The SPEAKER ( Hon. Tony Smith ) took the chair at 09:30, made an acknowledgement of country and read prayers.
BUSINESS
Leave of Absence
Mr BURKE (Watson—Manager of Opposition Business) (09:31): It is with a fair degree of emotion that I move:
That leave of absence for 25 and 26 October 2017 be given to Ms Burney, for personal reasons
Members across the chamber will be aware of the circumstances that have hit Linda overnight. In her statement that she has put out, Linda Burney has asked for privacy and has said that she will speak when she is able to. I think we all need to respect that it's for Linda to make those statements when she is ready.
I would simply say—and I don't think it's presumptuous of me to speak on behalf of the whole House—that Linda is a much loved and deeply respected member of this place and that, for all of us, all of our thoughts are with her and her family—and, for those of us who pray, all of our prayers are with her—at a time that could not be more difficult.
I thank the House and wish all our thoughts and love to Linda Burney.
Mr PYNE (Sturt—Leader of the House and Minister for Defence Industry) (09:33): On behalf of the government, I'd like to congratulate the Manager of Opposition Business for making that statement and getting through it as well as he did and, also on behalf of the government, our deepest condolences go to Linda Burney and her wider family for the most unimaginable tragedy that could occur to anyone with children and close ones.
Of course we'll do everything in our power on our side of the House to make this time as reasonable as possible for Linda and for the members of the Labor Party, who must be feeling very deeply and keenly the tragedy that's befallen one of their members.
The SPEAKER: The Manager of Opposition Business and the Leader of the House have eloquently spoken on behalf of the whole House.
Question agreed to.
COMMITTEES
Selection Committee
Report
The SPEAKER (09:34): I present report No. 19 of the Selection Committee relating to the consideration of committee and delegation business and private member's business on Monday, 27 November 2017. The report will be printed in the Hansard for today and the committee's determinations will appear on tomorrow's Notice Paper. Copies of the report have been placed on the table.
The report read as follows—
Report relating to the consideration of committee and delegation business and of private Members' business
1. The committee met in private session on Tuesday, 24 October 2017.
2. The Committee deliberated on items of committee and delegation business that had been notified, private Members' business items listed on the Notice Paper and notices lodged on Tuesday, 24 October 2017, and determined the order of precedence and times on Monday, 27 November 2017, as follows:
Items for House of Representatives Chamber (10.10 am to 12 noon)
COMMITTEE AND DELEGATION BUSINESS
Presentation and statements
1 Publications Committee:
Inquiry into the printing standards for documents presented to Parliament: 2017 Report
The Committee determined that statements on the report may be made—all statements to conclude by 10.20 am
Speech time limits—
Mr Christensen—5 minutes.
Next Member speaking—5 minutes.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 2 x 5 mins]
PRIVATE MEMBERS ' BUSINESS
Notices
1 MR BANDT: To present a Bill for an Act to amend the Fair Work Act 2009, and for related purposes. (Fair Work Amendment (Improving National Employment Standards) Bill 2017)
(Notice given 24 October 2017.)
Presenter may speak to the second reading for a period not exceeding 10 minutes—pursuant to standing order 41. Debate must be adjourned pursuant to standing order 142.
2 MS L. M. CHESTERS: To move:
That this House:
(1) notes that:
(a) National Asbestos Awareness Week is 27 November to 1 December;
(b) as part of this year's events, the Australian Government Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency (Agency) is holding the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Summit (Summit) in Canberra;
(c) this year's Summit will focus on debate on Australia's next National Strategic Plan to eliminate asbestos nationwide;
(d) the Agency has raised concerns over workplace safety following the 100 workers who were exposed to asbestos while working on the Sydney Opera House renovation in July 2017;
(e) it is unclear how many further building sites across Australia contain asbestos or how many workers are unknowingly exposed to asbestos each day; and
(f) the Agency advised the Senate Economics References Committee's inquiry into non-conforming building products that building products containing asbestos are being imported to Australia contrary to Australian law;
(2) acknowledges that:
(a) Australia has one of the highest rates of asbestos related deaths and injury in the world, with 33,000 people already having lost their lives to asbestos;
(b) around 700 Australians die each year from asbestos related diseases, and without proper management experts worry that tens of thousands of Australians could be diagnosed with asbestos related diseases in the coming decades; and
(c) experts believe that 20,000 to 25,000 Australians will die from asbestos or asbestos related illnesses before the end of this century;
(3) condemns the Government's inaction and silence on the dangers of asbestos, despite warnings provided to the Senate inquiry; and
(4) calls on the Government to:
(a) give greater importance to stopping asbestos importers at the border and immediately increase the penalties for illegal asbestos contamination on Australian building sites; and
(b) create greater transparency and accountability between the Australian Border Force and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in their dealings with asbestos related importations.
(Notice given 24 October 2017.)
Time allotted—45 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Ms L. M. Chesters—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 9 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
3 MR VAN MANEN: To move:
That this House:
(1) acknowledges the importance of the trade and economic relationship between Australia and Japan;
(2) welcomes the sixty year anniversary since the signing of the Australia-Japan Agreement on Commerce;
(3) notes the significant opportunities offered by the Japan-Australia Economic Partnership Agreement for Australian exporters;
(4) recognises and celebrates the significant role of Japanese investment in Australia's economy, noting that this investment is creating and supporting Australian jobs;
(5) notes the ongoing cooperation and commitment between Australia and Japan to open markets and a strong, rules-based global trading system; and
(6) encourages the Australian Government to continue its economic cooperation with Japan to the mutual benefit of both countries, to create jobs and support prosperity in both our nations.
(Notice given 24 October 2017.)
Time allotted—remaining private Members ' business time prior to 12 noon
Speech time limits—
Mr van Manen—10 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 1 x 10 mins + 7 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
Items for Federation Chamber (11 am to 1.30 pm)
PRIVATE MEMBERS ' BUSINESS
Notices
1 MS VAMVAKINOU: To move:
That this House:
(1) notes that:
(a) Amnesty International has evidence that hundreds of Rohingya women, men and children have been killed since the escalation of a violent assault in Northern Arakan/Rakhine State, Myanmar, since 25 August 2017;
(b) the United Nations has estimated that since August 2017, over 589,000 Rohingyas have been forced to flee to refugee camps in Bangladesh;
(c) there are at least another 20,000 Rohingyas being detained at the borders;
(d) the United Nations Human Rights Council has witnessed accounts and heard testimonies of the Myanmar security force setting villages on fire and injuring, torturing, raping, killing and executing innocent victims;
(e) 214 villages have been destroyed through fire and will be taken over by the Myanmar Government because burnt land becomes government-managed land;
(f) the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein, has called these government attacks 'a textbook example of ethnic cleansing';
(g) approximately 600,000 people are still deadlocked inside Rakhine State with limited access to food, medical care or humanitarian assistance;
(h) despite the history of the Rohingya Muslims in the Rakhine region extending back the post-colonial era, this community has been denied citizenship and most basic government services under since 1982; and
(i) the treatment of Rohingya Muslims in the Rakhine region is an issue that deeply concerns the Australian community; and
(2) urges:
(a) the Government of Myanmar to:
(i) recommit to the pursuit of peace and national reconciliation; and
(ii) allow access to all parts of Rakhine State to allow for the provision of humanitarian aid;
(b) the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs to:
(i) do everything in her power to help alleviate the suffering in Rakhine State;
(ii) lead the push for a strong United Nations General Assembly Resolution on the violence in Rakhine State, and
(iii) work to establish an independent United Nations investigation into human rights abuses in Myanmar; and
(c) the Australian Government to:
(i) support unimpeded humanitarian access to the Rohingya population;
(ii) maintain pressure on the Myanmar Government, particularly the military and security forces, by condemning the persecution, attacks, killings and human rights abuses of the Rohingyas; and
(iii) stand up for the moderate voices in Myanmar which are being widely suppressed by the threat of persecution by the Myanmar military.
(Notice given 23 October 2017.)
Time allotted—40 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Ms Vamvakinou—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 8 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
2 MR WALLACE: To move:
That this House:
(1) welcomes the Government's action to make our cities better places to live in and do business through ongoing City Deal developments in Townsville, Launceston, Western Sydney and Darwin;
(2) notes that:
(a) City Deals:
(i) bring together all three levels of Government to develop collective plans for growth with a focus on jobs, housing, transport and the environment; and
(ii) are already delivering firm commitments and real benefits for communities, including the $250 million North Queensland Stadium, the Townsville Eastern Access Rail Corridor, movement of the University of Tasmania's main campus and the rejuvenation of the CBD in Launceston;
(b) further benefits through City Deals are under development, including the Western Sydney Housing Package and the redevelopment of Paterson Barracks in Launceston;
(3) commends the Government for continuing to encourage and pursue new City Deals with other regional cities around Australia, including areas such as the Sunshine Coast; and
(4) encourages state and territory governments and local councils in regional cities, especially on the Sunshine Coast, to work closely with their local Members of Parliament and the Assistant Minister for Cities and Digital Transformation to develop City Deals for their eligible communities.
(Notice given 17 October 2017.)
