If there is no objection, the meetings are authorised.

Northern Australia is not a distant frontier; it is central to Australia's prosperity, security and future growth. That is why the coalition supports the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Amendment Bill 2026, extending the NAIF for a further 10 years from 30 June 2026 to 30 June 2036.

The coalition established the NAIF in 2016 because we recognised the enormous economic contribution of northern Western Australia and the wider north. Northern Australia covers more than half the continent but is home to just 5.1 per cent of all Australians, yet it produces well above its population share through mining, energy, agriculture, tourism, logistics and exports. In Western Australia, that contribution is unmistakeable. The Pilbara is one of the great economic powerhouses of the world. Its ports, mines, gas fields, roads, airports and energy systems help drive Australia's export income and national prosperity. The Kimberley is rich in agriculture, pastoral production, tourism, aquaculture, resources and First Nations culture. From Broome to Kununurra, it carries enormous potential but also enormous infrastructure challenges. That is why the NAIF matters so much.

Since its establishment, the NAIF has helped bridge financing gaps and deliver infrastructure projects that might otherwise never proceed. It has supported projects across agriculture and water, energy, resources, transport and, importantly, social infrastructure. As at December 2025, the NAIF had supported 33 projects backed by $4.3 billion in commitments. Those projects are forecast to generate $33 billion in public benefit—around $7.60 for every dollar of NAIF finance—and support more than 18,000 jobs across northern Australia.

The independent review into the NAIF confirmed what regional communities already know: the NAIF is trusted, effective and regarded as a highly valued institution. Stakeholders describe it as part of the northern Australia ecosystem, with the review's first recommendation being that the NAIF continue permanently. This bill does not go that far, unfortunately, but a 10-year extension provides certainty—and certainty is exactly what northern Western Australia needs.

In the Kimberley, the infrastructure task is urgent. Roads are the lifeline of the north. The Great Northern Highway connects communities, freight, mining, agriculture and tourism across the Kimberley. But it was only three years ago when ex-tropical-cyclone Ellie tore through Australia's north, showing everyone across Australia just how vulnerable infrastructure can be when the Fitzroy Crossing bridge, one of Australia's major road freight connections, was significantly damaged, cutting off east Kimberley from the west Kimberley and disrupting communities, supply chains and businesses across the region. That was a stark reminder that resilient infrastructure is not optional in northern Australia. We need stronger roads, we need better bridges and we need more flood-resilient freight corridors that can withstand the severe weather events that regularly impact northern Australia.

Telecommunications remain another major and consistent challenge for northern communities. Across the Kimberley, digital connectivity affects business, health, education, emergency services and tourism. Many communities still rely on unreliable satellite connections, while some residents need multiple mobile providers simply to maintain coverage across the region. That is not good enough in modern Australia. These are standards that would be unacceptable in parts of our southern continent, so why should they be acceptable across the northern part of our continent? Reliable telecommunications are essential for remote health care, online learning, tourism operators, precision agriculture, small businesses and emergency services.

Housing, of course, is also becoming a major barrier to growth. In Broome and across the Kimberley, housing shortages make it harder for businesses, harder for schools and harder for health services to attract workers. In the Pilbara, limited housing supply and high costs are constraining economic growth and making it harder to transition workers from FIFO arrangements into permanent regional communities.

The Pilbara also demonstrates why strategic infrastructure investment matters. Port Hedland remains the world's largest bulk export port. Karratha Airport and Port Hedland International Airport are critical economic and emergency links. The region's iron ore, LNG and critical mineral industries underpin Australia's economy and will continue to play a critical role in driving our national growth, driving our export income and driving energy security today and for the decades to come.

But sustaining that strength requires continued investment in roads, ports, airports, reliable energy infrastructure, worker accommodation and training facilities. The NAIF is designed for exactly this purpose—to unlock private investment, reduce financing barriers and deliver long-term public benefit. The coalition support this bill because we believe in northern Australia. We support it because we believe in the Kimberley and the Pilbara, and we support it because when northern Western Australia is strong, indeed the whole nation is strong.

The Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, the NAIF, is something we should be talking about—and, whilst the minister's here, I note we should also be talking about trade. I, unfortunately, couldn't attend the Trade 2040 Taskforce because the bells were ringing.

Would you like a copy of my speech?

I'd love a copy of your speech, Minister. Thank you very much to you and your team for putting on that event.

We did attempt to delay proceedings, but the bells kept ringing.

Order!

They did. Congratulations to the Trade 2040 Taskforce as well for all their work.

I'll pass that on.

Thank you. Of course, that's very intimately tied with the bill I'm speaking on, Deputy President—the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Amendment Bill 2026—so thank you very much for your indulgence.

I congratulate the three panellists who undertook the 2024 Independent review of the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Act 2016, and I'll put their names on the record. They are the Hon. Warren Snowdon, who of course represented the Northern Territory for many years in this place; Professor Peter Yu; and Dr Lisa Caffery. I put on the record my thanks to them, in terms of the independent review which they undertook. I also put on the record my thanks to the secretariat, who supported them in that process, and also members of the department. I thought it was a quality review, and, as someone who's now speaking in relation to the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility and its future, I found it very informative and very helpful in terms of assessing the success—and it has been a success—of the NAIF.

I also want to associate myself with the remarks of my good friend Senator Dean Smith. He made a point, which is absolutely true: when north Australia prospers, Australia prospers. It's a fact. There's no doubt about it. I note I have fellow senators from Queensland in the chamber and I'm sure they would agree that, when northern Australia prospers, Australia prospers. So we should do everything we possibly can to unleash the potential of northern Australia, and I think NAIF does exactly that.

I note that, in the course of the review, the reviewers engaged in 85 targeted meetings, had six site visits and met with 83 different entities, so they actually undertook quite a considerable workload in terms of constructing the recommendations and observations that were made in the review. There were a few thoughts in the review that I thought resonated with me. The first was a question that one of the stakeholders posed in relation to the role of NAIF in terms of providing bridging finance to potential projects. That the difference between a project getting up and running or not getting up and running; NAIF actually bridges that gap and makes a difference. The question posed was: if not the NAIF, then who? That's a really important question. If we didn't have the NAIF, who would be performing that function in terms of bridging the gap and providing that additional loan on concessional terms, after having undergone due diligence and done all the things we expect before the taxpayers' money is advanced in this respect? If not the NAIF, then who? The answer to that question is nobody, because there's no institution of government that was performing this role before the creation of the NAIF. And I want to place on record my appreciation for the work that Senator Canavan did when he was Minister for Northern Australia, including in relation to the NAIF.

The second point that resonated with me—and which underpins the amendment that was moved by my colleague Senator Susan McDonald from Queensland—is that the most significant recommendation contained in this review document, recommendation 1, was:

The government remove the existing time limit to allow the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) to make Investment Decisions in perpetuity.

The review taskforce recognise the importance of NAIF, but they also recognise the limitations involved in NAIF only being established to work to a five-year timeline, or, as is proposed under this amending legislation, a 10-year timeframe. The reviewers were quite adamant—it was their No. 1 recommendation; it was their most significant recommendation—that NAIF should be enabled, or empowered, to operate in perpetuity. From my perspective, that makes a lot of sense, because I also think we should have a situation—and the reviewers touched upon this as well—where the NAIF actually recycles loan funds. That is the term used. Like a bank, the NAIF lends to a project. It gets repaid in relation to those concessional loans that have been made, and then that money comes back to NAIF to be reinvested in the next project and so on and so forth. I think there's a lot of merit in that, as opposed to, when the repayment of a loan is made, it goes into consolidated revenue and, maybe, the NAIF gets something in the future. I think that would be a way to empower the NAIF, and it's one of the recommendations that was made by the independent reviewers, so I do compliment them in relation to that.

We're talking about the reason we have the NAIF. Some of the facts that were put on the record in the review were quite startling. Northern Australia represents half of Australia's landmass. It's home to 1.5 million people—5.1 per cent of Australia's population—but it's an economic powerhouse in terms of producing GDP per capita in that region. Northern Australia supports more than 100,000 businesses that employ more than 639,000 Australians. The GRP, Gross Regional Product, is much greater than the per capita rates for the rest of the country. Northern Australia is a powerhouse, and the NAIF is helping it to unleash that power.

The review also touches upon the challenges faced by businesses, entrepreneurs and communities that are trying to get projects off the ground in northern Australia. I'm sure Senator Green, from my home state of Queensland, would be well aware of that, based, as she is, in Cairns. These include prolonged underinvestment in critical infrastructure, the high costs of delivery, the limited available workforce and extreme seasons. The costs of doing business are higher in northern Australia, and that's one of the reasons why we need the NAIF.

The NAIF has invested $4.4 billion to support 32 projects so far. But those projects, and that $4.4 billion, have led to $38.2 billion in public benefit. Just think about that: eight times the public benefit for that investment of $4.4 billion through largely concessional loans that will be repaid to the NAIF. So it makes a lot of sense. Due to the NAIF, 19,500 jobs have been created across northern Australia, and that includes jobs for 1,200 First Nations people who, of course, represent a greater percentage of the population in northern Australia than in the rest of Australia.

I'll give you one example of a transformative project that is being supported by NAIF in my home state of Queensland. I come from the mining industry, so I'm passionate about the mining industry. I'm also passionate about undertaking projects which revisit old mines which have been left, including tailings, which is the waste from the mining processes, rehabilitating those old mine sites and obtaining economic benefit in the process. A project which the NAIF is supporting with a $66 million concessional loan is the Mount Morgan Tailings Reprocessing and Rehabilitation Project, which is being undertaken by Heritage Minerals. Just think about this. Mount Morgan was one of the most outstanding gold mines in the whole world. If you go to Rockhampton, you see the beautiful architecture in Rockhampton. A lot of it was the result of wealth that was generated from the Mount Morgan mine. Aa hugely successful mine; hundreds of tonnes of gold were produced from the Mount Morgan mine.

With this concessional loan of up to $66 million, Heritage Minerals—and I congratulate the team at Heritage Minerals for undertaking this project—will go in and they'll treat the tailings, the waste from previous mining operations from, say, 100 years ago. They'll extract the gold that's still there in that waste, because processing techniques have improved. Through that extraction, they'll generate a profit for themselves and their shareholders, but they'll also generate a public benefit of $849 million for the people in the Rockhampton region. So they'll remediate an old mine site, obtain economic benefit out of what was previously considered waste through the best technology available, and generate that community benefit for regional Queensland. It is a win-win-win. A win-win for the community, a win for the environment and a win for the shareholders of that company. That is exactly what we're looking for.

I'm delighted to speak in support of the NAIF. I'm delighted to speak on behalf of the people of Queensland to support the amendment which was proposed by my good friend Senator McDonald. I know that there are quite a few Queensland senators in the chamber, which is always good to see—we've nearly got a majority in the chamber at the moment. I'm delighted to support the amendment that the NAIF be in perpetuity. As I started this speech, I'll end it: when northern Australia prospers, Australia prospers.

I'd like to start by thanking senators for their contribution to this debate on the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Amendment Bill 2026. I'll keep my comments brief because I know there are more amendments for us to work our way through this morning.

The Australian government is committed to driving economic development in northern Australia in a stable, reliable and accountable way, and this bill delivers practical and targeted updates to the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Act 2016. It ensures that the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility remains fit for purpose and capable of supporting transformational projects across the north well into the next decade. There are a range of amendments that this bill takes us through—extending NAIF's investment decision-making period for another 10 years, strengthening accountability and compliance, establishing joint responsibilities for the ministers of northern Australia and finance and refreshing the statutory review requirements so we can keep that accountability as part of the system. The continuation of the investment period through to 2036 responds directly to the findings of the review that Senator Scarr spoke to. This will preserve NAIF's capacity to continue promoting transformational projects across northern Australia and provide long-term certainty to investors and communities.

This bill strengthens the legislative foundations of the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, enhances accountability, provides certainty to investors and project proponents, ensures that NAIF remains a reliable partner in delivering the long-term infrastructure necessary to grow northern Australia. It's a practical, measured and future focused package of reforms. I've seen with my own eyes the real transformational effects and economic benefits that the NAIF has had in northern Australia—and will continue to have over the next 10 years if this bill is passed. I think, genuinely, if you are a supporter of the people of northern Australia and the NAIF, then you will support this bill. I thank the Senate, and I commend the bill to the Senate.

The question is that the second reading amendment as moved by Senator Roberts be agreed to.

The question now is that the second reading be agreed to.

by leave—I move the amendments on sheet 3901 as foreshadowed in my speech:

(1) Schedule 1, item 1, page 3 (lines 4 and 5), omit the item, substitute:

1 Section 8

Repeal the section.

(2) Schedule 1, item 13, page 5 (line 1), omit "Reviews", substitute "Periodic reviews".

(3) Schedule 1, item 13, page 5 (lines 2 to 12), omit subsections 43(1) and (2), substitute:

(1) The Minister must cause a review of the operation of this Act to commence as soon as practicable after:

(a) 30 June 2031; and

(b) each fifth anniversary of 30 June 2031.

The question is that amendments (1) to (3) on sheet 3901 be agreed to.

I move the Greens' amendment on sheet 3685:

(1) Schedule 1, page 3 (after line 5), after item 1, insert:

1A At the end of Part 2

Add:

8A Prohibited financial assistance

(1) Financial assistance must not be provided under this Act if it would:

(a) directly finance the extraction of coal or natural gas; or

(b) directly finance the construction of pipeline infrastructure primarily for the extraction of natural gas; or

(c) directly finance the logging of native forests.

(2) In this section:

native forest does not include a plantation.

plantation means an intensively managed stand of trees that is created by the regular placement of seedlings or seed.

I will speak briefly. The Greens are not going to support this bill unless this amendment is successful, because we are of the view that public money should not be spent on coal and gas—on fossil fuels—and on native forest logging.

Last year I went to the Great Northern Conference, and, at that conference, I heard from a vet who lives in Tennant Creek. She talked about the year that they'd experienced, a couple of years ago, where they had the number of hot days that they will continue to experience if the global temperature rises by more than 1.5 degrees. She talked about the impact that that warming had had on that community. That term—where they had day after day after day of extreme heat—became known as 'fight term' in the local school, because kids couldn't get cool, tempers flared and they had fight after fight after fight. The consequence of that, at the end of the year, was that there was a mass exodus of teachers from that community. In addition to the teachers leaving, other people then left because they were partners of those teachers. So they lost other critical workers in their town. The following year, they had temperatures that were high, and, again, it massively decimated their community. That community has not recovered from a summer of temperatures consistently warmer as a consequence of global heating. Yet we have a bill here that seeks to continue to fund the very types of projects that are contributing to that heating. The northern parts of Australia should not be treated as a sacrifice zone on the altar of coal and gas corporations' profits. Continuing to open up and invest in coal and gas and oil projects in northern Australia is condemning the people of northern Australia to an unliveable future. That is the science. Those are the facts.

The Greens are pleased that we have worked with the government on other pieces of legislation to exclude public money going to coal, oil and gas, and native forest logging. That needs to happen in the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility as well. So the Greens are putting forward this amendment to give the Labor government, the government that says that they believe in climate change and climate action, the government that says they believe we need to move to a renewable energy future, the opportunity to make sure that public money through this facility does not continue to go to coal, oil and gas companies.

The people of Tennant Creek already know what it's like to live in an unliveable future due to climate change. The people across the north deserve to have a liveable future, not to be treated as a sacrifice zone. So I implore the government. If you genuinely believe that climate change needs to be actioned, if you genuinely believe that we shouldn't leave the people of the north out on a limb, sacrificed on the altar of coal, oil and gas corporations, I implore you to support this Greens amendment.

I'll just speak briefly to the amendment to put the government's position on the record. The government will be opposing this amendment. In 2024 the government updated the NAIF's investment mandate to ensure that potential projects align with one or more of the following policy principles: sustainable and resilient economic development and alleviation of economic or social disadvantage in northern Australia; working with jurisdictions to deliver key infrastructure in northern Australia; sustainability, climate change and circular economy principles and solutions in northern Australia; realising the Critical Minerals Strategy; and materially improving the lives of Indigenous people and communities. What that means is that we have seen an increase in investment by NAIF in a range of sectors and in a range of projects, with more investment in housing, more investment in renewable energy and more investment in critical minerals.

This bill actually strengthens the NAIF board's accountability to this investment mandate, which is really important. It requires the board to notify responsible ministers if the NAIF fails to comply with the investment mandate. It also enables responsible ministers to direct the board to take corrective action. The Minister for Northern Australia continues to retain a veto power over investment decisions. In 2022 the minister provided NAIF with the government's statement of exceptions, and it included the government's priority to transition Australia's energy sector to net zero emissions by 2050, and that the NAIF has a key role in contributing to this priority in northern Australia. That's why the government won't be supporting this amendment. We recognise the role that NAIF is playing in that transition.

Just one of those projects that I want to talk to is the Alpha HPA First Project in Gladstone. The NAIF is providing a loan to Alpha HPA First Project to ensure the investment will lead to the production of over 10,000 tonnes of high-purity aluminium and a range of related products. This will support the high-technology manufacturing sector such as LED lighting, lithium batteries and semiconductors. These are all things that are needed in the transition, which is making sure that people in northern Australia, particularly in Gladstone, have good, secure jobs in industries that are either advanced manufacturing, renewable energy or transitioning from the economy that we have right now in regional Australia. People in northern Australia and particularly the Gladstone region deserve good, secure jobs, and these types of projects are supporting those types of jobs as we transition our economy.

Thank you for mentioning the Alpha HPA project. It is a fantastic project in Gladstone, a community that recognises that we do need to transition to renewable energy—and that's why Gladstone Regional Council was one of the first councils in the country to have a transition road map—but I'm struggling to follow the logic. If I heard you correctly, you talked about the investment mandate and said that it has to take into account sustainability and climate change, and then the example that you gave of a project that's being funded is a non-fossil-fuel project. Is it your position that the Greens amendment is inconsistent then with the mandate for the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility? Otherwise, I fail to see what the government's reasoning is for not excluding fossil fuel and native forest logging projects.

I've provided you the government's position. We're not supporting your amendment, and we maintain that the mandate is a very important direction to the NAIF board on the projects we would like to see them fund.

Is it the government's position that the mandate already excludes then the funding of fossil fuel and native forest logging projects, given what the mandate contains?

No, we're not supporting your amendment, and the mandate, as I set out, lists a number of different sectors. Of course, the NAIF mandate is a direction to the board. We have seen an increase in those types of projects. We're very proud of the investment that the NAIF is making in northern Australia. But I've been clear. We don't support your amendment.

I'd like some final clarity. I understand the government's position is that you're not supporting the amendment. My question is: is it the view then that fossil fuel projects could be funded—coal, oil and gas projects and native forest logging—under the current mandate?

In good faith, I want to answer your question to put it on the record. NAIF investments are proponent led and sector agnostic, and the senator knows that. That's the way that the NAIF has been set up and will continue, hopefully, to work over the next 10 years, and that's why we don't support the Greens' amendment. I know that they've brought amendments like that forward in other legislation. The NAIF does not control which sector's potential project proponents arise, and the sector-agnostic approach allows the NAIF to drive broad economic and social development across north Australia. Of course, the investment mandate requires that, to be eligible for NAIF financing, a project must align with at least one of the five policy priority areas.

Minister, as Special Envoy for the Great Barrier Reef, does the government accept that if the NAIF continues to be able to invest in coal, oil and gas projects that it's putting the health of the Great Barrier Reef and the jobs that rely on it at risk?

I'll respond to that, given the personal nature of the accusation. I'm actually not the special envoy for the reef anymore. I'm the Assistant Minister for Northern Australia. I'm very proud of the work that this government has done to protect the Great Barrier Reef, including our landmark changes in the EPBC reform that will protect the reef for generations to come. Our government is committed to net zero emissions by 2050, and the NAIF has a key role in contributing to this policy in northern Australia. The government takes a different view than the Greens political party about how we will reach that 2050 goal. But, of course, it's incredibly important that the NAIF continues to deliver economic development in northern Australia while we protect these special places.

My apologies to the minister; I neglected to note that that role had changed.

I just want to put on the record that I, too, have travelled around northern Australia. I've been into the territory in Far North Queensland, and it is certainly not the case that communities are not concerned about the impact of global heating on the north. I say to the government that it would appear, from the answers to questions, that the NAIF investment mandate does not preclude the funding of coal, oil and gas projects and native forest logging. If the government are serious about protecting communities in the north so that they have a vibrant and healthy future, I implore them to support the Greens' amendment.

The question is that amendment (1) on sheet 3685 be agreed to.

The question now is that the bill stand as printed.

I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

The question is that the bill be read a third time.

I am pleased to continue speaking to the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. Nurse prescribers have been pushing for this for a very long time—to be able to work to their full scope of practice and support patients to access faster, more affordable quality health care. The Greens are pleased to support this bill.

Nurse prescribing will allow for greater efficiency in the healthcare system, as many patients will only need to visit a single point of care. Fewer referrals and hospital admissions will bring down the cost of treatment for many patients, which will lower the cost barriers to accessing health care during this cost-of-living crisis. To get the full benefits of this change, nurse prescribing needs to be implemented not only in hospitals but also in primary healthcare settings, such as local clinics and aged-care settings. This bill went before a Senate inquiry and was supported by the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association and the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation, among many others.

Some submissions to the inquiry raised concerns about ensuring that nurse prescribing is implemented in a way that upholds the highest standards of patient safety. The Greens are firmly committed to making sure that people feel safe, supported and confident when accessing health care, regardless of who is providing that care. I am pleased that this bill introduces a number of important safeguarding measures, including the requirement for nurse prescribers to be in a prescribing agreement with existing prescribers and to complete a six-month clinical mentorship process with an authorised health practitioner; additional training and qualification requirements beyond those needed to be a registered nurse; the ability for the minister to designate which medicines can and can't be prescribed by nurse prescribers; and the expansion of the Professional Services Review, ensuring appropriate oversight of nurses in their role as PBS prescribers. Additionally, I understand that further safeguarding measures will be detailed in the delegated legislation. With these details that are in development, as they are in development, the Greens will be playing a careful, scrutinising role to ensure that patient safety remains at the centre of reform.

While we are discussing healthcare professionals working safely within their scope of practice, it is important to recognise that many submissions to the Senate inquiry identified opportunities to go further. More than 20 submissions highlighted a clear and practical reform—expanding access to PBS subsidised prescribing for additional qualified health practitioners. One of those professions is podiatrists and podiatric surgeons. I have had the pleasure of meeting with podiatric surgeons and representatives at the University of Western Australia's Podiatry Clinic, and their message was clear: podiatrists and podiatric surgeons are already endorsed prescribers. They are fully qualified and authorised to prescribe medicines. However, they cannot access the PBS for PBS subsidies for those prescriptions. This means their patients are left paying full price for medicines that would otherwise be subsidised. As the Australian Podiatry Association noted in its submission:

… a podiatrist with an endorsement to prescribe medicines may clinically decide a medicine is needed today, yet the patient must still book a second consult … just to obtain a PBS-subsidised script.

This is not just inefficient; it creates barriers to care.

We have a clear example provided to us from the Advanced Practicing Podiatrists High Risk Foot Group. A 72-year-old man on the age pension living with diabetes attends the podiatry clinic for his annual foot health review under an enhanced primary care referral. During the consultation, the podiatrist identifies a probable fungal infection and recommends a standard 12-week course of oral antifungal medications. The podiatrist is qualified to prescribe and can initiate treatment immediately, but, because the prescription is not covered by the PBS, the patient must pay out of pocket. At a discount chemist, this would be $27.99. He is left with a choice: pay out of pocket or book for an additional GP appointment just to access a subsidised script. This is unnecessary. It wastes time and it increases costs for patients and for the system. It reflects rules that have not kept pace with how people actually access health care.

We have an opportunity to fix this. The Australian Greens are calling on the government to update the law to allow podiatrists and podiatric surgeons to access PBS benefits when prescribing within their scope of practice. This is a practical reform that would make health care more affordable, more timely and more patient centred. The Greens call on the government to make this change, and I foreshadow that I will move the second reading amendment in my name to give effect to it.

In conclusion, allowing registered nurses to prescribe PBS medicines within their scope of practice will expand choice, improve access and reduce pressure on other parts of the healthcare system. The scope-of-practice review recommended this change, along with many other pathways to enable non-medical practitioners to play a greater role in the provision of safe, quality health care. The Greens encourage the Labor government to go further in their response to the scope-of-practice review and to implement the identified opportunities for ensuring more healthcare professionals can work to the top of their scope of practice. Getting this work done helps everybody in the system. It's complicated. It's detailed. It's often behind the scenes, but it is the work that, when achieved, delivers better care for people—more affordable care for people.

In the time that I've had the health portfolio for the Greens, I have had the opportunity to learn from many experts—treating clinicians, allied health professionals, general practitioners and so many others—and the common thread between them all is a desire to work with government to get good health outcomes for people and to reform the system so that it works. It's the responsibility of elected officials to be up for the hard and complicated work to get that done. It's sometimes not glamourous, but, when it is ultimately resolved, it makes a real difference in people's lives. I look forward to continuing to work across the chamber to advance the implementation of the scope of practice review and to bring down healthcare costs in the Australian community.

I rise to speak on the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. As a senator for Tasmania, I'm acutely aware of the profound and persistent challenges facing Australia's healthcare system. Nowhere are those challenges felt more clearly than in my home state. Tasmania is, in many respects, a microcosm of the pressures confronting health care nationally. We have the oldest population in the country, we have higher rates of chronic disease and socioeconomic disadvantage, and we are a regional and dispersed state where geography and limited transport options continue to create real barriers to care. Taken together, these factors have produced a perfect storm for a healthcare system that is struggling not only to meet demand but to recruit and retain the skilled workforce required to deliver high-quality, timely care.

For Tasmanians, difficulty in accessing health care is not an occasional inconvenience; it is routine. Access to general practitioners, particularly in regional and rural communities, is increasingly limited. Emergency departments are under sustained pressure, and hospital flow is routinely constrained. Too often, patients who are well enough to leave hospital remain stuck in beds, not because they require acute care but because there are insufficient aged-care or disability placements available to safely discharge them. This has a ripple effect across the entire system, reducing capacity and increasing delays for others who need care.

Behind these patient-facing challenges sits a workforce crisis. Tasmania, like many jurisdictions, relies heavily on interstate and overseas locums to fill critical gaps. While those clinicians play an important role, this reliance comes at a significant and unsustainable financial cost, further straining already stretched health budgets. All of these pressures persist despite increased investment from the Tasmanian Liberal government and additional funding from the Commonwealth. That reality demonstrates a crucial point: simply spending more money without meaningful reform will not fix a system under structural stress.

Tasmania shows us plainly that the challenges facing health care are national in nature and that the responsibility for reform must sit here in Canberra. It cannot be left solely to the states and territories to absorb growing demand, workforce shortages and outdated models of care.

The coalition supports the intent of this bill. Expanding prescribing capabilities to registered nurses has the potential to improve access to medicines and make better use of the skills already within our health workforce, particularly in regional, rural and remote areas. However, the government's narrow approach means significant pressure points remain embedded in the system. By limiting this expansion to registered nurses alone and excluding other suitably qualified health professionals such as podiatrists, Labor has missed an opportunity for more comprehensive reform. Reducing the burden on our healthcare system will not occur through a single policy lever. The coalition agrees that we must start somewhere. We support taking prudent first steps, but we are clear eyed that this legislation on its own will not deliver the systemic change required to address workforce shortages or growing patient demand.

I am a member of the Community Affairs Legislation Committee, which recently inquired into this bill. We received compelling evidence from a wide range of stakeholders supporting the inclusion of registered nurses as PBS prescribers. The Australian Medical Association, the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation, private health insurers such as Bupa, and other clinical experts all spoke to the benefits this change could deliver for patients. That evidence should be acknowledged. However, my coalition colleagues and I remain disappointed that the government has failed to present a coherent whole-of-system plan to improve access to PBS subsidised medicines across the board. More than 20 submissions to the inquiry specifically called for podiatrists to be included in the expansion of prescribing powers, yet under this legislation podiatrists and podiatric surgeons will remain the only nationally endorsed health practitioners whose patients cannot access PBS subsidised medicines from their treating clinicians. This outcome underscores the ad hoc nature of Labor's approach.

These reforms stem from the Unleashing the Potential of our Health Workforce—Scope of Practice Review, a review commissioned and completed some 18 months ago. Despite its significance, stakeholders are still waiting for the government's formal response. Disturbingly, Senate estimates recently revealed that the government has not even committed to delivering a response at all. That uncertainty leaves health professionals, service providers and patients without clarity, direction or confidence in Labor's long-term intent. While this bill will deliver some benefits, it falls well short of what is required to address rising demand, workforce shortages and access inequities across the country. Expanding prescribing powers for nurses is a step forward, but it does not and cannot resolve the systemic issues that are crippling the sector.

Australia's healthcare system is under significant strain. Addressing that strain will require bold, coordinated and comprehensive reform. This bill should be the first step, not the final word. The coalition, with patients and the broader health sector, will continue to call on the government to provide a comprehensive response to the scope-of-practice review—one that clearly outlines its position on each recommendation and provides an indicative timeline for action. Such transparency would offer much needed certainty to stakeholders and demonstrate a genuine commitment to improving health outcomes for all Australians.

Australians don't spend much time thinking about who's allowed to prescribe a medicine; they think about whether they can get an appointment, whether they have to drive two hours to see a doctor, whether Mum can get the medication she needs before the weekend or whether Dad can leave hospital without another delay. That's what the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025 is about. It's about making our health system work better for the people who rely on it every single day.

For too many Australians, particularly those living in regional, rural and remote communities, getting timely health care isn't as simple as booking an appointment down the road. Sometimes there isn't a GP down the road. Sometimes the nearest clinic is hours away. And sometimes your local nurse is the health professional you know, you trust and you see most regularly. If that nurse has the qualifications, the training and the appropriate endorsement, why should patients have to jump through another hoop just to access a medicine they're already taking? This bill recognises that common sense. It allows suitably qualified registered nurses to prescribe certain medications under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, helping patients get the care they need sooner without compromising safety.

This bill isn't about replacing doctors or lowering standards; it's about making better use of the incredible workforce we already have. Anyone who has spent time in a hospital, an aged-care home, an Aboriginal community controlled health organisation or a regional health clinic knows just how much nurses already do. They're often the first person a patient sees, the last person they see before going home and the one constant throughout their care. They know their patients. They know their communities. They are the backbone of the healthcare industry. And they know when something isn't quite right. This reform simply recognises the expertise they already bring to our health system. For someone in a country town, it could mean getting treatment without waiting days for the next available GP appointment.

Order! Sorry, Senator Walker. It being 1.30 pm, we shall now move to two-minute statements.

Australians know their money is not going far enough. They know that it doesn't go as far as it used to. They know that groceries costs more, power costs are going up, insurance costs more and mortgages are increasing. But Dr Jim Chalmers, the Labor Treasurer, insists on trading in false hope to these Australian families that are struggling.

In the Perth suburbs of Byford, Landsdale, Harrisdale and Aveley, they feel the pain more than anyone in Western Australia. They are the names of the suburbs that have the highest proportion of mortgages. They feel interest rate pressures. Jim Chalmers on the weekend said that the government has made good progress when it comes to tackling inflation, but that's not what the data says. The data says that inflationary pressures are pushing up housing and rental costs. They are concerningly high for Australian families.

We also know that Australia is now suffering from stagnant productivity growth. That just makes the inflationary challenge more urgent. And what have we heard today from the RBA? The Reserve Bank of Australia has made it very clear it will push up interest rates if the government doesn't do more to tackle inflation. This is not the time for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Dr Jim Chalmers to get lazy when it comes to tackling inflation in the economy.

Of course, there's more bad news. Consumer confidence in this country has fallen by almost three per cent to levels that are now amongst the lowest they have ever been in its 50 year record. That's a sign that Australian families have less confidence in their economic future and less economic security as they start to plan ahead. These are troubling times for the Australian economy, but Labor insists on punishing people.

There's something pretty special happening around Australia right now. People who have never watched football—soccer—before are setting alarms in the middle of the night. Pubs are packed; live sites are heaving. Families are gathered around televisions cheering the Socceroos on. And what's striking is that Australians from every background see themselves in this team because this team looks like modern Australia. Players whose families come from places like South Sudan, Cyprus, the United Kingdom, Croatia, Guinea and Italy all pull on the same green-and-gold jersey—different stories, different cultures, one team.

This is not a weakness. It's one of Australia's greatest strengths. Recently, we've heard voices arguing Australia should somehow become a monoculture, as though diversity is something to fear rather than celebrate. But if you want to know what Australia looks like at its best, don't listen to the culture warriors; watch the Socceroos. Watch 11 Australians trusting one another, relying on one another and working towards the literal same goal. That's the country most Australians recognise—a confident country that doesn't ask people to leave their heritage behind to belong here, a country where your family's story can begin anywhere in the world, but your future is proudly Aussie.

Sport has always had a remarkable way of bringing us together. For 90 minutes, our politics, our postcodes and our backgrounds matter a little less. We celebrate together, we suffer together, and, when Australia scores, everyone is on their feet together. As the Socceroos continue their World Cup campaign, I know the whole country will be behind them. They aren't just representing Australia on the world stage; they are repping the very best of who we are as a nation.

Next week is NAIDOC week, a national celebration of First Nations culture. This year's NAIDOC Week theme is 50 Years of Deadly, recognising decades of advocacy. Oodgeroo Noonuccal, Uncle Jack Charles, Lowitja O'Donoghue, Adrian Burragubba, the Minjerribah Moorgumpin Elders in Council—it's a rich list of elders who work tirelessly to protect culture and community.

I want to give a shout-out to some amazing First Nations community leaders continuing this work. Donnella Mills, who, as interim chair of Our Ways Strong Together, is leading the work to tackle family, domestic and sexual violence against First Nations women and children. Professor Megan Davis and Dr Hannah McGlade, whose complaint on behalf of incarcerated First Nations youth led the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to find that Australia's youth justice system was breaching human rights. The late Rhoda Roberts AO elevated Indigenous voices in the arts and creative space for First Nations stories to be seen and heard and celebrated. Travis Lovett walked all the way from Naarm to Parliament House calling for national truth-telling. Dr Jackie Huggins AO, Larissa Baldwin-Roberts and Millie Telford founded Common Threads to support grassroots leadership for truth, land back and climate justice. Professor Anne Poelina is chair of the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council and one of 10 people seeking a UN ruling that, by failing to take climate action, Australia is putting country and living waters at risk.

Australia is lucky to have such a wealth of First Nations leadership and it's time to listen to them. This NAIDOC week we must celebrate 50 Years of Deadly by finally doing what's being asked: implement the death in custody recommendations, fund community controlled services, take climate action and— (Time expired)

The Australian Christian Freedom Index has recently published a report on the state of religious liberty pertaining to Christians in Australia. Over 10,000 Christians were surveyed and shared their experiences regarding expressing their faith. Ninety-two per cent said that they think it's riskier to affirm Christian beliefs than it was five years ago. Forty-two per cent said they experienced hostility, threats or harassment for expressing what they considered to be a Christian worldview. This most likely relates to opinions that could involve things like marriage and family. Twenty-five per cent said they were denied opportunities at work, volunteering or leadership due to their beliefs.

Now, while these are always subjective perspectives, it signals something that many Australians of conservative persuasions have felt for a very long time—that is, an ideology hostile to Christianity has taken hold in our institutions. This is something that I've been talking about for a long period of time. There were university students in this document expressing frustration at being dismissed for conservative opinions, which supposedly free-thinking academic institutions can't tolerate. Teachers in Christian schools expressed frustration with being policed in an environment where their faith is meant to provide the ethos in their workplace. And, personally, I've had many people who have escaped communist countries tell me that Australia feels eerily like what they fled from many years ago. Sometimes they whisper to state their honest opinion to avoid being overheard or they feel the need to police themselves lest they face disciplinary measures from HR departments. It shouldn't be this way in Australia, and all I can say is that it's important that we live not by lies.

There's a difference between arrogantly pushing one's belief onto others and simply holding to one's religious convictions. Many Australians feel that the latter has become risky. I would encourage anyone listening to go and read the Australian Christian Freedom Index document from May this year. It touches on a whole lot of important subjects, including, but not limited to, the ones I've mentioned this afternoon.

I rise today with news for Hobart's northern suburbs. The Albanese Labor government is delivering a Medicare urgent care clinic in the Glenorchy and Derwent Park area.

An honourable senator interjecting—

Yes, it was good news! I was proud to announce it alongside Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care, and member for Lyons, Rebecca White. This clinic means people will be able to get urgent care close to home seven days a week over extended hours, fully bulk-billed and without needing an appointment. That matters because when your child wakes up sick at night or when you cut your hand, twist an ankle or need care that cannot wait, the only option should not be a long trip to the Royal Hobart Hospital's emergency department. Around 32 per cent of presentations to that emergency department in 2024-25 were semi-urgent or non-urgent. This clinic will give families another choice and help the hospital focus on the most serious cases.

Medicare urgent care clinics are working. Labor promised 137 clinics across Australia, and all 137 are now open. Around three million Australians have already received care through them. They are treating children, helping people afterhours and taking pressure off hospital emergency departments. This is what strengthening Medicare looks like. It is also part of a much bigger health agenda: more bulk-billing, cheaper medicines, more doctors and nurses, and better care in communities where people live.

For families in Glenorchy, Moonah, Derwent Park and across the northern suburbs, this is practical help—closer care, faster care, free care. Labor listened to the community and Labor is delivering. The new Glenorchy Medicare urgent care clinic will make a difference, and I am proud to bring it to our community.

