream to build drought resilience across Australia.

This funding is additional to the funding already made available by the Liberal‑National Government to assist farmers during an existing drought and will not replace existing funding.

The Bill contains a robust and transparent governance framework, which has been augmented by amendments made by the previous Parliament in the House of Representatives, and I thank the current and former members of the House of Representatives crossbench for working productively with the Government on these. The governance framework is similar to the frameworks of other funds, such as the Medical Research Future Fund.

The Future Drought Fund will be managed by the Future Fund Board of Guardians, which has a proven track record of managing investment portfolios on behalf of the Government and maximising returns over the long-term.

The Bill requires the Treasurer and the Minister for Finance to issue directions setting out the Government's expectations as to how the Fund will be managed and invested by the Board, including setting a benchmark return for earnings. In setting the benchmark rate of return, the Government will consider the objectives to grow the fund to around $5 billion and make annual payments to the Agriculture Future Drought Resilience Special Account of $100 million per year to build drought resilience.

The Government will develop and publish the Drought Resilience Funding Plan to ensure that a coherent and consistent approach is undertaken when considering and providing funding for drought resilience projects. The draft Funding Plan will be informed by expert advice from the Future Drought Fund Consultative Committee, which will be established by this Bill. The Consultative Committee will consist of a diverse range of experts in fields such as the agriculture industry, drought resilience and rural and regional development. The Funding Plan will also be informed through public consultation over a period of at least 6 weeks.

The Funding Plan will be reviewed every four years to ensure that emerging priorities are appropriately captured and the Fund remains future-focussed. To help inform these reviews, the Productivity Commission will conduct an assessment of the effectiveness of each Funding Plan before it expires, including having regard to the economic, social and environmental outcomes. The Productivity Commission will make recommendations and the report will be tabled in each House of the Parliament.

In developing the Funding Plan, the Minister for Water Resources, Drought, Rural Finance, Natural Disaster and Emergency Management (Minister for Drought) will have regard to the National Drought Agreement and any successive agreements, as well as any related Government drought policies and strategies.

The Funding Plan will inform the design of the programs, which will be considered through future Budget processes. The Consultative Committee will provide advice to the Minister for Drought on whether the proposed design of a program for arrangements or grants is consistent with the Funding Plan.

To further ensure consistency with the Funding Plan, the Minister for Drought is required to seek advice from the Regional Investment Corporation Board before entering into any grants or funding arrangements. The Regional Investment Corporation Board is a skills-based independent expert board with the knowledge and experience needed to oversee significant government investments in farm businesses and water infrastructure. All funding decisions will comply with the Commonwealth's established rules and guidelines on grants and procurements. Detailed information on grants and arrangements under the Future Drought Fund will be published on the Agriculture Department's website.

Drought is a constant factor in Australian agriculture and the establishment of the Future Drought Fund will provide a new, secure, predictable funding stream for drought resilience into the future to ensure the potential of this vibrant industry is realised through drought resilience planning.

The Government has been absolutely clear that use of the dormant Building Australia Fund to deliver the Future Drought Fund will have absolutely no impact on the funding of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, which is fully funded through the Liberal-National Government's responsible economic and fiscal management that has delivered a strong and improving budget position, and a credible path back to surplus in 2019-20. Sustained responsible economic and fiscal management has ensured that the National Disability Insurance Scheme is fully funded, without the need to increase the Medicare levy or proceed with the previous Building Australia Fund measure.

It is why we are now in a position to guarantee Australians with a disability, and their families and carers, that all planned expenditure on the National Disability Insurance Scheme will be met in this year's Budget and beyond.

We have also committed more than $100 billion over the next 10 years to new and upgraded transport infrastructure projects across Australia, $47 billion of which is planned to be invested over the forward estimates.

Helping our farming communities face the challenges of drought is a key focus of this Government and because we have fully funded the NDIS and made substantial infrastructure commitments, we are in a position to build a sustainable source of funding for drought resilience, preparedness and recovery across Australia.

FUTURE DROUGHT FUND (CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS) BILL 2019

The Future Drought Fund (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019 facilitates the establishment of the Future Drought Fund through amendments to related legislation.

The consequential amendments to these acts enable the effective operation of the Future Drought Fund at commencement, including the abolition of the Building Australia Fund.

Commencement and further details can be found in the explanatory memorandum.

Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Shadow Minister for Finance, Shadow Minister for the Public Service and Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (13:08): I welcome the opportunity to speak today on these two bills, the Future Drought Fund Bill 2019 and the Future Drought Fund (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019. Labor have made it clear that we are not going to stand in the way of a drought fund. This is a position we've made clear in the House, but there are some criticisms I'd like to make in this speech this afternoon. I'll touch on a couple of points.

The first one is around the proper process for these bills. We do believe that this legislation is being rushed through without proper process. The debacle—

Senator Siewert: But you voted for the bills!

Senator GALLAGHER: Could I just make my comments. I listened to yours. In the debacle that occurred in the House last night, every attempt was made by the Labor Party to ensure there was a proper process and proper passage of this legislation, including allowing the opportunity for individual parties to go through their own processes. It has long been the convention in this place that, when you introduce a bill into the parliament, debate on the bill is then adjourned and then there are processes that parties go through in their own organisations and then there are processes that follow in this parliament to have a bill dealt with appropriately.

We have placed on the record our concerns that that process has been abused and that those conventions have been thrown out. The only reason for this, it seems, is so that the government can play some political game, the politics of wedge. That is the only the reason this has been rammed through; there are no other logical reasons. This bill was not introduced with the other legislation that was introduced in the first sitting week along with other bills that the government identified as priorities. This bill was not a part of that. There was no mention of it. The earliest opportunity that money could flow from these bills is 1 July 2020. So, in that sense, the urgency around these funds flowing is not there either.

The substance of the bill is another area that Labor has raised concerns about. This is not a $5 billion fund going to farmers, as the government would like the headlines to read. This is a fund that's being established from $3.9 billion, which is held in the Building Australia Fund, which was a fund established to ensure that there were proper processes around the allocation of infrastructure funding to align with Infrastructure Australia and to ensure, in the national interest, that our infrastructure funding was aligned with those priorities. We are concerned about the abolition of the Building Australia Fund. It was an important microeconomic reform, in terms of the ability to work in the national interest, as opposed to the examples we've seen in working in the National Party's interest. Again, we would be monitoring this drought fund for evidence of that.

In terms of the urgency, what we've seen from this government—particularly in this Prime Minister's rather bullying and arrogant style, which is fast becoming the standard operating procedure of this government since the 18 May election—is that it is essentially looking at how it can prioritise legislation based on fights that they can pick with Labor. We've seen this from so many, including the Leader of the Government in the Senate, the Prime Minister and other senior ministers, who are constantly out and about, going, 'This legislation is a test for Labor'. It is not: 'This legislation is seeking to support farmers, seeking to ensure we have appropriate resourcing going into drought remediation and research'. It is: 'This legislation is a test for Labor'. That's why this legislation has been rammed through over the last two days. In terms of the money that's allocated, not one cent of this fund will flow until 1 July 2020, at the earliest. And it's not a $5 billion fund; only $200 million is allocated for this parliamentary term.

We think it is juvenile and arrogant of this government to use this bill to play parliamentary games. There are only so many games they can play. Yesterday in this place, they ran out of work on the first real sitting day of the first sitting week since re-election. This third-term government, seemingly without an agenda, is dusting off legislation that they seemingly didn't prioritise in the last term. It was originally drafted and could have passed during the last parliament. The government is dusting off this legislation in an attempt to play a game and set a test for the opposition.

This government needs to start governing and it needs to start governing in the national interest. I think that's what the people of Australia want. They are sick of the conflict and the argument and the games that get played here in Canberra. It brings my home town into disrepute, I can tell you that. What they want to see is a government that's focused on the issues that matter to them, and those issues are significant and the drought is one of those significant issues. It is the worst drought in 120 years. When you travel around this country, you see the effects of it everywhere. The fact that the government would try and take a bill that, on the substance of the issue, a fund for drought remediation, should be something that has the unanimous support of this parliament and then use it in a way to try and wedge Labor is, I think, evidence of the fact that the government was not ready to be the government and is still scrambling around, looking at what its actual agenda will be over the next three years.

Labor's not going to play the game. We are prepared to stand up, move amendments, explain our position, argue for good process, argue to ensure that the national interest is being met and argue to make sure that the priorities facing this country are being dealt with. But we're not going to get suckered into the game the government is trying to play with us. We will not stand in the way of this fund, but we don't believe it's going to do the things the government is arguing it will do. We don't know why the government doesn't have a drought envoy anymore. We don't know why it doesn't have a drought strategy. We don't know why it's making this fund wait a year for any application to be considered under the arrangements. We don't think it's enough.

The Leader of the Opposition has made it clear: come and talk to us about an appropriation to actually support farmers and deal with the worst effects of the drought that is ravaging this country. Come and talk to us. At this stage, this is the best we've got to offer. We won't stand in the way of this bill, but we are going to make it clear that we don't think this is the proper way to deal with legislation. We don't think it treats the parliament respectfully and we don't think it treats the conventions of this place and the other place as they should be treated—that is, as the parliament has operated for some time now.

In the other place, Labor suggested a 24-hour delay to allow its processes to occur and to allow for proper consideration of the bills. But the government wouldn't even allow that to happen. Faced with the majority they've got in the House, and the fact that they are emboldened after the election, the thought that they could deny Labor caucus members the opportunity to discuss this bill obviously really excited them, and that's the path that they took yesterday. They wouldn't allow our caucus members to go through our own democratic processes and have that discussion. At the same time that the government was ramming this bill through in the other place, we were left with a farcical situation in this parliament—this chamber actually running out of business and having to revert back to the Governor-General's address-in-reply.

The fund isn't urgent. I mentioned the comments the Leader of the Labor Party made last week, when he made it clear that we will support drought assistance:

We'll support it not just for $100 million; we'll support it at every level you're prepared to put forward. We can bring it forward to the current financial year, not 12 months time. It could be more than $100 million, and we'd vote for it.

But the government is not telling the truth when it comes to the facts about the fund. It continues to call it the $5 billion Future Drought Fund. The $5 billion won't be available for farmers. It's $100 million a year, $200 million over the life of this parliament, and the fund doesn't reach that $5 billion level until the end of the decade.

In terms of the urgency of this bill, the government had this bill before the election but it didn't even put it before the Senate. Why wasn't it urgent then? The weather and the drought situation haven't dramatically changed in the last six months. Australia has been suffering through this drought for many years now.

In terms of support, we have played an important role in supporting government action to help farmers make their operations more resilient in the face of drought. We have supported all of the recent and immediate drought measures put forward by the Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison governments, including: an additional supplementary farm household allowance payment of up to $12,000 for eligible FHA recipients; increasing the FHA extension from three years to four years; increasing the farm asset threshold from $2.6 million to $5 million; and increasing the farm management deposit scheme to $800,000.

I don't think it's fair for those opposite—as they've been attempting to do—to play politics with this, ask Labor which side it's on and use all that poisonous divisive language that Australians are so sick of. When they look at the voting record, when they look at our position on this bill today, they cannot run any narrative about Labor not being on the side of farmers. Our voting record proves it. This is the pragmatic position we have taken on this bill today. Despite the attempts by the government to wind Labor up, we will not play that game. We are making our decisions on what's in the national interest and, in this instance, not standing in the way of this fund—despite our concerns about it—is the right thing to do.

In terms of the Building Australia Fund, the Future Drought Fund Bill not only sets up the new fund but also abolishes the Building Australia Fund and transfers the current uncommitted amount of funding, $3.95 billion, as in the 2019-20 portfolio budget statements, into the new fund. One of the arguments made by the government is that nothing has been drawn out of the BAF since 2012-13 and that it's been making small amounts of interest revenue. Let's have a look at that.