Time allotted—40 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Mr Wallace—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 8 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
3 MS SHARKIE: To move:
That this House:
(1) notes that:
(a) plastic bags are detrimental to the environment;
(b) Australians use an estimated 5 billion plastic bags a year, which represents over 20 million bags used every day;
(c) research has indicated that as of 2013, approximately 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic have been floating in our world's oceans—these are mostly microplastics of less than 5 millimetres in size and are regularly eaten by marine life, through which they enter the global food chain and are consumed by humans;
(d) thousands of marine mammals and seabirds die every year around the world as a result of plastic litter;
(e) plastic bags are particularly bad for the environment because they take from between 20 and 1,000 years to biodegrade and can travel long distances via air and water;
(f) South Australia led the nation with the phasing out of lightweight non-biodegradable plastic shopping bags, which state legislation defines as a carry bag, the body of which comprises (in whole or in part) polyethylene with a thickness of less than 35 microns and includes handles;
(g) South Australia's ban on plastic shopping bags came into force on 4 May 2009; and
(h) the South Australian Environmental Protection Authority estimates that the state's ban on plastic shopping bags has resulted in almost 400 million fewer plastic bags in that state each year; and
(2) calls on the:
(a) state governments yet to enact a ban on lightweight non-biodegradable plastic shopping bags to do so with speed and urgency; and
(b) Australian Government to work with the state Governments to implement a national ban on lightweight non-biodegradable plastic shopping bags by the end of 2018.
(Notice given 17 October 2017.)
Time allotted—40 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Ms Sharkie—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 8 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
4 MR COULTON: To move:
That this House:
(1) acknowledges the important contribution that the Export Finance and Insurance Corporation (Efic) makes to supporting Australian exporters;
(2) notes the recent passage of the Insurance Corporation Amendment (Support for Commonwealth Entities) Bill 2016 through the Parliament with bipartisan support, helping Efic keep pace with Australia's changing exports; and
(3) commends the Government for issuing a new Statement of Expectations for Efic, re-enabling it to support onshore resource projects, and related infrastructure.
(Notice given 17 October 2017.)
Time allotted—remaining private Members ' business time prior to 1.30 pm
Speech time limits—
Mr Coulton—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 6 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
Items for Federation Chamber (4.45 pm to 7.30 pm)
PRIVATE MEMBERS ' BUSINESS
Notices — continued
5 MR ALBANESE: To move:
That this House:
(1) declares:
(a) its support for the vital work performed each and every day by the highly trained professionals providing aviation rescue and fire fighting (ARFF) services to ensure the safety of the flying public;
(b) that the ARFF service is particularly important to the safe operation of airports in regional Australia where it also responds to non-aviation emergencies within its local communities; and
(c) that the presence of the ARFF service is key to safeguarding the safety and security at major metropolitan and regional airports around the country, which is critical for international and domestic tourism; and
(2) calls on the Government to reject any proposal to increase the threshold for the provision of ARFF services at airports from the existing 350,000 passenger movements annually, noting that this would preclude the establishment of these services at Proserpine Whitsunday Coast Airport and lead to the removal of these services from the following regional communities: Ballina; Coffs Harbour; Ayres Rock; Gladstone; Hamilton Island; Broome; Karratha; Newman; and Port Hedland.
(Notice given 19 October 2017.)
Time allotted—40 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Mr Albanese—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 8 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
6 MR VAN MANEN: To move:
That this House:
(1) recognises positive effect of the Government's measures to assist more hard working Australians to:
(a) earn more through the tax system, in particular by:
(i) legislating tax cuts for middle income earners to ensure they are not pushed into the second highest tax bracket;
(ii) introducing to Parliament the Enterprise Tax Plan, which will extend small business tax concessions to businesses up to $10 million from the outdated $2 million threshold; and
(iii) supporting employers to invest more, provide more hours and increase wages through a more competitive international tax rate;
(b) save more for their retirement through increased flexibility in the superannuation system, in particular by:
(i) abolishing the so called '10 per cent rule', which prevents anyone earning more than 10 per cent of their income from salary and wages from claiming a deduction for personal superannuation contributions; and
(ii) introducing catch up concessional contributions to provide assistance to those—particularly women—who have interrupted work patterns, whether to raise children, look after elderly parents, or seek to boost their retirement savings just before retirement; and
(2) notes with deep concern that the Opposition:
(a) refuses to support tax relief for small business, while at the same time advocating tax cuts for foreign workers;
(b) seeks to abolish measures to improve the retirement savings of hard working Australians, particularly those on low incomes and with interrupted work patterns; and
(c) has no plan for jobs and growth, despite having previously advocated for a more competitive tax rate for employers.
(Notice given 17 October 2017.)
Time allotted—30 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Mr van Manen—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 6 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
7 MS CLAYDON: To move:
That this House:
(1) notes that:
(a) one in three Australian women have experienced physical violence since the age of 15; and
(b) two thirds of women who experience violence are in paid employment;
(2) recognises that:
(a) family violence isolates and excludes its victims and disconnects people from community, work, education, friends and family;
(b) the trauma experienced by an employee facing family violence will be lessened if they have the support of an understanding and accommodating employer that offers domestic and family violence leave; and
(c) access to a leave specifically allocated for situations of domestic and family violence protects employees from discrimination and allows them to maintain stable employment which increases their likelihood of leaving violent relationships;
(3) commends the many private companies that already provide domestic and family violence leave, including Telstra, Virgin, Qantas, the National Australia Bank, to more than one million Australian workers;
(4) condemns the Government for its public service bargaining policy which has resulted in the removal of domestic and family violence leave provisions in some public service enterprise agreements; and
(5) calls on the Government to amend the National Employment Standards to include domestic and family violence leave as a universal workplace right.
(Notice given 17 October 2017.)
Time allotted—40 minutes.
Speech time limits—
Ms Claydon—5 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 8 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
8 MR ZIMMERMAN: To move:
That this House:
(1) notes the release on 5 October 2017 of the Consular State of Play 2016-17 (State of Play), which provides an overview of the Government's provision of consular assistance to Australians in the last financial year;
(2) acknowledges the hard work and dedication of Australian consular officials who have provided high-quality assistance to Australians in distress in 12,454 cases during 2016-17;
(3) notes with concern that a significant number of Australian travellers are travelling overseas without insurance;
(4) reiterates the Minister for Foreign Affairs' remarks in launching the State of Play that if travellers cannot afford travel insurance, they cannot afford to travel;
(5) acknowledges that the Australian Government will provide consular assistance where possible, while noting there are limits to what it can do to assist Australians in trouble overseas; and
(6) calls on Australians to:
(a) draw on resources such as Australian Government Smartraveller advice to inform themselves about their destination; and
(b) purchase insurance appropriate to their activities and circumstances.
(Notice given 17 October 2017.)
Time allotted—remaining private Members ' business time prior to 7.30 pm
Speech time limits—
Mr Zimmerman—10 minutes.
Other Members—5 minutes. each.
[Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 1 x 10 mins + 9 x 5 mins]
The Committee determined that consideration of this should continue on a future day.
BILLS
Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Legislation Amendment (Operational Efficiency) Bill 2017
First Reading
Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Joyce.
Bill read a first time.
Second Reading
Mr JOYCE (New England—Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources and Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) (09:35): I move:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Agricultural chemicals and veterinary medicines—or agvet chemicals—are essential to our quality of life. We all know that these chemicals protect our crops and animals from pests and diseases, and underpin the productivity and competitiveness of Australia's farmers. However, agvet chemicals also have a range of other uses, including protecting our health, managing domestic pests and fulfilling consumer needs. Agvet chemicals are used to control vermin and pests in food premises, kill flies and mosquitoes around our houses, preserve timber, control fouling of boat hulls and keep our swimming pools safe. These chemicals are also vital for keeping our pets healthy and protecting our environment from invasive weeds and animals. The regulation of safe and effective agvet chemicals is therefore of interest to all Australians.
Through a cooperative scheme with the states and territories, the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority—the APVMA—is the national regulator of agvet chemicals. The APVMA ensures that agvet chemicals used in Australia are safe for people, animals, plants and the environment.
Legislation underpinning the APVMA and agvet chemical regulation was developed in the early 1990s. A detailed review of the whole legislative framework is overdue. The government announced in April that it would undertake such a review and the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources is currently developing terms of reference for this important piece of work.
In the meantime, the chemical industry has made it clear that there are simple, non-controversial changes that could be done now that improve the efficiency of the regulator and increase the speed to which farmers can get access to safe effective chemicals. We are heeding these calls.
The Agricultural and Veterinary Chemicals Legislation Amendment (Operational Efficiency) Bill 2017 amends agvet chemical legislation to streamline industry reporting and support the operational efficiency of the APVMA. The bill also clarifies some ambiguities in the legislation and removes unnecessary and redundant provisions.
This bill reduces some of the unnecessary regulatory burden on industry by simplifying reporting requirements for chemical products. The amendments in the bill ensure that industry continues to provide necessary information about registered chemicals in the marketplace but reduces the time and effort that industry require to collect this information.
Essentially, the bill removes the need for industry to undertake two unrelated reporting activities—one for levies, based on chemical product sales, and a more complex reporting activity on active constituent quantities. It simplifies and aligns these reporting processes based on the quantity and value of product sales. This significantly reduces reporting costs for industry without compromising the availability of information for our international reporting obligations and policy development needs. The chemical industry has been seeking changes to the burdensome reporting requirements and the bill delivers these changes.
The role of the regulator is to ensure that the safe agvet chemicals we need are available in a timely fashion. The bill therefore includes measures to improve the administrative efficiency of the APVMA and promote quicker access to chemical products. The measures in the bill reduce the handling time for applications by increasing the APVMA's flexibility when dealing with errors in applications and for altering applications.
Other measures in the bill enable the holder of a label approval to vary a label approval while this approval is suspended. This removes an administrative barrier that currently prevents the holder from addressing the reasons for the suspension. This will ensure that the issue with a label approval that led to its suspension can be appropriately rectified at the holder's request.