On behalf of Canberrans, I would like to recognise some of the outstanding work that happens in this place and thank senators for their important contribution. In March 2023, we saw the Finance and Public Administration References Committee begin an inquiry into the integrity of consulting services, and I believe we saw the Senate at its best. We saw Senator O'Neill, Senator Barbara Pocock, Senator Colbeck and others forensically examining allegations and goings-on at PwC. Ten days of public hearings, 61 submissions, 129 responses to questions on notice—a huge body of work. And we've seen them at it again: Senator O'Neill, Senator Barbara Pocock and Senator Scarr looking at KPMG. This is what the Senate can do, and I really thank colleagues for their important work on this, holding these companies to account and shining light on what is happening.

The other area I would like to mention is aged care, where we've seen Senator Allman-Payne and Senator Ruston do outstanding work to shine a light on what is happening to older Australians, to raise concerns about the government's assessment process for Support at Home and about the algorithm that really isn't delivering for older Australians. For me, it reinforces just how important it is that on these sorts of issues we have a multipartisan approach, that as a Senate we use our powers and we use them well to shine a light on these issues and then to make sure that we are doing the work that headlines simply cannot do.

Every day, we hear that Labor has zero tolerance for corruption, yet it continues to happen under their watch. We continue to hand over Australians' hard earned money, corruption continues, and the Prime Minister and Labor simply shrug. The latest revelations about Victoria's Big Build expose a culture that should be an alarm, a wake-up call, to every single Australian. The headline from the Age said it all; it said, 'Don't pay Gatto, don't get access.'

Now, these are not payments that happened before Labor was elected. They are payments that happened this year, as recently as this year—the same year in which the CFMEU is apparently under administration, the same year that Labor committed billions of dollars more to Victoria's corrupt big-build program. Even more chilling was the use of a phrase by those involved: 'Everybody eats.' What does that mean? What that means is that corruption isn't isolated. It means that everybody expects a cut while taxpayers foot the bill.

And, if this isn't bad enough, both state and federal Labor governments knew this was happening. Think about that. The Albanese government knew of at least four corruption allegations about the Suburban Rail Loop in Victoria before it handed over another $3.8 billion of taxpayer money. Now we learn that access to government funded projects in Victoria depended entirely not on merit but on who you knew and who you paid—specifically, whether you knew and paid Mick Gatto.

The Allan Labor government has turned a blind eye to this, and it's still turning a blind eye. The Prime Minister says he's sought assurances, but what's he doing to stop it? Australians deserve answers, and they deserve accountability. They deserve confidence that taxpayer funded dollars are building infrastructure, not feeding a culture where— (Time expired)

Cleanaway has become one of Australia's worst offenders when it comes to workplace safety. In the past two years alone, five people have lost their lives while working there—and a total of eight since 2022.

Now a working mother of seven and a grandmother has been left with permanent vision loss, due to Cleanaway's disregard for safety. Hine Murphy, a hardworking truck driver, was carrying out her shift when concentrated methanol poured from a hospital waste bin over her. She contacted management to seek urgent safety advice. Crickets—no response. In the coming weeks she was hospitalised, before finding out she would have permanent vision loss.

Weeks later, when the Transport Workers' Union tried to inspect the site, Cleanaway refused entry. Comcare, the national safety regulator, had to intervene. They intervened, and Cleanaway didn't report the incident or take any steps to stop it happening again.

Despite all this, Cleanaway's CEO, Mark Schubert, took home over $4.2 million, and Cleanaway still made $109 million in profit in the first half of this financial year. But no amount of profits can wash away the blood from Cleanaway's hands.

I want to acknowledge Hine Murphy and her family and thank them for coming in today, because listening to her speak earlier today was heartbreaking and something that I don't think anyone here will forget. She said:

I should never be in this situation just because of my job.

The two outcomes of methanol are death and blindness—I'm lucky I got the latter.

No worker should have to be thankful they were lucky to be blinded instead of being killed.

Before Cleanaway manages Australia's waste, it needs to clean up its own mess and sack the CEO. It's time for a clean-out at Cleanaway.

Today is the last day of Pride Month, which is held around the world on the anniversary of the 1969 Stonewall riots in New York, where gay activists fought back against the regular police brutality they were subjected to. Of course, Australia has its own shameful history of hatred and discrimination against queer folks, including when marchers in the first Mardi Gras were brutally bashed and arrested by police; and the Salamanca protests in Tasmania, where over a hundred people were arrested simply for asking people to sign a petition at a market.

Queer communities in this country and around the world have come a long way in their fight to be free of discrimination, but there is a long, long way still to go. As we've seen from One Nation in this place, as recently as yesterday, there are still people who want to politicise and persecute queer communities for political gain.

That is why, today, the Australian Greens will be introducing legislation to create a dedicated LGBTIQA+ commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission. When discrimination and hate are increasing, you respond by fighting back and by strengthening the institutions that defend people's rights. Visibility matters. Representation matters. Having a dedicated commissioner tells LGBTIQA+ Australians that their rights deserve to be defended with vigour and to be aggressively promoted with seriousness and in the same way that everybody else's rights are defended and promoted.

On 2 July, I wrote to the Prime Minister imploring him to declare the Great Western Highway—which is cracked and crumbling, and now closed—a disaster. The government has declined to act.

Now, today, another local business has gone to the wall. The Triple 8 Cafe at South Bowenfels is closing its doors. This is what happens when the government fails to act. Family businesses get shut down. Workers lose shifts. And now a community is losing another local employer.

For 114 days, following the highway cracking and crumbling, communities and businesses across the Blue Mountains and the Central West have been cut off from customers' trade and certainty. We asked the government to act. We wrote to the Prime Minister. Again, they have declined to declare this a disaster. We asked for the government to provide urgent Commonwealth support for businesses and communities being smashed by this disaster, and again they have ignored those calls.

What's worse is that Labor has put no new money into the Great Western Highway in the federal budget. The locals are being told they'll have to wait another year for a repair job—a temporary fix—while the region remains no closer to having the infrastructure, the highway, they should have had years ago. This disaster is nearly two decades in the making. It's the result of constant government inaction. The need for a proper route between Mount Victoria and Lithgow has been known for years. Labor knows it. The Liberals know it. The Nationals know it. Every government that has looked at this knows that this is what is needed.

The warning signs were there, but they left the job undone, and now the entire region is paying the price. Families and businesses are going to the wall, and it's not good enough. This business didn't close because it had not worked hard enough. It closed because it had not received the infrastructure or the support from the federal government that it needed. One Nation is saying, 'Enough!' The Central West needs urgent disaster support for these affected businesses.

Right now, communities are dealing with the harsh reality of an increasingly extreme climate. On the other side of the world, millions of people are suffering through an unprecedented heatwave. Ecosystems are breaking down before our very eyes. It is beyond clear that urgent and large-scale climate action in Australia and across the globe is needed.

Thanks to the tireless advocacy of local communities and environmental groups, we have a critical opportunity to stop a megapolluting project in its tracks. Labor has been forced to reopen the case against Woodside and their climate-wrecking Browse gas project. We know that the Browse project poses a catastrophic risk to communities. It will spew 1.6 billion tonnes of polluting carbon emissions into our air, pressure cooking the climate and exacerbating extreme weather conditions. If this project goes ahead, WA's own precious Scott Reef and the 27 protected species that call it home will be decimated. Climate change is driving mass bleaching events from Ningaloo to the Great Barrier Reef and in so many other precious reef systems. Browse must be stopped. This project will supercharge this devastation. All that once thrived with life and burst with colour will weaken, wither and wash away—gone forever.

Labor didn't want the community to be heard. Woodside definitely didn't want the community to be heard. Well, too bad, so sad. We have until 21 July to make submissions. The community will be heard, and the government must listen.

According to those who are bitterly opposed to myself and One Nation, another sacred cow I supposedly slaughtered at the National Press Club was paid parental leave funded by taxpayers. Let's be absolutely clear on the facts. I support paid parental leave, and I will not change it. I repeat I will not change it. Actually, I supported the 26 weeks of paid parental leave passed recently. Anyone who says or implies otherwise is lying to the Australian people.

That's what's been happening every day since my speech: misrepresentations and outright falsehoods. It's why Australians' trust in government, politics and the media is at an all-time low. Australians are sick of being lied to. Australians are sick of being ignored. As I said in that same speech, Australians know what you've been saying about me, and they no longer believe it.

One Nation supports Australian families and supports more choices and flexibility for Australian families. We're the only party that has a policy to enable couples with children to split incomes and file joint tax returns. We're the only party which supports greater choices and greater oversight for parents in the education of their children. We're the only party which wants to scrap net zero and bring genuine cost-of-living relief to Australian workers and their families. We're the only party which wants to slash mass migration to reduce housing demand and ban foreign ownership of residential property to increase housing supply. We're the only party which has a policy to slash the out-of-control government spending that is driving high inflation and high mortgage payments. We're the only party that puts Australian families first. As I said before, stop your lies. Stop misconstruing my words into something they're not. I support paid parental leave. (Time expired)

Yesterday's landmark Nakamal agreement with Vanuatu is another transformational breakthrough in our region by the Albanese Labor government. We are doing the work after Australia lost a decade in the Pacific under the Liberals—a decade that we can never get back. They neglected our region and failed to show up when it mattered. Scott Morrison declined to even attend the Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting in 2018. When he went the next year, the Fijian prime minister said, 'After what we went through with Morrison, nothing can be worse,' and that Australia 'should not be in the Pacific Islands Forum'.

We remember that they failed to respect the Pacific. They mocked their priorities. The Pacific remembers the jokes about water lapping at their doors. The coalition oversaw the largest cuts to foreign aid in Australian history. They sought to diminish the Pacific's access to the Australian labour market through the establishment of a rival visa. Nothing has changed. The coalition—this opposition—opposed the Pacific engagement visa and greater support for PALM workers' families. We all saw those opposite, including Senator Collins and Senator Henderson, lead the charge in the coup to scrap net zero. They would not even be able to sign the Nakamal agreement because it commits to net zero. They want to team up with One Nation, who have made slurs against the Pacific which are unforgivable.

The Liberals and One Nation want to take the country backwards, and our relationships and strategic position in the region would go backwards with them. I ask those opposite—including you, Senator Collins: will you condemn Pauline Hanson for her slur against our newest ally, and do the Liberals support the Nakamal agreement even though they wouldn't be able to sign it themselves? (Time expired)

Recently, I was able to visit the Bronte Surf Life Saving Club with the president, Basil Scaffidi. It was tremendous to be able to see that great institution, with prospects for a much larger surf club. In the past year, regrettably, our surf clubs have had to do a lot of heavy lifting in the community. During the Bondi terrorist attacks, North Bondi Surf Life Saving Club patrons and officials went out of their way to help people on the day of the massacre but also to provide services to the community afterwards, including hosting state government, mental health services and the like. One of the things that these surf clubs are having to contend with at the moment is what to do about sharks, particularly in Sydney, where there have been a number of attacks of late, including one at Coogee just a couple of weeks ago.

It's always going to be good to get the best information that we can muster. For that reason, I think we should get more up-to-date information from the CSIRO, as the Commonwealth's pre-eminent science organisation, on the numbers of sharks and the nature of sharks. I think it would be helpful and would aid the debate that we're going to have around the measures that might be required. A lot of the measures that have been used to protect surfers and beachgoers from sharks may not have the effect that people imagine that they might have. It is an area where we are going to benefit from more scientific information. It's been almost 10 years since CSIRO has done a body of work on shark populations on the east coast. It would be very helpful if the next survey could be done within the next six to nine months.

Last week, leaders of the Five Eyes cybersecurity agencies issued a very important warning to our people, our businesses and governments: AI is rapidly transforming cyber risk and swift action is necessary. Through Horizon 2 of the Australian Cyber Security Strategy, the Albanese government is committed to scaling our cyber resilience across our economy, our society and our digital infrastructure. Horizon 2 is about recognising that cyber risk can no longer be treated as a solely technical issue. It is a core risk and a responsibility for leaders in government and businesses right across the economy.

In a modern economy, all professionals must also account for cyber risk in everything that they do. This is why reinforcing our human firewall is key to the Horizon 2 Action Plan. Just as all professionals must account for cyber risk, all of government must factor AI into its work—both its potential and its risks. Faced with constantly evolving possibility and risks, it is important to remind ourselves, and those in the community, that the responsibility for all our security falls on all of us.

Those responsible have a lot of answering to do, because they still have not told us how and why they legislated a widows tax. Seriously, you talk about standing up for women, but what government says they stand up for women and—

The time for senators' statements has concluded. We'll move to question time.

My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. When did the Prime Minister first become aware that Labor's tax legislation would impose what has become known as the widows tax?

First, I think that is a title in your party room that you keep utilising. I think we have been clear that it is the case that grandfathering arrangements do need to ensure that that scenario is addressed. The Treasurer, I think, made very clear on Insiders on Sunday that the government would address it, and we will do so. But I again remind those opposite and Senator Paterson—it's interesting that the opposition are not arguing against really most of the policy.

Senator Paterson, on a point of order?

The minister's reflections on the opposition are interesting but not directly relevant to a 22-word question.

The minister has been relevant to your question, and I will continue to listen carefully.

I again say the Treasurer has made clear it will be resolved. It is an issue of the extent of grandfathering arrangements. Obviously, in an ambitious set of tax policies, it's not unusual for there to be various tranches of legislation, and that is what we intend to do to resolve it. But, Senator, it is reasonable for me to point out you're not even arguing against the policy anymore, because you know that the status quo of the housing market is not sustainable and was not sustainable. And you know that continuing to give investors an unfair advantage over first home buyers is not sustainable.

Senator Cash, on a point of order?

President, it is relevance. With all due respect, Senator Wong has admitted legislating the tax. The question was quite specific. When did the Prime Minister first become aware that the tax would be legislated?

I will draw the minister back to your question.

I think the government was very clear on budget night that there would be a number of tranches of legislation, and we have been clear with the Australian people that there would be more than one tranche of legislation, including to deal with this issue but also to deal with the startup exemptions and to deal with testamentary trusts. There are a range of issues that we know will require further consideration after consultation, and the government has been doing that and will continue to do that.

Senator Paterson, before I come to you, I'll remind the Senate that it's absolutely fine to rise on points of order, but if you rise on a point of order I expect you to listen in silence to the response. Senator Paterson, first supplementary?

Once the Prime Minister became aware that his legislation contained a widows tax, what action did he take to prevent the parliament from legislating it?

This is ambitious legislation that has passed the parliament in order to ensure that we give first home buyers a fair crack at the housing market, because we believe that is fair. And I note that those opposite have not been able to argue that point. This legislation also provided tax cuts for working people—also voted against by those opposite. I note that they are not asking questions about 13 million Australians getting a tax cut. No, you don't want to talk about tax cuts.

Senator Paterson, on a point of order?

On direct relevance, I asked, 'What action did the Prime Minister take?' and I haven't heard any yet.

You're talking about legislation that passed the parliament last week, and the minister is being relevant.

What I would say is that we were clear from announcement on budget night that there would be more than one tranche of legislation. The core of the reforms, the big moving parts of the reforms, were legislated in this parliament, against the opposition of those opposite. And we've made clear that there are a range of other matters where there are more tranches of legislation coming, including in relation to these grandfathering issues. (Time expired)

Senator Paterson, second supplementary?

Why did the Prime Minister force every member of caucus, including all the senators here, to vote for a widows tax, and what other defects are there in Labor's tax package that the government has identified but still not disclosed to the parliament?

Every member of the Labor caucus was proud to vote for tax cuts for working people. Every member of the Labor caucus was proud to vote for tax changes which ensure first home buyers have a fair crack at the market. Every member of the Labor caucus was proud to vote for fairer tax arrangements. You see, we on this side, unlike you opposite, actually have a collective decision-making process, and we know who we stand for and what we believe in. That makes us really unique when compared to those opposite. You do not know who you are, what you stand for or what you represent. You don't know whether you're chasing Senator Hanson or the teals. You don't know who you are or what you stand for. We do.

Order across the chamber! That was a disgraceful display. This is not a football match. It is not your role, particularly those on my left, to yell louder than the minister. You ask a question. The answer is given, and you listen in silence.

My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. From tomorrow, 1 July, Australians will be receiving even more cost-of-living relief, including an additional tax cut and help at the checkout. Can the minister outline the important measures that will come into effect from tomorrow and explain the Albanese Labor government's approach to helping Australians with the cost of living?

I thank Senator Tyrrell for her question and I thank her for her support for workers, including casual workers and parents in Tasmania. Senator Tyrrell knows that every Tasmanian worker—in fact, every Australian worker—will benefit from the cost-of-living measures that the Albanese government has introduced, which are kicking in from tomorrow, 1 July. We are delivering real cost-of-living help to the people of Australia. That has always been a priority for this government—since the day we were elected and for the 1,500 days since.

Tomorrow is especially important. From tomorrow every Australian worker gets another tax cut. Every Australian worker gets another tax cut on top of the tax cuts we have already brought in and in addition to the tax cuts which are coming for working Australians—and all of them were opposed by the three right-wing parties opposite. We know those opposite have consistently voted against tax cuts for working people.

But we're not only focused on making sure Australians earn more and keep more of what they earn; we're also making sure people have more when they retire through payday super, and we're supporting Australians at the checkout with our ban on excessive grocery pricing coming into effect, with a strengthened ACCC to hold the big supermarkets to account. Motorists will continue to get more relief at the bowser with the 16 per cent litre cut to the fuel excise for all of July, and we are backing small business by permanently extending the $20,000 instant asset write-off. This government is delivering real cost-of-living relief, and the measures that are kicking in from tomorrow demonstrate our commitment to supporting every Australian.

Senator Tyrrell, first supplementary?

I'm sure everybody in my state of Tasmania will be glad to hear about the further cost-of-living help that's coming from tomorrow. It's actually not just my state; it's my home state. Could the minister provide more detail on how the Albanese Labor government is supporting working families right across Australia?

We are proud to support working families, and in particular we are proud that it was a Labor government, many years ago, which first legislated paid parental leave, and it is now a Labor government that is ensuring that paid parental leave is extended to a full 26 weeks. This provides support and certainty to families and parents caring for their children, with even more time for parents to cherish those precious early months. And, from tomorrow, almost 2.7 million Australian workers will benefit from a six per cent increase to the national minimum wage and a 4.75 per cent increase to modern award wages. It will be the first time the national minimum wage is above $1,000 a week.

It's inflation.

I'll take the interjection from the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, who is again criticising wage increases. We know what they're about—lower wages. We're about higher wages. (Time expired)

Senator Tyrrell, second supplementary?

As the minister has explained, helping Australians with the cost of living and delivering real change is one of the Albanese Labor government's highest priorities. Can the minister please outline if there are any risks to the government's plans to help Australians get ahead?

We've got tax cuts benefiting every Australian worker, cost-of-living relief for every Australian household and real reform for every young Australian who has been locked out of the housing market for too long. There is more to do, but we have achieved that despite the best efforts of the three right-wing parties to block it. Last week the three right-wing parties voted against tax cuts for every Australian worker, and we know that Senator Hume famously described these tax cuts as 'egregious'. That is hardly surprising when you remember that the Nationals and the Liberals went to the last election promising they would unwind tax cuts for working people—so not only are they now calling tax cuts 'egregious'; had they been elected, they would have ensured they unwound tax cuts for working people. It is only the Labor Party that is focused on making real change. (Time expired)

My question is to the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Wong. Last weekend, Sydney recorded its lowest auction clearance rates since April 2020—the very start of the pandemic—falling below 50 per cent. Melbourne recorded its lowest clearance rate since 2021, during the world's longest lockdowns. Will the minister admit that Labor's tax changes have shattered confidence in our property market, to the point where even first home buyers are staying away?

Our changes are about backing first home buyers. I remind the Senate that house prices have increased around 400 per cent since 2000, and 58 per cent since 2020. That means first home buyers have found it much harder to enter the market; senators who engage with the community will know that that is the case. Increasingly, owning your own home has been out of reach for too many Australians. We are determined to fix that. We have been determined to fix that because we know the status quo is not sustainable.

I make a couple of points. Many factors, not just tax settings, influence the housing market. I note that auction clearance rates were declining before the budget. A number of factors influence the housing market. I refer again to the Treasury forecasts, which assume house prices will continue to grow and that the changes in the budget mean that house prices will be around two per cent lower than they would otherwise have been. I note Senator Bragg himself has said that house prices are too high; I note he said that. We are seeking, through the tax changes that we have made, to level the playing field when it comes to first home buyers, because we want more young Australians to get their own home.

Senator Canavan, first supplementary?

Minister, Brisbane's auction clearance rates are down from 53 per cent last year to 40 per cent, and Adelaide's are down from 64 per cent to 49 per cent. Has the government modelled the impact that falling property values and declining confidence in our property markets could have on household wealth, bank lending practices and the broader Australian economy?

I again would make the point that many factors influence the housing market, and I'd refer back again to what Treasury has said. I know you have an interest in trying to find a political point. The reality is the housing market was broken. Anyone who spoke to engage with young people who were trying to get into the market would know that.

We want people to have the same opportunities so many of us have had to own our own home. What we have done is change the tax system so that people have more of that opportunity. I would again make the point that Senator Bragg himself said—

Senator Canavan, a point of order?

It's on relevance, with less than 20 seconds left. The question went to whether the government has looked at the risks of this happening, not the statements of others.

The minister is being relevant to your question. Minister, please continue.

In fact, I think I responded to that directly. I think I did respond to it directly—

No, you didn't. Have you modelled?

I know that you want to say the sky is falling because that's what desperate right-wing opposition parties do, but the sky is not falling. (Time expired)

Minister, yesterday your colleague Minister Plibersek claimed that hundreds of thousands of Australians have entered the housing market thanks to the government's five per cent deposit scheme. How many of those Australians are now in negative equity because of the government's broken promises, its housing tax changes and the consequent falling confidence in property markets?

Ms Plibersek was right. The figures I have here are that some 260,00 first home buyers with five per cent deposits have been helped into the system. They are many thousands of Australians who would not have entered the property market if not for what the Labor government has done, which you opposed. You actually are opposed to us trying to get more young people into the market. It is quite remarkable that those opposite don't want more young Australians to have the opportunities that all of you have had—or so many of you—to own your own home. If you sit in this place, you can see that the coalition really is averse to government trying to ensure that more young Australians own their own home. I don't think Australians are where you're at.

My question is to the minister representing the Minister for Transport. Minister, this morning I met with Queen and Christiana who are both former Carnival Cruise crew members. These young women told me how they were forced to work for just $2.50 an hour, well below Australian minimum wages. The only reason they were forced to accept such a pittance for their labour is that the Albanese government gave Carnival's Australian ships a ministerial exemption from the coastal trading act. Minister, how can your government support 'same job, same pay', but stand by and see these workers paid so much less in Australian waters?

I thank Senator Pocock for his question. Of course, the government does support 'same job, same pay', and it was the Albanese government that introduced that legislation. It's now working very, very well.

But, in respect of particular issues that relate to the Carnival Cruise Line, the Maritime Labour Convention 2006 provides standards and regulations relating to seafarer welfare, including a base standard of rights and protections aimed at creating a secure working environment for those in the maritime industry.

The AMSA, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority, plays a key role in enforcing international maritime safety and labour standards, including the Maritime Labour Convention. The AMSA applies a zero-tolerance approach to breaches of the Maritime Labour Convention and has the authority to issue deficiencies, detain vessels or prohibit ships from operating in Australian waters. The authority routinely acts on issues such as the payment of wages, conditions of employment and workplace health and safety.

Individuals or organisations aware of any concerns or potential breaches of the Maritime Labour Convention are encouraged to promptly notify the authority so that they can investigate and take appropriate responses. The authority investigates all complaints it receives and takes appropriate regulatory action where warranted. Complaints may be lodged directly through the authority's established complaints process by seafarers and by seafarer representatives, and I saw some of them around the building this morning. The Albanese government— (Time expired)

Senator Pocock, first supplementary?

Thank you, Minister, for the explanation, but my question is: why has your government given Carnival an exemption from Australian labour laws for ships that are based here in Australia and operate here in Australia, in Australian waters?

I thank Senator Pocock for his first supplementary question. Of course, I'm not the minister in charge of these issues. We have a wonderful minister in Minister King, who is in charge. I shall convey your question to her and seek a prompt response so that I can come back to you with the correct answer, Senator Pocock.

Senator Pocock, second supplementary?

Thank you, Minister. I appreciate that and look forward to hearing that answer. My understanding is that this exemption is renewed annually. Can the government give any indication or commitment that they will not renew this so that we'll have people working on ships in Australian waters that stay in Australian waters actually paid an award rate in Australia?

I thank Senator Pocock for his second supplementary question. Again, this is not an issue that I am familiar with, but I shall very promptly seek a response from Minister King and will come back to you at the earliest opportunity with the answers.

My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Health and Ageing, Senator McAllister. We on this side of the chamber hear every day how important a strong and affordable health system is to the communities we represent. Tomorrow, the Albanese Labor government rolls out further measures to help every Australian access affordable health care, from hospital care through to urgent care for non-life-threatening conditions. How is the government delivering real change for Australians by investing in our public health system after a decade of cuts and neglect?

Thank you, Senator Brown. Tomorrow is an important day, and I am glad that you asked about it. Tomorrow, the Albanese Labor government is delivering record funding for our public hospitals—$25 billion in additional funding for public hospitals—and that is for the doctors and for the nurses who are the backbone of our public health system. It's for the ambos and the allied health workers who show up every single day to support everyday Australians. In your home state, Senator Brown, Tasmanians will receive $5.1 billion in total funding for hospitals over the next five years.

We're clear about what we need to fix. The previous government, the Liberal government, spent a decade neglecting our hospital system. Many senators on the benches opposite were part of a government that cut $50 billion from the hospital system that Australians depend on, and this government is delivering three times more additional funding for public hospitals than under the last five-year agreement. That is what real change looks like. That is what delivering real change means.

And that's not all. Not only are we investing in hospital care; we are ensuring that there is a permanent option for Australians to go for medical care when they need it most. Last week, I told the chamber how the Albanese Labor government has delivered every single one of our 137 urgent care clinics across the country, and, from 1 July, every single one of those will be permanent and every single one of them will bulk-bill for every Australian. And that means that a mum with a sick child on the weekend has somewhere to go, it means that a tradie with a bad cut doesn't have to sit in an ED for hours, and it means our hospitals can focus on the patients that need them most. This is what Labor governments do. We deliver real change for Australia. (Time expired)

Senator Brown, first supplementary?

The Albanese Labor government is not only committed to ensuring Australians get the care they need in our hospitals and urgent care clinics; it is also focused on making more medicines cheaper. How is the government helping Australians access more medicines at a lower cost from tomorrow?

Thank you, Senator Brown. July is a big month for cheaper medicines; 10 new listings are giving Australians expanded access to even cheaper medicines on the PBS, all for no more than $25. Let me tell you a bit more about what that means. Around 18,500 Australians with severe, uncontrolled asthma can now benefit from a new treatment that lowers the risk of asthma attacks. Today, Australians may have to pay $1,600 per injection every week. From tomorrow, they will pay just $25. For a nasal spray for the emergency treatment of anaphylaxis, today Australians could be paying more than $95 per pack. From tomorrow, they will pay a maximum of $25. And it doesn't stop there. Australians with type 1 diabetes, lung cancer and rare blood cancer will also have access to expanded treatments on the PBS tomorrow.

Senator Brown, second supplementary?

When it comes to getting quality health care, all you should need is your Medicare card, not your credit card. Why is the Albanese Labor government making these investments to deliver quality health care to Australians? Why has the government chosen this approach?

Well, this Labor government believes in a simple principle: when you are sick, all you should need is your Medicare card, not your credit card. We have backed those beliefs with record investment in hospital funding and in Medicare. And what have those opposite done? On the one side, we have the coalition, led by their current leader, the member for Hume, who didn't just support cuts to health; he actually wanted the cuts to health to go further. In 2015, he said:

Cost-cutting programs can be painful, and they always involve hard trade-offs …

And then he continued to say:

… this work needs to extend across the entire health system.

Australians know who bore the costs of those trade-offs. It was them. Maybe it is time for those opposite to consider my counterpart's sage advice. Maybe it is time for a rebrand—a rebrand that would see you finally support public health, because you don't at the moment. (Time expired)

I advise the chamber that Senator Lambie has passed her question to Senator Ruston.

My question is also to the Minister representing the Minister for Aged Care and Seniors, Senator McAllister. Can the minister confirm how many pensioners will lose their private health insurance additional rebate under Labor's $11 billion tax on older Australians?

Labor is investing over $3 billion in delivering more aged-care beds, more packages and better care for older Australians in the 2026-27 budget. To fund this investment into aged care, the government will return the PHI rebate for older Australians back to the same level paid by everyone else. We do understand that it will not be—

I have a point of order on relevance. I simply asked how many pensioners will be affected by this change, nothing else.

The minister was getting to your question, and I'll continue to listen carefully.

The additional rebate is simply not the best way to spend precious taxpayer dollars on behalf of older Australians when we do need to do so much heavy lifting in aged care. The approach that we are taking will restore fairness to the rebate system and will free up funding to provide more dignity and care to older Australians.

Once again, it's on a point of relevance. If the minister doesn't know how many pensioners—

Thank you, Senator Ruston. I hear that you've raised an objection. The minister is being relevant. I'm going to ask the minister to continue.

Under the proposed changes, all Australians will now receive the same private health support based on their income, not their age. All over 65s will still receive significant government subsidised discounts of up to 24 per cent on the premiums that private health insurers charge them, the same as the rest of the population. The average impact on those 65 years and older—

Once again, it's on a point of order on relevance. I would ask you to direct the minister to answering the question about how many pensioners will be affected. I ask nothing else.

Senator Ruston, as you absolutely understand, I can't put words into the minister's mouth. That's what you're asking me to do. The minister is being relevant, and I'll invite the minister to continue.

These are important changes, and they're important changes that allow investments that are necessary into the aged-care system—$3 billion will be invested in delivering more aged-care beds, delivering more packages and better care for older Australians through the 2026-27 budget prospect.

Senator Ruston, first supplementary?

Private Healthcare Australia estimates couples over the age of 65 on gold cover will face up to $1,614 in additional costs from April 2027—the largest increase in private health costs on record. How does the minister expect Australian pensioners on fixed incomes to absorb that cost?

We understand that this will not be a welcome change for many people, but we also understand that the investments that we propose to secure the future of the aged-care system are important. The government has made difficult choices to ensure that we can make the investments that Australians expect, and our investments will build on the changes that we delivered in our first term that incentivise the construction of beds for aged-care residents. They will give providers the certainty that they need to build and maintain quality residential accommodation. They will make Support at Home fairer and more affordable for older Australians, and they will continue the government's work to set the aged-care system up for generations to come. People aged 65 and over currently do receive greater government subsidised discounts on their premiums than younger people on the same income. This has become a hard policy to defend. (Time expired)

Senator Ruston, second supplementary?

Linda is a pensioner who is living on $29,000 a year who told ABC radio she already 'struggles like mad' to pay her private health insurance to keep herself out of emergency departments. Minister, why should Linda be forced to struggle even more just to fix Labor's budget mess? How is that fair?

It's always difficult to comment on an individual case when I don't know all of the circumstances that face Linda—

Opposition senators interjecting—

but I will say this: all people over the age of 65 will continue—

Minister McAllister, please resume your seat. Senator Cash and Senator Ruston, stop interjecting. I can't be clearer than that. Minister, please continue.

Under the proposed changes, all Australians will now receive the same private health support based on their income, not their age. Over-65s will still receive significant government subsidised discounts of up to 24 per cent on the premiums that private health insurers charge them, and that is the same as the rest of the population. As I indicated in my answer to your primary question, the average impact on those 65 years and older is less than a dollar a day—an average of $250 a year.

My question is to Senator Wong, the Minister representing the Prime Minister. Minister, Palantir builds the tools that ICE uses to deport people from the US. It's been linked to targeting in Gaza. Yet your government has just handed a multimillion-dollar Defence contract with no tender to Palantir. What would it take for your government to have the leadership to say no to Palantir?

Senator, I understand that you are asking me about Defence procurement. I don't have any further information in relation to that particular contract, but I'll see what I can provide to you on notice.

Senator Shoebridge, first supplementary?

Minister, the Greens have called for an immediate moratorium on new Palantir contracts and a full public audit of every existing one, with the findings to be tabled in parliament. Given your government can't point to a single ethics or risk assessment of Palantir, given how little you seem to know about it, will you commit today to a moratorium on all further contracts with this noxious corporation and a review of those already signed? If not, why not?

You're correct, Senator; I do represent the Minister for Defence. I'm not the Minister for Defence, and I don't have a detailed knowledge of this contract, and that is not unusual. I understand from Senator McAllister that you did ask some questions about this at Senate estimates, where Senator McAllister represents the Minister for Defence. As I said in my earlier answer, if I can find further information for you on notice, I will do so.

Senator Shoebridge, second supplementary?

Thanks, Minister. To assist, your government has spent around $60 million of public money on contracts with Palantir. The Future Fund, under your government, holds more than $160 million worth of shares in the company. Yet not a single document has been provided to the public assessing whether this is ethical or responsible. Can you confirm that no ethics or risk assessment has ever been conducted on Palantir by your government? If so, how can your government claim it has exercised due diligence over a US owned company embedded inside Defence? (Time expired)

Senator, you would be aware that we do have procurement arrangements and a procurement framework which goes to some of the issues you've identified. I refer you to my earlier answer, which is that I will provide information to you if I can obtain it.

My question is for the Minister for the Environment and Water, Senator Watt. I refer to the deal between your government and the Greens to change the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act and strip farmers of the continuous use exemption for vegetation not cleared in the previous 15 years. Why do you impose this on farmers but not on wind turbines constructed in rainforests and native Queensland habitats?

I thank Senator Hanson for the question. Unfortunately, Senator Hanson is wrong in her question. It is correct that, in the EPBC reforms we passed last year, we did remove an exemption that had applied under the previous legislation, which simply means now that farmers who wish to clear their land—in particular, regrowth vegetation that's been there for 15 years or more—will simply have to comply with the same rules as those who are seeking to build wind farms, solar farms or even coal mines, which I know is something that Senator Hanson says she's a fan of as well. What we've done is simply level the playing field by saying that the agriculture sector must follow the same rules as every other sector.

Small farmers!

Senator Canavan, I know you're upset that Senator Hanson beat you to the punch in asking this question and that, yet again, we see Senator Hanson muscle in on what was once National Party territory. Senator Canavan managed to do a press conference with AgForce, but it was Senator Hanson who beat him to the punch to ask a question in the chamber. I understand, Senator Canavan, that you're very upset about losing relevance in the bush. I understand you're upset, but I might answer Senator Hanson's question—

Order! Come to order!

It's the NFF, Murray! You don't even know the difference; you don't even know. You don't even know the people.

Senator Canavan, you're not in a debate with me.

You don't even know the question.

Senator Canavan, I will name you.

It's interesting: Senator Canavan actually had a question today, and he didn't ask about farmers there. We all remember that it wasn't that long ago when Senator Canavan was saying that farmers were no longer the core constituency of the National Party. Senator Hanson's now trying to butt in on that.

My point of order is on direct relevance.

I should not have to remind the chamber that, if senators make interjections, the minister is entitled to take those interjections. But, Minister Watt, I am going to draw you back to Senator Hanson's question.

As I was saying, in fact what we are requiring is nothing different of farmers than what we have required for a very long time of renewables developers, mining developers, property developers. It's the same standard that applies to every industry.

Order! Senator Hanson, before I call you—

All red tape!

You should have asked about it, mate.

Order! I remind the chamber I drew the minister to order and, Senator Canavan, I drew you to order. Sadly, you were so busy interjecting you didn't seem to hear me. I'm simply asking that—

Why don't you go after him? This is a double standard; he's interjecting too.

No, Senator Canavan. You're not in a debate. I'm running the chamber. Senator Canavan, I will name you. You are persistently defying the standing order. If you continue to think that you can stand up and make an argument with me, I will use that standing order. Make no mistake.

I'm going to remind the chamber this is Senator Hanson's question and not to interject. Senator Hanson, first supplementary?

Minister, I totally reject everything you just said then, and I refer to the wide destruction of native vegetation at Kumbia, in Queensland, to make way for almost a hundred wind turbines, 290 metres tall. There are long-term plans to construct more than 30,000 such turbines across this continent. When will you acknowledge the double standards imposed on farmers in your government's unending war on Australian agriculture?

Well, Senator Hanson, you might reject what I've just said, but what I've actually just said are the facts and the law. Now, Senator Hanson, it wasn't that long ago that your party was demanding that this government do something about hate preachers, and then you came to Canberra and voted against legislation to do something about hate preachers, so your consistency—

Government senators interjecting —

My point of order is on relevance. That's got absolutely nothing to do with my question.

Senator Hanson, I will draw the minister back to your question, and I'll also ask those on my right to listen in respectful silence. Minister, I draw you back to the question.

Thanks, President. Senator Hanson, you say that we have imposed some sort of double standard. What we've actually done is ask farmers to comply with exactly the same regulations that every other industry has had to comply with for the last 25 years. Mining companies, renewables companies, property developers and anyone else who proposes a project that is likely to have a significant impact on the environment is required to have a federal assessment. That's now what we're asking of farmers in some situations.

The other thing worth remembering, Senator Hanson, is that one of the reasons we've done this is to protect the Great Barrier Reef, which in our state supplies 77,000 jobs in the regional communities that you claim you represent.

Senator Hanson, second supplementary?

Minister, just in reference to the Great Barrier Reef, it is in pristine condition and it's going to double its coral by 2050. Minister, why is your government destroying our natural environment in order to save it?