Instead of attempting to abolish the BAF on a number of occasions for asset recycling, and, most shamefully, attempting to paint Labor as being against the NDIS—those being just two of the examples—a serious government would not have let the BAF sit idle all this time. The Building Australia Fund actually assists people in regional Australia to get goods to markets, to make our roads safer and to build important infrastructure. This government has neglected that and is not talking about that side of the story at all.

Importantly, the Building Australia Fund was not a political slush fund. And that's exactly what the government's problem has been with it. It was a major economic reform. It was sensible. It was a transparent means of allocating scarce resources to achieve maximum benefit to the community. It wasn't to allow individual politicians to lobby hard and to get pet projects or special projects in their electorate that didn't necessarily align with the priorities of Infrastructure Australia, who'd go through a rigorous and detailed analysis of the benefits and costs of each project. If, in the future, we were elected and had the honour of forming government, we would re-establish a fund like the Building Australia Fund because we do think it's important that there be a funding component that's linked to the work that Infrastructure Australia does, and we do believe that the Australian people, when they have a look at it, will support independent, at-arms-length decisions made about nation-building infrastructure in this country.

To sum up: Labor supports the bill. We don't want to be painted as a party that opposes support for farmers. As I've explained in my speech, our voting record, the work that the shadow minister for agriculture has done and the comments that the Labor leader has made have made it very clear that we want more assistance for farmers; we want more effort from the government into looking at drought remediation and at things like climate change and the impact that that is having on the agricultural industry and farming in this country. We think a lot more can be done. We don't think this is the sole answer. But if this fund dishes out $200 million—hopefully, to very worthy projects that will have gone through a process that will have been improved through the efforts of the member for Indi—then that will be a good outcome.

But, as to the way that this has been handled by the government this week—without an agenda or any program, without any ideas on what they stand for, who they are and what they're going to do for the next three years—they have dusted off this bill and gone: 'You know what? This could be fun in the chamber this week. We could really try and put pressure on people if we bring this in and then ram it through the House and then put pressure on people not to support any delays in the Senate. That really could be fun.' That's the only reason we are standing here talking about this bill today—because it wasn't introduced by the government; it wasn't mentioned as a priority bill; it didn't get a mention in the first sitting week; it is not going to come into effect for another 11 to 12 months; no-one will see a cent of this—not one cent—next week, the week after nor the week after that; not for 11 or 12 months will any of this money flow.

We do object to the closing of the Building Australia Fund. We do think the reform that was put in place by the previous Labor government to separate infrastructure funding decisions from parliamentarians and to have a better process for aligning a funding source with the decisions of Infrastructure Australia is a much better way to go when you're looking at the long-term infrastructure needs of this country, not short-term pork-barrelling interests. That is the difference. That's what we are walking away from with this bill today. We object to that. I will be moving a second reading amendment. It will in fact be identical to the amendment we moved in the House to make sure that our objections are recorded and clear and that we will, in government, seek to reintroduce this style of fund with this approach in order to make sure that the process for allocating infrastructure is very clean and clear.

Don't believe the government's rhetoric for a minute. This is not a $5 billion fund; it is $100 million going out to projects yet to be determined in a years time and only $200 million over the next couple of years. We think more needs to be done. When it becomes clear that this is the government's answer to some of these major issues, I think most farmers and most farming communities who are living through this drought will be deeply disappointed. I move:

At the end of the motion, add:

“, but the Senate:

(a) condemns the Government for its failure over six years to develop and implement a comprehensive and effective policy to assist rural and regional communities facing severe drought conditions; and

(b) notes that the inferior response contained in the bill requires the abolition of the Building Australia Fund, which could be used to build road, rail, and other vital infrastructure—including water infrastructure—in these very same rural and regional communities.”

Senator RICE (Victoria) (13:26): The problem of drought is not going to go away. It's no longer a rare or unpredictable occurrence, like tropical cyclones or tornados. It's a harsh ongoing way of life for many Australian farmers, and we need to deal with it. But we simply cannot ignore the elephant in the room. We cannot deal with the problem of drought without dealing with our climate crisis. If we ignore climate change and only throw money at drought we might as well be putting a bandaid on a bullet wound.

The No. 1 thing that we need to do to support farmers and communities that are struggling with drought is to tackle our climate crisis; otherwise, droughts are going to keep on getting worse and worse and communities will suffer more and more as our climate gets hotter and dryer. You only need to look at the news just in the last week. We've heard that the Murray Darling Basin has had half its normal rainfall this year and the Murray Darling is experiencing the worst drought on record. Across Australia, the first half of this year was the second warmest on record and we've had the second driest conditions in the 120 years that we've been keeping records. There's even evidence that Australia hasn't been as dry as it is right now for two to three million years. We are still on track for four degrees of warming. If that happens, the climate of our wheat-growing areas will become like the climate of the central deserts—and no drought fund can deal with that. That's what we're on track for by 2070, when these kids that are in the gallery today will only be as old as most of us in here are now. You cannot be bequeathing them that type of future.

Australia's domestic carbon pollution is the highest per person of any country in the world. When you add in the pollution that comes from our exports of coal, gas and oil, we're responsible for one tonne out of every 25 tonnes of carbon pollution into the atmosphere that's being released across the globe, despite being less than half a per cent of the world's population. In the carbon pollution stakes, Australia is a massive player. We really do punch above our weight, and we need to equally pay a big role in tackling our climate crisis.

The importance of doing this is underlined by the fact that, sadly, we know that we are already in this climate crisis. Hotter and dryer conditions are already baked in. We're dealing with the consequent drought crisis that we have to be tackling, which shows that we must be investing in projects that support farmers in building resilience to face this climate crisis, that build agricultural systems, that work to regenerate our land and our soils, and that reduce rather than increase the water that's being taken from our rivers, our streams and our groundwater. What this means is not building big new dams to prop up unsustainable agribusiness. It means not delivering for the corporate vested interests that are sucking our rivers dry rather than delivering for struggling farmers who really need our help.

This bill, as it currently stands, is not what Australia needs. It's been rammed through. It's been used as a political football. But I'm not going to dwell on this, because the issue of drought is too important for us to be dwelling on the politics of how this is being misused at the moment. So I'm going to focus on what needs to happen to improve this bill and on the amendments that the Greens are going to move to this bill, which will make it a bill that can be supported and that will deliver for the struggling farmers of Australia. The problems with this bill start with the deep lack of accountability of the drought minister and the fact that the whole bill and the whole fund that is being invested in is leaving the door open to money actually being invested in fossil fuels, the sector that contributes to drought. There are huge changes that are needed.

There are four issues that the Greens seek to amend, and we look forward to the amendments being supported across this parliament. I'm particularly looking forward to the support of the Labor Party, because many of the issues are those that Senator Gallagher just outlined about the Labor Party's concerns about the bill. Firstly, we must significantly increase the parliamentary oversight of the drought minister. This bill gives far too much leeway to the minister and his National Party mates to pick and choose which projects get funded. Secondly, we must ensure the integrity of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan and of our national water laws. Thirdly, we have to make sure that this bill doesn't rip $3.9 billion out of the Building Australia Fund. Our cities and regions are already experiencing chronic underinvestment in transport infrastructure. Instead, the Greens are proposing that the moneys for this fund should come from the billions of dollars in subsidies and tax breaks that we give to the fossil fuel industry every year. They are the ones who should be paying to clean up their own mess. Finally, it needs to be crystal clear that the investment vehicle for this fund must not invest in fossil fuels. It would be the peak of cynicism to have a drought fund that's designed to help our regions adapt to the impacts of climate change simultaneously investing in the very industries that are causing that climate crisis.

Cathy McGowan's amendments from the last parliament did improve this bill and the transparency and accountability of the remit of the minister, but they don't go far enough. As the bill currently sits, we've got a Future Drought Fund Consultative Committee which must provide advice on the Drought Resilience Funding Plan, and the minister must have regard to that advice. But, when it comes to advice on the design of grants or payments for individual projects, there is nothing. There's no need whatsoever for the minister to listen to the committee. The minister must ask for advice from the committee, but there's no requirement for the minister actually to listen to that advice. They can pick and choose whatever projects they like, as long as it can be argued that overall they comply with that drought resistance plan. So our first suite of amendments is building on and strengthening it to ensure that the minister actually must have regard to the advice of the committee on whether each individual grant or arrangement complies with the plan, as it would provide one further check on the minister's discretion.

Let's go to the consultative committee. We're setting up a consultative committee, but who do you think gets to pick the members of the consultative committee? Why, it's the minister. There needs to at least be some degree of proper community oversight over this committee. That's why the Greens would require, first of all, a public call for nominations to the committee, inviting the public to nominate people and then requiring the minister to take notice of the submissions that they receive. Then we would require the minister to publish written notice of their intent to nominate a member of that committee. There should be a submission period in relation to that nomination, and the final decision by the minister must have regard to those submissions.

When you look at other bodies that distribute money on this sort of scale, such as the Regional Investment Corporation, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, it's not the minister for energy or the minister for industry running around selecting individual projects to fund. By leaving these decisions directly in the hands of the minister, there is a much higher threshold of accountability that's required. That's why we think that each arrangement or grant should be disallowable by the parliament. We simply cannot afford to have a drought minister pork-barrelling projects across the country with such minimal oversight. Drought mitigation and resilience is too serious an issue for that. We're not saying that parliament should be disallowing hundreds of projects, but it does mean that in any egregious breach of good governance or in cases of clear corruption, which we have seen plenty of evidence of, there need to be safeguards in the public interest.

Our second suite of amendments relates to preventing the Future Drought Fund from ripping billions of dollars out of our infrastructure budget. Yes, Minister Littleproud was correct in saying that the Building Australia Fund hasn't been used to fund projects for half a decade; but that's entirely the fault of the government. The government have chosen to work around the Building Australia Fund because that money actually requires a degree of oversight by Infrastructure Australia of where the money goes, and they don't want that oversight—another example of the Nationals trying to work around good governance and good process to deliver money for their pet projects. But we don't even need to make this compromise. You don't need to raid the infrastructure budget to pay for this drought fund. There are billions and billions of dollars on the table ready to be taken from the very companies who are causing the climate crisis and the water crisis and the drought crisis, and that is the fossil fuel industry.

The Greens propose that we can raise $4.9 billion over the next two years merely by applying a flat 10 per cent royalty on projects that are subject to the petroleum resource rent tax. This would mean that multinational oil and gas companies like Exxon and Royal Dutch Shell would be funding drought resilience, not the taxpayer—and they should. It is the climate pollution spewing out of their operations that is causing and exacerbating drought. Right now the petroleum resource rent tax is the most rorted tax in the country. There are over $300 billion of tax credits ready to offset future payments, and they are growing at a higher rate than the bond rate. In its current form, the PRRT is absolutely useless. We are simply letting these giant oil and gas companies dig up and burn our resources for free. If you did fix the PRRT, this 10 per cent royalty would be offset against their liabilities under the PRRT and basically act as a floor. If they are making profits out of digging up our oil and gas, then 10 per cent of those profits should be taxed and go to pay for drought resilience. It's a policy that the Greens took to the election. But, even without changes to the way that the PRRT is calculated, this royalty would at least provide a baseline of revenue for the Commonwealth.

I will be moving amendments to keep the Building Australia Fund intact. And, yes, we understand the constitutional limitations of the Senate, so our initiative with regard to the PRRT is in the form of a second reading amendment. I foreshadow that I will move my second reading amendment that has been distributed in the chamber, calling on the government to properly tax those oil and gas super-majors to pay for the climate chaos that they are creating.

Our third suite of amendments relates to our grave concerns that this money is going to be used to build giant new dams up and down the Murray-Darling Basin—

Senator McKenzie: Hear, hear!