To perform its role as a regulator the APVMA has to rely on information provided to it by applicants. The bill includes civil penalty provisions for providing false or misleading information. These provisions provide a broader suite of sanctions than currently available to the APVMA for dealing with any false or misleading information that may be provided to it. This is important as it will provide the APVMA with the necessary tools to proportionately respond to any false or misleading information it receives. Industry understands the importance of increasing the range of compliance options available to the APVMA.
Further measures in the bill clarify the meaning of the expiry date for a chemical product and allow applicants to address minor errors identified during preliminary assessment of an application, without having to go through the whole application process again.
Stakeholders have confirmed that the bill will deliver tangible benefits to industry and the regulator.
Collectively, the measures in the bill will reduce regulatory burden on industry and allow the regulator to be more efficient, while ensuring safe and effective agvet chemicals continue to be available to the community.
The government will continue to work with industry to implement further improvements to agvet chemicals regulation through future legislation and administrative reform.
I would also like to convey my deepest sympathies to and keep in my closest thoughts and prayers the family of Linda Burney.
Debate adjourned.
Treasury Laws Amendment (National Housing and Homelessness Agreement) Bill 2017
First Reading
Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Sukkar.
Bill read a first time.
Second Reading
Mr SUKKAR (Deakin—Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) (09:40): I move:
That this bill be now read a second time.
This bill enacts the government's budget announcement to reform the way that the Commonwealth makes housing related payments to the states and territories. It supports improved housing and homelessness outcomes by requiring jurisdictions to develop a detailed housing and homelessness strategy and to commit to improved data collection and reporting in exchange for significant Commonwealth funding. This approach will secure improved outcomes but in a way that the government believes is reasonable, that is achievable for the states and territories and does not jeopardise the funding of core social housing and homelessness services.
The bill replaces the national specific purpose payment for housing services that supports the National Affordable Housing Agreement, or NAHA, and introduces new, conditional funding arrangements from 1 July 2018.
Housing is fundamental to the wellbeing of all Australians. It is a driver of social and economic participation and promotes better employment, education and health outcomes.
The government's comprehensive housing affordability plan announced in this year's budget includes measures that will support improved outcomes for Australians across the housing spectrum, from first home buyers and renters to those in need of crisis accommodation and those at risk of or experiencing homelessness.
As part of this housing affordability plan, the government announced that it would be working with state and territory governments to introduce a new National Housing and Homelessness Agreement to replace the NAHA. Since then, the government has engaged in a series of productive discussions with each and every state and territory.
Despite contributing over $9 billion to states and territories since 2009 to support the provision of social and affordable housing, the Council of Australian Governments' 2016 Report on performance found that the current NAHA has completely failed to deliver on three of its four key benchmarks and is unlikely to meet them.
These three benchmarks include a 10 per cent reduction nationally in the proportion of low-income renter households in rental stress from 2007-08 to 2015-16; a seven per cent reduction nationally in the number of homeless Australians from 2006 to 2013; and a 10 per cent increase nationally in the proportion of Indigenous households owning or purchasing a home from 2008 to 2017-18.
Other indicators confirm the extent of this failure. Growth in the size of the social housing stock has stagnated and numbers on waiting lists have increased.
The new National Housing and Homelessness Agreement will replace the NAHA and the National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness. It will not only maintain the current levels of funding under these agreements but will also, for the first time, ensure that funding allocated to homelessness services will be permanent and indexed. Between 1 July 2018 and 30 June 2021, this equates to total funding of around $4.6 billion, including $375.3 million of new funding for homelessness that will be matched dollar-for-dollar by the states and territories.
The new funding arrangements for homelessness will provide certainty to organisations that provide frontline homelessness services and will continue to support priority cohorts, including domestic violence victims and vulnerable young Australians.
The new National Housing and Homelessness Agreement will ensure that each state or territory acknowledges and addresses the specific challenges to their jurisdiction through comprehensive housing and homelessness strategies. It will contribute to the development of a comprehensive evidence base through improved collection and reporting of housing and homelessness related data. It will secure ongoing and indexed funding for homelessness services, and ensure that states and territories match the Commonwealth's funding contribution for homelessness services, again, dollar for dollar. Under this new agreement, all we ask of the states and territories is that they set out how they intend to implement their housing and homelessness strategies and assist the Commonwealth to improve the collection and reporting of relevant housing data.
The new National Housing and Homelessness Agreement will promote better outcomes for the Commonwealth's housing and homelessness funding, but in a way that acknowledges the different priorities and challenges faced by each state or territory without jeopardising the funding of crucial social housing and homelessness services.
Full details of the measure are contained in the explanatory memorandum.
Debate adjourned.
COMMITTEES
Public Accounts and Audit Committee
Report
Ms BRODTMANN (Canberra) (09:46): On behalf of the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit, I present the committee's report entitled Report 467: Cybersecurity compliance: inquiry based on Auditor-General's report 42 (2016-17).
Report made a parliamentary paper in accordance with standing order 39(e).
Ms BRODTMANN: by leave—The release of the report into cybersecurity compliance by the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit highlights the continuing negligence of the Turnbull government when it comes to ensuring our departments and agencies are safe from cyberattack. Since the creation of the cybersecurity portfolio in 2016, Labor has been consistently calling on the government to take this issue seriously. So far, the only thing the Turnbull government has done to fix this mess is send a letter to the heads of government agencies—a letter to each head of department asking them to please take cybersecurity 'very seriously'. This is pathetic and it's a serious concern for our national security.
When it was revealed in 2014 that not one of the seven departments investigated by the Australian National Audits Office was compliant with its cybersecurity requirements, action should have been taken then. Instead, here we are at the end of 2017 and all we can say definitively is that only one of those seven departments has met its security requirements—just one in 2017. The rest are all still at risk of serious cyberattacks and data breaches. This is simply unacceptable.
This issue has been ignored for far too long by the Turnbull government and action needs to be taken now. Deadlines need to be set and consequences need to be enforced for those who continue to ignore this threat. As we speak, large government departments such as the Australian Taxation Office and the Department of Immigration and Border Protection are still not compliant with their cybersecurity responsibilities—that's as we speak, right here and right now. We are talking about the systems and networks that collect and store personal information on every Australian citizen, that manage this country's most important public services and that protect this country's borders and run our national security operations.
The recommendations in this report are loud and clear: compliance with cybersecurity standards is not optional—it is not optional. As holders of detailed and sensitive information, all government departments must maintain a strong cybersecurity posture. There is simply no excuse for any department or agency to ignore mandated—and these are mandated—security requirements. And there is certainly no excuse for the Turnbull government to continue to ignore this problem. It cannot be tolerated. This blase approach to cybersecurity has got to stop; it has got to change.
This report reveals a long history of prolonged negligence and a lack of concern for the significant threat cyberattack poses. In October 2014, a public hearing was held to examine the disastrous findings earlier that year by the ANAO that not one of the departments that were investigated was cyber-resilient—not one in 2014.
Three of the seven audited entities—the Australian Taxation Office, the Department of Human Services and the then Australian Customs and Border Protection Service—appeared before the hearing to explain their plans and timetables to achieve compliance. They each gave assurances—big-time assurances—to the committee that compliance with the top four mitigation strategies would be achieved during 2016.
The follow-up report published in March this year revealed that, despite those assurances in 2016, only one department, the Department of Human Services, had met its mandated requirements—and I'm underscoring here 'mandated', because these are mandated cybersecurity requirements across government agencies. Only one federal government agency could be deemed cyber-resilient.
Both the Australian Taxation Office and the Department of Immigration and Border Protection failed to meet the requirements and achieve their own deadline for compliance. They failed to meet it in 2014, and they failed again in 2016. So far, the only consequences that have come from this repeated failure are a letter by the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Cyber Security asking government agencies to take cybersecurity 'very seriously', and that was almost a year ago.
It is simply unacceptable. The fact that only one out of three of the largest Australian government agencies is meeting its mandated cybersecurity requirements is absolutely shocking. This is a huge risk to our national security and it needs to be treated as such. Why is the government so blase about this? At a time when significant data breaches and cyberattacks are an almost daily occurrence, the revelation that our own government agencies are failing to meet basic, mandated standards should come as a wake-up call. It should be ringing alarm bells for the government.
Through its electronic lodgement systems, the Australian Taxation Office collects over $440 billion in gross tax revenue annually. The Department of Immigration and Border Protection electronically processes around seven million visas annually and inspects and examines around two million air and sea cargo imports and exports every year. The collection and storage of this and other personally identifiable data can be used to identify, contact, locate or impersonate an individual. It includes information such as birth dates, bank account details, driver's licence numbers, tax file numbers and biometric data. By failing to be cyber-resilient, these departments are putting this data at great risk, with potentially significant consequences for Australian citizens.
Each of the 10 recommendations in this report will ensure the cyber-resilience of government departments and agencies is brought up to speed, but only if they are actually adopted. These recommendations offer significant improvements including introducing tangible deadlines for compliance, updating the top four strategies to the newer and comprehensive Essential Eight cybersecurity strategies, annual audits reviewing departmental compliance with these requirements, mandating—and again I'm saying 'mandating' here, because we've had a mandated approach on this before, and I'm imploring the government to actually take this report seriously and make these government agencies comply with mandated requirements—that all agencies complete and return the annual ASD cybersecurity survey, and mandating the internet gateway reduction program to reduce the number of attack vectors into government systems.
On this last point, the internet gateway reduction program was started in 2009. It was meant to reduce the patchwork of over 120 different internet gateway services being used right across government, particularly in smaller agencies, down to a manageable and auditable eight. The program was designed to reduce the attack surface into government systems. Eight years on, this policy is still being sidestepped by many smaller agencies who are just choosing to ignore the problem. And what's the Turnbull government done to address this issue? Absolutely nothing.