Senator Hanson, you might not care about the Great Barrier Reef and the 77,000 jobs in Australia that rely on it and the $9 billion in economic turnover that it produces every year, but Labor certainly does. We want to hang on to those jobs that are in Cairns, in Townsville, in Mackay, in Airlie Beach, even in Gladstone and as far south as Bundaberg. We want to protect those jobs, and one of the ways that we're doing it is by requiring regulation of land clearing that occurs in the Great Barrier Reef catchment.

Again, we saw Senator Canavan be very upset about Senator Hanson beating him to the punch on this question. The problem for Senator Canavan is that, for the last few years, he, more than anyone, has enabled Senator Hanson and now he's paying the price.

Minister, have you concluded your answer?

Just a little bit more—four seconds should be enough. Senator Hanson, we will stand up for farmers, agriculture and the Great Barrier Reef. (Time expired)

My question is to the Minister representing the Treasurer, Senator Gallagher. As we know, tomorrow is 1 July, and the next lot of income tax cuts will start. This is very good news for many, many Australian workers. It's the latest of five tax cuts, actually, that the Albanese government is delivering, and, when they're fully rolled out, a worker on average earnings stands to be around $2,800 better off. How are these tax cuts, Minister, and other cost-of-living help that will arrive on 1 July making a difference for working people and their families?

I thank Senator Ciccone for the question. Again, all the work has been done on this side of the chamber to make sure that, when 1 July rolls around tomorrow, we've got a whole range of supports flowing through to Australians to assist with the cost of living.

Of course, we've got the tax cuts that those opposite voted against, which will come in on 1 July. Every Australian taxpayer will get a tax cut from 1 July this year. From 1 July, we will reduce the 16 per cent tax rate to 15 per cent, with another one to come next year. We've also passed important legislation to help more Australians into the dream of homeownership. We've got the working Australian tax offset—again, Senator Bragg voted against that—to provide a permanent annual tax offset of up to $250 for every working Australian taxpayer. There's the $1,000 instant deduction with no receipts—again, those opposite voted against that—allowing workers to deduct up to $1,000 off their taxable income without providing receipts.

We know that, while the changes to negative gearing, CGT and trusts don't impact the majority of people, they help support the investment that we are making in 13 million Australian workers through those tax cuts coming in. We will also see the national minimum wage increase by six per cent, and modern award wages will increase by 4.75, following the annual wage review decision, to which we provided a submission in support of a real wage increase.

Around 2.6 million Australians will also benefit from indexation of a range of social security payments and thresholds. Workers will also benefit from having super paid at the same time as their salary and wages. And, of course, there's the work that we've been doing to ban excessive pricing in supermarkets. (Time expired)

Senator Ciccone, first supplementary?

Thanks, Minister, for that very thorough answer. From 1 July, the Albanese government will also deliver another first—that is, paid parental leave for a full six months. Superannuation will also be paid on it to ensure that parents don't lose out in their retirement. Minister, how is this PPL expansion supporting parents to share care and stay connected to work, and what does it mean for parents' retirement savings over the long term?

I thank Senator Ciccone for that question. As a parent of a young Australian, these issues around paid parental leave and making them work for families have been central to our thinking about sensible reforms that could be made to PPL, not only to make sure that families are getting the extended time—so going to a full six months—but, as Senator Ciccone said, also to make sure that super is paid on PPL.

We on this side of the chamber thought it was a problem that we had an employment condition—essentially the only employment condition—that didn't have super paid on it, and we have fixed that with the investments that we've made. We're also making it easier for families to share care under those arrangements. We know more and more dads or second parents in those relationships are wanting to spend time with their babies as well, and our changes to PPL do that. We always look for ways to help people with caring responsibilities.

Senator Ciccone, second supplementary?

():  From tax cuts to expanded PPL, this government is helping many working Australians with the cost of living, even when some in this chamber have failed to back these important supports for these families. How will the government continue this work, Minister, so that many Australians can continue to earn more and keep more of what they earn?

I thank Senator Ciccone for that supplementary as well. Well, this government is focusing on real change for Australians—more tax cuts, six months of paid parental leave, making it easier for first homebuyers to get into a home, our investments to make Medicare stronger and keeping our kids safe online. I think it's very clear from what we have delivered over our term in government that addressing cost-of-living help for households is our number one priority.

Our five tax cuts, once fully implemented, will mean that the average working Australian will be $2,800 better off every year from 2028. And in addition to that, we have our investments in Medicare, cheaper medicine, cheaper child care, free TAFE, our home batteries program, Help to Buy and five per cent deposits. All of these investments are about making life easier for Australians, particularly when they're feeling under pressure, and we'll continue to focus on all measures to do that.

My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Aged Care and Seniors, Senator McAllister. Ninety-one-year-old John Wilson spent the final months of his life waiting for care your government had already assessed he needed. His family repeatedly warned My Aged Care that he would die before help arrived. They were right. John died at the end of April. Months later, the day after his funeral, his family received a letter approving his package. The government's own figures, quietly released on budget night, show the median wait for assessment in receiving a Support at Home package is now 12 months. Minister, how many more older Australians will die waiting for care from your government that you already promised them?

Thank you, Senator, for that question. It is always sad to hear about an older Australian who has died, and it is always sad to hear about an older Australian who has died waiting for care. It underlines the reason why the reforms that we are making to the aged-care system are so significant and so important.

Opposition senators interjecting—

Order!

We know that older Australians have spent their lives caring for their children, building communities and contributing to this country, and they deserve to live the rest of their lives with dignity and respect and love. And it is why we are making the reforms that we are making.

Of course, we come to government with significant work to do because the previous government—

Opposition senators interjecting—

Order!

the Liberal government—the government that so many people on the opposition benches were part of—cut $2½ billion out of the sector. And they failed to—

Opposition senators interjecting—

Senator, please resume your seat. I've called for order two or three times. Show respect. Order! If you have so much to say, put your name on the adjournment list tonight. But right now, in question time, the interjections need to stop. Minister, please continue.

Those opposite were part of a government that cut $2½ billion from the sector. They failed to meet—

Minister McAllister, please resume your seat. Senator Liddle?

On relevance, how many more will die?

The minister is being relevant to your question, Senator Liddle, and I'll continue to listen carefully.

Those opposite failed to meet the growing need for home care. And the royal commission revealed what was happening on their watch: neglect. Aged-care workers could get paid more stacking shelves than looking after older Australians. And we know that investments are necessary. We want older Australians to have the freedom, the support and the choices that they ask for to remain at home and to stay in the community that they love. (Time expired)

Senator Liddle, first supplementary?

John Wilson's ordeal began long before he died. His first assessment was conducted over the phone. Despite being nearly blind in one eye, unable to walk without a frame, unable to dress himself and unable to even cut up his own food, he was assessed as needing only entry-level help. Minister, how could your system look at a 91-year-old man in that condition and decide he needed only the most basic level of care?

Opposition senators interjecting—

I would like to call the minister to answer the question, but I'm not going to do that until there's silence. Minister McAllister.

It's not possible for me to speak in any detail about the circumstances put to me by Senator Liddle, and I appreciate her interest in these issues and bringing them to the chamber. But I do want to speak a little about the approach that we are taking to assessment, because the old assessment approach was not working. The system overseen by those on the other side was not working. It was taking too long.

Opposition senators interjecting—

I have asked, since the very first question, for those on my left to listen in silence. You're showing me great disrespect and you're completely ignoring me as the President of this chamber. If you can't listen in silence, leave the chamber.

The old assessment system was not working. It took too long, it was inaccurate—

This one's worse.

and it was producing very unfair outcomes to older people all across the country.

So's this one, Jenny.

Order!

That is why—

Minister, please resume your seat. My goodness! Senator Scarr, I don't know what possessed you then to interject loudly—and you, Senator Colbeck—after I just explained how disrespectful you were to me. Leave the chamber! I shouldn't have to name senators on my left, but I will.

To be clear about the problem, the old system resulted in older people with the same needs receiving very different outcomes depending on where they lived and who did their assessment. It led to very high volumes of high-priority ratings, with some organisations approving more than 50— (Time expired)

Senator Liddle, second supplementary?

Your own department confirmed at Senate estimates that one in four aged-care assessments is conducted over the phone, using an assessment tool that has never been independently validated and that assessors cannot override when it gets the answer wrong. Minister, if this system failed John Wilson so catastrophically, how can you tell older Australians and their families that it is not failing thousands more right now?

Well, there is a lot of misinformation about the approach that the government is taking, and it is worth getting some of the facts on the record. There are people involved in every single step of the assessment process. The assessment is conducted by trained assessors—human beings—who are highly skilled, who work with older people to understand what their functional needs are and what the evolution of those needs might look like so that we can make determinations about the sort of care that will be appropriate for those people.

Of course, there is an opportunity at the end of these processes for a person to look at the result. A second person looks at the outcome of the assessment. That person is called the assessor delegate. They look at that outcome to make sure that it is right before the outcome is signed off. And there is now a further safeguard whereby delegates can send assessments back to assessors if it is clear that there has been an error in the inputs during that assessment. (Time expired)

President, I ask that further questions be placed on notice.

In response to Senator David Pocock's question, I undertook to come back to the chamber if there was further information I could provide. The government is committed to ensuring ships operating in Australian waters employ their crew under fair and safe working conditions. The exemption has been considered as part of the government's broader review of the Coastal Trading (Revitalising Australian Shipping) Act.

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Opposition senators today.

It was an interesting question time. There was a general theme. We went from the widows tax to auction clearances to how we're treating our ageing in this country, because they're all very key issues. It was an interesting response from the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Wong, when she sat there and she argued the point that we're not arguing about the taxes anymore. We've moved on. We're now talking about other aspects of what we're talking about. That is because that argument is one and done. Aspiration in this country is dead, buried and cremated. It's gone. All of Australia knows it. Don't try too hard, because you're not going to get there anymore, so just give up. What this government's tax package is saying is: 'Give up, go home, earn a wage, work for a good corporation, find a nice superannuation owned company, go and work for them under their IR laws and go home, if you can afford one.' We had to get confirmation the other day that we're not taxing car sales anymore, because let's face it—the way homelessness is going, cars will be homes later.

But we went back to the widow tax because what we passed in this chamber was not legislation that was fit for purpose. They've admitted it needs to be changed. The widow and widower tax is as follows. If your partner dies, it creates a capital gains thing where your property that you may have owned together, CGT exempt, is now CGT liable. You may have to pay tax on the capital gains of properties because you become a widow or a widower. It's the same for divorce. Imagine that. Imagine going through an emotional time. You and your partner have split up; everything's terrible. You settle with your partner. You've got custody. You settle your issues and your property, and then the government comes and says, 'And now where's ours? Can we have a bit more of your settlement too?' right at a really exposed time. How fair is that?

This could have been fixed. This could have been fixed at the time had we had the time here. Amendments could have been brought in, and we could have fixed it in one go. And they sit there and say, 'But we passed tax cuts.' It's not hard at all to separate the two and move the tax cuts through, which we would have supported. We said we'd support and we wanted to support tax cuts and the working people tax offset, but they wanted to link it so they could hold it over your head and say: 'Pay this tax. We're putting all these changes together with the tax cuts.' They were picking your pocket when they gave you a dollar. It is what they are good at. So we weren't talking about the tax. They say we moved on because that is done. Australia is done for that. Pack it up and work for the man.

When we come to that, it came to similar questions when we were talking about aged care at the end. Remember we were talking about that and we were saying, 'What are you doing about the aged-care rebate for Medicare?' These are aged people who are paying their private health insurance because they want to remain independent. They want their choice. They want to live their lives the way they want to. But this government, again, said, 'No, we're putting money into aged-care beds. We're putting it into health packages,' because they want you to live a life organised by the government, not by yourself. 'Don't have choice to go to your own doctor, your own specialist. Don't pay your health rebate and come back. Live it the way we want to do.' This is control. As I keep coming back to, this is an abusive relationship this government has with its people. It financially controls you. It manipulates you and gets you to do what it wants you to do. Everything is around that.

I come back to the second question asked by Senator Canavan here, the question about auction clearance rates, because we're speed-dating through this. The minister actually admitted, by their own thing, that 260,000 people have taken advantage of the five per cent home deposit scheme. The problem is housing seems to have gone down by about that pace in the last three months. So 260,000 people have no equity, are in greater debt, have done their deposit, have done their dough—backing a government backed scheme. This is what we'll see if the housing market falls.

I get getting young people into housing markets. The way they have gone about it is shambolic. You can't put hundreds of thousands of people into negative equity in their homes. More to the point, every homeowner in Australia is now poorer because the property market is falling. Congratulations! I've never seen an act whereby so many people have paid such high amounts of money for such poor legislation.

I look forward to making my contribution. I will say this: Senator Cadell's passion is unquestionable. I can't remember how many of these sessions I've sat through over the years, but that really was speedy—

Thank you, brother!

Thank you, Senator Cadell! You covered every question, so congrats on that one.

I would like to put a different slant on this, if I can, through you, Deputy President. I'd like to look at it through an older man's eyes. I've spent many months—years, the last few years. Everywhere I go, everywhere I speak—it doesn't matter who I speak to, if I'm speaking to punters in the trucking industry, agriculture, construction, shop workers—it doesn't matter, because the common theme here is that I really dread the young ones nowadays trying to get into the housing market. I say that not with political spin or because I want to get a hit on that social media crap—rubbish—that goes around this nation, but I say it from here: I truly, honestly, don't know how the young ones are going to get into the housing market.

I support every option we take to try and make it fairer for them. I want to be really upfront with the people out there who are unfortunately listening to this debate because they probably haven't got anything better to do, the poor devils. I remember when the Howard government came in. I'm not being political, Mr Deputy President. I believe the housing market started going backwards back in those days, but I will say this: I was one of those people who took advantage of those new tax systems to go out there and buy an investment property. It wasn't illegal; that's what we did. But I sit back now—my wife and I have had three investment properties; we don't have three now—and I look at the opportunity that we were given. I had no idea the consequences that we were creating—to see homes since 2020 increase by a figure of, I think, $400,000.

I know Senator Cadell said that, now, everyone who owns an investment property—not in those words, but similar—has now lost money. Well, a $400,000 increase—go back to the early 1980s when my wife and I first decided we wanted to buy a home. Back in those days, the price of a home, roughly, was probably about five times the average yearly wage. Crikey, wouldn't it be nice if that was the case now! I remember that we had to go to the bank manager, cap in hand, with absolutely no assets—none at all—to probably borrow a miserable $80,000 or $90,000. When I say 'miserable', it wasn't miserable back then; it's miserable compared to what you pay nowadays. We were told to go away and come back when we had more of a deposit. I remember the sacrifices that my generation made and those of generations today. You may have had to go and live with the in-laws, or you couldn't go on the holiday. You had to do all of that, but it was a small price to pay because it was only for a couple of years that we did it. Then we had the fortune of being able to get that loan and go buy our own homes.

Seriously, the debate in this chamber, the debate in the other chamber, the debate through the media is really out of whack. It is incomprehensible, the language that's being used. I will say this: I've had a fortunate life. I really have. I'm a proud father and grandfather. But I'll tell you what, as long as I'm in this place and on this planet, I will do anything I can to support any option that gives younger people the opportunity to have the remarkable opportunities that my generation had to get into the housing market. Think of your language. It has consequences.

Senator Sterle, you may well have had a fortunate life, but the Senate's fortunate to have the benefit of your service as well. I want to take note, specifically, of the questions which were asked by Senator Liddle. There was some passion from me and Senator Colbeck, who actually held the portfolio of Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services the last time the coalition was in government. I remember sitting on the other side, listening to the unfair treatment Senator Colbeck had to endure from those who were then sitting in opposition.

Let's put some facts on the table. When Senator Colbeck concluded his service as aged-care minister, the waiting time for every level of home-care package was between 30 and 90 days. It is now 12 months. When Senator Colbeck completed his service as aged-care minister, there were 28,000 older Australians waiting for home-care packages. There are now over 100,000 waiting for assessment and another 100,000 waiting for a home-care package. That is why Senator Colbeck is so passionate about this issue. The reason for my interjection, in relation to the ability of an aged-care home-care package assessor to override this notorious algorithm, is that we have heard, again and again, that this so-called integrated assessment tool and the automated decision-making which they're using to assess the needs of our older Australians is not able to be overridden by the assessor at that point in time. Older Australian are pushed back because of this automated decision-making. There needs to be a look across government at the use of automated decision-making. And I say that, in particular, vulnerable Australians—whether they're older Australians or Australians accessing the NDIS—should not be subject to automated decision-making which leads them to be denied the necessities of life without an actual human being involved in the assessment process. That needs to change. Whoever's in government, it is unacceptable. It's unacceptable that this older Australian went through this telephone assessment and then his family had to plead for a face-to-face assessment. Can you imagine what that's like? I can't imagine what that's like. They've lost their father and their grandfather, and the day after the funeral a letter arrives: 'Congratulations, you've got your home-care package.' Surely we've got to do better than that—seriously.

I have some sympathy for Senator McAllister. She's not the responsible minister. It's Minister Rae in the other place. He's the person who needs to take responsibility for this integrated assessment tool after being told, again and again, that it is unacceptable to a majority of the Australian people that this automated decision-making is being used to make life-or-death decisions in relation to the care of older Australians. And it's unacceptable that we now have 100,000 Australians waiting for assessment and 100,000 Australians who have been assessed waiting to actually get access to the home-care funding package. It is completely unacceptable. Our older Australians deserve better. (Time expired)

I will take this opportunity to stand and talk about our proud record of delivering for Australian workers, including delivering a tax cut for every single Australian worker, not just some. We went to the last election with a plan to lower taxes. Those opposite went to the election with a plan to raise taxes. That's the difference between us and them. From tomorrow, 1 July, every worker is getting another tax cut.

Order! Senator Scarr?

I raise a point of order on relevance. I thought the debate was taking note of the answers to coalition questions.

We do allow a very wide ranging debate during take note of answers. However, I will remind you that this is taking note of answers to coalition questions.

President, I am absolutely getting to it. Tomorrow, Australian workers are getting another tax cut. Tomorrow, around three million workers are getting a pay rise. We are very proud of that on this side. That is one of the many ways that we have backed in Australian workers in this country.

On that side of the parliament, you've got senior members of the Liberal Party calling some of those changes 'egregious'. While we are very happy that you are getting tax cuts and you are getting pay rises, they're offended by that. They're offended by you, the Australian worker, getting a pay rise and tax cuts.

Order! Senator Collins?

Sorry, Deputy President, can we just get clarification as to which coalition question this was?

Senator Collins, there was a coalition question on taxation. Wide-ranging debates are allowed at this point in the day. Senator Stewart has the call.

There were also plenty of interjections and ministerial responses, too.

Senator Stewart, it is not acceptable to take interjections.

Sure.

But you have the call.

I appreciate it. Thank you.

On the topic of housing and first home buyers, which was talked about: we are changing the property investor tax breaks to give first home buyers a chance of getting into their first home—to give first home buyers a fair go. There is not a single person who says that the housing market is not broken. You can speak to a young person who, for such a long time, felt like getting into their own home was completely out of reach for them, and now, for the first time, young Australians have hope—they feel like it is something within their reach. It's not just young people who have concerns about the housing market. It's their parents. It is grandparents who have concerns about their grandchildren being able to get in to the housing market.

If we agree that the system is broken—that it's not working for everyday Australians trying to get into get in to their own home—then we have a responsibility to do something about that. We cannot just sit on the sidelines and allow these things to continue happening.

Since we announced our changes, we have been hearing more and more stories of first home buyers going along to auctions and securing their first home, thanks to Labor's changes. Hopefully, you've seen some of those headlines too. It is a good thing for Australians to feel like owning their own home is within reach, and even better that they are realising that dream for themselves. And this should absolutely be the rule and not the exception.

The other change we've made to help young Australians realise the dream of owning their own home is a change to the rules so that a first home buyer needs only a five per cent deposit. It cuts years off the time that young Australians need to save for a deposit, helping them get into their home sooner. The other thing that we've done to help first home buyers is: we are building 100,000 new homes just for first home buyers, not for property investors.

Lower taxes, higher pay and a fair go for families and first home buyers—those are the real changes that matter to Australians. And they're the real changes we'll keep delivering.

There's a reason that they call it 'question time' and not 'answer time', and I think what we've seen today, from the Labor government, is, again, dodging answers to serious questions. The coalition asked serious questions. We asked serious questions for older people here in Australia. We asked serious questions about young people and how they're going to get in to the housing market. And all we got was political spin coming back to us from this Labor government. They do not care about the Australian people. They are more interested in giving us their talking points and their spin on what is happening out there.

But I think Australians know: Australians are doing it tough—Australians that have gone out there and taken the five per cent deposit scheme, who now have negative equity in their homes. Can you imagine the position that these young people are in? They've gone out there, with this harebrained scheme which the Labor government decided was going to be great for everyone. The housing market has cooled, because they've decided to play around with the settings. This is all about an experiment for this Labor government, and what they've done is: they have created negative equity for these young Australians, who are going to struggle. They are going to struggle to afford their mortgages, because we've had—how many interest rate rises have we had under this government? I think we were up to 14 or 15 last time I checked.

Fifteen.

We're up to 15. So there's negative equity and there have been 15 interest rate rises under this Labor government. It is disgraceful. And then they've come out with this budget. This budget has set to cool the housing market, so we have seen auction clearance rates plummet across the country. That means fewer first home buyers getting into their homes. No-one is bidding for homes anymore. First home buyers are even wanting to stay out of the market because they're just not sure what is going to happen.

Every time this Labor government tries to play with the economy—every time this Labor government experiments on the Australian people—it is disastrous. How does it solve this? This is a government that—rather than having to live within its means like everyday Australians—is not cutting spending. It is not controlling our federal debt. What it is doing is taxing Australians even more: $70 billion in additional taxes for hardworking Australians. That is $70 billion that Australians have to first earn, for the government to come along and take it from them. That's the reality of this government here.

If you're an older Australian in Australia, look out. This government is coming for you, too. There is no-one who is safe from the sticky fingers of this government. If you've saved all your life, worked hard and made sure that you provided for yourself in your retirement—don't worry; this government is going to come and take that from you as well. What it's going to do is say to you: 'If you need some help—if you need an aged-care package—you will literally die waiting for it.' That is the reality under this government. There is no dignity in the way that they are looking after older people in this country. There are hundreds of thousands of older Australians waiting for the dignity of an aged-care package in this country, and it is a disgrace that they are dying waiting for them.

It is an insult that this poor family—who had to beg for their loved one to be assessed for an aged-care package and wait for 10 months, caring for and trying to allow their loved one to age with dignity, only for them to pass away—a couple days after the funeral got a letter saying the aged-care package— (Time expired)

Question agreed to.

I move:

That the Senate take notice of the answer given by the Minister representing the Prime Minister (Senator Wong) to a question without notice asked by the Greens today.

Palantir CEO Alex Karp published a manifesto earlier this year declaring that 'some cultures are dysfunctional' and that Western tech firms have a 'moral debt' to US military dominance. This is cartoon-level villainy. So why is Labor rolling out the red carpet to this Trump-aligned fantasist?

Palantir identified Australia as a lucrative market for its surveillance software, and the Albanese government said, 'Here are the keys'—$60 million in government contracts with favourable terms and little public scrutiny. Palantir staff are embedded inside Defence. The company holds top secret clearance. Australian Signals Directorate, AUSTRAC, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission—'Have at it,' the government says. Those contracts are in addition to the $100 million that Labor has invested in Palantir through Australia's Future Fund.

Palantir's AI has been linked to lethal targeting in Gaza, contributing to tens of thousands of innocent civilians' deaths. That fact alone should have triggered an immediate review of every Australian contract, but, no, this government doesn't take that approach to genocide. Palantir also has deep ties to Westpac, Rio Tinto and Coles—Coles, where, every week, millions of us are scanning our groceries, tapping our cards and, as it turns out, handing our data to Palantir, a Trump-linked surveillance corporation owned by a far-right billionaire whose core business is building AI data and surveillance tech for actors like ICE and the US military.

Whether it's war, surveillance, data centres or workers protections, Labor have shown they don't have the guts to stand up to big AI corporations any more than they have for the gas corporations or the big banks or the supermarkets. AI policy in this country shouldn't be a tech bro free-for-all, where big tech just gets wealthier at our expense, but Labor can't help themselves. At every turn, they choose big business and their billionaire mates over people. There's only one party in here putting people before corporate profits, and that's the Greens.

Three times, the leader of the Albanese government in this place was asked, 'What are you doing about Palantir?' How have you let Palantir and the US tech bros, who no doubt are funding and pumping the tires of One Nation, come in here and get their teeth, their contracts, into the defence department, into AUSTRAC?

I hear Senator Hanson over there wanting to go to the defence of Palantir. She always does the same. Why? Because Palantir is also funding Donald Trump, the same bloke that One Nation flies off to Mar-a-Lago for. They're of a type. Is it any wonder Australians are suspicious about the online activities of One Nation, when they come into this place and defend the likes of Palantir? Palantir have said what their priorities are. Their priorities aren't to back in Aussie battlers and to back in the Australian economy. One Nation and Labor's mates in Palantir have made clear what their priorities are. Their priorities are to back in the US military and to back in the US government.

What is really extraordinary is that they haven't been hiding it. They published a manifesto. They put a manifesto out online talking about their basic plans to push fascism—to push this hard-right politics. Their having published that, what does the Albanese Labor government do? It gets the Future Fund to buy $160 million of shares in Palantir. It signs more defence department contracts to literally bring the wolves inside the defence—Palantir is the same company that is giving targeting data to Israel to kill people in Gaza. Palantir is the same company that's giving targeting information to ICE in the United States to deport Americans. That's who the Albanese Labor government has invited in. That's who they keep signing contracts with.

It's the Greens in this place who are saying: 'What about Australia? What about protecting our national interests?' Why would you let in these international bottom feeders, who have said their interests are serving Washington, not Australia? We want a full public audit, and table the results here, because the Australian public want politicians on their side, not some US tech bro's side. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for the Environment and Water (Senator Watt) to a question without notice I asked today relating to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

I want to take note of the answer from Senator Murray Watt with regard to the native vegetation act that the government has actually passed, under the Environment Protection Agency. I'm going to read directly from the National Farmers' Federation because I think they've really summed it all up: 'The deal that they've made has stripped back the longstanding continuous-use exemption for vegetation not cleared in the previous 15 years and for some areas near waterways in Great Barrier Reef catchments.' As I say, this is preventing farmers from clearing the lands that have been left idle for about 15 years, and it's going to cost up to $140,000 for them to get this done. The NFF said:

The NFF opposed these changes. We still do.

Now we are seeing exactly what farmers feared. Activist groups are using these reforms to run sweeping campaigns against agriculture, particularly northern cattle producers. A recent Great Barrier Reef report makes serious claims about land clearing, sediment and grazing, including 856,744 hectares cleared in Reef catchments from 2018 to 2023, 84% for grazing, and more than 4.9 million tonnes of fine sediment each year from the Burdekin and Fitzroy catchments.

The Greens have never felt the need to be factual and they use pictures of koalas to crowd source funds, which is just a little disingenuous.

Farmers are sick of being lectured by people who have never had to make a payroll through drought, rebuild after flood, manage weeds and pests, maintain ground cover, care for stock and keep a business alive.

They are sick of being told they are the problem by campaigners whose answer is always more red tape for regional Australia.

…   …   …

Farmers reject the idea that protecting the environment means burying them in confusion, threatening compliance action, and outsourcing policy to city-based campaigners. That might make for a tidy Greens press release, but it does not make for good law.

…   …   …

Farmers should be cautious as the reforms commence. Where there is doubt, they should seek advice. But a system that forces ordinary farming families to pay advisors and consultants just to know whether they can get on with the job has failed.

…   …   …

Australia needs strong environmental laws—

and I agree.

We also need food and fibre, regional jobs, productive landscapes and farmers who are treated as partners and professional stewards.

The NFF will keep working with Government to get the implementation right, but we will also call out political attacks that use the Reef, koalas or any other much-loved part of our environment as a stick to beat agriculture.

Farmers are doing their part. It is time for Canberra to do its part too: provide clarity, back practical stewardship, and stop letting the loudest voices in the room write the rules for the people who live and work on the land.

This needs to change, and this is the Greens-Labor government shutting down farming in our country with these ridiculous laws. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister representing the Minister for Transport (Senator Farrell) to a question without notice I asked today relating to the maritime industry.

We didn't learn much in the answer today, and that's fair enough. It wasn't the actual minister; it was the representing minister. But I do think the Carnival Cruise Lines exemption from Australian labour laws raises an ethical question for us as Australians.

This is a company that operates cruise ships here in Australia. They don't seem to pay tax here. They pay tax in the UK and are so exempt because they have an agreement with the UK government. They clearly bring in tourism revenue. They're economically important. But we need to be asking the question: does that justify allowing them to be based here in Australia, operate in Australian waters and still pay their crews, potentially, as low as $2.50 an hour?

This is something that we should be thinking about as a country. Does the economic importance, the tourism revenue, mean that we're willing to pay foreign nationals on cruise ships in Australian waters $2.50 an hour? I assume this cruise company has said something like, 'If we can't do that, it won't be competitive, and we won't bring our cruise ships here.' I think this is a genuine conundrum. But, I think, at the core, there's an ethical question about whether or not, as Australians, we will stand for a company that is paying foreign nationals operating in Australia, in Australian waters, $2.50 an hour. I don't agree with that, so I look forward to hearing more from the government, and I appreciate Minister Farrell's undertaking to find out more.

Question agreed to.

I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move:

That the provisions of paragraphs (5) to (8) of standing order 111 not apply to the Online Safety Amendment (Strengthening Enforcement for the Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2026, allowing it to be considered during this period of sittings.

Document: Senator Watt tabled the following document:

Consideration of legislation—Statement of reasons for the introduction and passage of the bill in the 2026 winter sittings.

I also table a statement of reasons justifying the need for this bill to be considered during these sittings and seek leave to have the statement incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The statement reads as follows—

STATEMENT OF REASONS FOR INTRODUCTION AND PASSAGE IN THE 2026 WINTER SITTINGS

ONLINE SAFETY AMENDMENT (SOCIAL MEDIA MINIMUM AGE) BILL 2026

Purpose of the Bill

The Bill amends the Online Safety Act 2021 to strengthen the operation of the social media minimum age framework by expanding the eSafety Commissioner's information-gathering powers and increasing applicable civil penalties.

In particular, the Bill would enable the Commissioner to compel the production of documents, as well as information, and to issue information-gathering notices to third parties other than providers of age-restricted social media platforms or electronic service providers, for example, age assurance or app-store providers that supply services to age-restricted social media platforms. It would allow the eSafety Commissioner to request production of information and documents from a person if the Commissioner believes that the person may be a provider of an age-restricted social media platform or a provider of an electronic service.

The Bill would also increase the maximum civil penalty for non-compliance with minimum age obligations from 30,000 to 60,000 penalty units.

Reasons for Urgency

Passage of the Bill in the 2026 Winter sittings is required to urgently strengthen the eSafety Commissioner's ability to effectively investigate and enforce compliance with the social media minimum age framework.

In the absence of these amendments, the Commissioner's capacity to obtain relevant information and respond to potential non-compliance is constrained. Passing the Bill within the current sitting period will ensure that strengthened enforcement powers and increased penalty settings are available in the near term to support investigations underway.

(Circulated by authority of the Minister for Communications)

by leave—I move:

That leave of absence be granted to the following senators:

(a) Senator Green for 25 June 2026, for personal reasons;

(b) Senator Chisholm from 29 June to 2 July 2026, on account of ministerial business; and

(c) Senators McCarthy and Mulholland from 29 June to 2 July 2026, for personal reasons.

Question agreed to.

If there is no objection, the business is postponed.

I ask that the question be put separately on the postponement of Business of the Senate No. 2.

The question is that business of the Senate No. 2 be postponed.

I move:

That, in accordance with section 5 of the Parliament Act 1974, the Senate approves the proposal by the National Capital Authority for capital works within the Parliamentary Zone, relating to relating to the commemoration of Nangar (Jimmy Clements) and Ooloogan (George John Noble).

The question is that government business No. 1 be agreed to.

I advise senators there may be further divisions. There will be one-minute bells.

An opposition senator interjecting—

You'll manage.

At the request of Senator Bragg, I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) on 2 September 2025, the Senate agreed to order for the production of documents no. 140, and on 28 October 2025 order for the production of documents no. 195, ordering the production of the government response, in draft or final form, to the Economics References Committee report, dated July 2024, titled Australian Securities and Investments Commission investigation and enforcement,

(ii) in letters dated 3 September and 30 October 2025, the Treasurer stated that there were no documents in scope of either order,

(iii) on Thursday, 4 June 2026, during the Budget estimates hearings of the Economics Legislation Committee, in relation to the government response to the report, the Minister for Finance said 'It's not far… I'm trying to get advice. It doesn't directly relate to my portfolio, so I'm trying to get some advice for you. I understand it's not far away from being lodged', and

(iv) the orders have therefore not been complied with;

(b) affirms that the Senate has the power, arising from section 49 of the Constitution, to order the creation and production of documents not yet in existence, a view endorsed by the Privileges Committee in its 153rd report; and

(c) requires the Minister representing the Treasurer to comply with the orders by no later than midday on Wednesday, 1 July 2026.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 534 standing in the name of Senator Bragg be agreed to.

A division having been called and the bells being rung—

Senators, I will allow the bells to ring longer, but I do remind you it is a standing order that, when there is no debate following successive divisions, they are one-minute bells. It's a standing order. That is where we're up to. I have indicated I'll let the bells ring longer, but I did advise the Senate there would be one-minute bells.

Could I ask if you could perhaps review your previous determination so that, when the previous divisions have not been real, you actually always ring the bells for four minutes. If you could, just review that.

The standing orders, Senator Ruston, do not refer to 'real'. We've had two four-minute bells. The question is that general business notice of motion No. 534 standing in the name of Senator Bragg be agreed to.

I further advise senators that, if there are further divisions, there will be one-minute bells.

At the request of Senator Bragg, I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) order for the production of documents no. 499, agreed to by the Senate on 14 May 2026, requiring the Minister representing the Treasurer to table all Treasury modelling for the 65,000 more dwellings related to the infrastructure spend included in the 2026-27 Budget, has not been complied with,

(ii) on 22 June 2026, in response to the order, the minister provided 4 documents with significant redactions, and

(iii) the minister has failed to fully comply with the order as the documents provided do not include the Treasury modelling required to be produced by the order; and

(b) requires the Minister representing the Treasurer to fully comply with the order by no later than midday on Wednesday, 1 July 2026.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 535, standing in the name of Senator Bragg, be agreed to.

I move:

That the Senate —

(a) orders that the Parliamentary Joint Committee on the National Anti-Corruption Commission in its consideration of approval of the minister's proposed recommendation for the appointment of the National Anti-Corruption Commissioner or a Deputy Commissioner under section 178 of the National Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2022, require from the Attorney-General all primary documentation relevant to applications for the position of Commissioner or Deputy Commissioner, any review of the applications by the Attorney-General's Department, any panel undertaking assessments or conducting interviews, or the Attorney-General;

(b) directs the committee to conduct interviews with each recommended candidate during in camera hearings, where there is sufficient opportunity to question candidates and consider their responses; and

(c) transmits this resolution to the House of Representatives for concurrence.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 536 standing in the name of Senator Shoebridge be agreed to.

At the request of the Chair of the Select Committee on Productivity in Australia, Senator Bragg, I move:

That the time for the presentation of the report of the Select Committee on Productivity in Australia be extended to 31 March 2027.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 537, standing in the name of Senator Bragg, be agreed to.

I move:

That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Home Affairs, by no later than 5 pm on 2 July 2026:

(a) the submission of Metrea Australia to the Department of Home Affairs' request for tender (ATM ID: HOMEAFFAIRS/2143/RFT) that led to the $4.32 billion surveillance contract under contract notice CN4239669; and

(b) the $4.32 billion contract with Metrea Australia executed under CN4239669.

I seek leave to make a short statement.

Leave is granted for one minute.

The coalition will support this motion. Ordinarily we are cautious about orders requiring the production of highly sensitive border and national security documents. However, the awarding of this contract has already been the subject of considerable coalition scrutiny, particularly through Senate estimates, given many worrying elements in the process behind it. Australians deserve confidence that the $4.32 billion aerial surveillance contract was awarded properly. We are pleased One Nation is now following the coalition's lead and the detailed work we have undertaken in pursuing transparency on this matter.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 538 standing in the name of Senator Roberts be agreed to.

At the request of Senator Kovacic, I move:

(1) That a select committee, to be known as the Select Committee on Corruption in the Construction Industry, be established to inquire into and report on:

(a) allegations of corruption, criminal infiltration, intimidation, coercion and misconduct in the construction industry;

(b) the impact of such conduct on project costs, productivity, workplace safety, competition and public confidence in the construction industry;

(c) the adequacy of Commonwealth laws, policies, procurement rules, regulatory frameworks and enforcement responses;

(d) risks arising in relation to tendering, subcontracting, labour hire, industrial arrangements and Commonwealth-funded projects;

(e) the adequacy of existing oversight and administration mechanisms, and whether administrative or legislative reform is required; and

(f) any other related matter.

(2) That the committee present its final report by 18 November 2026.

(3) That the committee consist of 7 senators, as follows:

(a) three nominated by the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate;

(b) two nominated by the Leader of the Government in the Senate;

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

(d) one nominated by minority party or independent senators.

(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 a 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 a member nominated by the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate and as deputy chair the member nominated by the Leader of the Australian Greens.