Senator RICE: that mean that downstream communities in Wilcannia, Menindee, Mildura, Wentworth and Renmark, at the Murray mouth and all along the Coorong, will see their situation worsen. There simply is not enough water in the basin for further extraction. But we know that the Nationals don't care. In fact, I just heard Senator McKenzie saying 'hear, hear'. We know that they see their role as facilitating the rorting, facilitating the gross corruption of the Basin Plan, and supporting upstream irrigation.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Bernardi ): Order. Resume your seat for a moment, Senator Rice. Senator McKenzie, do you have a point of order?

Senator McKenzie: Senator Rice thinks she can come into this place and—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Do you have a point of order, Senator McKenzie?

Senator McKenzie: I do. I think she just disparaged the entire National Party and, as National Party deputy leader, I think we are not—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: There is no point of order, Senator McKenzie. Please resume your seat. Senator Rice, you have the call.

Senator RICE: And they are supporting upstream irrigation by big agribusiness. We want some security that this funding isn't about helping out big corporate irrigators but is about delivering real water efficiency and real land rehabilitation, so we'll be moving amendments to ensure that the drought minister is properly consulting with the Murray-Darling Basin Authority and that the arrangements and grants from this fund are properly compliant with the Water Act.

Finally, we need to be very clear about what this proposed $3.9 billion is for. Yes, there's $100 million going to drought resilience, but that $3.9 billion will be invested in a suite of securities and financial assets. It would be so deeply cynical and ironic if that $3.9 billion, which is designed to generate a self-sustaining $100 million a year drought resilience fund, was in turn investing in the very companies and body corporates that produce the fossil fuels that create drought. The Greens have previously called for divestment from fossil fuels and the tobacco and arms industries across all of the Commonwealth's financial investments, but this is such a clear-cut starting place. How can you not support the concept? It would just be astounding if this Senate thought it appropriate for the Future Drought Fund to invest in fossil fuel companies. To supplement this we believe the investment mandate of the Future Drought Fund should be a disallowable instrument. We must counteract this trend that we're seeing—that is, more and more use of delegated instruments and taking power away from this parliament and putting it in the hands of the minister.

These amendments are sensible; they follow the principles of accountability of the executive to parliament and proper community consultation. They make it clear that you don't need to lay waste to our infrastructure portfolio to fund drought relief. They ensure that the Murray-Darling Basin Plan is protected from further wrecking by the National Party, and they make clear the principle that the very fund designed to ensure drought resilience should not be investing in the companies that are causing the climate crisis.

We hope that Labor support these commonsense amendments. But it's hard to hold much hope in them any more when they seem to be rolling over for the government at every opportunity. I mean, they said they were against the government's tax cuts and then they voted for them. They said that Australia needs to act on climate change, yet they voted with the government on a motion supporting opening up the Galilee Basin. Labor says that Newstart payments are too low, yet they voted against the Greens' motion to raise the rate of Newstart by $75 a week. Labor said they were against this bill but then they voted with the government in the House, and we just heard Senator Gallagher saying that Labor are not going to stand in the way. What has happened to Labor's principles? Where is their backbone? What is the point? Labor, it's not your job to facilitate the government's agenda. Yes, you lost the election, but millions of Australians voted for you to represent them. Millions of people voted for you in what is now obviously the vain hope that you would actually do something, that you would actually stand up and stand by your principles. Labor, you said that you weren't happy with the bill and that you didn't want the funding to come from the Building Australia Fund, so let's work together. Support these Greens' amendments to fix the big problems with this bill and to get that money to the farmers who need it.

I say: yes, let's create a national drought fund but not a giant slush fund for the drought minister and the Nationals to continue to prop up their mates in big agribusiness, not if it means ripping out nearly $4 billion from our national infrastructure budget, not if it means ripping up the Water Act and the Murray Darling Basin Plan and building giant new dams for the upstream cotton industry and not if it means creating a new investment stream for coal and oil and gas companies. We can do this; we can create a proper drought fund with proper oversight, and we can make the fossil fuel industry pay for it. Our amendments are sensible. They make important and nuance changes to the bill, and I call on the Senate to support the Greens in holding this government to account and ensuring that we don't exacerbate this truly awful drought blighting our country by once again handing the National Party a blank cheque.

Senator McKENZIE (Victoria—Minister for Agriculture and Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) (13:45): Once again we've been subjected to Senator Rice, on behalf of the Greens, deriding regional Australians, deriding our primary producers, our farmers, our fishers and our foresters, deriding people who are doing it tough in a drought. We are the nation of droughts and flooding rains. That is not just a part of our present and our future but it has always been a part of our past. The Australian Greens come in here as the ultimate hypocrites. They say they support farmers and farming, but the reality is they do not want to see us farming in this country. It is members of the Greens who promote civil disobedience as animal activists rush in to terrorise, intimidate, harass and steal from our primary producers. That is the reality of the Australian Greens and the view they hold of Australian farming families and their communities. The National Party have been in this place for 100 years, standing up for farmers and regional communities, not for some private slush fund, Senator Rice—through you, Mr Acting Deputy President. We fundamentally understand and know that our nation's entire wealth generation comes from regional Australia, from the blood, sweat and tears of our pioneers in the past and from the innovation and the hard work of our farmers going into the future. That's why we as a government are very proud to continue to support our farmers and communities to prepare for future droughts.

Those opposite—and we heard it with Senator Gallagher's contribution—complain about not knowing that the Future Drought Fund Bill 2019 was going to be debated this week. I don't know why they didn't hear that at the Bush Summit last weekend in Dubbo. I don't know why they hadn't heard. Maybe they don't read regional newspapers. But blind Freddy knew that this bill was going to be debated this week. I would have thought that any political party that was seeking to form government at this point in our nation's present would have a plan on how to deal with the drought, not just in the present—as we are doing, and I'll run through those initiatives—but onwards into the future, because this won't be the last time our farmers, our communities and our nation experience drought conditions. We need to have a plan to ensure we build resilience going forward.

We have a variable climate, and it continues to change. We'll continue to support our farmers to produce the best clean, green product but also prepare for ongoing droughts and climate contingencies. The politics being played by the ALP in the other place last night was absolutely farcical. At the Bush Summit run by The Daily Tele in Dubbo last week, you would have heard the Leader of the Opposition talk a big game about supporting regional communities and drought-affected farmers and then say he was going to take the politics out of it. Well, all I've seen in the other place for the last two days, on issues that affect drought-affected farmers, is politics being played. There was vote after vote last night, as Tony Burke threw a tantrum around us trying to move this bill forward.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Bernardi ): I'd ask you to refer to the member in the other place by his right title.

Senator McKENZIE: Well, a lot of politics has been played and—

Opposition senators interjecting—

Senator McKENZIE: I'm sorry I haven't memorised the electorates of every MP in the country.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Sterle, you have a point of order?

Senator Sterle: Mr Acting Deputy President, the point of order is that you asked the minister to refer to those in the other house by their titles, and she ignored you. It's pretty simple.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Sterle, I thought Senator McKenzie made a very gracious save, and I don't think she needs any of your assistance.

Senator McKENZIE: So the opposition choose to play politics with drought and drought-affected farmers because of their inability to make decisions and their lack of understanding and appreciation of the issues affecting regional Australia, whereas we, on the other hand, have a suite of measures already that we've been delivering in government and that we will continue to deliver not just for the present but, as I said, to build the resilience in our regional communities and our primary producers to deal with the next drought.

Since we were last here, I've travelled the country, meeting farmers, agribusiness owners, workers and families from rural and regional Australia, many of whom are suffering from the impacts of the drought. From Bowen to Dubbo, Mildura to Port Lincoln and right across the country, the message remains the same. Many of our regional communities are doing it really tough right now. For many, this drought is the worst they have ever experienced. It's long monotonous days of feeding cattle and sheep, of wondering how the next household bill or farm bill is going to get paid, of watching the horizon and the BOM radar results for a speck of cloud and pleasing data, and of praying for rain.

Our farmers are resilient. They're tough. They're used to the good and bad, but this drought has been tough and is testing even the best farmers out there. From day one, our government has prioritised backing our farmers. They not only feed and clothe our nation but help drive our nation's wealth, as they export 70 per cent of what they produce. The lifestyles of those living in the city are actually only possible because of the hard work of our primary producers.

We know as a government that, when regional Australia is strong and prosperous, our whole nation's economy is strong. Already as a government, we've provided $6.3 billion to farmers experiencing drought. Our support and assistance measures cover a range of areas, including financial assistance, investment in infrastructure, rural and regional mental health initiatives, combating pests and weeds, making information easier to access and improving existing services such as the farm household allowance and the Rural Financial Counselling Service.

But we're not only supporting our farmers now. We've always said we will support our farmers and their communities and hence our nation's future prosperity into the future, and that's exactly what this bill does. It is our government's commitment to supporting our agricultural sector into the future. The Future Drought Fund is a long-term investment to build drought resilience, including preparedness and recovery in our most drought-affected communities. It will enable farmers and their communities to fulfil their potential as productive and profitable contributors to the Australian economy by improving the performance of the overall agricultural sector. The Future Drought Fund will support research, development and innovation. We know that healthy farming landscapes created through innovative farming techniques will contribute to a drought-resilient and sustainable agricultural sector.

From the stump-jump plough to precision direct cropping, our farmers have always led the world in innovation. This fund will ensure the next innovations come sooner to help our farmers to continue to adjust. It will also support the delivery of infrastructure projects, promote the adoption of technology and deliver improved environmental and natural resource management to enhance sustainable agricultural practices. The Future Drought Fund will also provide farm and community support to bolster drought resilience across rural and regional communities. And, once established, the Future Drought Fund will provide a new, secure and predictable revenue stream to build drought resilience across Australia. This funding is additional to the funding already made available by the Liberal-National government to assist farmers during the existing drought and will not replace existing funding measures.

The Future Drought Fund will be managed by the Future Fund Board of Guardians, and these guys have a proven track record of managing investment portfolios on behalf of the government and of maximising returns over the long term. In setting the benchmark rate of return, the government will consider the objectives to grow the fund to around $5 billion and make annual payments of $100 million to the Agriculture Future Drought Resilience Special Account to build drought resilience.

Drought is a constant factor in our agricultural system. The establishment of the Future Drought Fund will provide new, secure and predictable funding streams for drought resilience into the future to ensure the potential of this vibrant industry is realised through resilience planning. Drought has been on our government's agenda from day one. Helping our farming communities face the challenges is a key focus of our government. We won't be playing politics on drought. We'll continue to back our regions, back our regional communities and farmers and fight for the issues they care about.

We've heard a lot of talk in some of the contributions about slush funds. I'm sure that, if the Greens held a regional seat—or, indeed, if the Labor Party had seats that were dependent on agriculture—they wouldn't be viewing this money as slush funding; they would be viewing this money as building the future capacity and resilience of those communities and providing more local jobs into regional communities of growing agriculture. For Nationals MPs and regional Liberal MPs, drought programs and future resilience are key not for a slush fund but in building and seeking to secure a safe, prosperous regional Australia and agriculture industry not just for them and their local communities but indeed for our entire nation. I support the bill.

Senator WATT (Queensland) (13:55): In the short time I have before question time I will also begin my contribution in which I rise to speak on the Future Drought Fund Bill 2019 and the Future Drought Fund (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019 and support the amendment moved by Senator Gallagher. I want to make clear that Labor supports all and any actions being taken to support drought-affected farmers and communities. In fact we have supported all recent and immediate drought measures put forward by first the Abbott government, then the Turnbull government and more recently the Morrison government, but these bills are not putting forward any real solutions. The government has had plenty of opportunities to bring forward real funding to support farmers and their communities. Indeed Labor have said time and again that we will support a special appropriation for drought support. We actually want to see this government provide some real funding for drought support.