Similarly, the Australian Signals Directorate sends out an annual cybersecurity survey to the heads of all major government agencies to assess their cyber risks. These surveys are rarely completed or sent back to the ASD, which has a significant impact on the ASD's ability to accurately assess the risk within these departments. As the report says:
The results of the ASD survey are reported to a secretaries' cyber security board, coordinated by PM&C—
the Prime Minister's own department.
The results of the surveys provide a list of high-risk entities, for which ASD can then focus its resources on assisting.
However—
remember, this is meant to be mandated—
the ASD has no capacity to compel agencies to complete the survey. For this year's survey, as at 23 June, fewer than 40 per cent of agencies had completed the survey. In 2016, fewer than 30 per cent completed the non-mandatory survey.
Absolutely appalling! So, as at 23 June, for this year's survey, less than 40 per cent had completed it; and, in 2016, fewer than 30 per cent. These surveys are a vital way of assessing whether government agencies are keeping up to date with their cybersecurity risks and threats, and the fact that they're just treated in such an arbitrary way is breathtaking. It's breathtaking.
There is a pattern of negligence here, of ignoring cybersecurity. The recommendations in this report seek to directly address these issues. They are proactive steps we must take to fixing this tick-box compliance culture, a culture that ignores responsibility and that gets away with it under this government. The Turnbull government must sit up and take notice of this report. It must adopt—it must, must adopt—the recommendations in it, and it must do so quickly. The recommendations it makes are urgently required to ensure our nation and our nation's data are safe and secure. We cannot afford to continue to turn a blind eye to cybersecurity, especially in our own government agencies and departments. Government agencies must be the standard against which others in the community measure themselves.
Cybersecurity is everyone's responsibility and none more so than the government and heads of government departments. It is not acceptable—it's simply not acceptable—for Australian government departments to just ignore their security requirements: 'All too hard; can't be bothered,' even though these are mandated requirements.
This government needs to start taking cybersecurity seriously, and I implore the Turnbull government to accept all the recommendations in this report, and I implore the Turnbull government to accept all the recommendations in this report today.
I move:
That the House take note of the report.
The SPEAKER: The debate is now adjourned, and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.
Reference to Federation Chamber
Ms BRODTMANN (Canberra) (09:57): I move:
That the order of the day be referred to the Federation Chamber for debate.
Question agreed to.
DOCUMENTS
Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit
Presentation
Ms BRODTMANN (Canberra) (09:57): I present Executive Minutes on reports Nos 452 and 462 of the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit.
BILLS
Medicare Levy Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Fringe Benefits Tax Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Income Tax Rates Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Superannuation (Excess Non-concessional Contributions Tax) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Superannuation (Excess Untaxed Roll-over Amounts Tax) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Income Tax (TFN Withholding Tax (ESS)) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Family Trust Distribution Tax (Primary Liability) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Taxation (Trustee Beneficiary Non-disclosure Tax) (No. 1) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Taxation (Trustee Beneficiary Non-disclosure Tax) (No. 2) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Treasury Laws Amendment (Untainting Tax) (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Nation-building Funds Repeal (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Cognate debate.
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
to which the following amendment was moved:
That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:
"the House declines to give this bill a second reading as:
(1) this is a tax hike on over seven million Australian workers earning less than $87,000 a year;
(2) the Government is already supporting cuts to penalty rates for low and middle income workers;
(3) at a time of low wages growth and the high cost of living pressures, including energy costs, the Government should not be seeking to raise taxes on these low and middle income workers;
(4) the Government:
(a) is cutting funding for vocational education, university and research infrastructure, and transport infrastructure;
(b) has failed to abolish the Nation-Building Funds previously; and
(c) has sidelined Infrastructure Australia when making infrastructure investment decisions;
(5) the National Disability Insurance Scheme has been fully funded in a bipartisan fashion, and funding has been allocated to the NDIS in all Budgets since 2013-14 and bilateral agreements with the states that contain the Commonwealth Government's commitment to the full funding of the NDIS have been signed in a bipartisan manner;
(6) like all other items of Government expenditure, such as defence, the NDIS is funded from consolidated revenue and does not require a separate funding arrangement; and
(7) there is a better and fairer plan which would:
(a) only raise the Medicare Levy for those earning above $87,000 a year;
(b) reinstate the Budget Repair Levy for those earning above $180,000 a year; and
(c) ease the pressure on low and middle income workers, and be better for the budget bottom line."
Mr BANDT (Melbourne) (09:58): Given we're about to head into the summing up and then amendments and then votes on this bill, I just wanted to briefly place on the record that the member for Mayo intends to vote with the government on these bills but has requested, and I've agreed, that she and I would seek to be paired, effectively, on the votes; that I would be voting with the opposition on the amendments and the bill; and that she would be taken as voting with the government. This is, of course, an informal arrangement. Pairs are an informal arrangement, and reached as such, but they are usually between the government and the opposition, but, in this case, crossbenchers are having to do it ourselves. So I wanted to place on the record that that is our stance in relation to the amendments and these bills. I'm not sure of the process. I would hope that that could be recorded in some way, in the Hansard or in the Votes and Proceedings, but I just wanted to place that matter on the record. With respect to the substance of the issues, that is something that our portfolio holders will prosecute more fully when the matter comes to the Senate.
The SPEAKER: The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for McMahon has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The question now is that the amendment be agreed to.
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:00): In summing up the debate I firstly thank all those members who have contributed to this debate. This is a very sensitive issue. Many members of this place have their own personal experience of either directly living with disability or having family members, friends or colleagues who are affected by disability. As I observed in this debate earlier, when introducing these bills, in my own case there is my brother-in-law Gary. It's understandable and it's appropriate that this House reflect on the personal experiences. I think it has been the deep personal commitment of people in this place on both sides of this House that led to the bipartisan introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
This House is committed to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, and what I've sought to do in this budget—what the government has sought to do in this budget—is to ensure that we can provide certainty for the National Disability Insurance Scheme by providing the funding that is needed to guarantee its future and to lock that funding up, to create a pipeline from the Medicare levy directly into the National Disability Insurance Scheme to ensure that never again, based on the forward program of the NDIS, should it be found wanting for funds.
These bills will secure the essential funding required for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, giving Australians with permanent and significant disability and their families and carers certainty that this vital service will be there for them into the future. A responsible government looks after those most in need, and everyone in this place knows that Australians with a disability deserve support to fully participate in the life of this nation, which is what the NDIS does. That is why we backed the establishment of the NDIS, so that individuals could get essential help based on their needs and not where they live.
It is one thing, however, to set up a scheme like the NDIS, but it is meaningless if it is not funded, if it's not secured, if it's not protected and if its funding is not protected into the future. Governments will lower taxes like the Turnbull government has and will continue to seek to do. Other governments, if they're elected, will raise taxes as Labor have done in the past. That's a matter for them. But, as a result of any of those general decisions taken on tax measures in this country, the National Disability Insurance Scheme should be unaffected by those decisions. The NDIS should have its own secure source of funding to provide for its future and its present, and the mechanism that we have sought to do that with is the Medicare levy and the measures that are proposed in this series of bills.
There's a fundamental difference between the Labor Party and the government when it comes to this issue. The Labor Party do not believe, despite all of the evidence, that there is a $55.7 billion hole in funding for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. They're wrong about that, and that has been demonstrated by the testimony and evidence of Treasury and others. It's clear there's a $55.7 billion hole in the funding for the NDIS. They claim there were savings that they spent four times, some of which never appeared and some of which they even voted against when we sought to take those savings through this House.
We endeavoured, prior to this budget, to secure savings that would have been put into a special-purpose account to ensure that that was a locked box for the funding of the NDIS. We sought to do it through savings. That was rejected by the Labor Party and it was rejected by the Senate. That's the will of the parliament. We accept that. We understand that. But what we can't walk back from is addressing the fundamental problem of the massive hole in funding for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. So we put forward in the budget a way to achieve that. It was a way that absolutely and completely mirrored the initial increase in the Medicare levy that the Labor Party had introduced when they were in government to contribute towards the funding costs of the NDIS. They had received the support of the opposition in the Liberal and National parties and they were able to move forward. We have simply brought through their exact same mechanism to deal with this problem, and we have not secured the support of the Labor Party to achieve that.
I give Julia Gillard credit for her significant role in introducing the National Disability Insurance Scheme—and she deserves it. I believe she should be disappointed by the behaviour of those who followed her, who could be acting to secure the future of the NDIS by supporting this bill. When she was Prime Minister she said:
… the Medicare levy does not pay for all our Medicare or health care expenditure but the fundamental principle of the Medicare levy is we all put in and we all take out …
She also said:
… it would be terrific to see the half a per cent increase in the Medicare levy pass with bipartisan support.
That would give security for the future around the half a per cent increase in the Medicare levy.
The former Treasurer, now the member for Lilley, said:
… we are asking Australians to make a small contribution that will make a big difference to the lives of over 460,000 people with disability …
When Labor were proposing exactly the same thing, the now Leader of the Opposition said:
These bills will change lives.
Change families.
Change the dimension of hope in every community.
No longer do we fill this place with empty rhetoric on this issue. We now put our money on the table. And we ask: what is the price of an ordinary life?
That is what the Leader of the Opposition said when, in government, he was supporting bills to do exactly this. What is the price of an ordinary life to the member for Maribyrnong? Well, he's clearly not prepared to stump up or take his party with him to live up to the ideals and standards that Julia Gillard, as Prime Minister, was able to draw from the Labor Party when she introduced this scheme and introduced as like a measure as you could find. And there's a reason for that, which is that they don't believe there's a funding hole. They want to live in budgetary denial, as they did in government, and just pretend the problem isn't there.