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

(9) That the committee have power to appoint subcommittees consisting of 3 or more of its members, and to refer to any such subcommittee any of the matters which the committee is empowered to consider.

(10) 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 and the evidence taken and such interim recommendations as it may deem fit.

(11) 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.

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

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 539 standing in the name of Senator Kovacic be agreed to.

On behalf of Senator Colbeck, I move general business notice of motion No. 542:

That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Climate Change and Energy, by no later than midday on Wednesday, 1 July 2026, copies of any document held by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation or the minister's office in the period 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026 that records whether the Clean Energy Finance Corporation has considered, assessed, discussed, approved, offered or provided any loan, investment, guarantee, grant, co-financing or other financial support in connection with the proposed acquisition of Rushy Lagoon in Tasmania, including any brief to a minister and any correspondence with the proposed purchaser or its representatives.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 542 standing in the name of Senator Colbeck and moved by Senator Askew be agreed to.

On behalf of Senator Bragg, I move general business notice of motion No. 544:

That paragraph (b) of the order agreed to on Wednesday, 24 June 2026, requiring the Minister representing the Minister for Housing to attend the Senate in relation to orders for the production of documents nos. 27 and 119, be amended as follows:

Omit "first day", substitute "second day".

The question is that general business No. 544, standing in the name of Senator Bragg, be agreed to.

At the request of Senator Bragg, I move:

That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Treasurer, by no later than midday on Thursday, 2 July 2026, a regulatory impact statement relating to the decision of the Government to ban self-managed superannuation funds from using limited recourse borrowing arrangements to purchase residential properties.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 545, standing in the name of Senator Bragg, be agreed to.

I ask that general business notice of motion No. 543, proposing the introduction of a bill, be taken as formal.

Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?

Honourable senators interjecting—

What a bunch of sooky la las!

Senator McKim, you'll withdraw that statement.

I do withdraw that. How predictable. Pursuant to contingent notice standing in the name of Senator Waters, I move:

That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the motion being moved immediately and determined without amendment or debate.

The question is the motion as moved by Senator McKim be agreed to.

I move:

That the following bill be introduced:

A Bill for an Act to amend the law relating to discrimination and human rights, and for related purposes.

The question is that the motion moved by Senator McKim be agreed to.

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.

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.

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

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

For background

The Anti-Discrimination Legislation Amendment (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner) Bill 2026 (the Bill) will create the role of Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner (the Commissioner) under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984.

The role of the Commissioner will be to protect and promote the legislated human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer/questioning, and asexual (LGBTIQA+) people in Australia regarding sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics.

The Bill will provide for discrimination against, and advocacy for, LGBTIQA+ people to be treated in the same way at a Commonwealth level as discrimination against other vulnerable groups with protected attributes under Commonwealth law, such as women, people with disability, culturally and linguistically diverse communities, etc.

In 2013, amendments were made to the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 that added sexual orientation, gender identity and intersex status as protected attributes. These are currently the only attributes in the four main Commonwealth anti-discrimination laws that do not have a Commissioner attached to them. The Anti-Discrimination Legislation Amendment (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner) Bill 2026 fills this gap in human rights advocacy.

The Commissioner will work within the Australian Human Rights Commission—an independent statutory authority that protects and promotes human rights in Australia—under its President and alongside the Sex Discrimination Commissioner, Human Rights Commissioner, Age Discrimination Commissioner, Disability Discrimination Commissioner, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Race Discrimination Commissioner, and Children's Commissioner.

The Bill will also replace all instances of the term 'intersex status' found in the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 with 'innate variations of sex characteristics'. When the term 'intersex status' was introduced into the Act in 2013, the supporting Explanatory Memorandum stated its usage was 'not intended to create a third sex in any sense'. However, this is essentially what it has done. This ignores the diverse range of people and sex characteristics the term was supposed to represent, many of whom do not identify as intersex.

This simple and small change in language will bring the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 into line with legal reforms called for in the Darlington Statement, a 2017 joint consensus statement by Australian and Aotearoa/New Zealand intersex organisations and independent advocates which the governments of Victoria, Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory, and the Northern Territory have already acted on.

The Bill will also make necessary consequential amendments to the Australian Human Rights Commission Act 1986, to recognise the role of the Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner it creates under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984, and to the Fair Work Act 2009, to introduce definitions for 'Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner' and 'sex characteristics' and replace all instances of the term 'intersex status' with 'innate variations of sex characteristics'.

On commencement

The Bill commences the day after the day on which it receives the Royal Assent.

On the structure

The Bill provides for a role and office of Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner.

The Bill also provides for a merit-based process to appoint the Commissioner, which will include meaningful engagement with LGBTIQA+ civil society.

On the scope

The scope of the Bill is summarised in the title of the Bill, which is reflected in the title of the new Commissioner role that it provides for. The title Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner directly aligns with international human rights language.

The Bill also replaces the term 'intersex status' with 'innate variations of sex characteristics'.

The Bill is based on evidence and is in line with the wishes of relevant representative organisations at the time of drafting.

On the implementation of scope through definitions

As with the role of Sex Discrimination Commissioner, the Bill provides for the role of Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner to be provided for under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 rather than the Australian Human Rights Commission Act 1986.

Providing for the role of Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 allows the Bill to provide a delineation of duties with the existing role of Sex Discrimination Commissioner.

The Bill would allow the Sex Discrimination Commissioner to retain responsibility for matters relating to discrimination on the ground of sex, and for the Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Sex Characteristics Discrimination Commissioner to assume responsibility for matters regarding sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics, noting that the Australian Human Rights Commission is responsible for assigning functions which have been conferred on it between different commissioners. Under the Bill, both Commissioners have some overlapping responsibility for the other attributes in the Sex Discrimination Act 1984marital or relationship status, pregnancy, potential pregnancy, breastfeeding or family responsibilities, and hostile workplace environments—given these matters affect people of different sexes as well as LGBTIQA+ people.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

I seek leave to make a short statement.

Leave is granted for one minute.

While the Senate has the opportunity to oppose the introduction of a bill or reject a bill at the first reading, in practice, the first reading or the introduction is almost always passed without opposition and is regarded as a purely formal stage. The coalition supports these normal procedures, as we have with many other Greens, Labor and other crossbench bills that we've had opposition to in substance. The normal process enables bills to be fairly considered and debated by the Senate before substantive decisions are taken. It should only be deviated from in the most extreme of circumstances, lest we deny the right of senators to even have matters debated. In all cases, a vote on the first reading should not be taken as a position on the substantive legislation, especially where a bill has not had the opportunity to be subject to a normal internal process.

At the request of Senator Bragg, I move:

That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Housing, by no later than midday on Thursday, 2 July 2026, documents setting out the total number of first home guarantees issued by Housing Australia for the 2025-26 financial year to the end of May 2026, broken down by the top 10 suburbs in each state and territory.

Question agreed to.

At the request of Senator Hume, I move general business notices of motion Nos 540 and 541 together:

GENERAL BUSINESS NOTICES OF MOTION NO. 540

That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, by no later than 9 am on Thursday, 2 July 2026, a copy of any brief, briefing or minute prepared by the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations for the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations or the minister's office relating to the consultation process for the reform of employment services and the overhaul of Workforce Australia, including any such document that addresses the use of non-disclosure or confidentiality agreements with consultation participants.

GENERAL BUSINESS NOTICES OF MOTION NO. 541

That there be laid on the table by the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, by no later than 9 am on Thursday, 2 July 2026, a copy of each non-disclosure agreement, confidentiality agreement or deed of confidentiality (however described) that the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations has presented to, or required to be signed by, any person or organisation as a condition of participating in consultations relating to the reform of employment services, including the overhaul of Workforce Australia.

Question agreed to.

At the request of Senator Bragg, I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) on Wednesday, 13 May 2026, the Senate agreed to order for the production of documents no. 484, relating to the appointment of the Chair of the Housing Australia Board, requiring the Minister representing the Treasurer to comply by midday on Thursday, 14 May 2026, and

(ii) the order has not been complied with; and

(b) requires the Minister representing the Treasurer to comply with the order by no later than midday on Wednesday, 1 July 2026.

Question agreed to.

I seek leave to make a statement of no more than five minutes relating to the decision of Pauline Hanson's One Nation to deny me formality in relation to introducing a bill.

Leave not granted.

Pursuant to the contingent notice of motion standing in the name of Senator Waters, I move:

That so much of standing orders be suspended as would prevent me from making a statement of no more than five minutes in regard to the decision of Pauline Hanson's One Nation senators to deny me leave for formality in relation to introducing a piece of legislation that seeks to provide greater protections for LGBTIQA+ Australians.

Now, let's be very clear about what is happening here, and let's be very clear about why the Senate should support suspending the standing orders. Yesterday, Pauline Hanson's One Nation sought to introduce into this parliament a transphobic, hateful piece of legislation in order to provide a platform with the protections of parliamentary privilege to allow a whole bunch of transphobic, bigoted people in this country to punch down on transgender folks and, in particular, on transgender children. That's what One Nation tried to do yesterday.

Then, when they lost that vote yesterday and were prevented from being able to provide a platform for hateful bigotry that would be harmful for transgender people right across this country, they had a giant sook about it. One of the ways that that sook manifested itself was their denying me and the Australian Greens leave and formality today for a bill that we want to introduce to provide greater protections not just for transgender folks but for people right across the queer community in this country.

I've got two questions for One Nation senators. The first is: Why are you so obsessed with other people's genitals and reproductive organs? What is wrong with you that you are so obsessed with other people's genitals and reproductive organs? Do you know what? We've got a name for that in this country: perversion. You are perverts. Get out of the gutter. Get out of people's underpants. Get out—

Senator McKim, your microphone is off. Please resume your seat. It's one thing to be enthusiastic about your argument, but can I direct you to make your comments to the chair. I think it might be appropriate for you to withdraw that last comment.

I do withdraw that, but I do want to say that this fixation on other people's genitals—this fixation about which toilet people go into to do the things that every single human being in this chamber does every day—is a perversion. It is a fixation on genitals and a fixation on other people's reproductive organs that are at the foundation of so much that one Nation does and says.

The second question I have for One Nation senators—which I will ask through you, of course, Acting Deputy President—is: what has Pauline Hanson's One Nation got against transgender people, and why do they want to provide a platform for trans folk in this country to be harmed, to be hurt? These are people who just want to get on with their lives and be who they are, people who want to live their day-to-day lives free of harm, free of discrimination, like we all do as we go about our day-to-day lives, people who simply want to embrace who they are as human beings. Why—I ask through you, Acting Deputy President—does Pauline Hanson's One Nation want to throw trans people under a bus in the name of their incessant culture wars in this country purely for political purpose?

I want to say to trans people in this country—and I know I say this on behalf of all of my colleagues in the Australian Greens—we have your back. We are your allies. We will fight to defend your right to be who you are. We acknowledge that as humans you deserve love and support for who you are, and we commit ourselves as a party and as a party room to being your allies and to giving you that love and support. We will always be there for you to defend your rights and to aggressively push back against people like Pauline Hanson's One Nation and anyone else—and I know there are others in this place, the transphobic elements—who seek to harm you, who seek to hurt you, who seek to demonise you, who seek to exploit you and who seek to allow you to be deliberately harmed because they think it suits their political agenda. That is a despicable thing that you are doing to trans people, and we will always be here for trans folks because trans rights are human rights.

Senator McKim, have you finished your contribution?

No, I haven't. I've got six seconds to go. I'm not done yet.

Senator Bell, are you standing to take a point of order?

Yes, under 193(3). I do believe that Senator McKim crossed the line there with his statements that we were looking to cause people deliberate harm. It's an improper imputation of motivation and unparliamentary. I ask him to withdraw.

I'm not sure that that's correct, but it would assist the chamber if Senator McKim could withdraw and complete your contribution.

Acting Deputy President, because you have asked me to withdraw it, I will withdraw it, but could I please ask you to just review that ruling and come back to the chamber?

I will do so. I'll let the President know.

Like you, I'm not sure that it did actually cross the threshold. Honestly, they're just reinforcing what sooky la las they are, if you ask me, Acting Deputy President. We are here for trans folks. Trans rights are human rights.

I move:

That the question be now put.

The minister sought the call ahead of you, Senator Bell. Your point of order was already addressed.

The question now is that the question be now put.

The question is that the motion moved by Senator McKim to suspend standing orders be agreed to.

Senator Ruston has submitted a proposal, under standing order 75, today, as shown at item 12 of today's Order of Business:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need for the Albanese Government to immediately reverse its harmful treatment of older Australians, including its decision to gut the private health insurance rebate for Australians over 65, impose a flawed algorithm on aged care needs assessments with no capacity for human override and bury a so-called 'widow tax' in rushed legislation, which together demonstrate a profound disregard for the dignity, security and contribution of older Australians.

Is consideration of the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

With the concurrence of the Senate, the clerks will set the clock in line with the informal arrangements made by the whips.

I move:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need for the Albanese Government to immediately reverse its harmful treatment of older Australians, including its decision to gut the private health insurance rebate for Australians over 65, impose a flawed algorithm on aged care needs assessments with no capacity for human override and bury a so-called 'widow tax' in rushed legislation, which together demonstrate a profound disregard for the dignity, security and contribution of older Australians.

I stand today to speak on this urgency motion because I believe it should be the opinion of the Senate that this Labor government is waging a war on older Australians. I am pleased to move this urgency motion standing in my name; it's an urgency motion that calls out the Labor government for waging a war on older Australians through higher taxes, higher healthcare costs and reduced aged-care support. Older Australians are being hit with a triple whammy—an $11 billion cut to the private health insurance rebate which impacts over-65s; a flawed aged-care assessment algorithm that puts a computer, instead of a person, in charge of somebody's assessment being introduced into a system that is already seeing blowouts in wait times and waitlists; and a hidden widow's tax that strips Australians of the promised grandfathering protections when they are at their most vulnerable.

Labor's $11 billion rebate cut is a tax on older Australians who have spent decades paying for their own private health insurance. From April 2027, couples over the age of 65 with gold cover will pay up to $1,614 more per year—a 21.3 per cent increase; the largest increase on record—and the government admits it doesn't even know how many of the 3.1 million older Australians who will be affected are pensioners. But we know that over 50 per cent of these people are likely to be pensioners, because National Seniors have already estimated that 55 per cent of those 3.1 million Australians who will be impacted will be pensioners.

Many older Australians will have little choice but to absorb the costs, because they rely so heavily on their private health care. Older Australians disproportionately hold gold and silver policies covering procedures like joint replacements and cataract surgery. Losing cover means longer waitlists in our public hospitals and greater pressure on our public health system.

There's Labor's aged-care assessment algorithm. It's an assessment tool that allows assessors to collect information, but the algorithm, the computer, is the one that makes the decision that determines the funding. Assessors have no ability to override incorrect outcomes, even when the clinical assessors' professional judgement says the decision is wrong.

Since the rollout in November 2025, almost a thousand older Australians have sought reviews to challenge the outcome of their assessment. Thousands of older Australians have had care reduced or been found ineligible, despite their worsening health conditions. The Inspector-General found that only 0.1 per cent of cases are classified as urgent, even for people with advanced dementia or motor neurone disease. The Commonwealth Ombudsman is investigating this algorithm, following thousands of complaints. The Inspector-General of Aged Care, and peak organisations, including OPAN, COTA, MND Australia and the Australian and New Zealand Society for Geriatric Medicine, have all called for human override. This week, we, in this chamber, have the opportunity to be able to put that back in, and I hope everybody in this chamber supports that.

And there's the 'widows tax'. Under Labor's new CGT and negative gearing laws, Australians were promised that their existing assets would be grandfathered if held on budget night. That promise was another cruel hoax from Labor. Buried in Labor's legislation, which it rushed through the parliament with the Greens, was a provision stripping grandfathering provisions and protections from Australians who lose a partner through death or divorce, or who are fleeing domestic violence. Because ownership structures change, the protections disappear—at the very moment when Australians are at their most vulnerable.

Whether it's higher taxes, higher health costs or denying older Australians the care that they have been assessed as needing, Labor continues to make life harder for older Australians. This Treasurer has got no idea about the details of his budget. This government has got no idea about the details of legislation that it has jammed through this place.

There's one thing you can be assured of: we will stand on the side of you, older Australians, who deserve a more dignified retirement and ageing process than this government is prepared to give you. The Labor government have declared war on older Australians. Older Australians deserve policies that will support them, not punish them. That means that we need to make sure that Australians get the care and the aged-care support that they need, and that they should not be taxed when they are at their most vulnerable.

Well, what another ridiculous scare campaign from those opposite. And it's not all that surprising. I mean, they're badly down in the polls; just when we thought they couldn't drop any further, they have. They're in absolute chaos. They're in coalition with not only the Nationals but also One Nation. They are in a desperate attempt to distract from the chaos, from the division, from the divisiveness that we're seeing from the Liberal Party and the National Party and One Nation working together. They're in an attempt to get the Australian people to miss the fact that they've voted against our tax cuts for working Australians in this place and that they've stood in the way of every attempt we have tried to make to build more homes and get more young people into their first home, and that they have stood in the way of every attempt that we have made to help with the cost of living.

They are sinking to new lows with this desperate scare campaign, using older Australians in their political quest for relevance. It is absolutely shameful, it is irresponsible and it is wrong. In the other place, we saw the shadow treasurer claim the government had scrapped rebates for private health insurance for people aged over 65. This is wrong. It is simply not true. It is not what our government is proposing. He went even further and suggested it was because the government does not want to provide health care to older Australians.

What a ridiculous proposition to say about this Labor government, which has done more to deliver health care for Australians than any other government since the establishment of Medicare—and certainly more than those opposite. It's a particularly 'egregious' claim—to use Senator Hume's words—about our tax cuts by those opposite, who were found by the royal commission to have overseen an aged-care system of neglect of older Australians. For them to come into this place, and the other place, and accuse us of not being on the side of older Australians is a desperate scare campaign. It's a desperate political tactic to hide from the Australian people the truth about what they stand for, what they don't stand for and what they stand in the way of. They stand in the way of our attempts to deliver tax cuts. They stand in the way of our attempts to build more homes. They stand in the way of our attempts to deliver cost-of-living relief, time and time again.

The bill to which Senator Ruston refers to, the Private Health Insurance Amendment (Modernising the Private Health Insurance Rebate) Bill 2026, ensures more funding for aged care by removing the additional private health insurance subsidy provided to Australians aged 65 and over. We announced these reforms in the budget, and, really, what they mean is that all Australians will receive the same private health support, based on their income rather than their age. Under the current private health insurance arrangements, the government provides a higher subsidy to Australians aged over 65. This bill simplifies the rebate tiers and removes this inequity.

On the other matters that Senator Ruston has raised in her motion—the widow tax, come on! Again, it's another scare tactic and an attempt by them to muddy the truth. On the jointly held assets question about how these matters are dealt with under the existing arrangements prior to our tax reforms being passed through the Senate, the Treasurer and the Prime Minister have said that those matters will be reviewed and considered as we continue to work through these important reforms in a staged way, which is entirely consistent with how these matters are delivered at home. On the question of AI and its use in aged-care assessments, we've been really clear that there is always human oversight over these decisions, as there should be.

But we know the facts don't matter to those opposite. The truth doesn't matter to those opposite, because the Liberals, the Nationals and One Nation are committed to working together to stand in the way of the things Australians want to see our government taking action on. But we won't allow them to do it.

I want to again commend Senators Ruston and Allman-Payne for the work that they've done in aged care in shining a light on the use of an algorithm that doesn't seem fit for purpose, shining a light on an assessment tool that—despite what the government says—seems like its only human oversight is the putting of numbers into the algorithm. You can't change it once it comes out, and that is no way to treat Australians.

This leads us to a very important and much broader challenge that we're facing—how do you have more transparency and accountability when there is widespread use of automated decision-making and widespread use of algorithms? Clearly, so far, we haven't figured that out as a country. We need the government to step up when it comes to recommendations from the royal commission and when it comes to transparency of an algorithm that has such a big impact on people's lives.

I am proud to stand here and call out what is happening in aged care, particularly around the algorithms. As shadow assistant minister for health and aged care, I know about it because I get the calls to my office from people who are anxious—who are terrified. Their families, worried about what's happening to them as they age, are waiting and waiting for the government to respond. You can't hide from the fact that this government's waiting lists have got worse and that its ideas for addressing aged care aren't working—because people power proves it. Labor claim to support older Australians, but their budget is riddled with hidden taxes on hardworking and vulnerable Australians, and the truth has been revealed. They don't understand how their own laws will impact people most affected by changes, and they don't even have the capacity to fix it. We've heard it time and time again.

With the coalition, I'm calling on the Albanese government to immediately scrap this damaging policy. It hurts older Australians; they tell us that, time and time again. These are real people who are ageing, scared and wanting better—and they deserve better. Your $11 billion tax on older Australians' private health insurance will actually result in higher costs for people on fixed incomes who have no real choice but to absorb them. What about those couples over 65 with gold cover who will struggle with being slugged up to $1,614 extra from next year? That's a staggering 21 per cent increase. It's the biggest rise in private health costs on record. This is real for these people. These figures aren't made up. And do you know what's worse? The Labor government has conceded it doesn't even know how many of the 3.1 million older Australians will be affected as pensioners, because it never bothered to find out. But research by National Seniors suggests around 55 per cent will be affected. That's not a small number. What does Labor go and do? It punishes those financially exposed older Australians who have worked hard their whole lives and managed their finances carefully to maintain their cover and maintain some sort of dignity in aged care. It's a fact that older Australians are more likely to need health care as they age. I don't think any Australian is different in that respect. It's something they expect. That's why they hold on to certainty. They plan for their futures. They've contributed to our communities, they've been taxpayers in our communities and they expect to be looked after in their old age better than they are right now.

We've seen over the last couple of weeks that the government doesn't even do the modelling to understand how many people are affected by the things it chooses to do to them. We've seen legislation come into this place and then the fixes done after the legislation has gone through. Not just Australians but older Australians trust the Labor government to fix it afterwards. You didn't take your tax changes to them at an election to give them choice, so why should they trust you? Of course they shouldn't. What matters is that older Australians can prepare with their families for their futures, choose what sort of health cover they go on and choose the kind of care that they get as they age—because they deserve it. Labor Premier Chris Minns said:

Little changes at a federal level, made by somebody in a darkened room in Canberra, can have a huge impact on an emergency department in Mount Druitt.

He was talking about older Australians. I couldn't have said it better. You can't make decisions in this place without doing the work. You can't make decisions in this place without consulting properly. You can't make those decisions without doing the modelling. But do you know what? That's what Labor does, time and time again.

I seek leave to move an amendment to the motion.

Leave not granted.

Pursuant to contingent notice standing in the name of Senator Waters, I move:

That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent me moving an amendment to the motion.

It is urgent that standing orders be suspended because the coalition's motion does not go to the heart of the problem with the aged-care reforms. It is necessary for us to suspend standing orders so that we can speak to the fact that the reforms that we have before us are based on the financial co-payment model that was designed behind closed doors with the government and the coalition. It is important that we suspend standing orders so that the community understands that, whilst the coalition gets up and says this aged-care reform is not working and the government is to blame, it shares in the blame for the co-payment system that is causing older Australians to suffer.

It is important that we suspend standing orders so we can focus the debate on the fact that, whilst the coalition stands up and says it is so concerned about pensioners having to pay more, it was the coalition who joined with the Labor government to pass the aged-care reform bill, which contains the co-payment model. It is important and urgent that we suspend standing orders so that every Australian knows that the co-payment model that older Australians are now trying to work within in aged care was voted for in this chamber by Labor senators, coalition senators, One Nation senators and every senator on the crossbench except the senators from the Australian Greens.

It is important that we suspend standing orders so that the community knows and understands this and we can debate the fact that the Inspector-General of Aged Care, Ms Siegel-Brown, said, before these reforms came to pass, that the co-payment model would see people being denied access to the care that they need and deserve. It is important that we suspend standing orders so we can debate the fact that the co-payment model was voted for by the coalition and the government, who cooked it up behind closed doors, and was supported by every member of the crossbench except the Greens.

It is important that we focus our debate and therefore suspend standing orders so that we can move this amendment so that the community understands that Labor, the coalition, One Nation and the crossbench share the blame for the co-payment model that is still currently seeing seniors paying up to $50 for a shower, assistance with dressing and incontinence care. It is important that they also understand that Labor is responsible for the algorithm that is currently underassessing thousands of Australians who can't access care at the level they need.

It is important that we suspend standing orders so that we focus this debate on the Greens amendment which says that a problem here is the integrated assessment tool, which must be immediately changed to reinstate human override so that people with progressive degenerative diseases like MND are not underassessed. It is important that we suspend standing orders to move this amendment because, whilst the algorithm is underassessing people, we also have people who are still prevented from accessing the care they need because they cannot afford the co-payments.

Pensioners and part-pensioners in this country are making more hardship applications than ever because this system and the financials behind the aged-care reforms that we now have in place were designed behind closed doors by the Labor government and the coalition and voted for in the Senate by the Labor government, the coalition One Nation senators and every person on the crossbench, despite the Inspector-General warning that they would deprive people of care. It is important that the Australian public understands how we got here.

The Greens agree that we need to reinstate human override into the integrated assessment tool. But make no mistake. Pensioners are suffering because everyone in this chamber except the Greens supported co-payments for aged care.

The coalition won't be supporting this amendment because this is an attempt to divert attention from what is actually happening to people on the ground right now through the measures of this government. If the Greens want to put up their own motion, then they're quite free to do that as a part of everyday business. They could have put up a motion in the terms that they've proposed as a part of this amendment. The reality is that the issue that we're dealing with as part of the substantive motion is also contained within the Greens' motion, and that is the lack of override that's available to assessors under the new aged-care assessment tool, which is all of the government's making. They might try to pretend that it belongs to somebody else, but I can tell you, as a former minister in the portfolio who commenced the process, that it has got nothing to do with anyone but the Labor Party. It's their tool that takes away the capacity of human assessors to make an assessment of the care needed for senior Australians.

The reference was made in the last presentation with respect to the Inspector-General of Aged Care. Her evidence at estimates was absolutely damning of the Labor Party, and to hear the Secretary of the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing talking about the sad reality of the way that aged care is being handed out was shameful.

The fact is that we are now rationing aged-care home-care packages again, which is exactly the opposite of what the royal commission, which we all remember so well, said to do. The aged-care royal commission interim report said this cruel lottery for home-care packages must stop. That's what the coalition did. The coalition put $7.2 billion into home care in its response to the royal commission in 2021, and that saw 100,000 Australians come off the waiting list for home-care packages. The home-care package waiting list was reduced from 128,000 to 28,000 people in about the middle of 2022. The fact that there are now over 100,000 people back on that list is shameful, and it's got nothing to do with anything but the way the government is managing this system.

We cannot support this amendment. This is about what the government has done with respect to the assessment tool and their management of home-care packages. The fact that there are now over 100,000 people waiting to get an assessment is a further indictment on this government. Hard work was done by the coalition in allocating 118,000 packages over three years to get the waiting list down—which is what the royal commission asked us to do—to 28,000. The fact that that effort, that investment, has been wasted by Labor is shameful. To hear the minister at question time trying to suggest that we've taken money out of aged care was a disgrace. It was dishonest and demonstrates again that you cannot believe a thing that this government says. It doesn't matter what they're talking about or when they're talking about it. You cannot believe a thing that this government says, particularly with respect to aged care.

How was the cricket, Richard?

Yes, that's right. Go personal, Helen. It's typical of the Labor Party. Just go personal. When you've lost the argument, go personal. You do it all the time. You've got no shame at all. The Labor Party has absolutely no shame at all.

Senior Australians, which are who we're talking about, can't get a home-care package. Over 100,000 of them are waiting. The waiting list is blowing out; it got to 130,000. It's shameful what this government allowed to happen, after all the hard work that was put in by everybody involved to get the home-care waiting list back down. The fact that there is now no human involvement in the assessment of aged-care packages, except for putting in the data, is an absolute disgrace. Quite frankly, I don't know why the government just doesn't do something to fix it.

I let the chamber know that the time for debate will expire at 5.23. Senator Polley.

Thank you very much, Acting Deputy President Hodgins-May, for the opportunity to support the suspension motion. It is important to support this suspension motion. I also think it's very important that we remind people of the real facts when it comes to aged care. For the previous speaker to get up and try and paint this pretty picture of what those opposite did for the nine years that they were in government—they were so good when it came to aged care; they had five ministers and all of them failed! The Liberal government were so bad—and they didn't care about aged care because no-one really wanted to be the minister—that they had to call a royal commission into their own failure. Why? Because they neglected older Australians. Older Australians were neglected by that government because they didn't care. They didn't fund aged care. They used aged care as an ATM and ripped money out. That's the reality.

This government, having spent the time in opposition seeing the results of the lack of interest of their government, injected more money into aged care. We have adopted the recommendations of the royal commission—which is why we need to suspend standing orders to have a real debate about the opposition's failures when they were in government. It's very unusual for a government to call a royal commission into their own failings. I would be ashamed if I'd been a minister for aged care during those years. To stand up and try and rewrite history, to come in here with crocodile tears saying that they care about older Australians—you had the opportunity, decade after decade, when you were in government—

Senator Polley, please take your seat. Senator Henderson?

I'm just seeking clarification that the government is supporting the Greens' amendment.

Government senators interjecting—

You're supporting the suspension in relation to the Greens' amendment? Wow!

That's not a point of order, Senator Henderson.

I thought I was very clear when I rose and said I was supporting the suspension motion. I think it is a great opportunity to call out the crocodile tears from those opposite. Those that were in government with Senator Colbeck when he was the minister were very quiet when it came to aged care, and the record will show that. I commend Minister Butler for the work that he did in re-establishing some dignity for older Australians. We've invested in that. With Minister Butler and Minister Rae—

Senator Polley, please take your seat. Senators, the time for this debate has expired. As the motion to suspend standing orders to enable Senator Allman-Payne to move an amendment was not agreed to prior to the expiration of time for the debate, the motion to suspend standing orders has lapsed. The question will now be put on the unamended urgency motion moved by Senator Ruston.

The question is that the motion is moved by Senator Ruston be agreed to.

The Senate will now consider the proposal under standing order 75, from Senator McKim, which is also shown at item 12 on today's Order of Business:

The Albanese government's failure to protect the Australian environment, water, jobs, data, and national interest from the march of US tech billionaire controlled artificial intelligence and data centres across the country.

Is consideration of the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

With the concurrence of the Senate, the clerks will set the clock in line with the informal arrangements made by the whips.

I rise to speak on the matter of public importance in Senator McKim's name. This particular matter is really important because it highlights the failure of the Albanese government to protect Australia's environment, water, jobs, data and national interests in the march towards allowing the United States to set up hyperscale, massive, big data centres here in Australia. They are rolling out the red carpet before they've even worked out what Australia is going to get back in return.

We know that the regulations are not there. We know that Australians are very suspicious of what these big tech companies—these big AI companies—want to do right here in Australia. What we do know is that they want to be able to mine the intellect, the knowledge and the culture of the Australian community and pay nothing for it. We know that. But we also know that they want to set up shop here because Australia's regulations are weak—virtually non-existent. Australia is one of the only countries in the world that are seen as good placement for these types of centres, because of our safety, a lack of regulation and, of course, the government's willingness to roll over as soon as the dollar signs start shining.

I say to the Albanese government: stop being so starry eyed about this. Australians deserve to know and to be assured about what the real implications of artificial intelligence mean for them—what they mean for our jobs, what they mean for our water and our environment, and what they mean for our intellectual property rights. What do they mean for our national security? At the moment, the government can't answer any of those questions. They are simply rolling out the red carpet for billionaire after billionaire. We need to make sure Australians are in the conversation.

The issue here is really: what are we going to do to ensure that we can get the most from this revolution? These organisations probably have more power and control over our lives than any other organisation in the history of humanity. What are we going to do to ensure that we get a reasonable deal from them operating on our shores? This is going to be one of the great policy judgements over the next decade.

I would say that the case for having a role in the new world of artificial intelligence is a solid one. We're not going to become like Taiwan; we're not going to be manufacturing semiconductors here in Australia. It is important that we have some role in the value chain—in that ecosystem. If that is going to be data centres, then that is going to be a positive thing, because those, by definition, are going to bring investment, capability and employment into this country.

But these centres use a great deal of electricity. They use a great deal of water. And, generally speaking, these organisations in this technology space, the big tech space, have been negligent and criminal when it comes to the payment of taxes. I make the distinction that organisations like Anthropic or OpenAI are distinct from social media companies. But to bundle the technology sector together, perhaps in a crude way, these organisations have not been good taxpayers. They have created tax schemes through transfer pricing, which has allowed them to raise billions of dollars of revenue in this country and billions of dollars of profit and pay very low levels of taxation.

We must ensure that our tax systems and our regulatory systems move and adapt with changing technologies, so it is critical that the government and the parliament do consider the standards that should apply in relation to water, in relation to electricity and in relation to taxation and stewardship. These are all reasonable questions to raise. In relation to electricity, we should, by virtue of our solar capacity, be able to provide very high levels of computational capacity with the lowest level of environmental footprint. We should be able to do that. In relation to water, we should be able to provide reasonable levels of water, but we should be able to do it on the basis that it is sustainable.

These are the sorts of things that I don't think the government have really thought about. We have an incoherence from this government on the question of artificial intelligence. We have the former minister saying he wants to regulate it into oblivion. We have the current minister saying, 'Well, we're not really quite too sure.' It goes to this broader question of how we set Australia up as a country that is going to be able to avail itself of this new technology but is going to be smart about how we actually derive some public benefit from that.

One of the things that have frustrated the Australian people has been that we are a country which has great concentrations of power, which is not unusual. You can see concentrations of power in this government with the influence that the unions and the big super funds have over their day-to-day policy. We have huge concentrations of power in the finance sector, and we will have a huge concentration of power in the tech sector, just as we have today. The fact that the large technology companies are able to violate the principle of paying a large amount of tax where it is adjacent to the large amount of revenue and profit that they collect shows you that they are already in a very strong position, and so these are reasonable questions to raise. I think we want to avail ourselves of this technology, but we want to make sure that we get our pound of flesh along the way and that it's done in a sustainable fashion.

This motion once again reveals that the Greens really are a nuance-free zone when it comes to serious issues in this parliament. Australia and countries around the world will need to grapple with the various ways in which AI will impact our lives, not only in terms of our working lives and our social lives but in terms of the way we live as a society and interact. The attack in the motion is misguided on two levels. Firstly, it's misguided because it mischaracterises what's actually going on. Secondly, it's misguided because what it doesn't deal with is the nuance and the necessity to grasp with the fact that this is an emerging technology. There are lots of different uncertainties involved, and it's natural that we will evolve the way we regulate it to ensure not only that it serves the Australian people and it serves working people in this country but also that we don't get left behind and we don't get excluded from the capacity to develop sovereign capability in this space.

I'm very glad to have Senator Sheldon in the chamber here, because Senator Sheldon was the chair of a select committee into this in 2024, and its recommendations were nuanced. They were detailed. They reflected a concern on this side of the house from the Labor Party and from the trade union movement that as we adopt this technology we are protecting Australian workers and that we're ensuring that they have a say in the way that this technology gets rolled out. So I do want to congratulate Senator Sheldon in that respect for that work, but it's clear that the writer of this motion and those who spoke to it before didn't read that report, because, if they had, they couldn't have made those attacks. There was nothing starry-eyed in it. It was nuanced, and it reflected a deep concern about how AI was going to be rolled out, but it also reflected a recognition that Australia cannot block its eyes and ears to this new technology. It can't prevent its emergence as the rest of the world embraces it and as Australians adopt this technology. So we do need a regulatory framework that protects workers and protects the environment but also doesn't exclude us from sovereign capability and doesn't exclude us from the economic benefits that this technology will bring, here and around the world.

What does that mean from a policy perspective? The government has been very clear: it means we should be embedding AI into our economy and guiding it in a way that seeks to lift living standards rather than deepen inequality, and in such a way that it can be delivered sustainably. That means that we should be embedding AI literacy into our learning institutions, including TAFEs and universities. We must also ensure that workers have enforceable rights to consultation over how AI is used in workplaces. AI must never be a shield against accountability for hard-won workplace protections. I also commend the ACTU on the work they're doing in this space, as well as the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees' Association, whose recent report into this was so valuable.

It's important to remember in this debate that AI is a tool, and responsibility must rest with those who design and benefit from the systems. There need to be strong regulatory frameworks. There need to be bodies that are capable of enforcing and dealing with the challenges of AI, and dealing with the speed of the development of this technology, which is, at stages, quite breathtaking.

There's also no doubt that the increased use of AI will present risks to our society and have significant impacts, but we cannot pretend that the technology doesn't exist or isn't going to be used, here and around the world.

No-one is saying that.

Yes, they are, Senator Faruqi. If you want to interject on this, look at this motion. It is barely credible in the way that you've framed it. It's incoherent. And the attack that was made earlier is deeply misguided.

But the principles that are at the core of the Albanese government's National AI Plan are that we will work to attract investment in the necessary infrastructure, both physical and digital; we will work to make sure that workers and public services share in the benefits that can be derived from artificial intelligence; and we will develop regulations and legislation that will mitigate the risks from emerging AI. Data centres will have to go through rigorous environmental and planning approvals, like other infrastructure, and our expectations around that are that the projects will meet the standards and needs of Australians and must be in our national interest. Such projects will need to demonstrate their ability to help Australians invest in skills and jobs, encouraging global operators to partner with local researchers and startups to encourage innovation and to develop sovereign capacity. They will need to use water sustainably and responsibly, and they will need to support Australia's energy transition by contributing to the cost of network infrastructure and helping bring new energy supplies—sustainable energy supplies—onto the grid. Projects that do not meet those expectations will not be supported by the federal government.