But after six years of wasted opportunities this government is only making our farmers and our rural and regional communities wait even longer for investments. Despite all the bravado that these bills must be passed this week, guess when the money is actually going to flow from this fund? It will be at least a year. Not one cent can flow until 1 July 2020 at the earliest. This urgent fund to relieve droughts across Australia is so urgent that at the very earliest funds won't flow from it for at least 12 months—not next week, not next month, nor even January next year. So much for being an urgent drought package—the glacial pace with which this government moves.

Only on 1 July next year when we finally get around to the point that funds can actually be distributed from this drought fund, which we have been hearing over and over again is a $5 billion drought fund, guess how much money will be provided from this allegedly $5 billion drought fund? It will be only $100 million per year first for the 2020-21 financial year and then only another $100 million available for the following financial year. That's it: a $5 billion urgent drought fund that won't kick in for at least 12 months and even then will provide only $100 million a year—all this rush for $200 million over two years.

If the Morrison government were serious about assisting our farmers, real money would be on the table right now and real projects would be underway. That's what Labor would like to see happen. As the shadow minister for northern Australia and the shadow minister for natural disaster and emergency management, in addition to being a Queensland senator, I know well the effects of drought and have been devastated at what can only be described as the lack of action from this government over the past six years. Under a mirage of appearing to finally do something on the drought, this government is now rushing through these bills that will abolish the $3.9 billion Building Australia Fund, which is actually designed to build infrastructure in rural and regional communities, including those that are affected by drought, as well as in our cities and has been in place for many years since the last federal Labor government established it.

That Building Australia Fund set up by Labor, which is now being raided by the government because it's not prepared to make a special allocation to support farmers and rural communities, has built infrastructure like the Ipswich Motorway in Queensland, the Hunter Expressway in New South Wales, the Pacific Highway Kempsey bypass in New South Wales and the Regional Rail Express in Victoria and has fixed NBN blackspots throughout regional Australia. They are the kinds of projects that have previously been funded through the Building Australia Fund under the last Labor federal government. The Building Australia Fund is a $3.9 billion fund that this government has failed to draw on, failed to access and failed to utilise, even though it can support projects in drought affected communities across—

The PRESIDENT: Order! Senator Watt, you will be in continuation and I believe you have the call.

Senator PATRICK (South Australia) (15:37): I move:

(1) That a select committee, to be known as the Select Committee on the Multi-Jurisdictional Management and Execution of the Murray Darling Basin Plan, be established to inquire and report on the following matters:

(a) responsibilities in relation to the management and execution of the Murray Darling Basin Plan consistent with the objects of the Water Act 2007, in particular:

   (i) Commonwealth responsibilities,

   (ii) state and territory responsibilities, and

   (iii) areas of uncertainty or potential conflict in respect of responsibilities;

(b) the effects, positive or negative or otherwise, of the different approaches of the states and territories to water resource management in the Murray Darling Basin including, but not limited to:

   (i) legislation, regulations and rules,

   (ii) management and administration, including differences in management organisations,

   (iii) measuring, monitoring and compliance,

   (iv) enforcement, and

   (v) openness and transparency;

(c) complications in respect of basin-wide or cross jurisdiction oversight, including the oversight roles and jurisdictional limitations of:

   (i) state, territory and federal parliaments,

   (ii) state, territory and federal courts, and

   (iii) state, territory and federally-instituted inquiries and Royal Commissions;

(d) any bill related to the Murray Darling Basin referred to the committee; and

(e) any related matters.

(2) That the committee present its final report on or before 1 November 2020.

(3) That the committee consist of 6 senators:

(a) 2 nominated by the Leader of the Government in the Senate;

(b) 2 nominated by the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate;

(c) 1 nominated by the Leader of the Australian Greens; and

(d) Senator Patrick.

(4) That:

(a) participating members may be appointed to the committee on the nomination of the Leader of the Government in the Senate, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate or any minority party or independent senator;

(b) participating members may participate in hearings of evidence and deliberations of the committee, and have all the rights of members of the committee, but may not vote on any questions before the committee; and

(c) a participating member shall be taken to be a member of the committee for the purpose of forming a quorum of the committee if a majority of members of the committee is not present.

(5) That the committee may proceed to the dispatch of business notwithstanding that not all members have been duly nominated and appointed and notwithstanding any vacancy.

(6) That the committee elect as chair one of the members nominated by the Leader of the Government in the Senate, and Senator Patrick as deputy chair.

(7) That the deputy chair shall act as chair when the chair is absent from a meeting of the committee or the position of chair is temporarily vacant.

(8) That the chair, or the deputy chair when acting as chair, may appoint another member of the committee to act as chair during the temporary absence of both the chair and deputy chair at a meeting of the committee.

(9) That, in the event of an equally divided vote, the chair, or the deputy chair when acting as chair, have a casting vote.

(10) That the committee have power to appoint subcommittees consisting of three or more of its members, and to refer to any such subcommittee any of the matters which the committee is empowered to examine.

(11) That the committee and any subcommittee have power to send for and examine persons and documents, to move from place to place, to sit in public or in private, notwithstanding any prorogation of the Parliament or dissolution of the House of Representatives, and have leave to report from time to time its proceedings, the evidence taken and such interim recommendations as it may deem fit.

(12) That the committee be provided with all necessary staff, facilities and resources and be empowered to appoint persons with specialist knowledge for the purposes of the committee with the approval of the President.

(13) That the committee be empowered to print from day to day such documents and evidence as may be ordered by it, and a daily Hansard be published of such proceedings as take place in public.

Question agreed to.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (15:38): I move:

That the following bill be introduced: A Bill for an Act to amend the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011, and for related purposes. Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Amendment (Australian Freedoms) Bill 2019.

Question agreed to.

Senator BERNARDI: I present the bill and move:

That this bill may proceed without formalities and be now read a first time.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a first time.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (15:39): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to table an explanatory memorandum relating to the bill.

Leave granted.

Senator BERNARDI: I table an explanatory memorandum and I seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

It is time to make a bold and express stand for freedom in this country.

The Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Amendment (Australian Freedoms) Bill 2019 is designed to explicitly protect the inherent, unalienable freedoms of each and every Australian.

The Bill achieves this protection by prescribing a set of fundamental "Australian freedoms" that lawmakers will be required to consider and protect in the design, drafting and appraisal of new laws.

These newly prescribed freedoms include the freedom of opinion, speech, thought, conscience and religion as well as the rights to life and protection of the family. They also include freedom from torture and retrospective criminal laws.

As intended by our liberal-democratic predecessors, these prescribed, unalienable freedoms will be given priority over other human rights. Where competition or conflict occurs, these Australian freedoms will take priority, irrespective of whether the competing right:

is one prescribed in section 3 of the current Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act2011 (the Act);

has been created by laws prohibiting discrimination or "giving offence" to members of a certain identity group, for example, section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (RDA); or

exists through other means.

The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights (the Committee) will be armed with these explicit and prioritised Australian freedoms when carrying out its assessments of proposed laws for compatibility with human rights and freedoms. This will have the effect of better disciplining all lawmakers into preserving, respecting and prioritising our unalienable freedoms. Lawmakers will be less able and inclined to curtail or remove freedoms and only dare propose to—let alone succeed in doing so—if the rationale is explicit, unavoidable and compelling.

The Committee will also be armed with these explicit freedoms when either:

existing Acts or regulations are referred to it for examination regarding compatibility with human rights and freedoms, or

the Attorney-General refers a relevant matter to it.

Why is it now necessary to better prescribe and protect what was long implied?

Since Federation, our Constitution, lawmakers and common law practitioners have implicitly upheld these Australian freedoms; treating them as default positions to be keenly defended and protected. They were considered inherent and unalienable; unable to be taken away or transferred, and pre-existing of the state.

In fact, many of our predecessors—or founding fathers of the liberal-democratic West—considered that the nation-state only arises to better ensure, via a constitution, the protection of those unalienable freedoms (and maybe very little more).

Unfortunately, these freedoms—long-considered implied and existing by default in our Constitution and common law—can no longer be taken for granted. As myriad new rights are defined, with new laws enacted and new legal and corporate precedents set, these unalienable freedoms are being gradually whittled down, crowded out and competed away.

In this postmodernist politically correct (PC) era of identity politics, new rights, laws and interpretations are proliferating; ones that reward or appease certain interests and divide humanity into groups, often based on identity. Human and other rights are being increasingly contrived for certain groups or agendas which intrude on and undermine the inherent freedoms, dignity and sanctity of the individual. This in turn unpicks the fabric of liberal-democratic society.

In fact, more—not fewer—anti-discrimination Acts, commissioners and enforcements are being proposed by many, and not always from one side of the political aisle. Moreover, in law and in practice, the term "discrimination" has worryingly broadened. In many circles—both legal and social—it now seemingly also includes criticism, critique and anything other than endorsement, celebration and praise.

Will we one day have to overtly and eagerly applaud certain things as do North Koreans in front of their President?

Tepid tolerance or mere acceptance—that may trigger discomfort, hurt feelings or offence—can be construed as borderline discrimination and grounds for sanction. As such, anti-discrimination laws can become useful weapons to ostracise and suppress criticism of certain positions and views, driving opponents out of the public space and eroding fundamental freedoms of speech, expression, association and conscience. By doing so, it also prevents us from considering, describing and solving problems that a liberal democracy is so good at and exceptional for, relative to the socialist, tyrannical or developing world.

To counter this trend of new PC rights and anti-discrimination law eroding our unalienable freedoms, piecemeal Acts are being proposed to protect very specific freedoms. For example, a freedom of religion Act has been proposed to protect the views and practices of the religious from the relatively new, but burgeoning, rights of the LGBTIQ+/rainbow community; one that has become quite imperialistic and aggressive since winning the same-sex marriage debate in 2017, as many predicted.

Unless handled very carefully—both legislatively and in subsequent interpretations and practice—such a response gravely risks a slippery slope towards blasphemy laws, which certain religions and their adherents will eagerly exploit.

Another trend eating away at our unalienable freedoms is the rise of a disturbing form of PC corporate fascism. Increasingly, large employers and organisations are requiring their employees to sign employment contracts that place myriad PC prohibitions on the private lives, expressions and conduct of those employees; either due to pressure from sponsors, Twitter and social media or from the PC busybodies increasingly nesting in their own human resources or communications branches.

The typical justification is that it helps prevent employees from tarnishing the good name of the employer or brand and risking bringing it into disrepute. This has the effect of employers increasingly owning the lives of their employees in totality; not just the work that they do or the roles and tasks they perform. Without restoring some balance and common sense here, many unalienable freedoms of these individuals will be stripped away as they become, in effect, wards of their employers.

Such freedom-sapping terms in these contracts should not be enforceable, let alone drafted in the first place. However, in this era of Twitter and social media they are becoming the norm and employees feel that they have no choice but to accept and live by them. Whilst this Bill does not directly limit corporate fascism, it will help curb new laws being made that enable and encourage it. It also opens a potential avenue for the examination of existing anti-discrimination laws and practice which, in turn, could help identify and address their freedom-sapping effects.

For example, certain anti-discrimination law and practice can give rise to policies of "diversity and inclusion" in a workplace or industry sector. However, when activists are allowed to drive these policies and their enforcement to the extreme, unwanted views, ideas and people can be conveniently nobbled or even driven out of the public sphere.

This is another justification for an Act that seeks to prioritise the unalienable freedoms of all Australians and helps to remind us of our liberal-democratic roots and better selves.

In the United States, they at least have a Bill of Rights—comprising the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution—to counter these assaults and forays on basic freedoms. We do not. Sadly, it seems, we can no longer rely on our lawmakers, judiciary and corporations to uphold the freedoms that made Australia so free, expressive and prosperous.

These freedoms need to be reasserted—not through a US-style Bill of Rights, which would be overkill—but through a change to the law which makes it far more difficult for the Parliament to ride roughshod over our unalienable freedoms with so little justification when passing laws conferring new rights on certain citizens or groups (or examining existing laws that are shown to gratuitously crimp these freedoms).