What I find quite puzzling about the Labor Party's position on this is: if they really think there's no funding hole with the NDIS, then why are they supporting the increase in the levy at all? As the shadow Treasurer said, if the Labor Party were in government, not one cent of the increase in the Medicare levy that they're prepared to support would go to funding the National Disability Insurance Scheme—not one cent. So why are they supporting that element of it? For them, it's just another tax. For them, it's just another impost on working Australians. I'm joined now by the member for Hughes, who has a deep personal understanding of this issue. For those on this side of the House it's an insurance levy to pay for an insurance scheme that makes a big difference to families and people living with disabilities in this country. That's the only reason we're doing it. If there were no funding hole, we would not be doing this. But we must do it; we must fill this hole. We must ensure that we live up to the principles of those who actually brought this scheme into this parliament and were able to achieve bipartisan support.
I believe the way the Labor Party have responded to this is a great disappointment. If there were any issue we could agree on, if there were any opportunity to actually reach across the aisle, surely it would be for this. Members of the opposition should be ashamed of the level of conflict-dominated politics they have pursued on this issue. If they didn't believe there was a funding hole, then why would they want to increase the Medicare levy at all? They are seeking to take the cynical opportunity of this bill to go and spend money on any number of other things that mount up day by day. They're not doing this—even one cent of it—to support those with disabilities. They're just doing it to fund their addiction to higher spending on anything that comes across their desk.
During the course of this debate, we heard some tremendous testimonies about the courage of Australians living with disabilities. The member for Ryan, the Assistant Minister for Social Services and Disability Services, spoke of the 11-year-old boy who as a result of his NDIS package has received consistent coordinated support. This means that his relationship with his family has improved, he is learning better and he has a real hope for an independent life. The member for Gilmore spoke of Brad Rossiter, who has prosthetic legs, as well as having kidney and pancreas transplants. He's an advocate for kidney health awareness and organ donation registration. He's an Australian hero!
The member for Brisbane spoke on Monday of the outstanding work of Youngcare, providing accommodation for young people so that they are not forced to live in aged-care facilities. We heard of people like Shevaune Conry, who has MS—like my brother-in-law Gary—and Nick, who is confined to a wheelchair, who now receive the care they need. Their quality of life has improved immeasurably through the work of Youngcare and the support of the NDIS.
I highlight them simply to make the point that it's not too late for the opposition to make the right choice—to back the government's plan to provide secure funding for the NDIS. The way this bill has been structured with the others is to ensure that the increase in the Medicare levy goes directly, and is secured, to support the NDIS. It can't be siphoned off; it can't be sent off to subsidise or pay for other adventures by the Labor Party. It's there for Shevaune, it's there for Brad, it's there for Gary and it's there for the many other Australians that each and every one of us in this House can name, whom we love and care for. We want to see them have a quality of life that is unimpeded by things that we can do something about through the NDIS.
But the NDIS is a hollow promise if it is not funded, and that's what these bills rightly seek to do. So I would encourage the Labor Party to at least put down this sword—at least this one—and join with the government to provide for every person with a disability and every carer, every friend, every colleague and every passing stranger who has walked past and offered some kindness or support to them, demonstrating their commitment to their fellow Australians who suffer with disabilities. Get on board with this; put an end to the mindless opposition to this for political purposes.
The SPEAKER: The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this, the honourable member for McMahon has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The question before us now is that the amendment be agreed to.
The House divided. [10:17]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
The SPEAKER (10:21): The question now is that this bill be read a second time.
The House divided. [10:22]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Consideration in Detail
Bill—by leave—taken as a whole.
Dr LEIGH (Fenner) (10:27): by leave—I move amendments (1) to (4), as circulated in the name of the member for McMahon, together:
(1) Schedule 1, page 3 (after line 7), after item 2, insert:
2A After section 7
Insert:
8 Levy in cases of incomes not exceeding $87,000 (other than small incomes)
Where the taxable income of a person:
(a) is not income of an amount mentioned in subsection 7(1) or (2); and
(b) does not exceed $87,000;
the rate of levy payable by that person upon that taxable income (but for sections 8 and 9) is 2%.
(2) Schedule 1, item 3, page 3 (lines 9 to 10), omit "2.5", substitute "x".
(3) Schedule 1, item 3, page 3 (lines 9 to 10), omit "0.075", substitute "y".
(4) Schedule 1, page 3 (after line 10), after item 3, insert:
3A At the end of subsection 8(2)
Add:
where:
x means:
(a) if the family income threshold does not exceed $87,000—2; and
(b) otherwise—2.5.
y means:
(a) if the family income threshold does not exceed $87,000—0.08; and
(b) otherwise—0.075.
The NDIS was fully funded by Labor. Those who doubt this need only look to the DisabilityCare Australia document in the 2013-14 budget, page 4, which sets out the impact of private health insurance reforms, changes to tobacco excise and changes to import processing fees, among others. The question before the House is whether or not the exercise of budget repair should be done by slugging low- and middle-income earners or by reinstating the budget repair levy. As the Leader of the Opposition noted in the budget reply, Labor won't be supporting an increase in the Medicare levy for those with taxable incomes below $87,000. But, by reinstating the budget repair levy, our position leaves the budget more than $4 billion better off over the medium term.
The Treasurer asks: why is more revenue required? Anyone who did their tax return early will know the answer to that because they would have seen on their tax receipt that gross debt has now crashed through the half-trillion-dollar mark. The question is whether we tackle the challenge of debt in Australia by slugging the middle or by raising taxes on the top. The Treasurer said in July that inequality has 'actually gotten better'. But as the late professor-turned-politician Daniel Patrick Moynihan said, 'You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts.'
Let's just run through a few facts on inequality. Since 1975, real wages have grown 72 per cent for the top 10th and 23 per cent for the bottom 10th, meaning that the top 10th of earners earned twice as much as the bottom 10th in 1975 and nearly three times as much in 2014. The labour income share in the economy has fallen from 75 per cent in 1975 to 60 per cent today. The Treasurer said his preferred measure of inequality is the Gini coefficient. According to the Australian National University's Peter Whiteford, the Gini in 1981-82 was 0.27 and by 2013-14 was either 0.30 or 0.33. My own work on pre-tax male Gini coefficients again suggests a significant rise from 1942 to 2010. The top one per cent share of national income has almost doubled since 1980. The top 10 per cent income share has increased by a quarter. Wealth inequality has risen significantly over the course of the last generation. There has been an unambiguous rise in Australian inequality. As Roger Wilkins of the Melbourne Institute summed it up to me recently, 'Inequality is currently high by modern Australian historical standards.'
We see now from the coalition a plan to increase taxes so that a worker on $55,000 would pay $275 extra a year in tax while somebody on $80,000 would face an extra $400 in tax—effectively, a tax rise that would wipe out the benefit of last year's sandwich-and-milkshake tax cut for a worker earning $85,000 a year. Parliamentary Budget Office analysis shows that the average tax rate for individuals in every quintile will increase from 2017-18 to 2020-21, but the largest increase in average tax rates is for people in the middle income quintile under the changes proposed by this government. The Parliamentary Budget Office specifically states:
… average tax rates are projected to increase due to policy changes, most notably the policy decision to increase the Medicare levy from 2019/20.
This statement clearly disproves the Treasurer's claim that he is reducing taxes.
At a time when we have earnings inequality up, when the labour's share is the lowest in a generation, when income inequality by the Gini coefficient has risen and when wealth inequality is up, we have a government that wants to increase average taxes for those in the middle income quintile by 3.2 percentage points, significantly higher than the two-percentage-point increase for people in the top quintile. That would increase average tax rates on middle-income earners to 20-plus-year highs, according to the Parliamentary Budget Office. Labor's plan raises more for the budget over the medium term—an excess of $4 billion more. Most importantly, it tackles the challenge of rising inequality. It just isn't fair, with inequality as high as it's been in three-quarters of a century, to be slugging the middle and letting the top off scot free.
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:33): The amendment that is put forward by the opposition is not supported by the government. I'm a little puzzled as to why the shadow Treasurer hasn't come in to speak to his own amendments and has delegated this duty. If he really wants to own these, he should actually come in here and put his reasons for them rather than delegating it to the intern to go and put these issues forward in this place.
To deal with what has been put forward, the shadow assistant minister has just exposed the Labor Party on this issue. He says there's no funding gap on the NDIS—which is wrong, by the way; the budget papers clearly demonstrate a $55.7 billion funding hole. But the Labor Party have just said clearly here that there is no need to raise additional revenue to support the NDIS. So they are using people's disabilities as an excuse to raise levies on the Australian public. They have just admitted to this. I mean, if it weren't obscene enough that they couldn't live up to their own principles, as ordinary as they were, when they were in government, they now come in here and use people's disabilities to whack up levies on the Australian public. They don't believe it is necessary to raise additional revenue to support the NDIS.
So what is the purpose? He says it's to reduce the debt. He says it's to reduce the deficit. Under the Labor Party's election policies at the last election, the deficit was higher. Their position is to have a higher deficit. They're not reducing debt as a result of this; they're just spending even more money on things they don't have the courage to come in here and explain to the Australian people: why they want to increase the levy.
I'm going to be straight with the Australian people: we need to increase the Medicare levy by half a per cent to make sure that the National Disability Insurance Scheme is fully funded. Australians are fair-minded people. They understand that if you're unfortunate enough to have been born with a disability, that in this country you should be given every opportunity to realise your potential—just like any other Australian. I don't think there's an Australian in this country who doesn't think that's a fair thing and who isn't prepared to put their bit in, to put their fair share in, to make sure that all can benefit, particularly when they themselves might be in a position where they have to draw on that. The lack of faith shown by the Labor Party in the Australian people and their sense of fairness on this issue is abysmal, and they should be ashamed of themselves.