Overall, this government is conscious of the need to achieve balance here, in an uncertain and quickly evolving environment. We need regulation to harness this technology effectively and make sure we mitigate or minimise its impacts, and it needs to be used on behalf of working people.

I think we can all acknowledge that the world is going through an artificial intelligence revolution and that data centres will be a big part of this. What that means is that Australia is going to be faced with two choices: we can look at building and controlling our own critical infrastructure, or we can find ourselves dependent on data centres based overseas, controlled by foreign interests in countries like Communist China—that is just the reality, and that would be a risk to our sovereignty and our national security.

It does appear that the Albanese Labor government has been caught flat-footed here. I was listening carefully to Senator Ghosh's contribution, and I heard a lot of 'we have a plan' and 'we will do'. But there is a distinct lack of action here—and there needs to be action, because people are concerned.

On the issue of energy: you're not going to be able to power these with your solar factories or your wind farms. That's another critical issue here. You have hamstrung yourself, once again, with your net zero obsession. To hear that you are linking this to further renewable rollouts is concerning, and it will concern Australian landholders. That is why it's no surprise that we have local councils and communities and concerned members of the public coming to my office, and to our offices, because they're learning second-hand about what appear to be major land purchases being discussed or made, and proposed data centres in their area. Yet they do not know what's going on, because they are being bypassed because there is a lack of consultation. Councils do appear to have been ignored. Residents are being kept in the dark. Communities are only finding out about things later.

We've heard this story before, because it's the same blueprint that you, Labor and the Greens, used to force your industrial wind and solar on rural and regional communities. It's the same blueprint we have seen you use at the behest of your net zero billionaire mates. Labor and the Greens have already allowed multinational renewable companies to steamroll farmers and to divide communities—to rip them apart. So it is a bit rich to hear you talk about the concern you have for these communities because you've already done it to them. We don't want to see it happen again. There is an issue with consultation. Your record shows the exact opposite on this issue. You have not shown the due concern.

I rise to associate myself with the comments of my colleague Senator Ghosh in relation to this MPI. It's not really a serious policy argument that's being brought here this afternoon; it's another one of the Greens political party's scare campaigns. It's from the same old playbook as usual: find a complex issue, strip out every practical detail, blame the Labor Party, frighten the public and then offer a slogan instead of a solution. The Greens political party wants Australians to believe that there are only two choices: hand over the country to American tech billionaires or shut the whole thing down. Well, it's absolute nonsense. Two things can actually be true at once. You can hold both of those ideas together in the light and assess them. That's exactly what the Albanese Labor government are doing.

We will not let tech companies write the rules or let communities carry the costs where private companies take the profits, but we will also not pretend that Australia can opt out of the emerging frontiers of AI, digital infrastructure, data security and the associated economic changes. That's not environmentalism—newsflash—that is retreating from the future. AI is growing, and so is the infrastructure behind it. The question is who shapes it. Is it Australia, under Australian laws, with workers and safeguards at the centre, or is it other countries building the capability while Australia continues to fall behind? This government's answer is clear. Australia should be shaping the new frontier with Australia's interests at the centre of it. The Greens bring an MPI here today, and their answer to that is just another stop sign. It makes a neat little media release, but it actually doesn't make a serious policy.

The Albanese Labor government has already released our national AI plan and our data centre expectations, sending a very, very clear message to developers that Australian communities come first. This means prioritising the national interest, supporting the energy transition, using water responsibly, investing in Australian skills and jobs, and strengthening local capability. That is the Albanese Labor government setting the terms. Our approach is practical. Data centres should bring new renewable energy supply online, pay their fair share of network costs and provide flexibility to strengthen the grid. This is a serious energy policy, not a stunt that sends investment offshore and leaves Australia weaker.

On water, communities have a right to ask questions. Water security matters, whether it's for households, farmers, First Nations communities, industries and the environment. That's why Labor requires sustainable water use, early engagement with communities and water utilities, efficient cooling technology and non-potable water where possible. Projects that don't meet our requirements, standards or national interests should not be waved through, but a blanket moratorium does not protect one river, save one wetland, build one recycled water system or deliver one extra renewable project.

So let's absolutely get the clarity of what this is about. Bringing this MPI may make the Greens political party feel pure, but actually it's telling us everything we need to know. Of course, as always, somebody else has to do the work. They can pretend to care about jobs. Their answer is to block infrastructure, but that is actually what supports good jobs in communities.

Labor expects fair, safe, secure and well-paid jobs and investment in local capability. On the issue of data and sovereignty, the Greens argument is a house of cards, as usual. You don't protect Australians' data by saying data centres just need to be somewhere else. When companies want to operate here, our government's position is very, very clear: they operate under Australian terms. That is sovereignty. It's not replacing policy with protest. You don't protect workers by blocking infrastructure that could and will support Australian jobs. You don't protect water by issuing a press release. You protect it by setting the standards, using the planning systems, requiring sustainable water use and rejecting those bad projects.

This MPI concerns the real issues that Australians should be asking about—energy, water, jobs, data—but it turns into another lazy lecture on purity. While they lecture us, Labor continue to deliver. Labor is setting national expectations, backing the energy transition, protecting water, supporting jobs and skills, and building safety capability through the AI Safety Institute. The Albanese Labor government will continue to build a stronger, safer and more sovereign Australia.

Our country is facing yet another crisis brought to us by the billionaires, and the Labor government doesn't seem interested at all in doing anything about it. In fact, they welcome it. How we deal with AI goes to the heart of who controls information, who controls resources and what kind of a society, an economy and a world we want to live in. Things aren't looking good. The massive data centres used by AI corporations have an insatiable thirst for our water. They are energy vampires, and they will drive up carbon emissions and power prices. It's no wonder communities across this country are organising to resist them.

Even more than the environmental damage, it is the AI business model that seeks unprecedented control. It will only deepen the pockets of the so-called 'big five'—Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple and Meta. They are tax dodgers who contribute virtually nothing to Australia while extracting billions from us. AI has powered up a new class of oligarchs. It sucks dry our water and energy, hollows out our jobs and steals from our artists, writers, thinkers and musicians.

What is hidden and what is amplified is entirely up to these billionaires. Do we really trust Elon Musk's Grok to tell us the truth about the far right trashing our democracy? Do we really trust OpenAI to tell us the truth about the wars its own technology is now fighting? This economy is built on the billionaires' terms to transfer wealth upwards and smash the rest of us in the process. 'Wait and see' isn't good enough. We need a moratorium on data centres, and we need to properly regulate these capitalist nightmares.

Well, the Labor government tells us that we should just open our arms to these big multinationals with some statements of expectations on a website because, if we don't, we won't be shaping the future of AI. But the problem with that is that the government seems to have no actual intent to shape the future of AI. After years of work on AI Safety Act, it was scrapped. After months of work setting up an expert body to advise on AI, it was scrapped. We have this hands-off approach—no safeguards on AI—and, when it comes to data centres, a statement of expectations on a website about which the CEO of one of the biggest data centre companies in Australia told Alan Kirkland on a podcast that those are basically just the rules as they currently stand and as they exist at the moment and that there's nothing new in there.

I'm concerned we're not planning for this. We're not talking about the difference between sovereign Australian owned data centres that keep the data here and that are servicing Australian banks, government and researchers and these big multinational hyperscalers who want to come here on their terms, use our resources and not pay tax. We're not hearing anything from the government about something like a digital services tax. We're not hearing anything about the need for some sort of compute reservation policy. It's not like gas where we're paying international prices to access compute in our own data centres. These are the things that we need to plan for.

I welcome this from the Greens. This is something we should be talking about because there are hundreds of billions of dollars of investment flowing towards Australia. We hold some cards here. We should be setting the terms and ensuring that Australians now and future generations of Australians do benefit from this, rather than just saying, 'Well, if we don't just roll over for them, they'll go elsewhere.' That doesn't cut it.

Labor is not taking the threat of AI-powered far-right extremism seriously. Worse than that, they're opening the door to it. Take American AI surveillance company Palantir. Palantir was founded by far-right billionaire Peter Thiel, an unhinged nutcase who thinks that Greta Thunberg could be the Antichrist, a man who has said that he doesn't believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.

Palantir is now a central figure in the US military-industrial complex, enabling a massive expansion of the surveillance state, helping Israel generate kill lists in Gaza and supporting Donald Trump's ICE to track and deport immigrants. It was Palantir's AI targeting software that was responsible for the strike on the school in Iran that killed over a hundred children. This is a company whose CEO, Alex Karp, has lauded the West's 'superiority in applying organised violence'. This is a man who says that society needs to be willing to destroy millions of jobs to develop military AI.

You'd think that all of this would have made Labor think twice before getting into bed with Palantir. You might think that the government of a sovereign nation would be reluctant to let in, through the front door, a company that says it has a 'moral debt' to serve US military interests, but you'd be wrong. Labor is giving millions of dollars to Palantir in Defence contracts. The company has top-secret security clearance, embedding itself in the Australian Signals Directorate, AUSTRAC and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission. How much of your data does Palantir have access to, and what are they doing with it? How can we be confident that our data is secure? Labor needs to get with the program before it's too late and kick out Palantir.

Against the odds, the people of Hazelmere, the Swan Valley and the wider Perth community stopped a $600 million data centre. They organised, they turned up to meetings, they got thousands of people to sign petitions, and they won. But here's the thing: this isn't just about one data centre. Around the world, AI is driving a new extractive industry. Some of the world's biggest tech companies want to use our electricity, our water and our land to power giant data centres. The Climate Council says that electricity demand from Australian data centres could triple by 2030. These facilities use a huge amount of power and water, and they put more pressure on our clean energy transition.

Governments still don't have rules in place to manage them properly. That is simply not good enough. No community should have to spend years taking on powerful corporations just to protect their neighbourhoods, their environment and their very future. That's why the Greens are calling for a moratorium on new data centres. Let's stop approving them until we have proper safeguards in place. Let's make sure every project proves that it is in the public interest and is not just for corporate profit. This is about more than one data centre in Perth. It's about who government works for: the people or the corporation.

Big corporations are surveilling us, and they are invading our privacy. Some of the biggest offenders are our giant supermarket corporations, Coles and Woolworths. For example, Coles has a multi-year commercial arrangement with Palantir, one of the world's most dangerous and unethical corporations. Picture this: you're wheeling your supermarket trolley down the aisle in Coles, and, thanks to facial recognition software, Coles knows exactly who you are.

Thanks to Palantir integrating their data systems, Coles knows exactly what you like to buy, when you like to buy it and whether you are tempted by discounts or specials or not. Thanks to their digital price tags, Coles can manipulate the price in real time as you come down the supermarket aisle. This is surge pricing brought to you by Coles and Woolworths in the supermarket sector and delivered by surveillance capitalist corporations like Palantir. Prices may quietly go up for you and quietly go down for someone else 10 seconds later, depending on who is walking through the aisle, and the Labor government has no plan to protect Australians from this exploitation.

Get this: we put up a motion to say the Australian government should be protecting Australian jobs, our environment, our water and our national interests from the march of US controlled tech bros, with their AI centres and their data scraping, through our institutions. We put up a motion to say that, and the Albanese Labor government is coming together to say no, to oppose a motion talking about the core protections we should have for the national interest, for our jobs, for our future and for our ability to control our own future.

Get this clear: under the Albanese government, we've got this pressure from the global AI tech industry largely driven by US tech bros, billionaires like Elon Musk and others, and some of the bottom-feeders that run companies like Palantir and Anduril—really nasty types who have a direct political project to drive forward the interests of the United States military, the United States government and the Trump administration. And what does the Albanese government do? Does it say, 'Actually, we're the government for Australia, and we'll put in laws and controls and hard guardrails'? No, not this mob. The Albanese Labor government roll out the red carpet and give this lot contracts. They gave a $1.7 billion contract to Anduril, controlled by the kind of person you couldn't make up—the kind of cartoon-villain, right-wing US tech bro billionaire. They also roll the red carpet out to Palantir.

Australians are asking for a government that responds to the needs of the Australian people. Protect our jobs from this law. Don't put in place expectations that foreign multinational techs will roll over; put in place hard laws. And, for once, have this place, have this government, have this parliament, be on the side of Australians, Australian jobs and the Australian environment, not of whatever AI slop comes out of Washington.

The time for this discussion has expired.

In relation to the Commonwealth Ombudsman's report on the Public Interest Disclosure Act 2013, for the period 1 July to 31 December 2025, I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

I read with interest this report. It speaks very clearly to the great value of the Public Interest Disclosure Act to the Australian community. I thank the Ombudsman for the report.

The main thing that it brought clearly into focus, for me, was the urgent need to bring the National Disability Insurance Scheme legislation in line with the Public Interest Disclosure Act and the other pieces of law that sit around it that go to supporting whistleblowers to make disclosures to the public. This is a very live issue before the Senate and the parliament right now. Let's be really clear: when providers commit fraud, when NDIS providers commit fraud, that is a disgusting violation of Australian law and, I believe, Australian moral standards. It is very much the responsibility of government to ensure that everything is done in order to take on and hold to account those providers who would commit fraud against NDIS participants and their families.

There are two parts to addressing fraud. One is the consequence of fraud; there must be firm consequences to committing fraud and there must be tough penalties. As a Green, it is not within my usual lexicon to talk about the need for tough criminal penalties, but, when it comes to these large private providers ripping participants off, I say there needs to be an expedited and efficient legal process to see them held to account via the justice system.

But that's only one part of how we solve this. The other part is enabling people to report and disclose fraud. This is where the National Disability Insurance Scheme legislation has been found so significantly wanting for so long. It is one of the last pieces of Commonwealth law to lack some of the basic protections for those that want to blow the whistle on fraud, who want to report it.

As a member of the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme, I participated in the inquiry into the integrity of the scheme alongside you, Acting Deputy President Kovacic. We heard persuasive evidence from the Human Rights Law Centre about the need for further strengthening of the whistleblower protections that exist within the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act. One of the most significant things that we could do would be to align the relevant sections of the act with the Public Interest Disclosure Act, because that would grant additional protections and create additional pathways to enable people to report things, including fraud.

I was also quite shocked, as a member of the inquiry, to hear evidence given to us in such explicit detail of the barriers that the absence of these whistleblower protections creates for people trying to report wrongdoing. I'm happy to say that the Greens managed to successfully amend a piece of legislation earlier in the year to secure some improvements, some protections, around whistleblowers when they come forward after they have ceased their employment with an NDIS provider. But there's much more work to do. Kieran Pender and his associates from the Human Rights Law Centre gave detailed evidence about what work still remains to be done. They said—I think accurately—that 20 per cent of the work has been done to enable whistleblowers to be properly protected and supported when reporting fraud, but there is 80 per cent left to do. And I agree with that.

We should urgently move, as a parliament, to align the NDIS Act with the Public Interest Disclosure Act to provide people with the necessary protections to report fraud. Let's get this done. There seems to be a lot of hot air and narrative around fraud from the government. Let's get to work and put these protections in place.

Question agreed to.

I present the Senate Economics Legislation Committee's report in respect of the 2026-27 budget estimates, together with accompanying documents. On behalf of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works, I present the fourth report of 2026.

I present five 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—

Government response to the Senate Education and Employment Committee reports into the quality of governance at Australian higher education providers

June 2026

Overview

The Australian Government (the Government) thanks the Senate Education and Employment Committee (the Committee) for its inquiry into the quality of governance at Australian higher education providers and acknowledges the contributions to this of staff, students, the sector, communities and other stakeholders.

Australian universities receive more than $22 billion in public funding each year and play a central role in Australia's civic, economic and social life through education and research. As public institutions, universities should be held to high standards of governance, integrity and accountability.

The interim and final reports of the Committee highlight serious and troubling challenges across parts of the sector that have undermined trust, performance and universities' social licence.

The Government is taking decisive action to address these issues through regulatory reform, strengthening transparency and accountability and setting clearer expectations of university governing bodies.

This Government response addresses the Committee's interim report published on 19 September 2025 and final report published on 11 December 2025.

The Government acknowledges and notes the additional 16 recommendations from the Australian Greens in the interim and final reports, and the 17 recommendations made by Senator David Pocock in the final report.

Australian Government Response

The Government is committed to improving the transparency and accountability of Australian public university governing bodies and has initiated a range of actions to strengthen governance arrangements to ensure governance at Australian universities aligns with the expectations of students, staff and their communities.

The Government supports staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and supports elected staff and student representation on university councils.

The Government notes Australia's public universities are statutory corporations established under state or territory legislation, except for the Australian National University, and acknowledges responsibility for the establishing acts of universities rests with relevant jurisdictions.

University governance improvements

In January 2025, Education Ministers agreed membership of the Expert Council on University Governance. The Council was formed to develop new university governance principles (the Principles) and provide recommendations to strengthen governance in Australia's public universities.

In October 2025, Education Ministers considered the Principles and recommendations from the Expert Council alongside recommendations from this Senate Committee's interim report. The Government has announced it will implement the Principles and additional transparency requirements by writing them into Commonwealth regulation through the Higher Education Standards Framework (Threshold Standards) 2021.

Public universities will be required to report annually on their compliance with the Principles and additional transparency requirements on an 'if not, why not' basis to the independent higher education sector regulator, the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA). This will allow TEQSA to take compliance action against universities that repeatedly fail to meet the Principles and additional transparency requirements.

The Principles and additional transparency requirements will strengthen accountability and public trust in Australian universities and provide a framework for good governance and performance that will benefit universities, students, staff and the communities they serve.

The Principles set strong expectations across eight key themes:

In line with recommendations from this Senate Committee, the Government has also announced that university governing bodies will be required to meet additional transparency requirements, which include publishing:

The Government expects the Principles and additional transparency requirements will be incorporated into the Threshold Standards and commence from mid-2026.

Further, the Government, in collaboration with the Commonwealth Remuneration Tribunal, states and territories, and stakeholders including the Universities Chancellors Council, will establish a framework for Vice-Chancellor remuneration.

Modernising and strengthening TEQSA's powers

In September and October 2025, the Government consulted on opportunities to modernise and strengthen TEQSA's powers to better meet the standards students, staff and the community expect of our universities. This included ensuring the higher education regulatory system is student-centred and responsive to contemporary community expectations, including on university governance, and that TEQSA is equipped to act proactively where risks emerge.

Feedback from this process will inform further improvements to the higher education legislative and regulatory framework and will ensure TEQSA can step in and act when justified in the public interest.

Student and staff wellbeing

The Government established the independent National Student Ombudsman (NSO) to investigate and resolve student complaints about universities. The NSO commenced operations on 1 February 2025 and aims to provide an effective, trauma-informed complaints mechanism for higher education students.

The NSO has strong investigative powers, similar to those of a Royal Commission, and can make recommendations to a provider about the actions that should be taken to resolve a complaint. The NSO has the power to monitor a provider's implementation of its recommendations, as well as share information with relevant regulators to provide the basis for potential compliance action where necessary.

If a provider does not take appropriate action in response to NSO recommendations, the NSO is able to provide the Minister for Education with a copy of an investigation report for tabling in Parliament. The NSO reports annually on complaint volumes, complaints outcomes and compliance with recommendations.

TEQSA has issued a Statement of Regulatory Expectations on student grievance and complaint mechanisms which sets out TEQSA's expectations relating to governance and accountability regarding student complaints, including assurance and reporting to higher education providers' governance bodies.

TEQSA has published a Statement of Regulatory Expectations on compliance with workplace obligations. This Statement sets out TEQSA's expectations of registered higher education providers to ensure they are meeting their obligations under workplace laws (as defined in section 12 of the Fair Work Act 2009) to their staff.

Further changes to the higher education legislative and regulatory framework, as outlined above, will support TEQSA to develop new Statements of Regulatory Expectation, including on university governing bodies reflecting expectations of the communities they serve and meaningfully incorporating staff and student perspectives.

Better regulation

The Government has established the Better Regulation Working Group to streamline processes and improve efficiency in the higher education sector. The Working Group is considering opportunities to make government regulation and internal provider operations more efficient for higher education providers, while continuing to assure quality and confidence in the sector.

TEQSA and the Australian Skills Quality Authority have jointly released the Dual Sector Regulatory Strategy to reduce duplication and streamline regulation for Australia's 57 dual sector providers.

TEQSA is working closely with agencies including the Department of Education, the Fair Work Ombudsman and the interim Australian Tertiary Education Commission (ATEC) on data sharing and reducing duplicative data reporting requirements where possible.

Research, the Australian Tertiary Education Commission (ATEC) and the former Coalition government's Job-ready Graduates changes

The Strategic Examination of Research and Development (SERD) Final Report was provided to the Government for consideration by the SERD Expert Panel in December 2025. The Government is considering the report's recommendations.

Recommendations regarding the ATEC and the former Coalition government's Job-ready Graduates changes have been addressed in other recent Australian Government Responses to Senate Inquiries.

Australian Government response to Interim report recommendations

Australian Government response to Final report recommendations

Australian Greens Party additional comments and recommendations

Interim Report

Recommendation 1: Australian Tertiary Education Commission's foundational legislation should clearly articulate the public mission and the educational, social, and civic functions of a public university sector.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 2: Establishing acts of universities be amended to clarify their central purpose is public research and education, not commercial or corporate performance.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 3: The Government immediately reverse the Job-ready Graduates Package fee hikes and funding cuts.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 4: Meetings of all university councils and governing bodies be held in public and be livestreamed online.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 5: All higher education provider governing bodies reflect the community's diversity including First Nations peoples, culturally and racially marginalised people, LGBTIQA+ people and people with disabilities.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 6: The majority of members on university governing bodies have public administration and higher education expertise.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 7: A minimum membership requirement of at least 50 per cent democratically elected staff and student representatives (including undergraduate and postgraduate students) be set for governing bodies.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 8: In addition to council minutes, reports produced for council and annual self-performance reviews be published on university websites.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 9: Complaints processes be examined and enhanced by working with students, staff, and student bodies.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 10: The TEQSA regulatory framework be amended to include a consultation framework for how universities meaningfully involve, consult and work with students and staff as partners in major change proposals, prior to decisions being made.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Final Report

Recommendation 1: To limit the use of consultants and outsourcing at universities, an appropriate Federal government agency develops principles for this purpose that prioritise in-house expertise.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 2: Federal government funding to public universities be increased to fully fund universities and make them free, starting by increasing funding to at least the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development average.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 3: Universities implement protections for whistleblowers and student activists, including the establishment of a Whistleblower Protection Authority, and protect the right of students and staff to protest on university campuses.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 4: Require all public universities to adopt transparent ethical investment and procurement policies, with binding commitments to divest from weapons manufacturers, fossil fuel corporations, and gambling industries.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 5: Establish a publicly accessible register of all university partnerships, sponsorships, and funding arrangements with corporations and external entities, including the nature and value of the partnership.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 6: Increase PhD stipends to above the minimum wage.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Senator David Pocock additional comments and recommendations

Final Report

Recommendation 1: ATEC should prioritise work to develop and consult on new models to sustainably fund Australia's universities to achieve their primary purpose in the public good. ATEC's work program must also tackle with urgency reforming the failed Job Ready Graduates Scheme and changing the timing of indexation of student debt.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 2: With due consideration of the final report of the Strategic Examination of Research and Development review, the Government should commit to a pathway for increasing investment in research over the short, medium and longer term. This should also address the long-neglected issue of increasing PhD stipend base rates to support the next generation of researchers and academics our country will rely upon.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 3: Inquiries into university governance should be replicated in all other Australian states and territories to ensure that universities are meeting community expectations regarding governance practices.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation is a matter for States and Territories.

Recommendation 4: Further to the Committee's first recommendation, state and territory governments, in reviewing the establishing acts of universities, should also amend those acts to ensure they meet, at a minimum, the recommendations of this inquiry and the Expert Council. University establishing acts ought to have explicit public good objectives and should require that governing bodies have the appropriate structure and composition to meet such public good objectives.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation is a matter for States and Territories.

Recommendation 5: Independent bodies representing university stakeholders be created with powers to appoint new governing body members and, in cases of serious failure, breach, or loss of confidence, to terminate the appointment of existing members.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 6: Update university practices and procedures to prohibit or severely limit the circumstances in which non-disclosure or non-disparagement clauses or agreements can be used and establish a mechanism to oversee and challenge any such use.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 7: The Threshold Standards should prescribe an explicit minimum proportion of elected staff and student members on Australian university councils of at least one-half.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 8: All universities should transition to adopt a single, transparent, standard method for calculating and publishing their 'underlying operating result', developed with the ATEC and appropriate consultation, with the full methodology openly disclosed and reasons for inclusion or exclusion of revenues and expenditures individually and publicly reported. In addition to this standard measure, universities should also report common private-sector indicators such as earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA). States and territories should align their reporting requirements with this standard method.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 9: Universities make disclosure-of-interests registers for senior executives and governing body members public and update them in real time.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and supports-in-principle this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 10: To strengthen financial accountability, prevent conflicts of interest, and align university governance with established public sector integrity standards, universities should be required to report all procurement contracts through their jurisdictions' reporting portal. For the ANU, this would mean registering their contracts with the Commonwealth's public sector reporting platform, AusTender.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 11: Universities should adopt a clear transparency framework under which council meetings would be open to the public and livestreamed by default. Only a tightly limited in camera session would remain, reserved for matters where there is a demonstrable and compelling public interest in confidentiality. Council should publish reasons for the confidentiality of each in camera item. To support this, universities should establish clear and codified criteria that distinguish legitimate confidentia lity from unnecessary secrecy, ensuring that staff, students, and the broader community can be confident that closed sessions are the exception rather than the norm.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 12: Specific timeframes for publishing council minutes should be established and rules adopted governing the appropriate labelling and sourcing of all reports and documentation presented to council. This will both improve transparency and also help guard against any unwitting reliance on data, analysis and documents provided by external consultants by council members in their decision making.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and supports-in-principle this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 13: The Higher Education Standards Framework (Threshold Standards) 2021 should be amended to require all Australian universities to maintain genuinely independent, safe and transparent complaints and misconduct-handling systems, including for complaints made against senior leadership. In the case of the latter, such processes must be fit-for-purpose and not rest in the hands of more junior staff.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and supports-in-principle this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 14: Universities should be required to publicly disclose all consultancy contracts, consistent with Recommendation 10, and to publish any consultant-produced advice in a timely manner, including the underlying data and methodologies, with only narrow and clearly defined exemptions.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 15: To prevent real or perceived conflicts of interest arising from the revolving door between universities and consulting firms, individuals should be prohibited from holding senior university roles and consultancy positions concurrently, and a mandatory cooling-off period should apply before a former executive or council member can be employed by a consultancy firm, and vice versa.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages universities to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

Recommendation 16: That the Australian National University Act 1991 be amended to establish a statutory Australian National University Forum or Senate as a dedicated internal accountability body, with defined powers of providing advice, scrutiny, public questioning, information access, and appointment and recall in relation to the Chancellor and council members.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government's response, as outlined above, reflects a range of actions the Government is taking to strengthen university governance, to support staff and student involvement in the management of their university communities and in university decision-making processes, and to build a better and fairer tertiary education system.

Recommendation 17: That the ANU leadership methodically work through and provide a public response to each of the recommendations in the final report of the Australian National University Governance Project.

The Australian Government acknowledges the range of views presented to the inquiry and notes this recommendation.

The Australian Government encourages the ANU to consider this recommendation in consultation with their students, staff, communities and other stakeholders.

_____

Australian Government response to the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade report:

Australia's thematic sanctions framework

JUNE 2026   

Introduction

The Australian Government welcomes the opportunity to respond to the report of the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade on its inquiry into the operation of the Autonomous Sanctions Amendment (Magnitsky-style and other Thematic Sanctions) Act 2021 (the Amending Act).

Since the introduction of the Amending Act, the use of thematic sanctions has steadily increased as threats to international security and situations of international concern have grown in number and complexity. Sanctions listings are carefully assessed on a case-by-case basis against the relevant thematic framework.

As at 20 November, Australia has imposed thematic sanctions in response to various situations of international concern, including:

The Australian Government uses sanctions as one of the tools available to impose costs on foreign individuals, entities, regimes and governments for breaches of international law, human rights abuses and violations, and other behaviours that are contrary to Australian values and national interests. Australia's sanctions frameworks equip the Government to respond flexibly and effectively to situations of international concern. The Government uses sanctions judiciously, where it is in our national interest, and in concert with international partners where it is appropriate. Decisions to impose sanctions are made on a case-by-case basis.

Response to the recommendations

Recommendation 1

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government includes detailed reasoning for listing decisions in legislative instruments that impose autonomous sanctions.

Response: Noted

The Government notes this recommendation.

Each legislative instrument adding or removing a sanctions listing is already accompanied by a publicly available Explanatory Statement providing reasons for the Minister for Foreign Affairs' decision. The Minister and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade also provide information about listing decisions in media releases and announcements that accompany listings decisions.

The Government's decisions to impose sanctions are carefully considered on a case-by-case basis against the legal requirements of Australian sanctions laws, and in pursuit of Australia's national interest. The Minister, with the agreement of the Attorney-General, may impose thematic sanctions when, based on the information available to the Minister at the time, the Minister is satisfied that the thematic listings criteria are met.

Listed persons and entities can also seek information on the reasons for listing by the Minister. They also have a right to apply for a revocation or judicial review of a listing or a decision relating to a listing. Listed persons and entities are afforded procedural fairness through these processes.

The Government will review the information currently provided in relation to listing decisions, and consider whether there are other, appropriate options to enhance or increase the information provided.

Recommendation 2

The Committee recommends that the Australian Sanctions Office updates and maintains the Consolidated List to include detailed reasoning for each designation.

Response: Noted

The Government notes this recommendation.

The purpose of the Consolidated List is to provide the regulated community with sufficient information about listed persons and entities to satisfy their legal obligations under Australia's sanctions laws.

Throughout 2024, the Australian Government undertook extensive consultation on the Consolidated List with stakeholders across the regulated community. The feedback from consultation has informed work to improve the functionality of the Consolidated List, which was delivered in December 2025.

Listed persons and entities can seek information on the reasons for their listing by the Minister at any time.

Recommendation 3

The Committee recommends that the Minister for Foreign Affairs reports annually to the Parliament on all autonomous sanctions decisions taken during the previous 12 months.

Response: Agreed in principle

The Government agrees in principle to this recommendation.

The Australian Government is planning to commence the annual publication of a sanctions report, with the first such report in early 2026 on sanctions actions in 2025. This action is being undertaken to enhance transparency of the administration of sanctions and in line with regulator best practice. The report will not be tabled in Parliament.

Recommendation 4

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government amends Section 6A of the Autonomous Sanctions Regulations 2011 to:

include criteria for the thematic area of 'threats to international peace and security'

include criteria for the thematic area of 'serious violations of international humanitarian law', in conformity with the term's meaning under international law.

Response: Noted

The Government notes this recommendation.

Depending on the circumstances, it is possible for the existing thematic criteria to be applied to situations to which the proposed new criteria for 'international peace and security' and 'serious violations of international humanitarian law' would also be intended to apply.

The government will continue to keep its sanctions frameworks under review, including the thematic sanctions listing criteria, to consider whether they remain appropriate to address international situations of concern.

Recommendation 5

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government, in consultation with the humanitarian sector, amends the Autonomous Sanctions Act 2011 to provide a standing exemption from all sanctions measures for legitimate humanitarian assistance, consistent with the approach taken in United Nations Security Council Resolution 2664 (2022).

Response: Agreed in-principle

The Government agrees in-principle to this recommendation.

The Government keeps Australia's autonomous sanctions framework under regular review to ensure it remains effective. In 2023, the Department released an Issues Paper that raised the potential for a specific humanitarian exemption. The Department received numerous submissions in response to the Issues Paper, including from the humanitarian sector. The Government is considering the outcomes of this review and what reforms to Australia's sanctions framework may be necessary.

Australian entities may rely on the general humanitarian exemption under UNSCR 2664 to provide assistance in support of UN affiliated humanitarian operations to countries subject to UNSC sanctions. A sanctions permit may also authorise prohibited activities. The Department prioritises permit applications relating to humanitarian activities.

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Australian Government response to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee report:

Australia's sanctions regime

JUNE 2026

Introduction

The Australian Government welcomes the opportunity to respond to the report of the Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade (the Committee) on its inquiry into Australia's sanctions regime (the Report).

The Government is taking action to ensure Australia's sanctions regime is strong, effective, and responsive to situations of international concern.

As part of the 2024-25 Budget, the Government committed $26.4 million to significantly strengthen sanctions enforcement—including establishing a dedicated monitoring capability and enhancing compliance functions within the Australian Sanctions Office. This investment materially improves Australia's capacity to detect non-compliance and uphold the credibility of our sanctions regime.

As threats to international security and agreed rules, norms and standards have grown, so too has Australia's use of autonomous sanctions. Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the number of listings under Australia's autonomous sanctions framework has increased substantially. Over the past 12 months, the Government has expanded sanctions listings to a range of individuals and entities for acts of global terrorism, human rights abuse and cybercrime in response to evolving threats. On 6 December 2025, the Government also established a world-first autonomous sanctions framework for Afghanistan, as part of our ongoing efforts to hold the Taliban to account. The framework enables Australia to directly impose its own sanctions and travel bans to increase pressure on the Taliban, targeting the oppression of the Afghan people, particularly women, girls, and minority groups, as well as actions that undermine the rule of law and good governance in Afghanistan.

Our sanctions listings and the legislative framework that supports them are subject to regular and rigorous review to optimise their effectiveness and integrity. The Government uses sanctions judiciously, where it is in our national interest, and in concert with international partners where it is appropriate. Decisions to impose sanctions are made on a case-by-case basis.

The Government thanks the Committee for its work in preparing the report, including considering the 45 submissions and evidence provided during the public hearing.

Response to the recommendations

Recommendation 1

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government consider its application of thematic sanctions and explore ways to further strengthen consistency where appropriate.

Response: Agreed

The Government agrees to this recommendation.

Consistent with longstanding Australian Government policy, the Government does not speculate on potential future sanctions measures.

Sanctions are just one of the tools available to the Government to respond to situations of international concern, and careful consideration must be given as to whether sanctions are the most appropriate and effective measure in each circumstance. For example, in the human rights context, other foreign policy measures such as bilateral representations, advocacy on human rights in multilateral or other forums, including the United Nations General Assembly and the Human Rights Council, development assistance and humanitarian support may be more effective at a particular time.

Recommendation 2

The Committee recommends that, in circumstances where foreign policy objectives allow, the Australian Government, while continuing to make its own judgments concerning the imposition of sanctions, prioritise the alignment of sanctions with allies to maximise effectiveness and place greater emphasis on imposing such sanctions promptly.

Response: Agreed

The Government agrees to this recommendation.

Consistent with longstanding Australian Government policy, the Government does not speculate on potential future sanctions measures.

A decision to impose sanctions is carefully considered on a case-by-case basis against the legal requirements of Australian sanctions laws, and in accordance with Australia's national interest. The Foreign Minister may impose sanctions when satisfied that the listing criteria are met, and after careful consideration that sanctions are the most appropriate action for Australia to respond to the situation of international concern.

The Government regularly engages with international partners when considering the imposition of autonomous sanctions, noting sanctions are often most effective when applied in concert with others. For example, in late 2023 and 2024 Australia joined partners in targeting Hamas financial networks and facilitators after the October 7 attacks; in 2024 Australia joined countries including the UK, Canada, New Zealand and the US in imposing targeted financial sanctions and travel bans on Israeli settlers and extremist groups linked to violence in the West Bank; a substantial proportion of our sanctions on Russian individuals and entities are coordinated with partners; and we coordinated with partners to enact sanctions following human rights abuses in Iran after the death of Mahsa Amini.

However there may be times when it is not possible or appropriate to impose the same sanction or at the same time as international partners. Legal frameworks, legal criteria and thresholds, national interests and the range of diplomatic measures available among countries may differ.

The Government also considers the impact of potential sanctions on Australia, and the Australian Sanctions Office within the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade engages other agencies on these considerations.

In taking a decision to impose sanctions, where appropriate the Government does, and will continue to, consider carefully actions taken by partner countries.

Recommendation 3

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government consider establishing a mechanism for engagement with civil society on Australia's sanctions regime.

Response: Agreed

The Government agrees to this recommendation.

The Australian Government engages regularly with civil society and other stakeholders through ad hoc, formal and informal outreach, and targeted engagement, in-person, virtually and by correspondence.

These activities are complemented by the Government's publication of both guidance and advisory notes, and responses to direct inquiries and submissions.

Recommendation 4

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government work with its global partners to increase focus on sanctions enforcement and close loopholes which allow Iran and Russia to evade the financial impact of Australian sanctions.

Response: Agreed in-principle

The Government agrees in-principle to this recommendation.

The Government is committed to strengthening monitoring and enforcement of Australia's sanctions framework. In the 2024-25 Budget the Government provided $26.4 million over four years from 2024-25 (and $6.6 million per year ongoing) towards this work. A key element of this is working across agencies, and with international partners to strengthen the impact and effectiveness of sanctions, and to identify and respond to sanctions breaches and evasion, including by Iran and Russia.

Amendments to the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act enacted in December 2024 and the new Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Rules 2025, will also reinforce sanctions implementation in Australia. Under the reforms, AUSTRAC-regulated businesses will have new obligations to prevent sanctions contraventions, namely to:

Recommendation 5

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government continue to impose sanctions on Iranian officials involved in serious violations or serious abuses of human rights, including wrongful detention.

Response: Agreed in-principle

The Government agrees in-principle to this recommendation.

The Albanese Government has taken stronger action against Iran than any previous Australian government. We bolstered our autonomous sanctions framework to enable us to target more Iranian individuals and entities involved in oppression inside Iran, including against women and girls.