Australian freedoms (and sovereignty) are being eroded by forces both within and beyond our borders.

The United Nations (UN), through its myriad treaties, conferences and compacts, seeks to undermine the sovereignty of liberal-democratic nation-states. These UN instruments and agendas also deliberately curb the liberties of the citizenry of these states to determine their own outcomes.

Last December, the UN held migration and climate conferences in Marrakesh, Morocco and in Katowice, Poland respectively.

Thankfully, the Australian Government was sensible enough to reject signing the Global Compact on Migration in Morocco; designed to lay the foundation for open borders through a "right to migration". However, concerningly, the UN's other migration compact—on refugees—has yet to be as keenly rejected by our Government and so remains very much in play.

The UN climate conference in Poland further pushed signatories to the Paris Climate Accord—like Australia—toward a "right to sustainable development". These conferences and their outcomes empower radical green ideology on climate change and till the soil for all the redistributive taxes and stultifying regulations that are intended and will inevitably flow.

Last month's conference in Bonn, Germany, saw the UN climate agenda co-opting rainbow and indigenous politics to further unite globalist, left-wing causes and undermine the freedoms of the individual in favour of "woke" identity groups.

On another domestic front, over the last decade, we have seen the atrocious free speech cases around section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act (RDA). These involved Queensland University of Technology students, the late Bill Leak (and in a similar scenario Herald Sun cartoonist, Mark Knight), Andrew Bolt, Sonia Kruger and Samantha Armytage.

In each of these cases, someone was able to take offence at what had been either said, drawn or written, file a basic complaint to the Race Discrimination Commissioner of the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) —either openly or anonymously—and have that complaint enthusiastically taken up by the Commissioner. The respondent was then dragged through copious lawfare often without the complainant further impacted (even known).

Under section 18C of the RDA, the process imposed on the respondent has become the punishment. Such capacity for hit-and-run offence-taking invites vexatious, effortless complaints that target and silence political opponents. Any PC identity group protected by such legal rights and processes can weaponise the system to take out its opponents as well as shield other groups from that opponent's scrutiny and criticism (for example, Andrew Bolt).

The section 18C cases have had a chilling effect on speech and expression in the indigenous, immigration and multicultural space. So much so that real problems, valid criticisms, necessary critiques and likely solutions cannot be freely discussed as the threat of lawfare—for commentary which falls far short of defamation, libel and incitement to violence—looms large.

Worse, at the last election, Mr Shorten's Labor opposition was proposing to:

beef up enforcement of the RDA's section 18C to crack down further on "hate speech";

add an LGBTIQ Commissioner to the AHRC's eight current commissioners; and

look to expand the concept of section 18C to other forms of discrimination.

Proposals like this will not remain dormant for long. They will be dusted off and proposed again.

That is why we, as Australians, need to more explicitly define and protect our unalienable freedoms in law; to stop the encroachment of other rights being defined and enforced, particularly those favouring PC identity groups and their activists.

This Bill will help to challenge lawmaking mindsets and practices that too readily tamper with and restrict our unalienable freedoms. This Bill puts freedom first; it will ensure that politicians explain how proposed legislation protects our inalienable freedoms and ensures their protection is given priority over other human rights.

Some rights advocates may claim rights evolve; however, if that is the case, rights are cannibalising each other. Some key rights are unalienable and essential to the human condition. Adding ever more rights is nonsensical; Parliament must ring-fence Australia's key freedoms.

Governments must be made to justify any erosion of our fundamental freedoms and rights if we are to maintain sanctity of the individual and, on a national scale, our sovereignty.

I commend this Bill to the Senate.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Senator McKIM (Tasmania) (15:40): I move:

That the following matters be referred to the Environment and Communications References Committee for inquiry and report by the third sitting day of December 2019:

(a) disclosure and public reporting of sensitive and classified information, including the appropriate regime for warrants regarding journalists and media organisations and adequacy of existing legislation;

(b) the whistleblower protection regime and protections for public sector employees;

(c) the adequacy of referral practices of the Australian Government in relation to leaks of sensitive and classified information;

(d) appropriate culture, practice and leadership for Government and senior public employees;

(e) mechanisms to ensure that the Australian Federal Police have sufficient independence to effectively and impartially carry out their investigatory and law enforcement responsibilities in relation to politically sensitive matters; and

(f) any related matters.

Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Regional Tourism) (15:40): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator DUNIAM: The government is committed to ensuring our democracy strikes the right balance between a free press and keeping Australians safe—two fundamental tenets of our democracy. That's why the government has asked the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security to conduct an inquiry into law enforcement and intelligence powers in relation to the freedom of the press. The PJCIS is well placed to conduct this inquiry, given its responsibility for and experience in handling issues concerning national security information and legislation. The PJCIS has already commenced its inquiry and will report back to both houses of parliament by 17 October 2019.

Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Shadow Minister for Finance, Shadow Minister for the Public Service and Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (15:41): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator GALLAGHER: Unlike the Morrison government, Labor believes in freedom of the press and the public's right to know. We believe this inquiry is essential because it will be carried out by a committee that the Morrison government does not control. That the Morrison government opposes this inquiry tells the Australian people all they need to know about this government's contempt for freedom of the press and for the Australian public's right to know what this government is up to with their money, including the litany of policy disasters and personal scandals that the Morrison government is always trying to hide from the Australian public. A strong and independent media is vital to holding governments to account, and Labor will continue to fight to defend and strengthen press freedom through this inquiry.

Senator PATRICK (South Australia) (15:41): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator PATRICK: Centre Alliance will be supporting this referral. The PJCIS is in fact the very organisation that has had carriage of all the security legislation that has placed constraints on journalists in this country. I point out also that there are no crossbenchers on the PJCIS, and some of us crossbenchers are probably the strongest advocates for press freedom in this chamber. We're indicating our support for this. We don't want to leave the fox in charge of the henhouse.

The PRESIDENT: The question is the motion moved by Senator McKim, Business of the Senate matter No. 1, be agreed to.

Senator DEAN SMITH (Western Australia—Chief Government Whip in the Senate) (17:56): On behalf of the Economics Legislation Committee I present the report of the committee on the provisions of the Treasury Laws Amendment (Putting Members' Interests First) Bill 2019, together with the Hansard record of proceedings and documents presented to the committee.

Ordered that the report be printed.

Senator DEAN SMITH (Western Australia—Chief Government Whip in the Senate) (17:57): On behalf of the Chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement, I present four reports: Examination of the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission annual report 2016-17; Examination of the Australian Federal Police annual report 2016-17; Impact of new and emerging information and communications technology; and Theft and export of motor vehicles and parts, together with the minutes of proceedings of the committee and the Hansard transcript of evidence.

Ordered that the report be printed.

Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Opposition Whip in the Senate) (17:57): On behalf of Senator Bilyk, I present the report of the Senate Standing Committee of Senators' Interests, incorporating statements of registrable interests and notifications of alterations lodged between 1 January and 30 June 2019.

Ordered that the report be printed.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (17:57): On behalf of the Community Affairs Legislation and References committees, I present additional information received by the committees for their inquiries into aged care assessment and accreditation; support for thalidomide survivors; and the Social Security (Administration) Amendment (Income Management and Cashless Welfare) Bill 2019.

Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Regional Tourism) (17:58): I present two government responses to committee reports as listed on today’s Order of Business. In accordance with the usual practice, I seek leave to incorporate the documents in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The documents read as follows—

Australian Government response to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security report:

Advisory Report on the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 July 2019

Introduction

On 12 September 2018, the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 (the Bill) was introduced in the House of Representatives.

On 13 September 2018, the Minister for Home Affairs, the Hon Peter Dutton MP, referred the Bill to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security for inquiry.

On 13 February 2019, the Committee tabled its report into the Bill. The report made nine recommendations, which are addressed below.

Recommendations

Recommendation 1

2.39 The Committee recommends the Government amend the definition of 'aviation security' in proposed section 3UL of the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 to specify the scope of activities to which the term applies.

Response — Agreed

The Government will amend the Bill to address this recommendation.

Recommendation 2

2.41 The Committee recommends that the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 be amended to include a savings provision to ensure the move-on powers do not interfere with the right to peaceful assembly, or give police the ability to use the powers to disrupt or quell a protest that is peaceful and does not disrupt the safe operation of an airport.

Response — Agreed

The Government will amend the Bill to address this recommendation.

Recommendation 3

2.67 The Committee recommends that the Australian Federal Police be required to record the number of occasions on which an identity information direction is issued under proposed section 3UN of the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018. Such records—detailing the number of identity check directions issued at each major airport—should be made public on an

annual basis.

Response — Agreed

The Australian Federal Police will update its policies and procedures to capture the number of occasions on which an identity information direction is issued under proposed section 3UN to enable annual reporting.

Recommendation 4

2.95 The Committee recommends that the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 be amended to include, in certain restricted circumstances, the right to seek urgent or expedited judicial review.

Response — Agreed-in-principle

The Government will amend the Bill to address the intent of this recommendation.

In issuing a move-on direction, a constable or Australian Federal Police protective service officer will be required to use an approved form that includes details to enable the person to contact a Federal Court registry in the State or Territory in which the direction is given. These details could include, for example, a telephone number, address or a website which sets out the contact details for the relevant Federal Court registry.

Providing these contact details will assist the person subject to the move-on direction to apply for judicial review or interlocutory orders in relation to the direction. This information could include, for example, information relating to the process for making an urgent or expedited application for judicial review or interlocutory orders.

Recommendation 5

2.98 The Committee recommends that the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 be amended to clarify the definition of senior police officer under proposed section 3UO(5)(b) of the Bill.

Res p onse — Agreed

The Government will amend the Bill to address this recommendation.

Recommendation 6

2.100 The Committee recommends that the Australian Federal Police be required

to record the number of occasions on which a move-on direction is issued under proposed section 3UO of the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018. Such records—detailing the number of move-on directions issued at each major airport, and the number of move-on directions at each major airport that resulted in an individual missing a flight—should be made public on an annual basis.

Response — Agreed

The Australian Federal Police will update its policies and procedures to capture the number of occasions on which a move-on direction is issued under proposed section 3UO to enable annual reporting.

Recommendation 7

2.102 The Committee recommends that Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 be amended to ensure that, in circumstances where a senior police officer provides oral authorisation for a move-on direction, the authorisation is documented in writing as soon as practicable.

Response — Agreed

The Government will amend the Bill to address this recommendation.

Recommendation 8

2.116 The Committee recommends that proposed section 3UR of the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 be amended to ensure that obligations to provide information if requested apply equally to uniformed and plain clothes constables and Australian Federal Police protective service officers.

Response — Agreed

The Government will amend the Bill to address this recommendation.

Recommendation 9

2.125 The Committee recommends that, subject to the recommendations in this report, the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Police Powers at Airports) Bill 2018 be passed.

Response — Agreed

The Government will update the Bill to implement the recommendations of the Committee.

Senator KENEALLY (New South Wales—Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (17:59): In respect of the government response to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security's Advisory report on the Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) Bill 2019, I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

This is a lacking response from the government, and in particular from the Minister for Home Affairs. The Labor Party and the Liberals have already come together in agreeing to support the temporary exclusion laws subject to the 18 substantive recommendations made by the bipartisan Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. We need to remember that this is a Liberal-dominated committee chaired by Liberal MP Mr Hastie. Given this, the government have always had the final say and control over what the recommendations of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security are going to be. Labor has respected this fact because the committee has worked in a collegial fashion with the shared aim of improving legislation. This is what we as parliamentarians are expected to do, and it is in fact what we are paid to do.

The government's response shows that of the 18 recommendations made by the bipartisan committee the government has implemented only 16. That's the government's response. I contend, and Labor contends, that that is not the case, but I am going to come back to that in a moment. By the government's own standards, that they have only implemented 16 of the 18 recommendations, they have failed to implement two of the bipartisan committee's recommendations.