We understand that Australians would be prepared to step up for people with disabilities. The Labor Party used to think that; they are just using people's disabilities as an excuse to raise levies.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Rob Mitchell ): A point of order?
Ms Catherine King: Imputation of members, Mr Deputy Speaker. That was an outrageous thing you just said: withdraw it!
Mr MORRISON: I won't withdraw it, Mr Deputy Speaker. I won't withdraw it, because it's a fact—
Ms Catherine King: Deputy Speaker—
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You have been asked to withdraw—
Mr MORRISON: I won't withdraw it, Mr Deputy Speaker!
Ms Catherine King: Then throw him out, Mr Deputy Speaker!
Mr MORRISON: I won't withdraw.
Ms Catherine King: You've been asked by the Speaker to withdraw—
Mr MORRISON: I haven't actually, you've asked me!
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I just said that I'll ask you to withdraw that. I don't think that's appropriate—
Mr MORRISON: Mr Deputy Speaker, I withdraw. Let me rephrase: the Labor Party has said clearly that this levy does not need to be raised to fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme. That's what the shadow assistant minister at the table has said. What is then the purpose of raising this levy? It has been done under the guise—the truth on the government's part—to pay for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Those opposite do not support that purpose for this levy, but they want to increase the levy anyway. They're doing it in a bill that is designed to help people with disabilities, but they have no intention to use the money to help people with disabilities. So the glass jaw of the opposition on this has just been demonstrated and they have been called out.
But on top of that, it's bad tax policy. The effective marginal rate of tax that applies to how they propose to deliver this in their amendment would mean that in the absence of phasing arrangements a taxpayer might incur an additional tax liability of $435.39 on the first $1 earned above $87,000. That is an effective marginal tax rate of 43,539 per cent. It's a daft idea in the practice of policy, and it's a heartless idea in the absence of morality on the part of the Labor Party.
The SPEAKER: The question is that the amendments be agreed to.
The House divided. [10:42]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:46): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Fringe Benefits Tax Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:48): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Income Tax Rates Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:49): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Superannuation (Excess Non-concessional Contributions Tax) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:50): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Superannuation (Excess Untaxed Roll-over Amounts Tax) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:51): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Income Tax (TFN Withholding Tax (ESS)) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:52): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Family Trust Distribution Tax (Primary Liability) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:53): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Taxation (Trustee Beneficiary Non-disclosure Tax) (No. 1) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:54): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Taxation (Trustee Beneficiary Non-disclosure Tax) (No. 2) Amendment (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (10:55): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Treasury Laws Amendment (Untainting Tax) (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Consideration in Detail
Bill—by leave—taken as a whole.
Dr LEIGH (Fenner) (10:56): I move the opposition amendment circulated in the name of the member for McMahon:
(1) Schedule 1, page 3 (after line 3), before item 1, insert:
1A Subsection 4 ‑10(3) (note 2)
Omit "of the Income Tax (Transitional Provisions) Act 1997 (which is about the temporary", substitute "(which is about the".
1B After section 4 ‑10
Insert:
4 ‑11 Budget repair levy
Budget repair levy
(1) Extra income tax is payable for a financial year (budget repair levy) if:
(a) you are an individual; and
(b) your taxable income for the corresponding income year exceeds $180,000; and
(c) the financial year is a budget repair levy year.
Amount of budget repair levy
(2) Your budget repair levy is worked out by reference to your taxable income for the corresponding income year using the rate or rates that apply to you.
Note: See Part IV of the Income Tax Rates Act 1986.
Interaction with other provisions
(3) For the purpose of working out your income tax for the financial year:
(a) section 4‑10 has effect as if it made you liable to pay the extra tax mentioned in subsection (1) of this section; and
(b) subsection 4‑10(3) has effect as if step 4 of the method statement in that subsection were omitted and the following were substituted:
Step 3A.Subtract your tax offsets from your basic income tax liability.
For the list of tax offsets, see section 13‑1.
Step 3B. Add the extra income tax you must pay as mentioned in subsection 4‑11(1).
Step 4. If an amount of your tax offset for foreign income tax under Division 770 remains after applying section 63‑10, subtract the remaining amount from the result of step 3B. The result is how much income tax you owe for the financial year.
(4) To avoid doubt, budget repair levy is not included in your basic income tax liability.
Note: As a result, you cannot apply any tax offsets against budget repair levy under Part 2‑20 (apart from the foreign income tax offset applied under step 4 of the method statement in subsection (3)).
Meaning of budget repair levy year
(5) Each of the following is a budget repair levy year:
(a) the 2017‑18 financial year;
(b) each financial year after the 2017‑18 financial year, until the Parliament otherwise provides.
While we are constitutionally barred from actually reinstating the budget repair levy, this amendment puts in place the legislative framework for so doing. As I noted in my earlier contribution, the House faces two choices as to how the budget might be repaired, with the Treasurer having taken gross debt through the half-trillion-dollar mark. The choice is between raising taxes on low- and middle-income Australia or reinstating the same tax rate that prevailed under Tony Abbott. The Liberal Party would have you believe that it is socialism to put in place the same tax rate that Tony Abbott put in place. Labor takes a different view. Labor's view is that it is appropriate, at a time when inequality is as high as it's been in three-quarters of a century, to ask those at the top to pay their fair share.
I won't repeat the statistics on rising inequality in Australia, which thoroughly debunk the Treasurer's claim that inequality is getting better. But the question we have before us is whether the House should continue with the plan that the government announced on budget night, which the Parliamentary Budget Office estimates would see the largest increase in average tax rates for people in the middle income quintile—they're people earning an average of just $46,000—or whether it's appropriate to put in place the same tax rates that prevailed under the first couple of years of the Abbott government.
The Treasurer would say that you can't do this because it's a tax on success. This reflects everything that the Liberal Party stand for. They on that side of the House think that success is about money. They think it's about how many mansions you've got or how many jet skis you've got. We on this side of the House think that a teacher earning $70,000 who is looking after kids and turning their eyes to the love of learning is a success, even though they're not in the top tax bracket. When we look at a police officer who is keeping our streets safe and earning maybe $65,000, we think that person is a success. When we look at the childcare workers—those who are there looking after our kids, not just babysitting but engaging in active early childhood education of the most vital kind—who are earning maybe $45,000 a year, we think those people are successes. We think those Australian families raising their kids with love, those union representatives out there trying to get a better pay deal for Australian workers, those families looking to pay the mortgage—in an environment in which housing affordability is as low as it's been in six decades—are a success.
Labor has nothing against the top two per cent of Australian adults who find themselves in the top tax bracket. Labor has nothing against the top one per cent of Australian adults who pay nine-tenths of the tax in that top tax bracket, but it has been a very good generation for the top one per cent, a generation that has seen them nearly double their share of national income. When the Treasurer says that it would put us out of step with other countries, were we to go back to the marginal tax rate that we had under the Abbott government, you simply have to look at OECD data. A fact check done by Kathrin Bain for The Conversation on 19 May found that Australia's highest marginal tax rate ranked us 13th among 34 OECD members, meaning that 12 OECD members have a higher top marginal tax rate than Australia.
The top one per cent can afford to pay a little more. It is better for the budget. It is better for fairness. It is the right decision for an Australian economy where consumer confidence and growth is still too fragile. Low- and middle-income Australians spend their pay cheques; they put that money straight back into the economy. Those at the top have higher savings rates, and so tax cuts given to them don't flow through to consumer expenditure. This is the right solution for fairness, the right solution for growth, and I urge this amendment upon the House.
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (11:01): The government does not support this amendment, and the tell in what the shadow assistant minister said in his presentation is this: not once did he say that this money was going to be used to support the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Do you know why? Because it's not. There is no suggestion here and there is no mechanism either. These funds from raising the top rate of marginal rate of tax will not go in to the special savings account for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. They will just go into another Labor slush fund to further expand wasteful spending and drive up the deficit. There is nothing in what the opposition is putting forward here that is designed to support Australians with disabilities. There is nothing in its design to guarantee funding and support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Once again I'm disappointed that the shadow Treasurer has not come in here and owned these amendments himself. He is as gutless as he is heartless in the way he has engaged with this issue. Going through the things that have been put forward, once again, under the cover of a bill that talks about the National Disability Insurance Scheme, we see the Labor Party is using this as an excuse to raise taxes. This is just a tax grab sought under the cover of a bill seeking to provide support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Labor has no intention of providing any support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme through raising these taxes. This is just another episode in Labor's class war to raise taxes on Australians who work for a living and provide a disincentive for them to do even better.
Under the Labor Party, this amendment would take the top marginal tax rate, with the measures already passed by this House already today, to 49.5 per cent. So the great reward you get for your effort is you work one day for yourself and one day for a Labor government. They're not much worth working for in the first place, but you shouldn't be charged more for the privilege; you're always charged more for the privilege of serving under a Labor government in this country. Labor is addicted to taxes for one reason only—that is, they are addicted to spending. The budget would be $14.7 billion better off right now if it weren't for the constant opposition of the Labor Party as the government has sought to repair the budget mess.
This measure won't go to reducing the deficit. Labor's deficit will be higher than the government's because the budget deficit in the last fiscal year was under two per cent. It came in at under two per cent, at 1.9 per cent, is continuing to fall and is projected to be back in balance in 2021, where that projection has been retained consistently since the end of 2015. When the deficit levy, which was a temporary levy and came off just as we promised to do, was introduced, this is what the Labor Party said about exactly what they're proposing to do here in this place today. The Leader of the Opposition said: 'It's a cheap trick of the government to sling on increasing the highest marginal rate of taxation.' The shadow Treasurer said:
We've been clear about our position on the deficit levy. We don't like it and we don't support it.