Since the violent crackdown on protests following the death of Mahsa Amini in September 2022, the Government has taken unprecedented action to hold Iranian officials and entities to account, including imposing sanctions on more than 50 individuals and entities for their involvement in serious violations or serious abuses of human rights in Iran. This represents a substantial strengthening of Australia's response to Iran's human rights abuses under the autonomous sanctions regime.

Consistent with long-standing Australian Government policy, the Government does not speculate on potential future sanctions measures.

Recommendation 6

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government prioritise, in consultation with international partners and non-governmental Australian stakeholders, the development of methodologies to target and measure the effectiveness of Australia's sanctions regime.

Response: Agreed in-principle

The Government agrees in-principle to this recommendation.

The Government continues to engage with like-minded partners and the regulated community on the impact of sanctions, and ways to strengthen their effectiveness. Sanctions vary in their objectives, context and the expected timescale of their impact, which are important considerations in the development of methodologies to measure their effectiveness.

Recommendation 7

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government consider how to identify and locate all Russian and Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-associated assets in Australia which are currently subject to sanctions.

Response: Agreed in-principle

The Government agrees in-principle to this recommendation.

Under Australian sanctions laws it is an offence to use or deal with an asset, or allow or facilitate another person to use or deal with an asset, that is owned or controlled by a designated person or entity. That is, the assets must be 'frozen'. The Australian Sanctions Office provides guidance material in relation to the assets of sanctioned persons or entities and undertakes targeted outreach. In addition, the Australian Sanctions Office undertakes regular checks to identify assets held by significant financial institutions.

The Department continues to improve and expand its monitoring function to identify assets of designated persons and entities that are in Australia that are required to be 'frozen' under Australian sanctions laws, as well as its outreach function to assist the regulated community to identify and report these assets as required under Australian sanctions laws.

Recommendation 8

The Committee recommends that the Australian Government identify all Russian assets in Australia that are subject to sanctions, and consider what legislative and other changes are required to enable the transfer of these assets.

Response: Agreed in-principle

The Government agrees in-principle to this recommendation and refers to its response to Recommendation 7.

The Government keeps the autonomous sanctions framework under regular review to ensure it remains fit for purpose and serves the national interest. The Australian Sanctions Office has established an inter-agency working group to consider this issue further.

_____

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

Review of the Exposure Draft Legislation: Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism Bill 2026

MAY 2026

Introduction

The Australian Government thanks the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security for its review of the exposure draft of the Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism Bill 2026.

There is no place in Australia for hatred or discrimination of any kind, and the Government unequivocally condemns this behaviour. Everyone has a right to feel safe and be proud of who they are, regardless of their religious, ethnic or cultural background. This legislative package forms part of the Government's efforts to address the spread of hatred and extremism and is critical to the Government's response to the devastating terrorist attack at Bondi Beach on 14 December 2025.

The Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Criminal and Migration Laws) Bill and the Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Firearms and Customs Laws) Bill 2026 were introduced to the Parliament on 20 January 2026. Both Bills passed the Parliament on 20 January 2026.

These reforms send a clear message that hate and violence has no place in Australia. The Government thanks the Committee for its consideration and recommendations.

Recommendations

Recommendation 1: The Committee urges the Parliament to work together in a constructive and collaborative manner across all parties and crossbench members to ensure that the legislative response to antisemitism, hate and extremism is effective, proportionate and reflects a unified national commitment to community safety and social cohesion.

Response: The Australian Government supports this recommendation.

The Government's priority is to keep our community safe and united. The Government is committed to continuing to work with the Parliament in a constructive and collaborative manner to respond to antisemitism, hate and extremism.

Recommendation 2: The Committee understands the Government's intent in bringing forward one draft Bill to deal with all elements of its response to the Bondi attack.

Noting the Government's decision not to proceed with the racial vilification provisions at this time, the Committee makes no recommendation in relation to that aspect of the Exposure Draft legislation.

Consistent with the remaining elements of the Exposure Draft legislation, the Committee recommends that (1) the hate crimes and migration provisions, and (2) the firearms reforms, proceed.

Given the importance of the hate crime, migration and firearms provisions to addressing antisemitism, hate and extremism, the Committee recommends that these measures be passed.

Response: The Australian Government agrees to this recommendation.

The Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Criminal and Migration Laws) Act 2026 and Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Firearms and Customs Laws) Act 2026 were passed by the Parliament on 20 January 2026.

Recommendation 3: The Committee recommends that the Australian Government, in implementing the provisions contained in Schedule 4 of the Exposure Draft legislation, including negotiations with States and Territories around the national gun buyback, ensure:

Response: The Australian Government agrees-in-principle to the recommendation.

The Department of Home Affairs will provide clear guidance to importers and individuals impacted by changes to the Customs (Prohibited Imports) Regulations 1956 made by the Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Firearms and Customs Laws) Act 2026.

Legislation governing firearms use and possession is the responsibility of state and territory governments. However, the Australian Government will work closely with states and territories on communicating national reforms, if agreed, and support a national information campaign on the proposed National Gun Buyback Scheme.

Recommendation 4: The Committee recommends that the [relevant] Bill be amended to include a specific defence for individuals who hold a valid licence permitting them to manufacture, repair, maintain or modify firearms, ensuring that possession or access to firearms- or explosives-manufacture material is not criminalised where the material relates to conduct lawfully authorised under that licence.

Response: The Australian Government agrees to this recommendation.

The Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Firearms and Customs Laws) Act 2026 includes a specific defence, for the offences relating to firearms and explosives manufacture material, which provides that the offences do not apply to individuals who hold a valid licence that authorises them to manufacture, repair, maintain or modify firearms, firearm accessories, firearm parts, firearm magazines or explosives or other lethal devices (see subsection 474.45J(2)). This ensures that dealing with material that relates to conduct which is lawfully authorised under the licence is not criminalised.

Coalition additional recommendations

Recommendation: Coalition members recommend that the Government work constructively with the Coalition on a revised legislative package that is clearly drafted and operationally workable and directed to the practical objective of preventing extremist intimidation and violence and ensuring Jewish Australians can live, worship and gather in safety.

Response: The Australian Government notes this recommendation.

The Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Criminal and Migration Laws) Act 2026 and Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Firearms and Customs Laws) Act 2026 were passed by the Parliament on 20 January 2026.

Recommendation: Coalition members further recommend that any legislation enacted include a requirement for review by this Committee two years after commencement, to assess effectiveness, enforceability, unintended consequences, and whether further amendments are required.

Response: The Australian Government agrees-in-part to this recommendation.

The Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism (Criminal and Migration Laws) Act 2026 (the Act) includes a requirement for the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security to review the operation, effectiveness and implications of the amendments made by Parts 1 and 4, of Schedule 1, of that Act, as soon as practicable after the second anniversary of the Act's commencement.

The Act also includes a requirement for the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs to begin a review of Subdivision CA of Division 80 of Part 5.1 of the

Criminal Code Act 1995 as soon as practicable after the second anniversary of the Act's commencement.

_____

Australian Government response to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works report:

Cocos (Keeling) Islands—West Island, Seawater Reverse Osmosis Plant Project and other works, 5/23

Australian Government response

The Australian Government's response (the department) to the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, West Island—Seawater Reverse Osmosis Plant and other works recommendations is set out in detail below.

Recommendation 1:

2.35 The Committee recommends that the House of Representatives resolve, pursuant to Section 18(7) of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, that it is expedient to carry out the following proposed works: Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts, Cocos (Keeling) Islands—West Island, Seawater Reverse Osmosis Plant Project.

The House of Representatives approved the public works on 10 May 2023 and the recommendation is resolved.

Recommendation 2:

3.48 For future projects that fall within the oversight of the Public Works Committee, the Committee recommends that the Australian Taxation Office conduct broader staff consultation during the design phase.

The ATO has a longstanding commitment to consulting with staff on workplace design and capital works projects. In response to the Committee's recommendation in 2023, the ATO has further strengthened this approach by commencing consultation earlier and embedding more structured and transparent engagement throughout both the design and delivery stages of property projects.

Since 2023, the ATO has introduced early-stage design discovery workshops as a core element of its consultation framework. These workshops are held at the outset of projects to test design assumptions and to identify work practices, functional needs and work health and safety requirements before concepts are finalised. This earlier engagement has enabled design solutions to better reflect how spaces are used in practice and to reduce the need for later design changes.

Consultation continues to be supported through site working groups (SWGs), comprising representatives from all affected business lines. SWGs provide structured input on business-specific requirements and local ways of working. Following the Committee's recommendation, the ATO has enhanced the role of SWG representatives, clarified their responsibilities and increased the visibility of the role to staff. This has improved the flow of information between project teams, business lines and staff, and supported more consistent communication of feedback and project updates.

In addition, the ATO has expanded opportunities for broader staff engagement through practical initiatives such as on-site display centres and visual mock-ups. These initiatives support staff understanding of proposed designs and provide accessible forums for feedback, strengthening confidence in both the design and delivery of property projects.

Recommendation 3:

3.50 The Committee recommends that the House of Representatives resolve, pursuant to Section 18(7) of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, that it is expedient to carry out the following proposed works: Australian Taxation Office—Australian Taxation Office Fit-out—Proposed Fit-out of Existing Leased Premises at 200 Collins Street, Hobart, Tasmania.

The House of Representatives approved the public works on 10 May 2023 and the recommendation is resolved.

Recommendation 4:

4.56 The Committee recommends that the House of Representatives resolve, pursuant to Section 18(7) of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, that it is expedient to carry out the following proposed works: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade—Proposed Construction and Decommissioning of the Australian Pavilion at the World Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai, Japan.

The House of Representatives approved the public works on 10 May 2023 and the recommendation is resolved.

_____

In respect of the government response to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee interim and final reports on quality of governance at Australian higher education providers, I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

I'd like to thank my colleagues on the committee, as well as the committee secretariat, for a report that really goes deep into the crisis that universities are facing. The final report exposes the depth and breadth of failed leadership, the corporate rot and the consultant capture decaying our public universities. Arrogant executives indulge in obscene pay packets and big consultancies, feasting on public money, while the people who teach, who research, who support students and who hold the university together are overworked, underpaid and exploited.

On behalf of the Greens, I really do want to thank staff and students across universities who have shown immense courage and commitment, not just by providing evidence to this inquiry but also by refusing to accept the neoliberal corporate culture that pervades our universities. This corporate culture treats staff and students as mere cogs in the wheel of a profit-making university instead of the heart and soul of a public institution. Staff and students and their unions have spoken out in a hostile and intimidatory environment. This inquiry would not have existed without their activism, without their advocacy and without their solidarity. The Greens will continue to amplify their voices in our mission to rebuild universities which are based on equity, democracy and public good.

While the final report is a scathing indictment of the corporatisation of universities and the severity of the crisis at hand, and while the committee report presents very strong evidence on the complete failures of the neoliberal agenda, it really falls short of providing remedies that match the systemic overhaul needed to end the era of managerial bloat and unaccountable, opaque governance. The final report really shows us some horrendous examples of universities and what corporatisation has done to those universities. Two of the very glaring case studies come from ANU and the University of Technology Sydney. They show us how the corporate governance model in universities has utterly failed the public interest test as transparency and accountability are falling by the wayside. For example, the UTS management engaged in bureaucratic contortions to avoid disclosing information.

What is happening at these universities, sadly, is by no means an anomaly. It is a symptom of a rotten model that has spread across the university sector in this country. It is a model built on running universities as businesses where consultant capture and endless restructures have become the norm. KPMG, Nous and other big consultancies feast on public money while the people, as I said earlier, who really uphold and run the universities are run into the ground.

The failures of governance in universities do go hand-in-hand with decades of underfunding by governments, most viciously exemplified by the fee hikes and funding cuts of the job-ready graduates scheme, which have been widely condemned but still not reversed by the Labor government. We know that the Job-ready Graduates Package has increased fees to almost $56,000 for humanities. This is a lifetime of debt that is near impossible for students to pay off. Their whole life is shackled by the weight of this student debt.

We heard from a lot of people during this inquiry, students included. Ms Campbell, a fifth-year student at UTS and the President of the UTS Students' Association, gave this evidence:

At every level, students see how little voice we have in decisions that directly affect our education and how far university leadership has drifted from transparency, accountability and public purpose.

Mr Lee, Vice President of the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations, reported:

… members who are student members on governing bodies have repeatedly talked to us about being treated as second-class members on their respective university councils.

He went on to note:

In some universities, the student members are the only ones who are not remunerated for their time. This is indicative of the levels of respect afforded to student members in the university senates.

This report should be a turning point for how universities operate and for how universities must see themselves not as job factories but as places of learning, of research and of teaching which build the minds of the next generation and which contribute to society as a public good. It is imperative that the government listens to the damning evidence provided in this inquiry, takes seriously the recommendations that are being made by staff and students, and acts with urgency to turn things around, because at the moment the recommendations in the report that the government has offered don't move the dial too much. It is as it always is with the Labor government—just tinkering around the edges. Universities don't need tinkering around the edges. Universities need to be fully publicly funded. Students need access to university which is free. Every single student deserves that and the wiping of debt. And let's get rid of the horrific, punitive, terrible, failed and flawed Job Ready Graduates package with urgency.

I wish to take note of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee report on Australia's sanctions regime, and I seek leave to continue my remarks.

by leave—I move:

That Senator Kovacic be discharged from and Senator Scarr be appointed to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works.

Question agreed to.

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.

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

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

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

AVIATION CONSUMER PROTECTION BILL 2026

INTRODUCTION

Aviation is a national connecter. It binds our cities to our regions, our exports to the world, and our families to one another. Because of our vast continent and the distances we travel; Australians rely on aviation perhaps more than many other people around the globe.

That is why it is so critical that the aviation sector builds and maintains the trust of Australian travellers.

Until now, consumers have relied on airlines handling escalated complaints themselves through voluntary industry arrangements.

This has not worked and consumers have often been left disappointed with the outcomes.

While airline performance has generally improved since the COVID-19 pandemic, there is still a need to offer greater protection for Australian travellers, including fair and appropriate treatment by airlines and airports when things go wrong.

EVENTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST

The events over the last month have also shown how times of global crisis can impact us domestically.

The conflict in the Middle East has led to flight and fuel disruptions, and broader uncertainty for travellers here and abroad.

We have seen passengers who are unsure of what to do next, and what recourse is available to them if their flights are cancelled or delayed.

Our airlines have been working under difficult circumstances and the government is incredibly grateful for the work they have done to ensure the Australians in the Middle East have been able to fly home safely.

But this current international crisis reminds us how important it is for Australian travellers to have increased protections when they fly and a clear understanding of what they are entitled to.

That is why the Australian Government is bringing forward the Aviation Consumer Protection bill package, delivering our commitment to hold the aviation industry accountable for delivering better outcomes for consumers.

This Bill, the Aviation Consumer Protection Bill 2026 (the ACP Bill), which is being introduced together with the Aviation Consumer Protection Levy Bill (the Levy Bill), the Aviation Consumer Protection Levy (Collection) Bill (the Collection Bill), and the Aviation Consumer Protection (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill (the Consequential Bill), represent the most significant reform any government has ever introduced for aviation consumer protection in this country.

Reforms that have been developed in close consultation with the public, with industry, and with experts to ensure we are delivering meaningful protections for passengers, while maintaining a competitive and sustainable aviation sector.

While the Levy Bills enable the government to recover costs of operating the regulatory function through industry levies, we are mindful of the current burden on industry due to the conflict in the Middle East and will make appropriate decisions in that regard.

THE WHITE PAPER

In 2024, the government released the Aviation White Paper: Towards 2050, a series of 56 policies setting the direction for the aviation industry to give passengers a better deal and enhance competition, while ensuring the industry maintains Australia's strong safety record.

The White Paper acknowledged that the industry-led Airline Customer Advocate (ACA) had not delivered an effective complaint resolution service, and that it was now necessary for the government to establish a more effective body.

This assessment has been supported by feedback from consumers, consumer advocacy groups and consumer and fair-trading regulators, who have told us that in recent years the domestic airline industry has demonstrated poor customer service, decreasing service quality, and that the ACA is ineffective at resolving disputes.

An independent review into airline and airport complaint handling processes advised the government that airlines and airports have work to do to lift their complaint handling standards, and that existing consumer pathways to escalate complaints are unclear, confusing and vary in their effectiveness.

Data from the government's Bureau of Infrastructure and Transport Research Economics (BITRE) shows that issues with on-time performance are substantial.

In December last year, on average, over a quarter of domestic flights reported were delayed on arrival and were delayed on departure.

While airline performance, including on-time performance has improved since the COVID-19 pandemic, there is still a broader need to better protect aviation consumers.

Research from the Behavioural Economics Team of the Australian Government (BETA) show more than 1 in 2 Australian adults travelled by air between August 2024 and August 2025, and 1 in 2 of those travellers experienced a flight disruption.

Only a third of those travellers were satisfied with how those disruptions were handled. Australians with disabilities, medical conditions or injuries

A more coherent aviation consumer protection framework will be capable of both assisting consumers to resolve disputes and encouraging improved service standards across the aviation sector.

THE BILL

The Australian Consumer Protection Bill establishes the Aviation Consumer Protection Framework (the ACP Framework) which will comprise:

An independent company, limited by guarantee, will operate the Aviation Consumer Ombudsperson scheme.

This company, the ACO company, will be governed by a Board of Directors with equal representation from industry, consumers and an independent Chair.

Regulated entities—airlines and airports—will be required to become members of the company.

One of the central functions of the ACO will be operating an aviation specific external dispute resolution service for consumer complaints about airlines and airports.

If an airline or airport operator has acted inconsistently with the Charter and a consumer is not satisfied with the handling of their complaint, they will be able to seek assistance from the ACO.

The ACO will have several ways to help resolve the complaint such as through an investigation, compelling the provision of information, recommending a particular course of action, and/or facilitating a dispute resolution process.

The ACO will be empowered to make a determination to require an airline or airport operator to resolve a consumer complaint in a particular way.

The ACPA will be established in the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications, Sport and the Arts.

It will enforce the Charter and be empowered to investigate systemic issues facing consumers in the aviation sector.

The ACPA will also carry out enforcement activities related to the ACP Framework, including pursuing enforcement of ACO determinations on behalf of the Ombudsperson through judicial processes if necessary.

The Charter will create obligations for airlines and airports towards consumers in the event of a flight disruption, delay or cancellation.

The Charter will also contain minimum standards in relation to booking information and assistance, communicating with consumers and complaint handling.

To support greater public transparency and accountability, the Aviation Consumer Protections Bill will also facilitate the reporting and publication of reasons for flight delays, cancellations and disruptions to the department and consumers respectively.

This will assist the ACPA and ACO to determine whether or not a disruption, delay or cancellation was within or outside of the relevant entity's control.

The ACO and ACPA will also have an advocacy role—ensuring consumer concerns are heard and actioned—by conducting inquiries, advising government and promoting best practice.

The ACO and ACPA will provide consumer-focused education and best practice advice to consumers, the aviation industry, and the government on complaints handling.

The ACPA will lead advocacy in relation to any systemic consumer-facing issues identified in the sector, regulatory improvement, and public reporting.

The Aircraft Noise Ombudsperson, responsible for independent reviews of Airservices Australia's and Defence's management of aircraft noise-related activities, will transition to the department.

They will continue their current work, independent of Airservices Australia and Defence. This is about ensuring the public has confidence in the Aircraft Noise Ombudsperson's findings and recommendations.

This Bill will improve outcomes for consumers and ensure the aviation sector is accountable for the services they offer and is focussed on aviation consumers.

AVIATION CONSUMER PROTECTION (CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS AND TRANSITIONAL PROVISIONS) BILL 2026

The Aviation Consumer Protection (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill provides clarity that a breach by an airline of a standard in the Aviation Consumer Protections Charter will not result in the cancellation of a licence under the Air Navigation Act 1920.

The Consequential Bill also ensures a smooth transition from the current non-legislated Aircraft Noise Ombudsperson (ANO) in Airservices Australia to the new independent, statutory ANO arrangements.

AVIATION CONSUMER PROTECTION LEVY BILL 2026

The Aviation Consumer Protection Levy Bill forms a key part of a package of bills to hold the aviation industry accountable for delivering better outcomes for consumers and to deliver on our commitment to improve aviation consumer protection.

The Levy Bill allows the Minister to set levy amounts to impose and collect monies by enabling regulations to be made that will cost recover the administrative expenses associated with administration of the Aviation Consumer Protection Bill by the Aviation Consumer Protection Authority. The annual levy is based on the estimated costs of the regulatory functions of the regulator.

The Australian Government intends the annual general levy to offset the cost of administering the aviation consumer protections contained in the ACP Bill, while ensuring the levy is applied equitably. The Minister will be required to consider whether the levy payable by the regulated entity is a fair proportion of the total annual funds raised via the levy.

AVIATION CONSUMER PROTECTION LEVY (COLLECTION) BILL 2026

The Aviation Consumer Protection Levy (Collection) Bill provides for the collection of levies to cost recover administration costs associated with the Aviation Consumer Protection Bill.

The cost recovery charges are intended to recover the costs of activities carried out by the Aviation Consumer Protection Authority (ACPA), which the ACP Bill establishes as a regulatory function within the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications, Sport and the Arts (the department).

The Collection Bill outlines the process for the collection of these charges, ensuring that the levies imposed on regulated entities are effectively managed and distributed. It establishes the procedures for collecting and administering the cost recovery charges, in line with the framework set by the Levy Bill.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

I move:

That paragraph 11(f) in item 18 of Schedule 1 to the Treasury Laws Amendment (Payday Superannuation) Regulations 2026, made under the Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act 1992, be disallowed [F2026L00133].

I rise today in support of a simple proposition: that young people deserve every dollar they've earned, including their super. The Greens will always stand up for young people—indeed for all people—and for decent pay and conditions for all Australian workers. We are here to make things better in a cost-of-living crisis.

Labor's platform supports what we are here to support, but here today Labor don't want to pay super to all workers under 18. That's the question. And we say to Labor: why wait? The Greens want to pay super to all workers under 18, and we can do it from tomorrow. And that's why we're here in the Senate fighting to secure super payments for all under-18s, no matter how many hours you work.

Currently, young workers are excluded from receiving super unless they work more than 30 hours a week and are over 18. Ninety-three per cent of those young people work less than 30 hours a week, so it's not a small carve-out; it's a massive carve out. It's not a technical anomaly. It's the rule for almost every young worker in this country. And it's a straightforward discrimination. It's a discrimination against young people based on age. It's a discrimination based on part-time work. And it's a discrimination, therefore, against women. Women are more negatively affected by this provision because more of them work part time.

The Greens support payday super. Workers should be paid their super at the same time they're paid their wages. It's simple, fair and long overdue. But, today, we deal with a glaring injustice that Labor knows is wrong and has chosen to leave in place. Under these regulations, 515,000 young workers—they're out there tonight stacking shelves, serving burgers, making coffees and cleaning tables—will continue to be denied superannuation simply because they're under 18 and work less than 30 hours a week. They're currently being robbed of an estimated $405 million in super contributions. That was in last year alone.

Let's be clear about what this means at 17 years old, you can work hard and you can pay tax, remembering they are paid a lot less than the adults they work alongside. A 17-year-old is earning around 57 per cent of an adult rate. A 16-year-old is earning around 47 per cent of an adult rate, and a 15-year-old is earning around 40 per cent of what an adult earns. In too many cases, they're doing exactly the same work, they know exactly as much as the person alongside them, and they're paid, in the case of a 15-year-old, 40 per cent of what that adult earns. They can contribute to their workplace. They're contributing to the economy, and, in too many cases right now, they're also contributing to putting food on the table in their family household in this cost-of-living crisis. When it comes to the retirement savings, Labor has said to these young people that, somehow, their work does not count when it comes to super. It's an outrageous double standard and a historic anomaly that must be cleaned up.

More than 500,000 young Australians are expected to miss out on super because of this loophole, and the cost of everything, as we know, has gone up. Wages haven't kept up with inflation. We all in this place know and Labor know how hard it is for young people in a cost-of-living crisis, and yet, to date, they've chosen to prevent young people from accessing the money they need for a safe retirement. Who benefits from this situation? Who benefits? Not workers and not young people. The beneficiaries are some of the largest and most profitable corporations in Australia—the major supermarkets, fast food giants and retail chains making billions in profits while employing armies of young workers on incredibly low pay. These companies can afford to pay for super for these young people. Many simply choose not to do so because the law lets them off the hook, so it's time for that to change. So far, Labor, regrettably, has decided to protect that loophole. Why would you do that? Why wouldn't you address it for those hundreds of thousands of young workers?

We know, from a Senate inquiry on this issue, the Greens compelled the largest employers of young people in Australia to disclose whether or not they paid super to young workers under 18, and the results are absolutely damning. Most large employers of young Australians do not provide under-18 workers with this basic workplace entitlement, despite raking in massive profits off the back of their labour. Our inquiry found that companies like Coles, Woolworths, Kmart, Target, Chemist Warehouse, Hungry Jack's and McDonalds employ tens of thousands of teenagers yet still refuse to pay super unless those workers meet outdated minimum hours thresholds. Meanwhile, these same corporations are raking in enormous profits. It's $1.08 billion for Coles; $1.38 billion for Woolworths; nearly $600 million for Chemist Warehouse; almost $2.9 billion for Wesfarmers, which owns Kmart and Target; and McDonald's global profits—wait for it!—exceed $13 billion.

This is not about whether big business can afford to pay super to young workers. They clearly can. The fact that some employers, such as Bunnings, Aldi, JB Hi-Fi and Priceline choose to pay their 18-year-old workers superannuation regardless of how many hours they work, shows that this is possible. These employers know these workers deserve it. It's a fair thing, and they are making sure they do it, leaving all of those other very large, very profitable billion bottom lines subsidised by a 12 per cent pay contribution from some of the poorest and lowest paid workers in our economy. Instead, the vast majority of those large employers are using a business model that relies on insecure, low paid teenage labour while denying those workers the same retirement benefits as everyone else.

Along with collecting evidence from large employers, the inquiry also heard stories from young workers impacted by this exclusion. The shop assistants' submission provided testimony of young workers experiencing this pay discrimination. For example:

Sarah is 18 and has been working since she was 15. She works at a discount department. $3000 is what Sarah's super balance could have exceeded by now if contributions had been paid while she was under 18, nearly three times what she has now. Asked, how do you feel about that, Sarah said, "Not good. That is a lot of money [unpaid], and I'm doing the same work, that's just not fair."

This exclusion entrenches lower lifetime savings before workers even turn 18. The system is designed to disadvantage people at the very moment they enter the workforce. Treasurer Chalmers said that he talked about this issue with a delegation of young workers just last week. He knows this is a huge loophole. The question is whether he will work to close it. This morning the Treasurer expressed a willingness to continue to engage on this issue. He knows we need to act. Young Australians are leaning on the Treasurer. 'Listen to our voices,' they are asking; 'Give us justice on our retirement earnings. If we are old enough to work, to pay tax, we are old enough to be paid super, regardless of the hours we work and regardless of our age.'

It would be shocking if Labor opposed this disallowance—truly shocking—when you look at their national platform. If they oppose it they are voting against their own national platform. Labor's 2023 national platform states that 'all workers must receive their full entitlement to superannuation'. It also says that Labor 'will ensure that superannuation is paid on every dollar earned so that, across a lifetime, Australians don't fall behind and gain the benefits of compound interest to support a dignified retirement'—so true, so important. That's a direct quote from Labor policy. Further, it says that Labor will 'work with unions and employers to examine gaps in the superannuation system and, where possible, close those gaps for young workers'. Well, how long do you need, Labor? Let's do this now. We Greens are ready to work with you to protect our kids' earnings and fix this incredibly unfair anomaly.

Labor's 2026 draft national platform, currently in the consultation stage, says that Labor 'will support young workers by advocating for the accumulation of superannuation on every dollar spent'. Well, Labor, here's your chance. Labor often says that no worker should be left behind, but the Labor Party's inaction to date speaks louder than words. It's extraordinary. It's time to fix this.

Every dollar of super paid early in life has decades to compound. It's the basic principle of superannuation. Missing out on super as a teenager can mean thousands, potentially tens of thousands, of dollars at retirement. We've seen estimates that put, for the average young person, a loss at retirement of between $7,000 and $18,000. That is a lot of money. This is a fair entitlement for those young people. They are paid incredibly low wages when they're 15, 16 and 17. Why would we cut their pay even further by not paying them the superannuation they are entitled to? It's unfair to young people, and it needs to be fixed.

At a time when young people are facing a housing crisis, rising rents, insecure work and declining living standards, this parliament should not be taking money out of their future pockets—12 per cent in every pay packet—and giving it to the bottom line of some of Australia's most wealthy and most profitable huge corporations, who count their profits in the billions. Young Australians are already being asked to carry more than their fair share. They should not also be expected to subsidise the profits of those very large multinational fast-food chains and the supermarket giants.

So let's be clear. If Labor don't do this, they are backing the wealthy one per cent over the young people in this wealthy country. And it's against their own policy. They know this is the right thing to do, and we in the Greens want to see it happen now—no delay. It's time. It's overdue. Labor's asking young workers to subsidise the profits of those very large companies, the most profitable in our nation, by allowing them to continue to not pay super to those young people who are on less than 30 hours a week, Labor cannot credibly argue that superannuation is an essential workplace entitlement whilst simultaneously maintaining that more than a million young workers should remain outside the system altogether.

Last year, Labor had a chance to back young workers when we moved an amendment in November to grant all young workers the right to superannuation contributions from their employers. They squibbed it. They opposed it. A party that leaves young workers out isn't a party for workers. Now Labor has an opportunity to right this wrong. It's simple. It can be done. It is possible, it is fair and it should be done. If this Labor government genuinely cares about young workers and about young people, it has no excuse but to support this disallowance.

The Greens will continue to stand with young workers and fight to close this loophole. We will stand with anyone in this parliament to make sure the loophole is closed for fairness for those young people and their households. This parliament must stand with those young people and make this change now.

Debate adjourned.

For an older Australian leaving hospital, it could mean getting home sooner with the medication that they need. For someone living with a chronic illness, it could mean fewer appointments, less travel and one less obstacle to staying healthy. These might sound like small things, but they make a big difference in people's lives.

The Albanese government has been clear that strengthening Medicare isn't just about investing more money, although we have done that too. It's also about making sure our health workforce can work to the full extent of their skills, which means backing doctors, nurses and allied health professionals—and, ultimately, it means backing patients. This reform has been years in the making, with extensive consultation across the health sector and agreement from health ministers across the country. It has the appropriate safeguards, appropriate training requirements and clear professional standards. It's a sensible reform because it's built on evidence, not ideology.

There is another point worth making. Nursing is one of Australia's most trusted professions. Every day, nurses care for Australians at some of the most difficult moments in their lives with compassion, professionalism and skill. This bill, the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025, says that we recognise that expertise. It says we trust properly trained nurses to do the job they have prepared for and, most importantly, it says that the health system should be designed around patients, not bureaucracy. If someone can receive safe, affordable treatment closer to home more quickly and with fewer barriers, that's a good outcome. That's what this bill delivers. It's practical, it's sensible and it will make a real difference for communities right across Australia, especially those that have too often found themselves at the back of the queue when it comes to accessing health care. I commend the bill to the Senate.

I rise to speak against the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025 and I seek to set out some of the reasons for that. The bill speaks in the language of aiming to improve access to medicines, particularly in rural and regional Australia, to remove the pressure that's on the health workforce and, most notably, to allow registered nurses to work the full scope of their practice. These, of course, are legitimate policy goals for consideration, and they do deserve consideration, but the key question really is whether or not the proposed safeguards are sufficient to protect patients, nurses and collaborating practitioners from the risks, and I think there are quite a number of risks in what's being proposed here.

It's important that improved access to prescribing shouldn't be confused with improving health care itself. Many times in health care the actual act of prescribing is the end point of the diagnostic process. Of course, we know that nurses and nurse practitioners are highly skilled professionals, but they're not doctors; they're not trained medical professionals. Often times the training that the nurse will have will be focused on the care of the patient and all the other important stuff. There is, I see, a foreseeable risk that treatment might be even initiated before an underlying diagnosis has been adequately explored or excluded.

The bill also raises questions about medication safety, including adverse drug reactions, interactions and prescribing cascades, particularly in elderly patients, many of whom will have very complex chronic disease. As I've been speaking to people in the industry, they've described to me the risk of fragmented care, which is where assessment, diagnosis and prescribing and ongoing management are shared across multiple practitioners where no single clinician can assume overall responsibility for the patient's care.

Finally, the one that was so egregiously overlooked during the COVID period is the issue of informed consent. That really does require a particular degree of consideration here. Many patients are unlikely to understand the substantial differences in training and diagnostic expertise and the scope of practice between the nurse and the medical practitioner. Patients really should be able to make an informed decision about who's providing that care and the nature of the clinical decision-making involved.

The bill also heavily relies on prescribing agreements, endorsement standards and conditions of approval and regulatory oversight, but we should consider whether these are genuine clinical safeguards or primarily administrative safeguards. A safeguard ultimately is only effective in the prescription if it changes behaviour and reduces risk in practice. The existence of prescribing agreements doesn't necessarily measure and ensure meaningful supervision, clinical oversight or accountability. So my question is: will the proposed governance arrangements provide real-world protection or just be in the business of creating documentary compliance?

As you can see, there are a range of issues that arise as a result of this bill. One that really hasn't been properly covered is the risks to the nursing profession itself. With the responsibility of prescribing what can be up to schedule 8 drugs, the reform in this bill may actually expose nurses to increasing complaints, to litigation, to regulatory scrutiny and to professional liability. So the issue is not really whether the nurses are capable and whether they're able to do this job. Rather, it's a question of whether or not workforce shortages are being addressed by transferring responsibilities which were traditionally borne by medical professionals and trained practitioners, without equivalent safeguards and support structures. The nursing profession, of course, has an enormously high level of public trust. Arguably, it may be said in some circumstances the nurses are even more trusted than the doctors themselves. But any expansion of prescribing authority has got to be accompanied by clear accountability, sound governance and ongoing evaluation.

Finally, this does overlay the cloud of overprescription. We know that pharmaceutical companies love nothing more than getting their products into the hands of willing recipients. For those reasons—and many, many others—I simply won't be supporting this bill today.

I rise to speak in support of the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. This is a practical and carefully designed piece of reform. It makes sure that Australians can access medicines through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme when those medicines are prescribed by appropriately qualified, endorsed and authorised registered nurses. At its heart is a simple Labor principle. It's about getting quality health care. All you should need is your Medicare card, not your credit card. That's what Medicare is about, that's what the PBS is also about and that's what this bill helps to deliver.

This bill amends the National Health Act 1953 to enable endorsed registered nurses, known as designated registered nurse prescribers, to prescribe certain pharmaceutical benefits under the PBS. It also amends the Health Insurance Act 1973 so the Professional Services Review can review PBS prescribing by nurse prescribers, ensuring that they are subject to the same oversight as other PBS prescribers.

This bill establishes a regulated Commonwealth PBS framework as well. It creates the approval process for authorised nurse prescribers to allow approvals to be suspended or revoked, including nurse prescribers as a category of the PBS prescriber. It enables the minister to specify which benefits they may also prescribe and ensures that patients can access those medicines through the PBS. That is all extremely important.

Authorising a nurse to prescribe is only part of this reform. The other part is making sure that, when a patient receives a prescription, they can access the medicine affordably through the PBS. Without this bill, we risk creating a gap between what the health workforce is trained and authorised to do and what patients can afford to access. That would simply be not fair. It would especially be not fair for people who live in regional, rural and remote communities and, in particular, in my home state of Western Australia.

This bill doesn't replace doctors or diminish the role of GPs or specialists or pharmacists or nurse practitioners, but it absolutely complements the existing health workforce. It supports team based care and allows nurses to work to the full scope of their training, endorsement and professional capability. Designated registered nurse prescribers must meet the requirements set by the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia. They must have proper education, qualifications and endorsement. They must prescribe within their competence and scope of practice and within a clinical governance framework in partnership with an authorised health practitioner and under an active prescribing agreement. So this is definitely not a loose model. It is regulated, it is accountable and it is designed around safe and collaborative care.

Registered nurses are already at the centre of health care in this country. They are often the health professionals people see first, know best and absolutely trust the most. In regional, rural and remote Australia—especially, again, in my home state of Western Australia—nurses are often holding the health system together. They are in hospitals, community clinics, Aboriginal community controlled health services, aged-care settings, schools, outreach services, palliative care services and primary care teams. They manage chronic conditions. They support families. They provide things like wound care, vaccinations, health education, screening and also follow up. They are often known to the patient, they know the family and sometimes they also know the community. Importantly, they know what delay means.

In a metropolitan area, a delayed prescription might mean booking another appointment or waiting until another day, and that's frustrating enough. But, in a rural or remote community in Western Australia, delay can mean something very different. It can mean a long drive. It can mean taking time off work. It can mean arranging transport. It can mean waiting for the next visit to a clinician. It can mean a patient deciding it's all too hard and, in fact, going without. For someone with a chronic condition, that delay can mean also deterioration of their condition. For an older person in aged care, that can mean unnecessary distress. For someone receiving palliative care at home, it can mean pain that could have been avoided. For a woman seeking time-sensitive reproductive healthcare, it can mean uncertainty, cost and a loss of control. For someone in a remote Aboriginal community, it can mean the difference between care close to home and care that requires leaving a community. This is why nurse prescribing matters. This is not an abstract workforce reform. It's a practical access reform.