This is an unprecedented move by this government. Since 2013, the government has not explicitly rejected a recommendation of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. The PJCIS has operated for years to achieve bipartisanship on national security legislation. We have worked together, as parliamentarians should, to improve national security legislation. Labor has strived to work in such a fashion since Bob Hawke established the first iteration of the committee to oversee Australia's intelligence services in 1986. The cooperative value of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security to reach consensus and improve national security legislation has afforded significant benefit to our national security agencies and to Australians alike. It is a record of which the parliament should be proud.

Given their response, the government has rejected the recommendations of its own members, including in this place Senator Abetz, Senator Fawcett and Senator Stoker. The government's own response says that they have not accepted recommendations from a Liberal-dominated committee. Committee members in this place, Senator Abetz, Senator Fawcett and Senator Stoker, have had their recommendations explicitly rejected by their government in their government's response.

While the government would have you believe that they have implemented 16 of the 18 recommendations of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, that is not the case. Instead of agreeing to and implementing all 18 of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security's substantive recommendations, the government has in fact rejected four of them, only partially implemented another six and ignored one recommendation completely—to produce Solicitor-General's advice that shows and assures Australians that this legislation is constitutionally valid. Further to this, there are now new provisions in this legislation which the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security has never considered. The government has opened up a Pandora's box of loose legislative drafting by jeopardising and politicising the work of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.

The revised temporary exclusion order legislation before the parliament is substantially different to the legislation introduced in February, substantially different to the recommendations made by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, and substantially different again to the United Kingdom legislation to which Mr Dutton, the Minister for Home Affairs, so frequently refers. This, in fact, includes new questions about the bill's constitutionality as well as loopholes which could result in a legal challenge. To address these concerns, last night I wrote to the Minister for Home Affairs asking for this legislation to be referred back to the PJCIS to consider these matters. I want these concerns to be addressed, and I believe and Labor believes they can be addressed swiftly. This referral is not a delaying tactic or politicking; it is to ensure that we have a temporary exclusion order regime that works, that keeps Australians safe and that is constitutional.

I'd like to highlight that this legislation, which is due to come before the Senate this week, applies to a small cohort of people overseas. The government has not been forthcoming with the public about the number of people to whom this scheme will apply. I have seen members of the government, including the Liberal chair of the PJCIS, Mr Andrew Hastie, claim that there is an operational imperative to pass this legislation. While I agree and Labor agrees with the intent of this legislation, one has to ask, given that the United Kingdom has had a similar scheme in place since 2015, why the government has not explained why it has taken the Minister for Home Affairs four years to introduce a similar scheme in Australia. Yesterday, the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Cormann, said that the government was 'working through national security legislation as quickly as possible'. When he was asked why the government has taken four years to replicate the UK scheme here in Australia, he said, 'We are working through this legislation as quickly as possible.' Given the threat of foreign fighters returning to Australia, given that 40 people have already returned to Australia, given that the UK implemented this scheme in 2015, how can Australians look at a four-year delay by this government and say, 'That is as quickly as possible'? Is that actually working to keep Australians safe? Would the Minister for Home Affairs or his representative in this chamber be willing to say he was working as quickly as possible when it has taken them four years to introduce the temporary exclusion order legislation?

As the government has done previously, on many occasions, the government should release the Solicitor-General's advice to assure all Australians of this bill's constitutionality. Labor wants a temporary exclusion order scheme that works, that is constitutional, that keeps Australians safe and that can withstand High Court challenges. Yes, there is an imperative to pass this legislation, but not any legislation and not sloppy legislation; it should be legislation that accords with the bipartisan recommendations of the bipartisan Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, a committee that is dominated by Liberal MPs and chaired by a Liberal MP. This Liberal government should take note of those recommendations and should endorse and accept, as it has done previously since 2013, the recommendations of this bipartisan committee. The government should refer the TEO legislation back to the PJCIS to ensure that we have legislation that works. If they do not, they will be jeopardising and politicising national security legislation. If they do not, they will be voting against the recommendations of Senators Abetz, Fawcett and Stoker. They are choosing to play politics with national security legislation and they are breaking the commitment—the compact, if you will—to a bipartisan approach through the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.

If the government does not refer this back to the PJCIS, Labor will do in the Senate as we are doing in the House right now: moving amendments to give effect to the full recommendations of this bipartisan committee. We have always supported the intent of the temporary exclusion order legislation. Given this lacking response tabled here today by the government, we want to do what the Minister for Home Affairs has failed to do, which is uphold the bipartisan approach to national security legislation and give effect to the recommendations supported by Liberal members on a Liberal dominated committee—unanimous recommendations to improve national security legislation, supported by both Labor and Liberal parties—to ensure that we have a temporary exclusion order scheme that keeps Australians safe, that is constitutional and that works for the benefit of the Australian community.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Senator McKIM (Tasmania) (18:09): Deputy President, I thank you for your indulgence and I do seek leave, even though I know it is slightly out of order, to take note of the annual report of the Surveillance Devices Act 2004. I believe I need to now do that by leave?

Leave granted.

Senator McKIM: I thank the Senate. I move:

That the Senate take note of the report.

This annual report into the Surveillance Devices Act 2004, as well as another report tabled today, the annual report into the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979, demonstrate clearly the dangerous path that this country is on. In the last 20 years, we've had over 200 pieces of legislation come through state, territory and this Commonwealth parliament, all of which erode fundamental rights, freedoms and liberties in this country. These rights and freedoms are amongst those that we used to send Australians overseas to fight—and in some cases, tragically, to die—to defend. We are now giving away these rights and freedoms, hand over fist, as rapidly as possible because the current federal government has done everything it can to scare the Australian people.

In giving away those fundamental rights and freedoms, we are sleep-walking down the dangerous path to an authoritarian police state in Australia. Make no mistake, that is the ultimate destination of the journey that we are on—becoming a surveillance state, becoming a police state and becoming subject as citizens to invasions of our privacy and, ultimately, to Australia becoming an authoritarian regime. We so desperately need a charter of rights in this country so we can protect and enshrine those fundamental rights and freedoms that actually are amongst those things that make Australia such a great country. Those rights and freedoms that so many of us take for granted are now being taken away, hand over fist, by a combination of the major political parties in this place, the LNP and the ALP. They do that because they stitch up cosy deals behind the closed doors of the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence and Security, a committee that operates often in total secret, without public scrutiny and which denies any crossbench representation and input into its decision-making process. What we get because of that collusion is the ongoing giving away of fundamental rights and freedoms in Australia.

The crossbench should be on the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence and Security; there's no doubt about that. I want to give a couple of examples of issues that have arisen in the last year or so in Australia. Firstly, the leaking, which I have no doubt came either from Minister Dutton or from his office to Simon Benson, to a journalist at The Australian, of classified ASIO information, a leak which was condemned by Mr Lewis, the head of ASIO, when it happened but which inexplicably the Australian Federal Police have declined to investigate. When you superimpose that onto the recent raids by the Australian Federal Police of prominent media outlets in this country, including News Corp and the ABC, you can understand why there is nervousness starting to emerge amongst our media, amongst journalists about the intimidatory nature of those raids.

I say to our media that in fact the issue here is far broader than just press and media freedom; it's about the freedoms of ordinary Australians to go about their day-to-day business without unnecessary spying and intrusion into their personal privacy by intelligence agencies in this country. It's time we had a charter of rights to protect a broad range of rights, including our rights to privacy. It's time that we had an informed conversation in this country about the ongoing erosion of rights and freedoms in the name of national security and an informed debate about whether or not giving away those rights and freedoms is necessary or, indeed, whether giving them away makes us any safer at all from the threats that no doubt exist today. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned

Senator DUNIAM (Tasmania—Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries and Assistant Minister for Regional Tourism) (18:15): I table documents relating to the order for the production of documents concerning the Department of Home Affairs and Paladin.

Senator WATT (Queensland) (18:16): I'm continuing my remarks, having spoken on these bills a bit before question time.

Just to further outline the opposition's position: I was saying before that Labor absolutely supports the government's desire to provide additional support for farmers and rural communities who are experiencing drought. All of us want to do that. This is about whether what the government is putting forward is the best way to do so. When I was speaking previously, I was particularly focusing on the fact that by setting up this Future Drought Fund, the government is raiding an alternative fund which is still very important in rural and regional communities, and that is the Building Australia Fund.

The Building Australia Fund, which was established by the last federal Labor government, is a $3.9 billion fund that this government has failed to draw down on, failed to access and failed to utilise, even though the fund can support projects in drought-affected communities across transport infrastructure, like roads, rail, urban transport and ports; communications infrastructure such as broadband; energy infrastructure; and water infrastructure. All the kinds of things that rural and regional communities are crying out for! Why is it that the government has failed to spend money from the Building Australia Fund, has left it in tact, has not drawn on it and is not building any of that infrastructure that is needed, whether it be in rural or regional communities or in urban communities? Now it wants to raid it for an alternative purpose. The reason is that the government fundamentally does not like how the Building Australia Fund is set up and the level of probity that is required to make sure that the money is well spent. Since being elected six years ago, the government has tried on four separate occasions to dismantle the Building Australia Fund.

As I've mentioned, the Building Australia Fund was established by Labor in 2008 under the Nation-building Funds Act 2008. Labor established this fund with the explicit purpose of being free of politics. Under the Nation-building Funds Act criteria were developed which must be applied by Infrastructure Australia before projects, other than broadband projects, can be recommended for funding. The fund is built on four key principles. Firstly, projects should address national infrastructure priorities. Secondly, they should demonstrate high benefits and effective use of resources. Thirdly, projects should efficiently address infrastructure needs. Fourthly, they should demonstrate they achieve established standards in their implementation and management.

It is these key principles around independent, transparent decision-making that the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison Liberal National governments so despise. Their problem, when it all boils down to it, is that the Building Australia Fund has four principles around transparency and independent decision-making and making sure that projects are actually needed and will provide value to the country. The Liberals' and Nationals' problem with the Building Australia Fund is that it doesn't have a fifth principle—one that allows for pork barrelling to win seats in marginal Liberal and National areas of the country. If it had that fifth principle, I reckon we'd get the support of the coalition, because we know that that's the way they have always used these types of infrastructure funds and various other regional funds that they have established. It is this inability to pork barrel for their mates that those opposite hate so much about the Building Australia Fund. While these bills set up consultation processes for the new Future Drought Fund, the minister can ignore them—just like the health minister so often ignores expert advice with respect to the Medical Research Future Fund. The member for Ballarat made that point yesterday in the House. We've got this series of funds that have been established by the government, theoretically with expert advice processes to help shape the decisions, only to be ignored by ministers within this government.

To be frank, under the bills as they're being put forward the minister will be able to support his favourite communities, to pork barrel funding into his preferred seats for the benefit of the National Party at the expense of so many drought stricken parts of rural and regional Australia. Having visited Darwin twice now since my appointment as shadow minister for northern Australia, and becoming more familiar with the extent of the drought that exists in the Northern Territory, which is really crippling the cattle industry and many other communities across the Northern Territory, I'll be very interested to see how many projects will be funded out of this Future Drought Fund in the electorate of Lingiari, held by Labor, covering a drought affected area. Let's just wait and see how many projects in that area get funded compared to projects in seats that the National Party have a direct interest in. The seat of Gilmore on the south coast of New South Wales is another area that's badly affected by drought at the moment. It's held by Labor. Let's wait and see how many projects in the electorate of Gilmore get funding out of this fund, or whether, mysteriously, all the funds flow through to electorates held by the National Party.