He also said:
… we don't believe that the answer of increasing the marginal tax rate is an innovative one or it's good policy …
Yet it's recommended here by the shadow Assistant Treasurer, and I have no doubt that's why the shadow Treasurer wouldn't dare show his face in this place to speak to this amendment, given the pathetic hypocrisy he is displaying in bringing this amendment forward. It's under his name, Mr Speaker. That doesn't mean much in this place when he's not prepared to come in here and speak to his own amendments. He also said, 'This is not something we would do if we were in office,' but they seem to be doing it in opposition.
We've learnt this about the Labor Party in opposition: they'll say all sorts of things—'Oh, we're going to stand against making the pension more sustainable'—and they have their petitions and go on about it day in, day out, leading people to believe they're going to do one thing, and then on the eve of the election, as we saw with countless measures, such as the schoolkids bonus and pensions, over they flip. They backflip on the eve of the election. And you know what? Even still their deficit is higher. So this is what the shadow Treasurer said. Then, on the issue, apparently everyone who earns over $180,000 is rich, according to what the shadow Assistant Treasurer has just said, but not according to the Leader of the Opposition when he was asked by Neil Mitchell, 'Is $180,000 a year rich?' and he answered, 'No, it's not.' (Time expired)
The SPEAKER: The question is that the amendment be agreed to.
The House divided. [11:11]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Third Reading
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (11:15): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Nation-building Funds Repeal (National Disability Insurance Scheme Funding) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler) (11:16): This is the second occasion on which the government has attempted to abolish the Building Australia Fund. The Building Australia Fund was established in 2008 as part of one of the first pieces of legislation of the Rudd Labor government. It was established in partnership with the establishment of Infrastructure Australia, and it was a key part of our approach when in government to nation building. The plan was pretty simple: to break the nexus between the infrastructure investment cycle, which by definition is long term, and the short-term nature of our political cycle, which in this country varies between three years and four years.
We also consulted extensively in the lead-up to the 2007 election—and we will celebrate the Labor victory in just a short period of time—with stakeholders. They all said, 'You need to break that nexus, and the second thing you need is a pipeline of projects.' So we established Infrastructure Australia, which conducted Australia's first ever audit of national infrastructure needs. Infrastructure Australia identified priority projects based upon the categories of 'projects that were ready to proceed' and 'projects that required more work but showed promise'. It was the first ever serious attempt in this nation to have the long-term planning that is needed if we are truly going to deliver on reducing the infrastructure deficit.
In the 2008 budget, we put initial funding into three funds—the Building Australia Fund, the Education Investment Fund and the Health Infrastructure Fund—to provide that long-term approach to the planning of our hospitals, our tertiary institutions and, through the Building Australia Fund, our roads, public transport, ports and airports. With the Building Australia Fund, it was there in the legislation that you could only have funds expended if Infrastructure Australia had identified the project as a priority project. We need to remove the politics from infrastructure investment, which, for too long, has seen the electoral map rather than business cases and productivity benefit determining where funds go for infrastructure.
The Building Australia Fund made some substantial investments. I note that last night in Senate estimates the new head of the Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development, Steven Kennedy, identified the Gold Coast light rail project as being an example of value capture working in practice there. It's an investment of some $365 million by the Commonwealth government, in partnership with commitments from the Queensland Labor government, then led by Anna Bligh, and the Gold Coast city council working with the private sector to deliver a project that has been an enormous success. It was opposed by the member for Moncrieff and by the state LNP, but it was delivered as a result of our determination.
It has transformed the Gold Coast for residents, who, for the first time, have an efficient public transport network that can move large numbers of people in short periods of time. It's being extended to meet up with the heavy rail line coming down from Brisbane, and should be extended to the south to connect up with the Gold Coast Airport. Potentially, there are also proposals to extend the network into the Tweed. But it's been particularly important for an economy that depends very much on tourism to drive jobs and economic development. And people have literally voted with their feet by walking onto that light rail infrastructure.
We funded, through the Building Australia Fund, the Regional Rail Link, which has transformed the linkages between Melbourne, Geelong, Ballarat, and Bendigo. It's a project that had an allocation of some $3.225 billion by the Commonwealth government—the largest ever investment by any federal government in a public transport project in our history since Federation. Some of the Johnny- and Mary-come-latelies have pretended that this government had something to do with it, but of course at the time they opposed the creation of Infrastructure Australia and the Building Australia Fund. They were happy to go to the openings of these projects, but they opposed them. And today this legislation, seeking to abolish the Building Australia Fund, shows that they haven't changed their attitude towards nation-building infrastructure.
The new stations along that route, at Tarneit and Wyndham Vale, have transformed those outer suburban communities in Melbourne. This is a great example of what is spoken about a lot by anyone with an interest in our cities and urban policy—that is, making sure that the infrastructure is there first, before the population, and that the infrastructure helps make sure that we don't just open up new land areas and then think after the fact about what to do about transport, school infrastructure and health infrastructure. Good planning requires those transport connections so that people can connect with jobs and their economic communities. That is why the approach of this government is wrong. I say to this government: don't just put out media releases attempting to claim support for projects that the government opposed at the time; actually have a think about the long-term needs of this nation.
To the government's credit, they have changed their attitude towards Infrastructure Australia. They have maintained Infrastructure Australia as an organisation. To their discredit, they've sidelined it. Here, in the abolition of the Building Australia Fund that is proposed with this legislation, they are seeking to essentially gut it when it comes to having any active role in prioritising government expenditure and determining where it should go. The Building Australia Fund was absolutely critical in identifying the roads and public transport needs that are required—projects like the M80 outer ring-road in Melbourne. It was delivered by federal Labor and, when they came into office, the government cut the funds of $500 million. To be fair, they put some of those funds back and pretended it was new money, after 2½ years of delay on that M80 project. If you look right around the country at the needs that were identified, through Infrastructure Australia we funded all 15 priority projects that were identified. An example is the Goodwood and Torrens rail project in South Australia, a freight project critical for improving productivity in Adelaide and for South Australia.
You don't actually have to go that far to see the benefit of the approach. Indeed, I suggest to honourable members that, as they pass under the underpass on the way to the airport, when they leave this fine city tomorrow, they have a think about the Majura Parkway, which is there. The Majura Parkway and the Hunter Expressway were both projects that were on the planning agenda for a very long time. The Majura Parkway was funded through a joint, fifty-fifty contribution—the total cost being in the order of $280 million, from memory—by the Commonwealth and by the government of the ACT, at that time led by now Senator Katy Gallagher. It was a project which I think it's fair to say probably didn't change too many votes. It is in Canberra, so, when it comes to Labor and Liberal and where the margins go, it probably didn't change too many votes. The big benefit of the Majura Parkway is that it prevents the need for trucks to go through the middle of Canberra and takes them around the city. It was one of those projects that, frankly, was a no-brainer, but it hadn't happened. Infrastructure Australia's analysis showed a very positive BCR of multiple dollars returned for every dollar that was invested. The creation of the Building Australia Fund meant that that project became a reality.
The Hunter Expressway, similarly, was in planning for a long period of time. I remember having a discussion with someone who said, 'Oh, but that doesn't go through any marginal seats.' 'Why did you fund that?' said a member of the coalition. We funded it because it had an enormous BCR of greater than three to one. It cost more than $1.7 billion, $1.5 billion of which was investment from the Commonwealth. It created thousands of jobs. It reduced the travelling time for tourists visiting the Hunter Valley. It reduced travelling time for farmers and people who live in the New England region travelling up there. It saved lives by taking people off congested roads. It increased productivity by reducing travelling times between Maitland and the Newcastle CBD. It opened up to development the suburbs in between Lake Macquarie and Cessnock along the route, and it made possible the development of new communities and new residents; therefore putting downward pressure on house prices and increasing housing affordability. It created thousands of jobs in construction. Again, this was because of Infrastructure Australia's support and because of the existence of the Building Australia Fund, which this government, through this legislation, is seeking to abolish.
Right around the country there are examples of projects that were done. There was the Noarlunga to Seaford rail line in Adelaide, an extension and electrification of that line that opened up access, through public transport, from those southern suburbs in the electorate so ably represented by the member for Kingston. It opened that up, again taking cars off the road, reducing congestion and having good outcomes in terms of road safety.
That was our approach in government: doubling the roads budget; increasing the rail budget by more than 10 times; investing more in public transport projects than all previous governments combined, from Federation right through to 2007. In just six years, there was more investment than in the previous 107 years when it came to public transport.
And what happened? The Abbott government came to office and immediately removed the funding that had been allocated for any public transport project that wasn't already under construction. So there were projects like the Cross River Rail, identified by Infrastructure Australia in 2012 as its No. 1 priority. It would have been of great benefit to not just the people of Brisbane but the people of the Sunshine Coast and the Gold Coast, by increasing the capacity of the entire rail network by providing that second crossing over the Brisbane River. The $715 million allocated in the 2013 budget was cut by this government.
The Melbourne Metro was approved by Infrastructure Australia and funded in the 2013 budget with $3 billion of investment. It was supported by the business community and residents as a vital project for Melbourne and for Victoria. Again, it was about increasing the capacity of the rail network. We even established a board with the coalition government in Victoria which had representation of the federal department of infrastructure, on a similar model to the board that was established to deliver the Regional Rail Link, which was delivered under budget and under time. And yet that money was taken out of the budget as well. The government took the money that had been allocated to projects—not just public transport projects but road projects like the M80, as well—including $500 million that had been allocated for public transport projects in Perth, and they funded projects that hadn't been through Infrastructure Australia and didn't have a business case. The infamous East West Link in Melbourne had a business case of 0.45, or a 45c return for every dollar invested. I say the offer's still there to members of the coalition from the time they made that decision: if they give me $100 today, I guarantee to give them back $45 down the track, because they reckon that's a good deal. That offer is there if that's what they think is appropriate.