Western Australia in particular understands this. WA Health has recognised that designated registered nurse prescribing can strengthen access to timely, safe and reliable medicines, particularly for people who live in rural and remote communities and in aged-care settings. In a WA first, Edith Cowan University has launched a Graduate Certificate in Registered Nurse Prescribing, and that course will upskill experienced registered nurses so they can safely prescribe or renew medications in partnership with authorised independent prescribers such as doctors and nurse practitioners. That matters because workforce challenges are absolutely real.

Across regional WA, communities simply cannot wish more health professionals into existence. We need to fully utilise the skills of the workforce that we absolutely have, and we need to support all of our nurses to work to their full scope of practice. We need to build team based care that reflects the realities of country WA, not just the convenience of metropolitan service models. A nurse in a regional clinic should not have to identify the need for a medicine, know that the patient needs it, know that delay will make it worse and then be prevented from helping someone simply because the PBS framework cannot keep pace.

That's what this bill absolutely fixes. It brings Commonwealth PBS law into line with modern health care. It reflects the direction of the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce and the Scope of Practice Review. Our health system must support health practitioners and professionals to work to their full scope of practice. When nurses can do the work that they are trained and authorised to do, patients get care sooner, GPs and other health professionals are better supported and the pressure that's on hospitals and acute care is reduced. Communities, particularly rural and regional communities, especially have a great benefit from getting a health system that works better for them.

The Senate inquiry into this bill received submissions that reflected strong support from across the health sector. This bill sets that legislative foundation. It creates the framework, accountability and PBS access needed for the model to operate safely and fairly. The committee recommended that the bill be passed, and I'm pleased to speak today in support of that. This bill is about access. It's about affordability. It's about strengthening primary care. It's about backing nurses. It's also about recognising that, in a state as vast as Western Australia, health care cannot be designed only around an assumption that every patient has a GP appointment just around the corner. For people in the Kimberley, the Pilbara, the Goldfields, the Wheatbelt, the Great Southern, the Mid West, the South West and communities right across my beautiful home state and regional Western Australia, health access depends on practical reforms just like this. It depends on making sure that a health professional who is there, who is qualified, who is trusted and who is authorised can actually help them.

Labor built Medicare. Labor created the PBS. Labor believes health care should depend on your need, not your post code and definitely not the size of your wallet. This bill honours that principle in a practical way. It says that when a nurse is properly trained, endorsed and authorised to prescribe, the patient should not lose access to affordable PBS medicines. That is simple. That is fair. For rural and regional WA, this bill matters.

One Nation will support the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. It amends the National Health Act and the Health Insurance Act 1973 to enable approved registered nurses to prescribe certain pharmaceutical benefits under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the PBS. Australia's health system is experiencing increasing demand due to an ageing population and rising prevalence of chronic disease, something we do need to better understand. Improving access to safe and effective medications is essential to meeting the health needs of everyday Australians.

Registered nurses comprise around half the Australian health workforce and are the most geographically distributed health profession. They're the best placed to prescribe certain common medications, taking the pressure off doctors while reducing travel and inconvenience to patients. This will support rural pharmacies. Registered nurses must complete a three-year bachelor's degree in nursing. Nurse practitioners must hold a master's degree in nursing and complete 5,000 hours of advanced clinical practice.

The history of the idea of allowing nurses, suitably trained, to write prescriptions is quite long. It began with a trial in New South Wales between 1991 and 2000—a generation ago. This went national in 2001 with the advent of the national Nursing and Midwifery Board, designed to bring regulation of nurses closer to the system used for doctors. It was at this time that the pathway to nurse practitioner was introduced. In 2010, nurse practitioners were approved to write prescriptions under the PBS, although only while working in collaboration with a registered medical prescriber. Then, in 2024, the government removed the need for collaboration with a registered prescriber, allowing nurse practitioners to prescribe most medications under their own Medicare Benefits Schedule prescriber number. Finally, in 2025, the government introduced the ability of registered nurses to prescribe. There are suitable checks and balances. Nurses must meet specified qualifications, complete the course and maintain endorsement. The first cohort were enrolled and have now completed their training.

This legislation will enable these health professionals to prescribe certain medications. Perhaps this could have been done the other way around, with the heads of power to allow registered nurses to prescribe written into law before we started training them, disrupting their careers and offering them a career path which didn't yet exist. Maybe that's just a sensible One Nation thing.

This legislation is being supported across the chamber and could have been supported a year ago. The point of this history lesson is clear. The move to allow registered nurses to prescribe is not a thought bubble. It's the result of a generation of evolution in the education and professional certification of and skill base within the nursing profession.

The system they've put in place appears fit for purpose. Not all drugs can be prescribed by registered nurses, just certain ones: birth control; repeat prescriptions across a wide range of conditions. There are lots of opportunities to take the pressure off our doctors. This is particularly beneficial to regional and remote areas.

For those who may be concerned about this measure—and One Nation is not concerned with it—I reference the PBS auditing framework. The PBS has excellent audit routines which scan all the prescriptions written across the system and zero in on any patterns out of the ordinary. These are then followed up with a phone call or, if necessary, a visit. Misuse will be detected. One Nation does contend medical professionals are given insufficient discretion to use their wealth of medical knowledge. In this case, it will provide an additional check. The initiative in part stems from the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce. One Nation is pleased to strengthen Medicare with this initiative.

Next, I must address 'Mediscare' 3.0, which disreputable media have been promoting in the last few weeks. I say 'Mediscare' version 3 because the last two elections saw the Labor Party, or their supporters, smear the Liberals with a false 'Mediscare' campaign. Now it's One Nation's turn to be smeared, and Labor is smearing One Nation. They must fear us. While it has been only one week since the last time I defended Medicare and the PBS in a Senate speech, it seems I need to do it again. Very well. One Nation will defend the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and Medicare. Both are part of a social-welfare safety net which maintains a healthy population and contributes to Australia enjoying a high standard of living. Medicare and the PBS are why people pay taxes—and don't forget it, government.

Taxes are, of course, not the government's money. Taxes are the people's money and should only be spent accordingly. Hardworking Australians do not deserve to have their money wasted or handed over to fraudsters. One Nation will work with and better resource the Benefits Integrity Division and the Fraud Fusion Taskforce to ensure every cent of money spent through Medicare and the PBS goes to people who need it and who qualify for the benefit.

It's intolerable to me that new drugs, drugs that could save lives, are held back, despite agreement between the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee and the drug maker, because of the cost, because billions are being taken out of the system in fraud. And, yes, some prescribers are complicit, although a tiny amount.

No patient with a legally obtained Medicare card should ever be afraid of using that card under a One Nation government. No Australian will have to pay more for a prescription under a One Nation government. We will support and maintain the system of the Medicare urgent care clinics, and we will work constructively with all stakeholders to extend operating hours for service delivery to take further pressure off public hospital emergency departments—which we will be able to afford because we will remove the criminals and fraudsters from the system and ensure everyone who uses a Medicare card is entitled to use that card. The government knows who these people are—yes, you do. The government knows where the $3 billion a year in fraud is coming from. Their own integrity division said as much in Senate estimates recently. The fraud figure is the government's, not One Nation's—we didn't cook it up; the government's own agency told us. The Albanese-Burke government doesn't have the guts to do anything about it.

I'm concerned that the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025 could create a two-tier health system. Rural, regional and poorer suburbs would get registered nurses and nurse practitioners. Richer suburbs would get doctors galore. In fact, I'm sure that's going to happen because it's happening now. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and the federal department of health track their workforce using a framework called the Modified Monash Model. Their data shows a stark imbalance. Roughly 84 per cent of private hospital medical practitioners and the vast majority of medical specialists operate exclusively within major capital cities and metropolitan centres. Small, regional, rural and remote towns classified as MM4 to MM7 contain the lowest number of healthcare workers per capita. In these areas, access to medical care drops drastically. In these areas, GPs provide primary care and act as emergency doctors and hospital doctors, making up 60 per cent of the entire available hospital workforce because there are so few dedicated specialists. The bill before the Senate will help take the weight off those GPs, yet will not solve the issue of doctors gravitating to wealthy suburbs and cities. What may solve that problem is to do more to assist children from the bush to take up medicine as a career. One Nation's health policy, to be released later this year, will add more detail to that statement.

Finally, I'll be moving amendments to this bill on behalf of Senator Lambie, who's recovering after recently herself quality-testing our healthcare system. As it currently stands, properly qualified podiatrists and podiatric surgeons can prescribe specific medicines to their patients, although these prescriptions are not recognised under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. Patients either have to pay the full price or meet with the GP to get the same medicine prescribed under the PBS—or, worse, go without and suffer the consequences. That's ridiculous. Podiatrists require a university degree, must maintain membership of their professional association and are affiliated with Ahpra, like other medical associations. Their medical expertise in their area of care is well capable of supporting improved prescribing rights. The focus of our healthcare system must be what's best for the patient, and what's best for the patient cannot include bureaucratic roadblocks and financial pain. The amendments I foreshadow do not reduce safeguards. They do not give podiatrists greater prescribing powers. They will ease GPs' workload and make things easier for patients. They are commonsense amendments, and they should be supported.

I rise to speak on the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025, a bill that represents a practical, overdue and historic reform to the way we deliver health care in this country, which is what this government has done since it came into office. At its core, this bill is about patients. It's about making it easier for Australians to get the medicines that they need, when they need them, at a price they can afford. It is also about recognising the skill, training and professionalism of our nurses and ensuring they are able to work to their full scope of practice in service of the communities and patients that they care for every single day.

This bill came about in part because of the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce and the subsequent Unleashing the potential of our health workforcescope of practice review. I acknowledge the Minister for Health and Ageing, Minister Mark Butler, for his determination and commitment in this space to make Australia the healthiest country in the world. Both the taskforce and the review recognised a simple truth: Australia cannot meet rising health demand by relying on old structures that leave highly trained professionals underutilised. The review, led by Professor Mark Cormack, found that many health professionals face barriers unrelated to their education or competence and recommended reforms so more of the workforce can deliver care safely and effectively in primary care settings. This bill responds directly to that national challenge.

Specifically, the bill amends the National Health Act 1953 to authorise registered nurses who are endorsed under the registration standard. It will also allow for designated registered nurse prescribers to prescribe certain medicines under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, attracting Commonwealth subsidy. It also amends the Health Insurance Act 1973 so that a designated registered nurse prescribing under the PBS is subject to the Professional Services Review scheme, providing peer review oversight and an important safeguard for integrity and safety. In short, the bill combines expanded access with strong accountability, which is exactly how good health reform should be—which is why the Australian people can always rely on Labor to deliver better health outcomes.

As the minister has stated, the significance of this reform is enormous. By enabling designated registered nurse prescribers to prescribe medicines under the PBS, the bill ensures that medicines prescribed by those nurses are affordable for patients and not out of reach. It aligns squarely with the government's commitment to cheaper medicines and with the principles of the National Medicines Policy, which seeks equitable, affordable and timely access to high-quality medicines and related services. For patients, that means fewer delays, fewer unnecessary appointments and fewer situations in which cost becomes a barrier to proper treatment.

If you had listened to the contribution before mine, you would have wondered why those opposite don't support, and didn't support, cheaper medicines. They haven't supported the cost-of-living measures that this government has introduced. But now all of a sudden we hear that they support Medicare, and they suddenly support cheaper medicines. We're a government with a record of actually delivering. We don't talk about it. We take the action and we deliver on those commitments.

Returning to the bill, at present many registered nurses are highly skilled and highly educated professionals who make up the largest and most geographically distributed health workforce in Australia. But they remain underutilised in primary care. That is not efficient for the health system, and it's not fair on patients. Allowing appropriately endorsed registered nurses to prescribe under the PBS will boost efficiency, strengthen care coordination and free GPS and nurse practitioners to focus on patients with more complex needs. In a system facing increasing demand from an ageing population—which we are—chronic disease and workforce shortages, these changes are not merely desirable; they are necessary.

This matters especially for rural and regional and remote communities like my home state of Tasmania, and we heard from my colleague from Western Australia. For communities that live in the regional areas of WA, which is so expansive, this reform will make a huge difference, as it will for all Tasmanians. Too often people outside our major cities must travel long distances, wait too long or navigate fragmented services to receive even basic care. We know that better access to primary health care reduces avoidable hospital visits and preventable hospitalisations. We also know that nurses are often the most trusted and most accessible health professionals in smaller communities. When we empower them to provide treatment directly and prescribe affordable medicines within a clear clinical framework, we bring care closer to home and improve equality across our nation.

Tasmanians know that geography can shape access to care. For communities in regional and more isolated parts of our state, timely access to GPs or to other primary care professionals cannot always be taken for granted. Tasmania's own Health Workforce 2040 strategy recognises the need to build a workforce of the right size and shape, foster innovation and ensure health services remain sustainable into the future. This bill complements that ambition. By enabling nurses to contribute more fully, it will help strengthen access not only to community settings but across hospitals as well, easing pressure where delays in primary care flow directly into emergency departments and acute services. This will complement the 137 urgent care clinics that we have introduced and which are going to be funded on an ongoing basis to help reduce that pressure on our accident and emergency departments. So this complements the delivery that this government has already demonstrated that we have to provide better health care for all Australians.

Importantly, this reform has not emerged in haste, nor has it been developed without rigorous professional input. Since 2017, the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia and the Australian chief nursing and midwifery officers have undertaken extensive research and consultation on nurse prescribing models. The board developed the relevant standards for designated registered nurse prescribers through multiple rounds of public consultation, and those processes received strong support. In December 2024, the health minister approved the new registration standard, and it came into effect on 30 September 2025. The first cohort of nurses is expected to complete the required education and receive endorsement from mid-2026.

There are also clear safeguards embedded in the reform. Designated registered nurse prescribers will not prescribe without structure or oversight. It's very important that people understand that. The list of medicines that may be prescribed under the PBS will be considered by the independent Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, the PBAC, ensuring decisions are informed by evidence and national standards. Under the registration standard, nurses must meet specific qualifications and endorsement requirements, and they must prescribe in partnership with an authorised health practitioner under a prescribed agreement. The extension of the Professional Services Review framework further ensures public confidence in safety, quality and proper stewardship of public funding.

This reform is in the true Labor tradition. Labor understands that universal health care is not only about the existence of a system. As much as we created Medicare and we have always defended it and we always will, it is about whether that system is accessible, affordable and fair in practice. Unlike those opposite, we actually believe in universal health care. We believe that Australians should have access to affordable medications and they have the best support that they can possibly have when they need it. It's about whether a person can get care close to home. It's also about whether hospital emergency departments are reserved for emergencies rather than becoming the default option when primary care is too hard to access. It's about whether every member of the health workforce is enabled to contribute at the top of their training and their competence, so this will actually encourage more into the nursing profession.

This is what this bill delivers: it strengthens Medicare's promise by making sure that care is going to be responsive, and that it will be delivered to all communities in our modern Australia. The practical benefits will be felt across the system. Patients with straightforward and ongoing care needs will be able to receive treatment more quickly. Nurses will be able to resolve issues that currently require extra appointments, sometimes extra delays. GPs will be able to devote more of their time to complex issues that they're presented with every single day. Hospitals will face less pressure from patients whose needs could and should be addressed earlier in the community. That's why, with these measures in this bill along with our urgent care clinics, we will be able to reduce pressure on accident and emergency departments. When you go to an urgent care clinic, you will get the service, the support, the care that you need and all you will need is your Medicare card. It will no longer be dictated by whether you've got a credit card in your wallet or your wallet's full of cash.

Rural and regional Australians will have a fairer chance of receiving timely care without the burden of distance and cost. That is better for patients, better for providers and better for the sustainability of our health system over the long term. This bill delivers on the government's commitment to ensure our health workforce can operate at full scope, while maintaining the safeguards Australians rightly expect. It is a thoughtful reform grounded in evidence, developed through consultation and aimed squarely at improving care for people who rely on our health system every day. It is a win for the nurses, it's a win for the patients, it's a win for rural and regional communities and it is a win for the future strength of our health system, including in my home state of Tasmania. It is also a win for any future governments.

If we invest in primary health care, access becomes quicker than in the past. We will have better health outcomes, which means we will have fewer hospitalisations. It will mean that patients will be healthier and communities will be healthier. People will be able to stay in their communities and get the support that they need, thereby reducing the need for those in rural and regional areas to travel long distances. This is a win for all Australians, and I think it is very good use of our health professionals so they're able to fulfil their professional capabilities. I commend the bill to the Senate, and I hope that it's not just going to be this bill that the people in One Nation are supporting. I wish that they would support all the recommendations that we have brought into this parliament to ensure better health outcomes for all Australians.

I rise in support of the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. This bill introduces a practical reform to improve the efficiency of our health system and ensure Australians can access timely health care. This bill amends the National Health Act and the Health Insurance Act to enable nurse practitioners to prescribe certain medicines under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, and this will in effect help Australians get the care and medicines they need when they need them.

Strengthening Medicare has been a key priority of the Albanese government since we came into office in 2022. When we did, it had never been harder or more expensive to see a doctor. Bulk billing was in decline, and too many Australians were putting off seeking care because of cost. That shouldn't happen in a country like Australia, so we've acted. We've made the largest investment in Medicare in its 40-year history. We've tripled the bulk-billing incentive. We've expanded the Medicare urgent care clinics to take pressure off hospitals and provide walk-in care for urgent but non-life threatening conditions. In Tasmania, this includes eight urgent care clinics, which are already making a real difference for families. These services are giving people confidence that they can get seven-days-a-week bulk-billed care close to home. They are easing pressure on the hospital emergency departments in Burnie, Launceston and Devonport, and we've got five around Hobart. They're ensuring that local healthcare workers can deliver care in the right settings at the right time.

Investments have also been made in general practice, headspaces, aged care, women's health and mental health support, and primary care infrastructure alongside direct investment in the GP workforce, but we know there is more to do. This bill builds on that work in a practical and tangible way. It acts on the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce and the Unleashing the potential of our health workforce review, which identified that highly trained nurses are often restricted from practising to their full potential due to outdated regulatory frameworks. This bill changes that. It allows appropriately trained and endorsed registered nurses to prescribe certain medicines under the PBS. This means patients can get prescriptions more easily, more quickly and often at a lower cost. This is about using the skills of our healthcare workers more efficiently.

Our nurses are highly trained, highly skilled and trusted professionals. They are often the first point of contact for patients, especially in regional community settings. For too long, outdated rules have limited what they can do. This reform changes that. It will empower nurses to work within their full scope of practice while maintaining the high-safety standards that Australians expect. Only nurses who meet the Nursing and Midwifery Board's requirements will be able to prescribe, and the medicines list will continue to be independently reviewed to ensure patient safety. Oversight arrangements are also being strengthened to protect the integrity of the system.

This is a careful evidence based reform that improves access without compromising quality. It will also take pressure off other parts of the system. By allowing nurses to manage straightforward cases, we can reduce unnecessary appointments and free up our GPS to focus on more complex care. This will mean shorter wait times, more efficient services and better outcomes for patients. We know this matters, especially in rural and regional communities like Tasmania, where access to health care can be more challenging and travel distances can be greater. These changes will help people get care closer to home without unnecessary delays.

This bill is part of a broader effort to modernise our health system and build a stronger, more connected model of care. The future of primary care is team based. It brings together doctors, nurses and allied health professionals, each playing their role. This reform supports that approach. It doesn't replace doctors; it supports them. It also complements our work to make medicines more affordable. Whether it's reducing PBS costs, listing new treatments or investing in women's health, we are focused on easing the cost-of-living pressures and improving access.

Millions of Australians are already benefiting from cheaper medicines and better services, and this bill builds on that progress. More broadly, we're investing in the workforce that underpins the entire system. We are training more doctors, we are supporting nurses, and we are supporting primary care. The Albanese Labor government is allocating $14.5 million to provide 306 additional GP training places in 2026 through the Australian General Practice Training Program. This initiative will increase the total number of doctors commencing GP training to approximately 2,100, representing a 14 per cent rise compared to 2025.

Continued government support has resulted in a greater number of doctors in the Australian health system over the past three years than at any point in the previous decade. We know that a strong health system depends on people, skilled supported health professionals delivering care every day. This bill is about making the system work better for patients. It's about removing barriers, improving access and making care that is delivered in the right place at the right time by the right professional.

I'm proud to be part of a government that is committed to strengthening Medicare and ensuring that no Australian is left behind because of the cost of care. This bill is sensible, it's practical and it will make a real difference, and I commend the bill to the Senate.

I rise today to speak in support of the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. This is an important reform that will help ensure Australians can access medicines they need when they need them and at an affordable price through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. At its heart, this bill is about improving access to health care and making better use of the skills and expertise that already exist within our health workforce. It's about ensuring registered nurses can work to their full scope of practice while maintaining appropriate safeguards and professional oversight.

The bill amends the National Health Act 1953 and the Health Insurance Act 1973 to enable suitably qualified and endorsed registered nurses to prescribe certain medicines under the PBS and to bring their prescribing services within the Professional Services Review framework. These reforms build upon the new national registration standard approved by Commonwealth, state and territory health ministers, which established the role of the designated registered nurse prescriber. The first cohort is expected to commence prescribing from July 2026—so from tomorrow.

For Tasmania, these reforms will be particularly significant. Tasmania has one of the oldest populations in the nation. We have communities spread across a large geographic area, and many Tasmanians live in rural, regional and remote locations where accessing health care can be challenging. Whether it's on the west coast, in the north-east, on King Island or Flinders Island, or in smaller regional communities, many people face long travel times to see a doctor, particularly for routine healthcare needs. Nurses are often the healthcare professionals who know these communities best. They are trusted and highly skilled and already play a central role in delivering care across our state.

By allowing designated registered nurse prescribers to prescribe certain PBS medicines, we can reduce unnecessary delays, improve continuity of care and make it easier for Tasmanians to access treatment close to home. For an elderly Tasmanian managing a chronic condition, this would mean obtaining timely access to medication without waiting weeks for a GP appointment. For families in regional communities, it could mean receiving care sooner and avoiding lengthy travel. For aged-care residents, it could mean more responsive treatment delivered by health professionals already involved in their care. These reforms recognise the reality of modern health care. They acknowledge that healthcare delivery is increasingly team based and that nurses have an essential role to play in meeting growing healthcare demands.

Importantly, this bill does not remove safeguards. Nurses will be required to meet rigorous education, training and endorsement requirements before becoming authorised prescribers. Their prescribing will occur within established regulatory frameworks and will be subject to the same professional scrutiny and accountability that Australians rightly expect.

This legislation is also part of a much broader agenda by the Albanese government to strengthen Medicare and rebuild Australia's healthcare system after years of neglect. Since coming to government, Labor has delivered the largest investment in Medicare in decades. We've expanded bulk-billing through the tripling of the bulk-billing incentive, helping millions of Australians access free visits to their GP. We are delivering additional Medicare urgent care clinics across the country, including in Tasmania, ensuring people can access urgent care without needing to attend a busy hospital emergency department. We have made medicines cheaper by reducing the maximum cost of PBS prescriptions, easing cost-of-living pressures for families, pensioners and concession card holders. We have delivered the largest investment in strengthening Medicare's primary-care workforce, supporting the doctors, nurses and allied health professionals who are the backbone of our healthcare system.

The Albanese government has also invested heavily in women's health, mental health services, aged-care reform and strengthening healthcare access in rural and regional Australia. For Tasmania, these investments are making a real difference. Tasmanians are benefiting from stronger Medicare services, cheaper medicines, expanded urgent-care options and targeted investments in healthcare infrastructure and workforce development.

This bill complements those initiatives. It recognises that improving healthcare access is not achieved through a single reform. It requires a comprehensive approach that supports patients, strengthens Medicare and enables health professionals to work effectively together. This reform before us today is consistent with the recommendations of the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce and the Scope of Practice Review, both of which recognise that better utilisation of healthcare professionals can improve access to care while maintaining safety and quality. As demand on our health system continues to grow, particularly in regional states such as Tasmania, we must embrace sensible reforms that improve capacity and improve patient care. This legislation does that exactly. It supports our nurses, it supports our community, it supports affordable access to medicine and it supports a stronger Medicare system for all Australians.

The Albanese government was elected with a commitment to strengthen Medicare and improve access to health care. This bill is another example of that commitment being delivered, and that is the difference between Labor and the parties of the right. Labor asks how we can make health care more affordable and accessible. The Liberals and the Nationals have repeatedly asked how much they can cut, and how much more patients can pay.

The Abbott government tried to impose a $7 fee on GP visits. It then proposed a $5 fee and extended the freeze on Medicare rebates, putting more pressure on doctors and patients. The coalition treated universal health care as a budget problem to be managed down, rather than a national institution to be protected. The Nationals backed those decisions every step of the way. They did so, despite the greatest impact often being felt in regional communities—communities they claim to represent—where workforce shortages, travel distances and fewer services already make access harder. Then there is One Nation. It talks about protecting Medicare, but its own policy proposes abolishing the Therapeutic Goods Administration and reviewing $3 billion worth of medicines approved for the PBS. Australians should be very cautious when a party promises to protect health care while proposing to pull apart the institutions that keep medicines safe and accessible. The Liberals, Nationals and One Nation may use different slogans, but they share the same instinct: to weaken public systems, undermine expert institutions and leave individuals to carry more of the costs and risks themselves.

Labor takes a different view. We believe health care is a right, not a privilege. I am proud to support these reforms, because they will help Tasmanians receive the care they need, closer to home, sooner and more affordably. I commend the bill to the Senate.

The Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025 amends the National Health Act 1953 to authorise designated registered nurses as prescribers under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. These nurses will be able to prescribe specific medicines that qualify for Commonwealth subsidy under the PBS. This bill advances scope-of-practice reforms identified by the Unleashing the potential of our health workforce review and the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce. Since 2017, the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia and chief nursing and midwifery officers have conducted extensive research and consultation on nurse-prescribing models. The NMBA developed the standards—

Debate interrupted.

This evening I'm going to talk about something that really concerns me, and that concern was compounded again this week. Last night we had debate in this place in relation to schedule 1, part 9 of the Workplace Relations Legislation Amendment (Building Cooperative Workplaces No. 1) Bill 2026. That legislation allows for the Commonwealth to preference supply chains with union backed EBAs. What does that actually mean? It means that it allows the Commonwealth to discriminate for companies that have those EBAs in place. So if you have two like-for-like businesses and one has an EBA and one doesn't the government can choose the one with the EBA without it being discriminatory.

What else did we see last night? We saw the Prime Minister on 7.30. We saw the Prime Minister attempting to defend what is currently happening in terms of the revelations of even further corruption, criminal conduct and infiltration of organised crime in the construction sector, particularly in the CFMEU in Victoria. The Prime Minister said that he has no tolerance for corruption. The Prime Minister said that he knows that there is corruption in the construction industry. The Prime Minister said that he has sought assurances from the Victorian Premier, Jacinta Allan, that no taxpayer funds have gone into the pockets of organised crime. Do you know what Premier Jacinta Allan said today? She said that there was no corruption, that the $15 billion was because of inflation.

Inflation in the bribes.

Indeed, Senator Scarr—that could well be it! So he's saying that corruption in the construction industry is a problem and that the CFMEU is a problem, the Fair Work Commission have told us that, independent eminent investigators have told us that and we've heard that from the Queensland commission of inquiry, but now Jacinta Allan is saying: 'No, it's Albo's fault. It's because of the inflation. It's his fault that—

Order! Please refer to members of the other place by their correct titles.

Apologies, Acting Deputy President. So Premier Allan said that it's Prime Minister Albanese's fault, that the inflationary pressures of Treasurer Jim Chalmers and the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, are to blame for the $15 billion that has been lost in Victoria. I found that very, very interesting.

Yet here we are today. Today's motion that I put to the Senate for an inquiry has once again failed. Once again, it has failed.

Shame! Who voted against it?

Labor and the Greens voted against it. So there we go. This is the fourth time actually, Senator Scarr, that Labor and the Greens have blocked an inquiry into the CFMEU. Twice they told me that I was anti worker and that I didn't care about corruption in construction. So then I amended it to include corruption in construction. I actually changed it and called it 'corruption in construction'. And guess what? They still rejected it. So I don't know. What do we do? Labor and the Greens, they're always talking about transparency and accountability, except for when it comes to their own vested interests.

The Greens, in particular, always talk about how bad corruption is. They are, in my view, anti corruption. I expect that members of the Greens would feel very uncomfortable about the fact that today they voted against an inquiry into corruption in construction.

What do the people say?

They would say that they are disappointed, that these are not the Greens that they thought they knew. They should feel uncomfortable about it, because it's wrong. I'm not uncomfortable about what an inquiry of this nature would uncover because, if there is criminal conduct, if there is corruption and if there is organised crime involved in our construction sector, we need to get it out. The corruption tax, the CFMEU tax or whatever you want to call it is adding between 15 and 30 per cent to the cost of infrastructure projects, and that is then compounding additional costs into the housing construction sector as well. In a housing crisis, we cannot afford to do that. I say to the Prime Minister again: the standard that you walk past is the standard that you accept, and, if you truly reject organised crime and corruption, you need to act now. (Time expired)

Australia has just made a deadly call. Despite irrefutable evidence linking toxic paraquat to Parkinson's disease, despite warnings from some of Australia's leading neurologists and despite more than 70 countries banning it, Australians will keep being exposed to this deadly chemical. This should sound the alarm bell for all of us. Our chemical safety system is supposed to protect people, not chemical company profits.

So what evidence was used to justify keeping paraquat on the market? Many of the studies relied on by the regulator were funded or supplied by the companies that make paraquat, while leading Parkinson's experts say that their concerns were largely ignored. When there's credible evidence that a chemical could cause a devastating disease, we shouldn't wait until more Australians get sick before acting. Chemical companies should have to prove that their products are safe. Instead, we're taking risks with people's lives.

Think about this: China manufactures paraquat, but it has banned it for domestic use. The European Union has banned paraquat. The United Kingdom has banned it. More than 70 countries have decided that it is not safe domestically for their communities and for their farmers. Yet Australia is saying: 'She'll be right. Carry on. Let's rip.' It is not good enough. Farmers shouldn't be asked to gamble with their health. They deserve support to use safer alternatives that protect their livelihoods, their families and their land.

There's a cluster of people with Parkinson's disease near my home town of Newlyn. As a fifth-generation farmer, I know that Australian farmers are some of the most innovative people in the world, and they do not need dangerous chemicals to succeed; they need governments willing to back them. Protecting public health takes political courage. It means standing up to powerful corporate interests and listening to independent science and the people living with the consequences. No company's profits are worth gambling with the lives of Australia's workers, farmers and families.

Labor are rolling out the red carpet to AI data centres, and they are failing to answer the most basic question: who benefits from all of this? Across Australia, communities are saying the same thing: stop making decisions about us without us. AI data centres use enormous amounts of water and electricity. They'll change local communities for decades. Yet Australians are being told to trust the process and a set of unenforceable expectations. Whose water will data centres use? Whose energy will data centres rely on? Who carries the environmental impacts? When the profits start flowing, what community benefit is there? Do local communities profit, or is it just the multinational tech giants? And then there's our data. Australians shouldn't have to worry about why we're inviting some of the world's biggest tech corporations to own and control the infrastructure that will increasingly store and process our personal information. This isn't about being anti technology; it is about being pro community, pro democracy and pro common sense.

Communities are demanding proper planning, real consultation and strong environmental protections before these projects go ahead. Last week, I was in an event in Sydenham, where a data centre the size of 175 MCGs is proposed to be built. The local community are rightly anxious and concerned about what this means for them. Around the world, communities are fighting AI data centres. They are fighting for stronger safeguards, and Australia should learn from those mistakes; it should not repeat them. We have no excuse. We have seen the template. We have seen these campaigns in other jurisdictions. The Greens are calling for a moratorium on all data centres until we have safeguards in place around water, around energy consumption, around our environment, around our communities and, of course, around what is happening to our data—who owns it, who controls it and what they are doing with it.

I want to thank the community of Sydenham in Melbourne's inner west. I want to say thank you for turning up and turning out. We have an opportunity. We need to be as loud as we possibly can because local councils are being silenced. They're being steamrolled, so our voices need to be louder than ever. We need to make sure that community voices are leading this debate, that they're not being steamrolled. And Labor has a simple choice to make: will it keep putting billion-dollar tech companies first or will it finally put Australia's communities first? (Time expired)

Refugee Week was celebrated between Sunday 14 June and Saturday 20 June. This is the 40th year in which Refugee Week has been held. The theme for this year was A Million Stories. I want to tell three stories during my contribution here this evening.

The first one relates to an event that was hosted by Her Excellency the Governor-General, the Hon. Ms Sam Mostyn AC, and Mr Simeon Beckett SC at the Governor-General's residence. This was an event that celebrated Refugee Week but also celebrated the launch of a stamp issued by Australia Post. This stamp celebrates the fact that, last year, Australia settled its one millionth refugee since World War II. That's an outstanding achievement and part of the Australian story.

During the event, which was so nicely hosted by the Governor-General and Mr Simeon Beckett—they do a wonderful job of welcoming everyone to the Governor-General's residence—we heard one of those stories from a former governor of South Australia. The Hon. Hieu Van Le AC came to this country by boat as a refugee from Vietnam. Just think about this: he fled Vietnam, made his way by boat to Australia and then became, a number of decades later, governor of South Australia. What a great story. We heard about his perilous journey by boat—in fact, there were two journeys. He was actually appointed navigator, after the first journey, because he seemed to have an idea as to how to navigate even though he had no experience. He told the story of how they were approaching Australia, approaching Darwin, when they came across a tinnie with two Aussie fishermen who lifted their beers and said: 'G'day mate. Welcome to Australia.' What a wonderful Australian story.

At the Governor-General's residence, we also met people from Chile, the Baltic States, Vietnam, Sudan—a million stories from all over the world—who have established wonderful lives in Australia. We saw the unveiling of the beautiful stamp, which was a collaborative project by the Refugee Council of Australia, UNHCR and Australia Post. And it is a beautiful stamp. It evokes the tale of a million stories coming from all over the world and becoming part of Australia—a multicultural Australia.

Last Saturday, I attended the Multicultural Community Centre football festival for 2026. This involved a number of teams comprised of members of different communities, including people who have come here as refugees—another wonderful event. I want to congratulate my good friend Jeannie Mok OAM who does such wonderful work in this area.

The Multicultural Community Centre empowers people who have come to this country, including those who have come to our country as refugees. It gives them skills, it gives them training, it helps place them in the workforce—in aged care, child care, hospitality. It empowers people, and that's what multiculturalism is all about. At that event I met Mr Jay Phillips, who is the general manager of a family owned timber packaging company called CMTP. I spoke to Mr Phillips about CMTP, a family owned company celebrating its 50th year and founded by Chris and Marilyn Meade. He told me how the company employs people from refugee backgrounds and gives them an opportunity by giving them employment in our manufacturing industry. What a terrific story; what a great story. During the course of that event, all I heard was gratitude—gratitude from members of our multicultural community and, for those who've come here as refugees, gratitude that they were given an opportunity to come to Australia to build their lives and contribute to our beautiful country. I want to give a shout-out to CMTP. Thank you so much for your support of the Multicultural Community Centre football festival and thank you for everything that you do as a Queensland family owned company to support new arrivals to Australia, including those who have refugee backgrounds. Thank you so much.

The last event I want to speak about is an event which I just attended this evening, which was hosted by the Parliamentary Friends of Refugees group. I'm a proud co-chair of that group. The Refugee Council of Australia helped organise an event this evening which provided an insight into what are referred to as complementary pathways. These are pathways complementary to our basic commitment to provide opportunities for refugees to come to the country. They provide additional methods by which people can come to our country. Again we heard amazing stories of people who've come to Australia as refugees through these complementary pathways.

We heard about the Community Refugee Integration and Settlement Program pilot, CRISP, and about a wonderful group at Aireys Inlet. I want to give a shout-out to the Aireys Inlet Rural Australians for Refugees group, who welcomed Antoine, Jeanine and their children from Burundi. They are now building their life at Aireys Inlet. It was so enriching to see the connection between that community at Aireys Inlet and that new family who have made their way to Australia from Burundi and are achieving all of these milestones: getting a drivers licence, getting a job in the local community and contributing to the community. It was enriching to see just how happy and filled with gratitude that family is. Thank you so much to the Aireys Inlet Rural Australians for Refugees group. You really do represent the very best of Australian values.

We then heard from two wonderful people who came to Australia under the Skilled Refugee Labour Agreement pilot program. This included Samira, who's come to Australia from Afghanistan and now works as an accountant at Hachette, a finance company. She told us her story and in fact the story of her family as well, which is absolutely inspiring. Her husband is now a general manager of a hotel in Australia and is also incredibly successful. I want to congratulate Talent Beyond Boundaries in relation to their work with Samira.

We also heard from Basha from Syria, who now works as a pharmacist in Darwin. Congratulations to the Northern Territory health department for providing an opportunity for Basha to come to Australia with his family and build a future as a pharmacist in Darwin.

We also heard about the refugee student settlement pathway, Skill Path Australia. We heard from two wonderful young people who are now studying in Australia. I have no doubt they will make a wonderful contribution to our beautiful country. We heard from Umar, who is from the Rohingya community. He is studying civil engineering at Deakin University. I'd like to congratulate Deakin University for their efforts in this regard. Umar did you proud. He had glowing references for Deakin University. He wants to be a civil engineer, and he's focused on affordable housing and the provision of infrastructure, especially for rural and regional areas. He gave a terrific speech with a great dose of Australian humour.

We also heard from Sumaia, who comes from Somalia originally. She is studying education at the University of Sydney. Again, it was a wonderful, heartfelt story about how she's contributing to our beautiful country.