What we have is the government abolishing a fund that was established to provide a strategic, transparent approach to infrastructure investment, led by the independent Infrastructure Australia. This is particularly important at a time when the Reserve Bank is highlighting the need for infrastructure spending to support Australia's flagging economy. Indeed, the very fund the government is abolishing, the Building Australia Fund, could be used in these current economic conditions to help stimulate and support the very communities that are affected by drought. It does not make sense that they are not drawing down on the Building Australia Fund now for projects that have been recommended by Infrastructure Australia to get investment into the economy now in communities across the country. It is pure politics at the expense of rural and regional communities that are doing it so tough right now. These communities need help from the federal government now, not in three months, not in six months, not in next year—now. Instead, what they're getting from this government is a fund that will only start distributing funds more than 12 months away. It's not going to give rural and regional communities the support that they need right now.

If the government were to choose to not utilise the Building Australia Fund, there's absolutely no reason that the government can't make an appropriation for drought funding right now. We have been calling for that to happen. There's no reason that the government couldn't decide today to make an appropriation, to make funding available for drought ridden communities now, not in over 12 months time. I make the point that there's nothing that stopped the government from having made an appropriation at any point over the last six years for drought funding. Of course, they haven't done so. Labor has said time and again we stand ready to support that.

We believe action should be taken now, not in over a year's time, to alleviate the social and economic costs in drought-affected communities and a strategic plan developed for future drought-proofing Australia, including through substantial investment in infrastructure, but these investments must be transparent and made on the best available science and the best available advice to government about what will work in the long term to support our regions. But the hurried introduction of these bills only demonstrates that they have been asleep at the wheel for the past six years—asleep at the wheel on the drought and on water reform, asleep at the wheel on utilising the Building Australia Fund to build infrastructure, leaving regional communities to suffer for far too long.

Rural and regional Australians need support and action now, not more years spent in consultation. Instead, this government is offering $100 million in about a year's time and another $100 million a year after that, not the $5 billion that they go around using as a headline figure of the fund. In fact this fund won't even reach $5 billion in size for another nine years. It's another furphy that's being put around by this government. It is just $200 million, with not a cent to flow for about a year. It is the removal of the $3.9 billion Building Australia Fund for just $200 million in this term of government for drought funding. As the leader of the Labor Party said in the House last night, you don't even have to count all the zeros to know that $3.9 billion out and $200 million in is a pretty bad deal. As Labor has repeated time and again, we support greater investment in our rural and regional communities at this time of drought, but the maths are pretty straightforward and the politics are even clearer. The new Future Fund will be a pork-barrel vehicle for the National Party just as we've seen so many other times from the National Party, and it will be to the detriment of communities right across the country.

The Labor Party will not oppose these bills. We support the additional resources to our rural and regional communities, but, when we return to government, we will restructure Infrastructure Australia and make it a strong body once again. We will ensure that this is a genuinely independent board of experts, making sure that it can do its job in driving microeconomic reform and having proper cost-benefit analysis and rigour in terms of infrastructure. We will establish in the future a fund like the Building Australia Fund because it is essential that there be a funding component to support Infrastructure Australia's rigorous, strategic work.

In conclusion, I repeat that there is absolutely no reason that government cannot make an appropriation for drought funding right now. They could have done so at any time during the last six years. Labor has stood ready to support rural and regional communities right across the country, but, for this government, it's all about the politics. You've even seen it in the run-up to the debate today. All the media has been full of government ministers and government backbenchers out there describing this bill as a test of Labor. It's very clear what this government is about. It's all just about politics. It's all about finding wedges for Labor. It almost feels like they haven't realised that they just won the election. They can actually get on and govern in the best interests of the country rather than trying to run around constantly finding wedges with which to test Labor.

Australians don't want it.

Senator Hume interjecting—

Senator WATT: Sorry, Senator Hume?

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Watt, through the chair.

Senator WATT: I heard Senator Hume referring to what sounded like 'a test for Labor', so I wondered if she was the latest frontbencher talking about things being tests for Labor rather than genuine exercises.

The government doesn't want scrutiny of the projects they fund, because, if they did have scrutiny, they'd fall over. They are just deals with their mates at the expense of rural and regional communities. We'll be keeping a close eye on how the government manages this new drought Future Fund, because we want to make sure those communities who need support the most—those councils, businesses and research organisations with the best ideas—are those that get the support they need from the federal government.

Senator ROBERTS (Queensland) (18:28): As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I rise to support the Future Drought Fund (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019 despite substantial reservations. Australia's hardworking farmers are suffering desperately in this drought, an entirely natural phenomenon that is part of our country—but that doesn't make it any less difficult for the farmers. Drought support for the land is not just about infrastructure, because there are many on-farm measures that can be taken. This bill places the attention where it needs to be: on the soil. Droughtproofing Australia is in part about regenerating degraded soil to retain more water and, from that, to use less fertiliser and chemicals. The ultimate goal is profitable, stable and sustainable agriculture. Regenerative agriculture, known as regen ag for short, stores water back in the soil. It captures and stores carbon, a natural element that is essential for all life on earth and that is in every living cell of every living organism. I want to compliment the One Nation member for the state seat of Mirani in Queensland for the work he has been doing with farmers, and will continue to do, on this matter.

After pushing for many years, One Nation is now very pleased to see soil regeneration being included in this bill, and we will hold the government accountable to that clearly stated intent. Yet, this is not a $5 billion drought bill. The bill provides $100 million each year to be put into a special fund for grants to farmers. But here is the problem: that money does not start to flow until 1 July 2020. In fact, the Future Drought Fund has a full 12 months after 1 July 2020 to put all of the money into that account. This scheme may not be in full swing until mid-2021 and, after processing grant applications, it could be 2022 before farmers can get their hands on their money. So, why did Senator Cormann earlier today take to Twitter soon after announcing this bill to declare that the bill would support famers and drought affected communities straight away, when that is not the case?

The bill provides for fund management expenses to be taken from the special account. Let me say that again: the bill provides for fund management expenses to be taken from the special fund account. Many questions remain around how much will be taken out of that $100 million for expenses in managing the fund. The bill lists page after page of expenses, including the cost of the Future Drought Fund as well as the special fund. One Nation is concerned that this is not a $5 billion bill and it's not a $100 million bill; rather, this bill may well turn out to offer funds in a trickle, not the flood that is needed. In many ways, this seems to be yet another Liberal facade that's going to be sold. One Nation will hold this government accountable to the promises it is making with this bill to provide drought relief.

We go further though. Why does the government continue to ignore the need for substantial nation building—for future-building and infrastructure projects that could droughtproof much of our nation, particularly our state of Queensland and our neighbouring state of New South Wales? That is a cost-effective and seemingly affordable project that would prevent forever the cost of recurring flood damage.

We go further, and ask the government to address Liberal and Labor policies and actions that are crippling Australia's productive capacity. In southern and Central Queensland, farmers are not planting fodder because the electricity prices are absurdly and artificially high. In a drought, farmers are not planting fodder. Electricity prices are high due to unfounded and dishonest energy policies complying with the UN's Paris pseudo agreement and various UN policies and advices. There is a drought, yet farmers are not planting fodder.

After listen to the loony and antihuman Greens who falsely claim that droughts are due to hydrocarbon fuels, I must address their falsities. They have never, never provided the hard data for their claim and they contradict the empirical scientific evidence that proves hydrocarbon fuels do not and cannot affect climate. The UN initiated this lie, the Greens push it and the Labour-Liberal duopoly drive it in policy, aiming to get Greens preferences. The Greens, I repeat again, have never provided data as proof for their absurd claim.

Banks are also crucifying farmers. That brings them to the edge, and then you get a drought and they go over the edge. Farmers are crippled by banks that have unfettered oligopoly powers.

Let's take another Labor-Liberal policy. How can farmers survive the Howard Liberal government that colluded first in 1996 with the then Borbidge National Party government, and then in 1998 with the Beattie Labor Queensland government and the Carr Labor New South Wales government to steal farmers' properties rights as a way of complying with the UN's Kyoto Protocol? That was repeatedly stated by the then Prime Minister, Mr John Howard, on behalf of his government and echoed and confirmed by Bob Carr and Mr Peter Beattie. I have been calling on the federal government to comply with section 51(xxxi) of the national Constitution and either restore farmers' stolen property rights or compensate them in just terms for the theft—restoration or compensation.

I want to single out Mr Dan McDonald; his lovely wife, Katrina; and their children, James, Ebony and Reece. They are taking on the whole of the Queensland government by standing up for their right to clear their land to provide mulga for their cattle that are starving. They bought that property near Charleville in south-western Queensland particularly because it had mulga and could be cleared, because that then provides natural drought proofing, and yet he's not allowed to clear the land now. He has lost his property rights as a result of Liberal and Labor governments at federal and state levels.

Finally, the support from farmers has been slow to come. While wanting faster delivery, we are nonetheless pleased that farmers will be getting support sometime in the next three years. We urge the government to get out and really listen across our wonderful nation and then change its energy and water policies while building vital drought-proofing infrastructure to restore Australia's productive capacity. That is what we in Pauline Hanson's One Nation advocate for: restoring our country's productive capacity.

Senator BROCKMAN (Western Australia—Deputy Government Whip in the Senate) (18:37): I rise to make, for the sake of future speakers, a fairly brief contribution today. I just need to address some of the falsehoods put out there by Senator Watt as to what the government is doing. Senator Watt, and to a degree Senator Roberts, talked as if the Future Drought Fund Bill before us here today is the only thing this government is doing for drought-affected farmers. As my colleague sitting here near me Senator McGrath would know very well, in Queensland and New South Wales this government has put a lot of support towards drought-affected communities in a variety of ways—grants to local governments, farm household allowance, grants for fodder et cetera. The idea that we are waiting for a future date to assist farmers is just an absolute falsehood. It's a nonsense, and it's something that should be condemned in the strongest terms possible.

What this bill does is it sets a path for the future. It sets a path to build the resilience of our farming communities. I grew up on a family farm, a family farm that's been in our family for quite a number of generations now; worked for rural bodies, in particular the Pastoralists and Graziers Association of Western Australia; and have looked into the eyes of drought-affected farming families—very, very good farmers who have been on the land for generations and who are facing the loss of their property and the loss of their ability to pass that farm on to the next generation thanks to, in this case, the 2006 drought in the eastern Wheatbelt of Western Australia. What this bill will do over time is it will continue to build the resilience of our farming communities. Its initial investment of $3.9 billion grows to $5 billion over the decade. Over time, obviously, this will provide a source of funding to enable on-farm drought-resilience projects to be undertaken.

Farmers are resilient. Farmers have got through droughts in Australia for more than 100 years. Even though I saw droughts make it impossible for some farmers to continue, others kept going and they battled their way through the hard times. Families that have been on the land for generations found a way to fight their way through. What this fund will do is provide an opportunity, an option, to continue that process of continually building the resilience of our farming communities, allowing them to proactively adopt new technologies and new opportunities to drought-proof properties and drought-proof agricultural in their particular region.

It's vitally important that we provide communities with hope for the future. It's certainly not the only thing we are doing in this space, but this is a very important component. It's a vehicle that will be there over the long term. It's a vehicle that will provide to rural and regional Australia over a long period of time a consistent, stable and growing source of funding that will allow regions to undertake significant projects to protect them against future drought events. It will provide farming communities and farming families with a degree of certainty and stability that they perhaps currently don't have. So I do commend the bill. I commend the work that's been done in this space by a number of ministers. This is not all that we are doing to assist drought-affected farmers and drought-affected communities, but it is an important part of that jigsaw.

Senator WATERS (Queensland) (18:41): I rise to speak on the Future Drought Fund Bill 2019. At the outset, I will just foreshadow that I will be moving my second reading amendment—which is on sheet 5817—to this bill. I want to start by saying that it is kind of insulting, really, to have a bill that sets up a fund to try to help desperately afflicted farmers in drought—and in my state of Queensland almost two-thirds of our entire state is now drought declared; so there are many, many people who are now facing desperate situations—while you continue to ignore the impacts of climate change that are of course driving, worsening and deepening that drought now and will continue to do so in the future.