A Million Stories, a million people from all over the world who've come to Australia as refugees and have contributed to our beautiful country—this represents the very, very best of multicultural Australia. It is something which should be celebrated, it is part of the Australian story, and it's something which we should cherish.

Thank you, Senator Scarr, for that lovely contribution.

In the middle of the country, there's a facility that most Australians couldn't tell you anything about, and it might be the single biggest reason we'd be dragged into a war we never chose. I'll be heading to Alice Springs on 16 July, till the 22nd, for the 'Close Pine Gap – Sacred Land Back' convergence.

Pine Gap sits on Arrernte country, near the heart of Australia. It's a joint US-Australia surveillance facility that's been used by the US to target drone strikes, to support US military operations around the world and to feed intelligence into US wars that Australia has never had any business being part of. For over 50 years, it has operated in the interests of Washington, not of Australia—definitely not for the First Nations communities whose land it's on and not for peace. Pine Gap is, in many ways, the clearest symbol of what the US alliance with Australia actually looks like on the ground, and it again raises a $375 billion question for AUKUS: how much of our sovereignty are we willing to sign away, to pay to lose, to the US?

There is another way: an independent Australia, a peaceful Australia, one that respects sovereignty and doesn't outsource its foreign policy to whoever happens to be sitting in the White House. I'm honoured to be heading up to Arrernte country and to be on a panel with Auntie Sue Haseldine, Karina Lester and Rita Jabri Markwell. So come join us to close Pine Gap and call for that peaceful, independent Australia we all want, because that is exactly the conversation our country needs.

AUKUS is melting down in real time, and the public in Australia is waking up to this continental-scale sellout being run by the Labor government. One of the best indicators of how badly AUKUS is failing is the number of AUKUS spinners being sent out by Labor to try and defend it. Last week, we had a senator standing here and scolding the Greens for our anti-American ideology, and I'll deal with that in a bit.

That speech was all about the new Labor religion of AUKUS, where they have faith, prayers and unquestioning confidence that these wondrous underwater machines will be delivered by their high priests in the UK and the US. To get a sense of their near-religious zeal, take the quote from that same senator last week describing three second-hand Virginia class submarines delivered from our US benefactors as 'the boltcutters that will ensure we are never wrapped in chains'. You can almost hear the trumpets; you can see the robes and smell the incense—such simple faith.

If that's not enough, we have the Assistant Minister for Defence, Peter Khalil, penning a manifesto on AUKUS. There's one point I want to draw close attention to in that, where he points to the US and Israel's war on Iran in order to justify AUKUS. I'll quote:

The war in Iran has also demonstrated how a regional conflict can have global economic implications—

and, according to Assistant Minister Khalil, shows how we need AUKUS so that 'we can bring sufficient military, economic and diplomatic heft to meaningfully contribute to regional stability'. Well, here's a question for Assistant Minister Khalil and here's one he didn't ask: Who started that war with Iran? Who backed it in? Oh, that's right—Donald Trump started it, and his loyal followers in the Australian Labor Party were the first on the globe to back it in. So, in the twisted logic of Labor, we need AUKUS to protect us from wars like that with Iran that are started by the US, the key player in AUKUS. Who writes this stuff?

Well, that shouldn't be surprising from Assistant Minister Khalil. It wasn't long ago that WikiLeaks published official US cables that show he used to be a protected source for the US. I think it's a bad thing to have sitting Australian ministers who have a history as a protected source for a foreign government. Call it 'anti-American ideology', but I think Australia's Defence Force should be for the defence of Australia, not a stalking horse for the US and its military. When one in three children in Australia are going hungry at school, when there's just one rental in the entire country that someone on JobSeeker can afford and when the government is gutting the NDIS to pay for the military, I don't think we should be lining the pockets of Trump and US corporations, and, unlike Labor, I don't care what Trump thinks. I and my party, the Greens, care about the Australian people.

The Albanese Labor government is currently corrupting Nauru. That is what we are seeing in real time. The recent deal that Labor struck with Nauru will pour $2½ billion of Australian public money into a country with an annual GDP of just $160 million. So much of that money is being directed by Nauruan president David Adeang and his family and a close group of political backers that surround him in Nauru. Almost all of that cash flows from Australia to Nauru in secret, without the slightest effort from the Australian government to ensure that it's spent to help the people of Nauru. It will, by its nature, do untold damage to Nauruan society.

We have already uncovered in Senate estimates how the money is being sent from Australia and funnelled through a series of subcontractors and Nauruan corporations, many of which are controlled by Adeang and his son. We also uncovered that $31 million had already been taken out of the slush fund established by Australia, and so much of that has gone to Adeang controlled ministries, like $400,000 going to entertainment, $300,000 to undisclosed local donations and millions more poured into Nauru Airlines. I'm deeply concerned about the impact this will have not only on the people being sent by Australia to Nauru but also on Nauru and society as a whole.

My fear is that we are seeing Australian public money further distort and degrade Nauruan democracy and society. We have heard deeply disturbing reports of money from Australia being used to monopolise and control Nauruan politics and its economy. The Adeang government is using the deal with Australia as a reason to establish greater repression over the people of Nauru and deliver extraordinary paramilitary-style powers. I strongly suspect the Australian government will, instead of being outraged by this—by Australian funds being used to graft and oppress—run cover for this. They'll no doubt attack those who speak out against it, because Labor know the only way to run the cruel system they've set up with Nauru that is designed to brutalise refugees is to do it corruptly.

Politics in this place, the stultifying consensus amongst Labor, One Nation and the coalition to support this ugly deal with Nauru, means it largely goes unexamined, and Labor is very happy with that. They can spend billions punching down on refugees and use their Nauru deal to try and outflank One Nation on immigration and refugees. Time and time again in this place, I've seen One Nation blame migrants for everything, and, time and time again, Labor not only fails to take on that rhetoric but adopts it. When that happens year after year, this is what happens: Labor, One Nation and the coalition in some distorted competition to outdo each other on cruelty. That doesn't just break politics here; it breaks down decency in our neighbours.

I'm deeply concerned with the deteriorating condition of Hatam Yekta from Iran, who sought refuge in Australia and instead was sent to detention in PNG. He's currently 36 years old and living in Port Moresby in PNG, if you can describe it as living. He was previously held in the Australian funded and run detention centre on Manus Island. Hotham is Kurdish and fled Iran in fear in 2013, and, when he reached Australia, he was briefly held in detention by the Australian government before being sent to Manus Island, and that was when he began experiencing significant health issues. We know that the Manus Island detention centre was a pit of despair and torture, backed in by the Australian government, and, after escaping from there, he was then sent to live in harsh conditions, really brutal neglect, in Port Moresby. More than a decade on, Hatam still has no place to call home, and Australia has left him without needed protections or support in PNG in truly appalling conditions. As I speak, his family is concerned that his life is on the line. This is on the Australian government.

For a few short years, Labor supported medevac, until they flipped after pressure from the right of politics. If ever there was a case to get someone urgent medical care, this is the moment. Hatam and the 40 people still in PNG sent there by Australia more than a decade ago need permanent resettlement now.

Why are we asking PNG to deal with people that are Australia's responsibility? This is not how we treat a neighbour. This is not how we should treat any people. The Australian government has already taken away more than a decade of Hatam's life, and, if action is not taken now, I am fearful that Labor will steal the rest.

I rise tonight to express concern regarding a recent episode that was produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation titled 'Women of the Revolution' which profiled women in Iran who support the Islamic regime and its supreme leader. The episode platforms supporters of the ayatollah whom the ABC interviewed at the direction of the regime. The issue is the conditions under which this story was told and what those conditions made it impossible to report—and whether Australians were given a clear enough picture of either.

Just two lines into the program's online piece, the ABC makes the incredible claim that, for every Iranian woman that is fighting for freedom and dignity, there is one who supports the ayatollah and the strict observance of Shia Islam—50 per cent. The ABC must explain how they verified this conclusion. I'm telling you that many in my diaspora back in Melbourne will be asking the very same question—and around the country, for that matter. It is very hard to understand how anyone could be sure about the views of a people who are killed for speaking out based only on interviews permitted by that regime.

The report was rife with superficial detail, such as the description of the eyebrows of a woman instructing very young girls on combat tactics. Little information of substance was provided by the ABC, but the woman in question is pictured wearing military fatigues and holding an AK-47. The ABC's journalist did include some critical views by women who had protested, defied oppression and oppressive hijab laws and suffered under the brutal January crackdown, where tens of thousands of people were murdered. But those stories were shared only via a message, separate from the ABC's managed tours of Tehran. Unsurprisingly, elements of the report which do draw on the journalist's time in Tehran read as little more than a puff piece for the ayatollah, raising serious questions as to whether this conditional access provided any value at all.

In a liberal democracy, journalists are generally free to travel, to investigate and to speak with whomever they choose. But, in the Islamic Republic of Iran, that freedom simply does not exist. Access is controlled. Movement is controlled. Information is controlled. Journalists have been imprisoned, tortured and killed by the Iranian regime for reporting the simple truth. The ABC produced this episode under conditions that were imposed by that government. The ABC journalist was restricted to Tehran, and she relied upon a translator from a government authorised media company. When journalism is done under such conditions, editorial judgement is fundamentally compromised. When a government controls where a journalist, or journalists, can go, who translates their conversations and which media companies they may work with, it shapes not just what is reported but what can be reported.

Consider also the rallies themselves. Many experts on authoritarian regimes and states have long documented the use of a state mobilised crowd to project an image of popular support. Whether those attending these rallies did so freely out of genuine conviction or under other forms of pressure is precisely the kind of context that the viewers needed to know about, and that context was largely absent.

My concern is not that the ABC interviewed supporters of the regime. My concern is whether sufficient weight was given to this reporting having occurred within an environment that was carefully managed by an authoritarian government with a clear interest in shaping international perceptions. There was no analysis of the impact of the regime's restrictions on its reporting, and this rare access delivered little more than the transmission of a state approved narrative, I hate to say.

This is not, though, to be clear, criticism of the journalist, who was working under very difficult and tough conditions. But it is a call for greater editorial vigilance and greater transparency with audiences when reporting from environments where access, movement and information are tightly controlled by the state in question. The ABC occupies a very privileged position in Australian public life—one that I proudly support and would love to continue funding. But with that privilege does come a responsibility to ensure that audiences are not only informed about what they are shown but also given a clear understanding of what may be hidden from view. That is the standard of journalism worthy of a national broadcaster. It is a standard that, I think, all Australians have a right to expect.

I wanted to speak about another matter that has been in the media domain for some time, following on from a speech that I gave in the Senate with respect to the nuclear submarines and AUKUS. A constituent recently wrote to me with a very simple and sharp suggestion: perhaps there is some merit in better informing the electorate about why Australia has a submarine force, why Australians excel at being submariners and why nuclear power. And I thought that was a good question and an excellent idea, so tonight I want to draw on the work of one of Australia's most distinguished submariners, Commodore Bob Trotter, and I want to unpack some of the questions that were put to me by this constituent.

Most Australians would be surprised to learn that we have operated submarines since 1914. HMAS AE1 and AE2 completed the longest ocean voyage ever made by a submarine, sailing from Barrow, in the United Kingdom, all the way to Sydney. AE2 became the first submarine to penetrate the Dardanelles, entering the Sea of Marmara, in Türkiye, and opening the way for Allied submarines to attack Turkish supply lines from the rear. Very few Australians know these stories. Even fewer know that Fremantle was once the second-largest submarine base in the world and that submarines operating from there played a decisive role in defeating Japan, not through battle but by cutting off its fuel supply. So it is important to understand that submariners and submarines have been a very crucial and critical part of our military's DNA for over a century.

Australians have proven themselves as being outstanding at it. Admiral Colvin, who served as chief of naval staff, once said that Australians are 'never mere copyists'; we absorb knowledge and tradition and blend it with something strictly our own, and the result is unmistakeable. Our submariners have proved him right time and time again. Our Collins class submarines regularly exceed global performance standards in conditions more demanding than those faced by any other conventionally powered submarine force. In exercises, our boats have repeatedly outperformed far larger and better resourced allied vessels. Our submariners carry the motto of HMAS Platypus, 'Nothing Too Difficult'.

This brings me to the technical question that I am most often asked about: why nuclear powered, and what does that actually mean? Nuclear powered submarines are not nuclear armed. That is something that we need to be very clear and careful about in this conversation. The reactor propels the vessel; there are no nuclear weapons. What the reactor provides is freedom—freedom from the single greatest constraint facing every commander of a conventional submarine in the world. Every conventional submarine runs on a battery, and every command of such a boat watches that battery percentage constantly. To recharge, the submarine must rise to periscope depth and run its diesel generators, a process called snorting, which is a very noisy, vulnerable moment. Technological advances mean that the moment a submarine rises to snort, it can be detected via satellite. In the age of missiles and network systems, this is a truly unacceptable risk for our sailors and submariners.

A nuclear submarine has none of these constraints. It can remain submerged and undetected for the entire duration of deployment. This dramatically improves the chances of a mission's success, but, above all else, it avoids placing the men and women of the Royal Australian Navy in a danger that is unnecessary now that nuclear propulsion is available to us. For a nation whose area of maritime interests stretches thousands of kilometres across two oceans, endurance and freedom of navigation are not luxuries; they are the difference between a submarine force that can truly protect Australia and one that is fundamentally limited in where it can reach and how long it can stay.

Senators would be aware that I'm a proud volunteer with St John Ambulance. On 24 June 2026, we celebrated St John's Day around the world. It's a time of celebration and reflection. We recognise our volunteers and staff, reaffirm our commitment and rededicate ourselves to the service of our fellow citizens.

I came across the sermon of the Right Reverend David Morris, who gave the reflection in London. He started with the traditional Welsh proverb which translated means 'the strength of a nation is its knowledge'. He said:

It highlights how vitally important education, wisdom, and learning are within a society. It suggests that a country's true power does not come from physical size, wealth, or military might, but rather from the intellect, skills, and wisdom of its people.

He went on to say:

Its—

St John's—

purpose is not one of self-interest, but one motivated by the empowerment of others and the betterment of society—we are helping to build something greater than ourselves for the benefit of all. Whether it is through the calm and reassuring voice of a first responder when an individual has collapsed at an event, the first aid trainer who gave someone the skills to save a life, or the Cadet leader who helped a young person discover their worth, with confidence and a sense of purpose.

Those were beautiful words.

This brings me to an amazing program of St John's in Papua New Guinea. Malaria remains one of Papua New Guinea's most persistent health challenges, particularly affecting children and young people in urban and rural communities. Limited access to timely information and basic health knowledge often leads to delayed treatment and preventable complications. St John has addressed the problem with a program that inserts malaria treatment, or malaria response, into the First Aid in Schools program. It has trained over 13,000 students nationally and is empowering youth to effect change in the community. It has been incredibly well received, and I congratulate all those that have been involved in the program. Young people now have life-saving skills and essential health knowledge, and, once again, in Papua New Guinea and around the world, St John is living up to its motto, 'for the faith and in the service of humanity'.

Honourable senators, I note in the public square there has been some groundless criticism, or critique, of the chair of the Climate Change Authority, Mr Matt Kean. In my view, Mr Kean and his staff are doing excellent work at the authority and are instrumental in guiding our nation along the path of electrification and decarbonisation.

I expect the chair to travel the world because pollution does not respect boundaries, and we need international cooperation to reduce emissions and allow our planet to cool so that life can be sustained for the next generation. The position of chair is not full time and demands the appointment of someone of Mr Kean's calibre and industry knowledge. Conflicts always arise in entities such as the Climate Change Authority. It's not that they arise, but how they're managed, and, given the disclosure regime in place, there is every reason to have confidence in the authority and its operation. I thank the members of the authority, especially Mr Kean, for their vital work in securing Australia's future.

Tonight I discuss the heart of Australia's future: whether our higher education system is identifying and supporting excellence or whether elites have captured education to reward size, history and established reputation. How many Australians know that some of the highest rated higher education institutions in our country, in terms of student satisfaction, are not the sandstone Group of Eight universities or any public universities? They're smaller, independent universities, one of which, Alphacrucis University College, records student satisfaction rates of 90 per cent for overall educational experience when the national average sits in the mid-70s. The national regulator recognises Alphacrucis as delivering superior quality education and granted it unlimited self-accrediting authority, in part because students studying a postgraduate teaching degree at Alphacrucis graduated with a job 100 per cent of the time. Until recently, I didn't know that tertiary education institutions with this level of success existed. Australians need to know there are exemplary institutions leading our country, yet we've never heard of them.

We need to reassess how our tertiary institutions are supported, because, if we don't, we're reinforcing the status quo, and that's not working. Our universities have governance issues, financial issues, confidence issues and efficiency issues, yet there are higher education providers achieving excellent outcomes for students without the hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars in funding that our public universities receive, including grants and commercial activity. If institutions like Alphacrucis do not become well known, students who might have thrived in such a place will miss the opportunity. Students will be less satisfied with their education than they might otherwise have been. Students might be less likely to graduate into employment and less likely to leave their mark and their legacy on our society. Philanthropic foundations need to know that outside of the G8 there's great teaching and research, and it's worthy of support. Foundations need to be looking for opportunities to fund teaching and research institutions like Alphacrucis, because that's where our future may well be.

Government has set lofty aspirational targets for tertiary attainment through the Australian Universities Accord and has already acknowledged that public universities alone cannot achieve these targets. The system needs provider diversity and rewards for excellence. Our tertiary funding must move to a level playing field. We must allocate funds on actual performance, not past reputation. The government makes much noise of diversity, yet where's the funding for real diversity in higher education? The G8 sandstone universities would benefit from increased competition. We must do all that we can to remove barriers from lesser known institutions to enable them to compete. Part of that is to raise their profile, and part of that is to shift funds from the sandstone G8s to institutions already delivering.

One Nation is committed to greater scrutiny of tertiary institution funding and wants to know why funding favours established universities over new entries. I'm focusing on Alphacrucis, yet the issue is larger than one university college. It's about whether Australia rewards performance or prestige. These are not the same thing. Reward is about working for today's students. Prestige is about what's been done for students in days past. It's about whether new institutions with fresh ideas are given the opportunity to compete or whether the system remains tilted towards those who have always held advantage.

Alphacrucis University College is a test case, an institution achieving outstanding student satisfaction, national recognition for quality and a growing reputation for excellence, yet most Australians have never heard of it. If we're serious about innovation, competition and value for taxpayers, then institutions should be judged on what they actually deliver, not on how old they are, how large they are or how well connected they are. Australia's future depends upon identifying excellence wherever it's found and giving it the opportunity to flourish. The Australian people deserve a higher education system that rewards achievement, encourages competition and invests in results. That's beneficial for students, for taxpayers and for Australia's future.

Tonight I address media misrepresentation of One Nation's policy to review some drugs on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the PBS. The New England Times newspaper flagrantly lied to readers in a story just published last Saturday, giving the false impression that One Nation will be removing medications from the PBS. Author RK Crosby's hit piece was titled 'Concern brewing as buried Hanson policy threatens affordable medicines'. Only last week, I included the PBS in a list of social welfare institutions that One Nation would defend in government—not tolerate or be afraid to touch but defend. This pathetic piece of journalism shows the lack of research the New England Times conducted for its story. I understand that, like many regional newspapers, the New England Times is short of staff. This leads them to accept a hit piece that Better Access Australia most likely prepared. It's quoted extensively, and its mission statement is to transfer as much taxpayer money as it can into big pharma's pockets.

One phone call would have cleared this up. The story stems from a two-line election policy promise in 2025 which said One Nation will review all medications fast-tracked during COVID to ensure safety and efficacy have been proven. It's perfectly sensible and responsible. In fact, most of the drugs that were given emergency use authorisation, officially known as the provisional use pathway, have already been withdrawn or had their use reduced to insignificance. Only three remain of interest to One Nation, and these are the drugs we will review: Paxlovid; remdesivir, or 'Run—death is near'; and molnupiravir. With each of these, there are alternatives which anecdotally carry a lower cost and better safety and efficacy outcomes. No Australian will be left without medication—not one Australian. This is actually a small promise that the pharmaceutical lobby has deliberately taken out of context. During COVID, big pharma benefited to the tune of billions of dollars and is terrified of any scrutiny.

To open their story, RK Crosby offered a vignette suggesting One Nation will remove asthma medication from the PBS—an outright lie; a fabrication, pure and simple. One Nation threatening affordable medicines is an outright lie. One Nation will not change PBS charges nor change the amounts government pays under the existing arrangements. Contracts signed will be honoured. If we start tearing up legally-binding contracts, confidence in government will never recover. We're not going to tear up contracts. Negotiate? Yes. Tear up? No. For clarity, no PBS contracts are in our sights.

The COVID vaccines will be looked at in our terms of reference for a royal commission, although these were not supplied through the PBS. Perhaps the pharmaceutical industry didn't want to mention their COVID products and instead chose to lie about our PBS policy. For the record, here's the philosophy behind our policy. As I said last week in the Senate, One Nation supports the PBS for the same reason we support Medicare. Society benefits when our sick are healed quickly and returned to looking after themselves. For those with permanent conditions, the basic laws of humanity require society to care for those people with love and respect. The financial cost of medication and related devices should not detract from this care.

Last week, Minister Butler made similar comments. On this, we're in alignment. Over the last 40 years, the PBS has balanced prices paid to pharmaceutical companies against product benefits. Sometimes negotiation has delayed drugs, and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee displayed a sensible balance, making our PBS the envy of the world. We will defend the process of negotiating drug prices to ensure no compromise on the principles that have informed the PBS for 40 years.

I'll discuss two more policies. One Nation will introduce legislation in the next parliament for the right to try. This means that, if a person is being treated for an illness the outcome of which could be death and all existing measures have failed, the patient has a right to request from their doctor, or a doctor has a right to suggest, a drug not listed for that condition. It may be an alternative therapy or an unlisted drug. To put this simply, the patient has nothing to lose and everything to gain. This may expand the market for existing pharmaceutical products—who knows? That's the point. It's a free clinical trial that a patient has voluntarily entered into, reducing drug prices and saving lives.

The other policy is to introduce an eight-year wait for new arrivals to access the PBS, unless you're a citizen or a permanent resident. Under One Nation, there'll be an eight-year wait for citizenship and for permanent residence. This will not be backdated. You can't be unmade as citizen. This will not deny medical care for new arrivals, who will pay for that care themselves. Anyone on prescription medication can vote One Nation without fear of losing access to or paying more for their medication. I trust that's clear.

Tonight I rise to acknowledge a significant milestone in the life of Western Australia's Filipino community: the 40th anniversary of the Filipino Australian Club of Perth. For four decades, the club has served as a cornerstone of community life, bringing together generations of Filipino Australians, while strengthening the cultural, social and economic bonds between Australia and the Philippines. Established in 1986, the Perth Filipino Australian club was founded on a simple but enduring vision: to provide a place where Filipino migrants and their families could gather, celebrate their heritage, support one another and build a strong future in their adopted home. Forty years later, that vision continues to thrive.

The club has played a vital role in preserving and promoting Filipino culture, through community events, festivals, language, music, dance and the celebration of important national and cultural occasions. It has helped new arrivals settle into life in Australia, fostered lifelong friendships and provided a welcoming environment for countless families. Importantly, the club has also contributed to the broader Western Australian community by encouraging cultural understanding, inclusion and community participation.

The Filipino community is one of the fastest-growing and most vibrant of the multicultural communities in Australia and in Western Australia. Across WA, Filipino Australians make an enormous contribution in fields as diverse as health care, education, small business, mining, hospitality, aged care and public service. Their contribution extends well beyond the workplace. Filipino Australians enrich our communities through their strong commitment to family, faith, volunteerism, civic engagement and those Australian values that unite us.

Milestones such as this provide an opportunity not only to celebrate an organisation's achievements, but also to recognise the people whose dedication made them possible. Generations of volunteers, community members, community leaders and supporters have invested countless hours to ensure the club's success and longevity.

I'd like to acknowledge one particular supporter of the Filipino community in Western Australia, and that is one Western Australian icon known to every Western Australian. His name is Mr John Hughes, and he and his wife have been tireless supporters of the Filipino community across Western Australia. For those of us from Western Australia, you'll understand what I'm about to say: just over the Causeway, on Shepperton Road, Victoria Park.

Hear, hear!

Thank you, Senator Brockman.

On behalf of the Senate, I congratulate the Perth Filipino Australian club on reaching its 40th anniversary. I wish the club, its members and the wider Filipino Australian community every success for the future and thank them for their outstanding contribution to the social, cultural and economic fabric of a wonderful state. Of course, that state is the state of Western Australia—a wonderful place to live, to grow up and to raise your family, and an important contributor to our national success.

Tonight I rise also to acknowledge a significant event that I was honoured to attend recently in Perth: the 61st anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Vietnam armed forces. As a Western Australian senator and as the son of a Vietnam veteran, it was a privilege to join members of the Republic of Vietnam veterans association of Western Australia and the Vietnamese Services RSL Sub-branch for a commemorative dinner, recognising the service and sacrifice of those who fought to defend South Vietnam, and, importantly, to express gratitude to the allied forces who stood alongside them.

The evening was a powerful reminder of the deep and enduring ties between Australia and the Vietnamese Australian community. It honoured the men and women of the Republic of Vietnam armed forces who fought for freedom, national sovereignty and self-determination.

Importantly, it also recognised the service of more than 60,000 Australians who served in Vietnam between 1962 and 1973. One of them was my father. More than 5,000 Australians lost their lives, and thousands more returned home wounded, both physically and emotionally. Sadly, many Vietnam veterans returned to a nation that did not fully understand their sacrifice or their service. Unlike previous generations of service men and women, they were met with indifference and, in some cases, hostility. They often found themselves excluded from the recognition and support afforded to earlier veterans. That experience was shared by many former members of the Republic of Vietnam Military Forces who later chose to make Australia their home and who have indeed made a significant and enduring contribution to their new home, Australia.

The establishment of the Vietnamese Services RSL Sub-Branch provided a long-overdue home within Western Australia's veteran community for former South Vietnamese service men and women and their families, ensuring their service and their sacrifices would be recognised and preserved for future generations. The sub-branch, together with the Republic of Vietnam Veterans Association of Western Australia, performs invaluable work preserving the history of those who fought alongside Australian forces and strengthening the bonds between veterans of both nations.

Importantly, the evening also celebrated the remarkable contribution Vietnamese Australians have made to Western Australia and our nation for over 50 years. Many arrived as refugees seeking freedom and opportunity and fleeing repression. Through hard work, resilience and determination, they have built thriving communities and enriched every aspect of Australian life. I'm proud to be an Australian who honours that contribution and is happy to make sure that Australia is a safe place for other people fleeing persecution throughout the world. I commend all those involved in organising this important event and thank them for ensuring that the stories of service, sacrifice and freedom continue to be passed on to future generations. Lest we forget.

My Nana passed away last month at the age of 106. For the first time since I started this job, I took leave from the Senate so that I could go to New Zealand and say goodbye to her. I sat by her bedside and I read out the letters that my children had written to her, but, when it came to my turn, I just didn't know what to say.

Not long after Petty Officer Nancy Moore peacefully took her last breath, surrounded by her family, it dawned upon us that we needed to notify the New Zealand Chief of Navy, because Nana wasn't just our matriarch; she was a titan of New Zealand. During World War II, Nana was one of the first people to sign up for the Women's Royal New Zealand Navy Service, known as the Wrens. Her serial number was 11. As a signaller, Nana was tasked with relaying coded messages, providing vital links between ships at sea and senior Allied commanders. She told the New Zealand Defence Force that, when relaying these important messages between allies, you would be scared of making a mistake, because the mission was bigger than the enlisted members. It was a fight for freedom and democracy and the ability for us Anzacs to raise our flags for generations to come. It was a fight for survival.

Nana served until a few years after the end of the war and then married Fleet Air Arm pilot John Moore and settled in Masterton, where she raised her four children on a farm. After Gramp died, Nana lived alone into her early hundreds before finally moving into assisted living at the age of 102. Would you believe that at that time, when Nana was 102 years old, the New Zealand health department assessed her for aged-care living? The official spent two hours assessing Nana, moving through a checklist on an iPad, which Nan had to show him how to use, and he was there for so long that Nana had to make him some lunch. Reaching the end of the checklist, he stood up and said, 'Well, Pat, I can't see any reason why you should go into aged care,' to which Nana replied: 'Well, I'm 102 years old dear. What else does one have to do?'

More than 80 years after the war, Nana's Navy training never left her. There was an occasion when Nan popped into a friend's room at the aged-care home, only to discover that her friend had fallen. Nana reached for the nurse alert button, but she didn't press it just once. She pressed it many times. It was a combination of short presses and long presses. The nurses probably arrived expecting to find a panicked resident that needed help. Instead, they found a cool, calm and collected Navy veteran with her friend, laughing when she realised that nurses these days probably don't get taught Morse code.

I took leave from this place so that I could say goodbye, and I'm so thankful that I got there in time. I want to take a moment to reflect on the impact that she has had on me. We often hear people in this place talk about what they believe in and what they want to do, but I just want to talk a little bit about why. Petty Officer Moore was one of the first to enlist and last to leave. She discharged after the war, in 1946, but stayed part of the Navy family. Even when all the friends she served with had passed, she would be visited by a senior contingent of naval officers every year on her birthday. They would arrive in their crisp uniforms to show their respect and would end up staying for lunch and swapping war stories with Nana. A female commodore from the New Zealand Navy who delivered the only eulogy at Nana's funeral described Nana as a trailblazer who made it just a little easier for every woman who followed behind her because she didn't just stop after service; she continued to work and built a career long after the war ended.

The support and well wishes that have come from the Navy have been so appreciated by the family. I particularly want to thank the New Zealand Chief of Navy, Rear Admiral Garin Golding; your predecessor, Rear Admiral David Proctor; and our Chief of Navy, Vice Admiral Mark Hammond, who is our soon-to-be-appointed Chief of the Defence Force. Congratulations, Admiral. The spirit of the Anzac is well and truly alive.

The men and women that sign up to serve their country—in your armed forces—make a sacred covenant to put their country ahead of themselves and their families. Whether you're a new digger being posted to a place you've never heard of or a battle hardened operator manning a gun in a place where insurgents hide behind civilians, the representatives in this building have an obligation to protect you so that you can protect us. To the men and women who have served their country and now feel like their country has forgotten them, I want you to know that we see you. We can do better and we will do better. We must do better.

The more soldiers, sailors, aviators and veterans that I meet, the more I come to understand that your culture goes to the heart of what you do and contributes something to our force elements that can't be quantified with a dollar value. As anyone who has ever worked in an office would know, when you leave, your last day is usually a morning tea to say thank you and, later on, maybe you'll have a couple of beers with your colleagues—the ones you actually like—right after you hand in your swipe card. Compare that to the senior officers who visited my Nana on her birthday who were not even born when she discharged. That is why Defence members talk about colleagues as their family, not just their friends or colleagues. It would be a mistake to think that the history and culture attached to the places where our people serve only has value as some kind of museum exhibit. The plan to sell off bases like Victoria Barracks Sydney and move Defence members into an office block is an attack on Defence culture. It will erode the cultural ties and make the hardest and most thankless jobs even harder. It will undermine our Defence capability.

To anyone currently serving and anyone who has served, I am doing everything I can to stop this and protect your culture. Nana, your life exemplified service, courage and humility. I hope I can make you proud. Petty Officer Moore, you stand relieved. We have the watch.

Thank you, Senator Collins; that was beautiful.

Now, Vicki Derderian was an Australian woman of extraordinary faith, courage and conviction. She was a devoted mother of two, a loving wife and a woman whose life was deeply grounded in her belief in God. Her faith was not something she simply spoke about; it shaped every decision that she made, every hardship she endured, every battle that she faced. Vicki believed wholeheartedly that her life, her struggles and her future were in God's hands, and she believed that until her very final days.

A heart transplant had always been on the cards for Vicki. She, after all, had lived for years with a very serious heart condition, carrying the burden of illness with quiet dignity and remarkable strength. Now, despite grave suffering, uncertainty and hardship Vicki did not complain. Those closest to her often said that others complained more often in a single day than what she did throughout her entire ordeal.

In 2021, because of her heart condition, Vicki was granted a medical exemption from the novel COVID-19 injection by her doctor. The exemption was in line with ATAGI guidelines. These injections are well known for their potential adverse impacts, like myocarditis and pericarditis, on heart health. An adverse reaction for Vicki could have been fatal. Yet, despite holding a valid medical exemption, Vicki was denied any chance of receiving a heart transplant in Australia by our medical bureaucracy. She was, in my opinion and in her family's opinion, discriminated against. She was shut out. She was told, in effect, that her conscience, her medical exemption and her circumstances were not enough.

But did she respond with bitterness? No. She responded instead with resolve. She challenged the decision, alleging discrimination, in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal. She fought respectfully and with dignity. During the proceedings, she and her family believed that their case was progressing favourably. But then Vicki was told that even if she were successful, she would still not be eligible for a heart transplant. They said that she was medically unfit for transplantation. Although she was weakened by illness, Vicki found her strength to stand before powerful institutions and say, 'This is wrong.' She did not cower before authority, but neither did she abandon grace, because her belief in doing the right thing never faltered.

With no pathway left in Australia, Vicki was forced to seek treatment overseas. Even then she faced further obstacles. Approvals were needed from the treating hospital and the airline to travel. Initially, these approvals appeared to be straightforward. However, according to her family, once it became known that Vicki was travelling overseas to seek a second medical opinion the process became even more difficult.

I helped Vicki as much as I could. I contacted Mark Butler, the federal health minister. I raised her plight right here in the Australian Senate. I called for compassion, common sense and basic human decency. Those attempts, however, fell on deaf ears. But the Australian people heard Vicki. They rallied behind her. Ordinary Aussies donated to her cause. They prayed for her. They supported her. They saw in her not controversy but a woman literally fighting for her life.

Despite these many challenges, Vicki and her family persevered. When she arrived overseas, an independent medical team conducted a comprehensive medical assessment and reviewed her results. Their conclusion was very different from what she had been told here in Australia. They determined that Vicki was, in fact, eligible for a heart transplant and she was subsequently placed on a transplant waiting list. This gave Vicki something that the Australian health bureaucracy denied her: hope.

During this period were discussions about whether assistance from Australian officials might help expedite the process. Vicki's family sought support from the Australian consulate and from members of the Australian government. The consular representative visited Vicki in hospital, witnessed firsthand her condition and, of course, expressed sympathy for what she was enduring. Efforts were also made to seek assistance through government channels, but, ultimately, no meaningful intervention occurred.

So Vicki waited for more than a year at great personal expense. She was separated from her home, separated from her family and separated from the country that she loved. And, through it all, her faith sustained her. Vicki believed that, whatever the outcome, God's will would ultimately prevail. Eventually, Vicki did receive her heart transplant, and, for a time, there were signs of recovery, there was hope, and there was relief. There was a possibility of returning to a life no longer dominated by uncertainty, waiting and, sadly, institutional indifference. But, sadly, complications followed, and earlier this year Vicki passed away.

The Australian health bureaucracy did nothing to prevent her death. Vicki and her family suffered needlessly. Even after her death, the indignity continued. Upon her return to Australia, a certificate was requested by the Australian government confirming that Vicki did not have COVID-19 before her remains could be brought back into the country, despite the fact that she had already passed away. For her family, this was a painful reminder of a system that she had been forced to fight.

But Vicki Derderian should not be remembered merely for what was done to her. She should be remembered for who she was: a person of strong character who trusted life completely to God and remained faithful to her final day. She was a woman of integrity, a woman of courage, a woman who loved her family deeply, a woman who endured suffering without complaint and a woman who stood by her beliefs when it would have been easier to surrender.

I was proud to call Vicki a friend—very proud. Now may we all remember Vicki as a faithful wife, a loving mother and a courageous Australian woman who placed her trust in God and refused to abandon her conscience. My sincere condolences to Vicki's husband, John, her children, her extended family and all her friends. May Vicki's story never be forgotten, and may no family ever have to endure a similar ordeal. God bless you, and thank you.

First of all, I also thank Senator Collins for her contribution earlier. It was a wonderful thing you shared with us all, so I thank you.

Rushy Lagoon is a big agricultural property in Tasmania; in fact, it's one of the biggest, at 22,000 hectares. In the recent past, it's run 55,000 sheep and 8½ thousand cattle. This is a big agricultural enterprise that helps feed Australia and helps feed the world. I along with a number of my colleagues led by Rick Wilson, the member for O'Connor, wrote to Treasurer Jim Chalmers and to Minister Bowen and Minister Collins asking them to make sure that the purchase of this property is being examined with the highest level of scrutiny possible. You have an international fund management company seeking to purchase this remarkable Australian property and use it not for food production but for trees.

Hovering in the background is the question over where the funding is coming from, because there are at this stage unconfirmed question marks about whether the Clean Energy Finance Corporation is actually providing cheap government funding to a foreign buyer of a 22,000 hectare Australian food producing enterprise to turn it into a carbon farm. Losing that land, out of production and into trees, in itself would be questionable, though I'm a believer in markets; the market should prevail. However, doing it through an international company with Australian government dollars, with cheap finance behind it, is an absolute disgrace if it's true.

Australia helps feed the world. We produce around three times the amount of food we consume in this country. It is through significant agricultural enterprises like this one, and like so many in my home state of WA, that we produce the food that feeds Australia and the world. In my home state we're hearing stories from high-rainfall areas, not marginal country, of land being purchased and locked up, taken out of food production. Just this week, the minister who sold out the sheep industry for a few preferences from the Animal Justice Party set up a new scheme to buy land for conservation—again using government dollars to artificially inflate the price of farmland, taking it out of the reach of Australian farmers, locking it up and taking it out of food production. This is not the path forward for Australia.

Senate adjourned at 20:51