My colleagues will make a range of contributions—and, indeed, we have a range of amendments that we will be moving to this bill—but our fundamental point is: what is the point if you are not going tackle what is causing the deepness, harshness and the cruelty of these droughts? If you continue to have your head in the sand on climate change, you are not faithfully representing or helping those people. Of course, we want to see farmers in drought receive the financial support to try to tackle this, but we also think that they deserve a decent climate policy. This government, sadly, is not going to give them that reality check.

I might also bring to mind the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, which was a similar sort of National Party-led slush fund that was meant to have great promise, and barely has had any dollars get out the door. It sounds to me that this fund is going to be pretty similar. It's not starting for ages—it is being rushed through today even though it doesn't kick in for a good 18 months or so—and then it is going to dribble out a little bit of funding each year. Surely you can do a bit better than that. People actually need assistance now. They need a genuine climate policy now, and they shouldn't have the whims of the likes of Minister Littleproud—or perhaps Barnaby Joyce will be minister again by then—dictating what little pet project gets funding. That's why I'm pleased that there have been some amendments that establish some level of accountability, transparency and oversight—though not quite enough, in our view. My colleague Senator Rice has run through the amendments that we will move to try to further tighten that process. This parliament shouldn't set up another slush fund for the National Party to administer while that party continues to abrogate its duty to tackle climate change and genuinely represent its members. That's the first point.

We are also concerned, as I believe my colleagues on the Labor benches are concerned, that this money would strip needed funds from an infrastructure fund. Yes, the government haven't spent anything from that infrastructure fund in recent years, but it was set up for good reason and has meritorious projects that could have funding allocated. But of course the government just want to score yet another political point and have decided to grab that money and try to spend it elsewhere. If they were genuine about wanting to alleviate the drought, not only would they have a better climate policy but they would decide that this was worthy of some funds that were not stolen from some other decent project but instead came from consolidated revenue or, as my colleague has proposed, from a levy on the fossil fuel resources industries. As you've probably heard us say before in this place, we know that coal and coal seam gas are driving climate change, which is furthering, worsening and deepening the drought, and yet all of our policies under this government are yet more subsidies for the mining industry, yet more free rides. They don't pay the appropriate amount of corporate taxes and they get many thousands of public subsidies for the privilege of taking out what are meant to be publicly owned resources. This is why we want to make it crystal clear that none of the investments made by the Future Drought Fund should further fossil fuels, and nor should the money come at the expense of an infrastructure fund when it could come from the fossil fuel industry.

That brings me to the substance of the second reading amendment that I will be moving, which is:

At the end of the motion, add:

", but the Senate notes that free or unlimited water entitlements given to fossil fuel companies by State and Territory governments, while farmers struggle with drought conditions, significantly undermines the effectiveness of any drought response by:

(a) depriving farmers of water;

(b) exacerbating droughts; and

(c) worsening climate change which further exacerbates droughts."

It makes a bit of a mockery of this plan for a drought fund and alleviation of drought through financial contributions when you've got state and territory governments giving free water to big mining companies and to coal seam gas companies. I want to go into a bit more detail about that. There's a little project that you might have heard mentioned sometimes—certainly it exercises the mind of Senator Canavan, who earlier told the chamber he'd been trying to get this mine up for years. It is of course the Adani mine. They're on a pretty good wicket when it comes to their water entitlements. In fact, the farmers in the region that they share are pretty cross about it. For the record, Adani have an associated water licence granted to them by the Queensland state Labor government which is for 60 years. It's got no volumetric cap, so they can take an unlimited amount of groundwater.

Senator Canavan: That is wrong.

Senator WATERS: No, it's not wrong, Minister. You know the difference between groundwater and surface water, and I'm about to come to their surface water entitlements.

Senator Canavan: You know it's not unlimited.

Senator WATERS: I do know, Minister. I remind you that I am in fact an environmental lawyer, so I am quite confident in my familiarity with this arrangement. It is 9½ billion litres of groundwater, which is almost as much as all of the other local users—most of them agricultural and farming—combined. They don't have to pay. It's free. It's unlimited. That is precisely why we are in the predicament that we are in. You cannot say that giving free water to a big coalmining multinational company, while the region is drought declared—and the minister wasn't here; I remind him that 65 per cent of our state is drought declared—is a good decision. That is exactly why we are moving an amendment to point out that the decisions to give a free ride to the fossil fuel industry—not just on their taxes, on subsidies for cheap diesel and on accelerated depreciation but on free, unlimited water, which nobody else gets—fundamentally undermine the utility of this so-called Future Drought Fund. I hope that, on that basis, we will receive support for our second reading amendment when I move it. And I'm sure the minister also knows this, although it predates his time in parliament: in 2011 an irrigator had their licence application rejected in the very same region that Adani have now had a 60-year unlimited groundwater entitlement given to them.

I want to move onto the surface water that Adani has also gotten a very nice, cushy deal on from our state Labor government. They've got a surface water licence of 12½ billion litres per year to extract water from the Suttor River. That licence was actually granted without public consultation, because again our state government gave Adani a free ride. Even though it was tightening up the water laws for everyone else at the time, it made an exception for Adani. So, 12½ billion litres of surface water from the Suttor River—again, that region is suffering from crippling drought. How can you stand here and say that you are trying to tackle the drought when you have no climate policy, when you're giving subsidies to fossil fuel companies and when other government regimes—I acknowledge this is the state government—are giving free water to those same fossil fuel companies that are not only depriving the farmers of that water but are also, when their product is burnt, exacerbating the conditions that will worsen the drought, not to mention all of the other climate impacts. These are impacts that not only our land managers have to face, but we all have to face. The sheer hypocrisy of this situation is really getting a bit boring.

The other thing that we found quite concerning was the approach that was taken with this bill. I accept that an earlier version of this bill was tabled—when was it?—in November last year, but it has been significantly changed since then. Of course, it has been expunged from the Notice Paperand reintroduced—we're in a new parliament; we've had an election since it was introduced—and yet this bill in its current form, with those changes that have been made, was only introduced to the House yesterday morning. It was rammed through the House yesterday—I understand Labor were a bit cross about that yesterday, but apparently they've changed their position on that today—and it's been brought to us today. And here we are now; we're talking about it. It has been just over 24 hours, and yet this government expects this bill to be passed without proper scrutiny. I'm sure they won't even consider any of the amendments that we'll be moving, even though our amendments go to actually tackling climate change, which could help us to reduce the severity and devastation of future droughts.

It just feels to me like this government is trying to be very performative—it's desperately trying to wedge the opposition—and it seems to have forgotten that it's actually here to govern the country. Now, we have very different views about how it should be doing that, and that's fine, but you've actually got a job to do. It would be useful if you started to pay attention to that, rather than just scoring political points off your opponents: making them squirm, ramming stuff through, making them backflip. They're always going to backflip; we see that time and time again. We kind of expect that now. We get that. It's very damaging when you treat this institution with such little regard. The cut-off order exists for a purpose. The rule that you can't ram a bill through in a sitting chunk exists for a purpose, and yet you've just thrown it out of the window. This bill was rammed through the House yesterday, and now you want to ram it through the Senate. We think that's not good process.

We've put up amendments that we think would strengthen this bill. They go to having a proper climate policy. They go to not giving a free ride to those water-guzzling fossil fuel companies. They go to the greater transparency measures that my colleague outlined, which would actually give this chamber more oversight over the particular projects that were to be funded from this fund, but we don't have a terribly good track record of getting support for our sensible, measured, well-thought-through amendments. I don't expect we'll get a lot of support for them this time around either, so all the more reason to have a proper process for this bill, so it could be scrutinised, so the opposition party could at least have a proper chance to send it through their caucus. They were rightfully concerned yesterday that they didn't have a chance to do that. I'm not quite sure why they've changed their mind and why they didn't object to exempting this bill from the cut-off order this morning and ramming it through. I think there was an abrogation of process there.

But here we are. We have a bill that will hopefully provide some support to farmers, but it won't start flowing for 18 months, it won't tackle climate change and it won't tackle the deep unfairness of mining companies getting free water while farmers in that very same region are struggling. Farmers are having to tighten their belts and are wondering where their water is going to come from while Adani gets a 60-year groundwater licence and a 12½-billion-litre licence for surface water. Seriously, what more can we give to this company? What on earth are you saying to those farmers when they are desperate for an explanation as to why they are not getting the water? I don't know what it is that you're saying, because I know that Bruce Currie, one of the farmers, was very distressed about the inequity, as quoted in an article that I have just here:

It's bloody-minded and barbaric.

He's a grazier who lives in the region, whom I have met over the years in my role as senator for this state. He said:

This is going to definitely impact on the integrity of [the Great Artesian Basin].

I don't see legislation here to address the threats to the Great Artesian Basin or the drawdown from the overallocation of free water to mining companies. I remember one of your former colleagues, who has left us now—in fact in the first inquiry I was involved in when I started in this chamber in 2011—called for protection for the Great Artesian Basin.

Senator Sterle interjecting—

Senator WATERS: I'm not too sure that you should be proud to be opposing protection for the Great Artesian Basin, because that is what that Senate committee inquiry recommended. We have seen zero action on that. It has been eight years and there has been nothing to protect the Great Artesian Basin. I do think that these farmers and land managers are a bit cluier than you give them credit for. They are pretty cross that their entitlements are getting restricted when mining companies have free reign.

By all means rush the bill through—we thought it should follow the proper processes but it seems that no-one actually minds so much about what the proper processes are any more—but please consider supporting these very sensible amendments which would make sure this parliament can have proper scrutiny over not just the broad plans but the actual projects that are sought to be funded. That builds on the amendments of the former member for Indi, Cathy McGowan, in her time in the other place. This amendment notes that you are just going to undermine any sort of genuine drought response by continuing to turn a blind eye to the free ride that the big fossil fuel companies are getting when it comes to water.

I thought the National Party were meant to represent farmers. They keep taking a whole lot of donations from fossil fuel companies in recent years and they're nowhere on this issue. People deserve representation. Everyone, no matter what political background they come from, deserves to feel like they have a voice in this place. I'm very saddened because the bush are feeling abandoned. I hope that the National Party do some soul-searching and try to remember whom they initially said they were going to represent, because the farmers that I meet with are deeply concerned about climate change. They can see the impacts of it not just on their water supply but on the fragility of their land and the severity of the bushfires.

Minister Canavan knows this—his own backyard was affected—yet we still have no decent climate policy. I don't know how often members of the government meet with climate scientists—and I don't expect that particular members of the crossbench who don't accept the climate science have any meetings—but I urge the government to genuinely consult with the expert climate scientists and get a real handle on what we can expect is going to be wreaked on our lands, our precious environment and our communities if you continue to do very little, an inadequate amount, on climate change and if you continue to subsidise hand over fist the very industries that are fuelling this problem and are worsening and deepening the droughts. You've backed the wrong horse. You really have. It is not fair that we have billions of dollars in subsidies going to coalmining and coal-seam gas companies when farmers are struggling, when species are being sent to the wall with the extinction crisis that is already under way, when half of the reef has been bleached.

These are not just social and environmental impacts; these are also economic impacts. I would have thought that the government, though they clearly don't care much for the social or environmental impacts, might be moved by the economic impacts. So, please, I urge you to do some genuine consultation with climate scientists, in particular those who know about the impact on water. Sadly, in that 60-year unlimited groundwater licence that Adani was handed by the Queensland state Labor government, the modelling did not take into account the climate impacts on groundwater and water generally. It was not required to because, evidently, our laws are so incredibly weak. That is a gross oversight. We don't lack scientific advisors, but it seems the government and our state government lack the will to actually listen to them. I urge support for the second reading amendment, and I formally move that at this point.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Askew ): Thank you very much, Senator Waters, but you can't actually move it until we go into the committee stage. At this point we'll just note it.

Senator WATERS: I did foreshadow it at the beginning of my speech. Thanks very much.