They then of course funded the WestConnex project in Sydney, which is still undertaking its EIS processes. They're still not sure where it's going. They've started building the tunnel; they're just not sure where the tunnel will come up. A project which began with a cost of $10 billion is now up to $17 billion. It began as a project where we provided $25 million to assist with proper planning to make sure of the problem that was identified by Infrastructure New South Wales, which was: how do you get freight from the port through the M5? How do you deal with that No. 1 issue for Sydney and New South Wales that was identified by the committee chaired by former Premier Nick Greiner? And the CEO, of course, was Paul Broad, who's now in charge of Snowy Hydro. It says it all that those two senior people both left. I think it casts their view on the New South Wales government's performance when it came to doing proper planning for its infrastructure.
What we now know with WestConnex is that, because of the current design, all of the federal funding—the whole $1.5 billion—has been expended as advance payments. In the first budget the money was paid in June 2014 for both East West Link and WestConnex. They were advance payments with no milestones being met and no planning. It was just 'here's some money for your bank account', against all of the recommendations. Everything that the government said—that they would only approve projects of any value above $100 million if they had been approved by Infrastructure Australia and they had a positive business case—all that went out the window in their first budget.
Of course, now, because the WestConnex project doesn't actually go to the port, the airport or the city, it is proposing to have another extension for the F6 down into the St George area—but not all the way through, because they can't work out how to do that—at an enormous cost. Certainty it will end up costing more than a billion dollars. They need a gateway project, which is unfunded by anyone at this stage, to actually get from St Peters to the airport and to the port. They're talking about a northern tunnel from the Rozelle interchange and another tunnel across the harbour because, when the cars come up at the Rozelle interchange, they'll hit the Anzac Bridge and have nowhere to go. This is a case in point that will be studied by students and academics for decades to come. It is why planning should be done before the project commences, not during. You don't plan it, you don't make it up, as you're going along, but that is what is happening.
At the same time, of course, we know the existing M4, which the people of Western Sydney had already paid for with tolls, has had a toll put back on it with not one extra metre able to be driven. On the existing road with a couple of new lanes there is a toll that's substantial. And that is causing some real concerns as well for equity, because, depending upon where you live, particularly in Western Sydney, you're bearing the brunt of those decisions.
The third in the trifecta was the Perth Freight Link. This was an interesting one, because I reckon this was done on the back of an envelope, maybe the back of a coaster, who knows, because the project 'freight link' had never been raised prior to the 2013 election with me as transport minister or with my department. No planning had been done, no EIS, nothing from the state government. We found out that it was about a freight link to the port, but it didn't actually go to the port. What's required in Western Australia, and the McGowan government has this vision, for freight is the Outer Harbor. The planning needs to done because, essentially, the Fremantle port is approaching capacity and needs a new facility, and any proper analysis would show that that is the case.
So money was taken away from projects that had been approved by Infrastructure Australia that had a positive business case and given to projects that hadn't been approved by Infrastructure Australia, that didn't have a business case and where the planning hadn't been done. That's why projects which were funded by the former Labor government have been opened, often with great fanfare, by those opposite. The Redcliffe rail line, first promised in 1895, was delivered by the federal Labor government in partnership with the then state Labor government and the Moreton Bay Regional Council. That's why you're seeing projects like that being completed. Regional rail, the Pacific Highway upgrades and a lot of the Bruce Highway upgrades that we funded have been completed now. The stages from Cooroy to Curra around the Gympie region, the Perth City Link project, Gateway Western Australia, the projects on the Midland Highway and the Majura Parkway here all were funded and were the product of Labor's vision in government but were opened by those opposite.
The government doesn't have a pipeline of projects, and that's why infrastructure investment is falling off the cliff. Last year's budget, 2016-17, was $9.2 billion; the actual spend was $7.6 billion, a $1.6 billion underspend in one year. The infrastructure investment in this year's budget declines across the forwards to $4.2 billion. The Parliamentary Budget Office identified that infrastructure investment as a proportion of GDP will fall over the next decade from 0.4 to 0.2 per cent—half. That represents a strategy for less growth and fewer jobs. There are two things you need to do to grow the economy: invest in capital through good infrastructure development and invest in people through education and skills. This government is doing neither. It's reducing both, and that's why it doesn't have a plan for growth and jobs. It just has a slogan of growth and jobs, and that's why it's failing. And this legislation before the House to abolish the Building Australia Fund is consistent with that.
The government tried before to abolish the Building Australia Fund in legislation that was defeated in the Senate. It was defeated because senators understood the importance of the Building Australia Fund. They understood that was the case. Hence, in terms of our approach to nation building, we will defend the funds that were established for transport infrastructure, for education infrastructure and for health infrastructure. We think setting aside funds that can only be used for projects approved by Infrastructure Australia is, frankly, the sort of discipline that this government needs. If it had applied that discipline, it wouldn't have funded projects that never happened.
There was year after year of inactivity on any new infrastructure project in Perth, and yet, if the government had applied proper rigour, that wouldn't have been the circumstance. Perth Freight Link was stopped. All that happened was that, tragically, some wetlands were destroyed, but that was it, three years after an announcement. That is because they haven't got the right approach to nation-building infrastructure, and that is why they should think again before they continue to try to come up with ways to abolish the funds that were established for the right reasons and which, in the government's own rhetoric, they say they support, but their actions undermine that rhetoric.
The SPEAKER: The question is that this bill be now read a second time.
The House divided. [11:50]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Third Reading
Mr McCORMACK (Riverina—Minister for Small Business) (11:56): by leave—I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.
Therapeutic Goods Amendment (2017 Measures No. 1) Bill 2017
Therapeutic Goods (Charges) Amendment Bill 2017
Second Reading
Cognate debate.
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Mr ZAPPIA (Makin) (11:57): The Therapeutic Goods Amendment (2017 Measures No. 1) Bill 2017 and the Therapeutic Goods (Charges) Amendment Bill 2017 further implement reforms stemming from the 58 recommendations of the expert panel review of medicines and medical devices, which reported to the government in 2015 via two separate reports. My understanding is that the government accepted in full, in part or in principle all but two of those 58 recommendations.
The Therapeutic Goods Amendment (2016 Measures No. 1) Bill began this process, recommending eight key recommendations from the review. That bill passed with Labor's support, albeit with some reservations which we held about the use of Australian notified bodies to carry out conformity assessments for medical devices. This is the second tranche of the legislation. It further supports three of the eight recommendations that were dealt with in the first bill and an additional 11 recommendations from the review. Again, Labor supports this legislation, as do, I understand, most of the stakeholders who made representations with respect to it during the consultation and, indeed, who made representations and submissions to the Senate inquiry that was held prior to the bills being debated in this House.
Specifically, these bills do a number of things that I will go to in a moment, as did the minister in his second reading speech. But for anybody who is listening to this broadcast or who is not familiar with the proposals, I will outline the intent of the bills. The bills allow for provisional registration of promising new prescription medicines by creating a new class of therapeutic goods that will be known as provisionally registered goods. This will allow sponsors to apply for a time-limited provisional registration of certain prescription medicines using early clinical data. Sponsors will also be required to meet post-market conditions relating to the efficacy and safety of those medicines.
The bills also form the regulatory framework for complementary medicines by, firstly, establishing an additional pathway for intermediate risk complementary medicines. Presently, complementary medicines are either listed on the ARTG, based on self-certification, or registered after evaluation by the Therapeutic Goods Administration. The additional new pathway will consist of a new application and assessment process for sponsors of listed complementary medicines seeking to use indications that are not on the Permitted Indications List. This will allow these medicines to be included on the register following certification by the sponsor about the safety and quality of the product, and assessment by the TGA of the evidence of the efficacy for the proposed indications; secondly, supporting the implementation of the recommendation that sponsors of relevant products be able to indicate on promotional materials and on the product label that the efficacy of the product has been independently assessed for approved indications; and, thirdly, providing the minister with the power to make a legislative instrument, specifying permitted indications for use with listed medicines.
When applying to list their medicines, sponsors will need to certify that each indication for their medicine is permitted under the new instrument. If certification was incorrect, or becomes incorrect, the listing can be cancelled from the register. This is to ensure that listed medicines, which are not assessed, only make pre-approved, low-level claims for the conditions that the medicine can treat.
The bill strengthens the postmarket monitoring powers in relation to biologicals by, firstly, adding compliance with record-keeping requirements to the standard conditions of registration; secondly, enabling the inspection of premises where documents are kept; and, thirdly, allowing record-keeping requirements for biologicals to be prescribed in the regulations.
The bill also implements stronger compliance and enforcement powers to protect the public and provide for graduated penalties that allow the TGA to respond appropriately to the full range of non-compliant behaviours. Powers from the Regulatory Powers (Standard Provisions) Act 2014 will be incorporated with some modifications, providing similar powers to other regulators in the health portfolio. The changes will remove the current requirement to prove harm, or the likelihood of harm, from strict liability offences in the act and reduce the maximum penalties for these offences. Aggravated criminal offences in the act will be strengthened by including the likelihood of harm or injury to better address culpable behaviour. Strict liability offence provisions will complement, where appropriate, existing standalone criminal offences throughout the act for matters such as breaches of conditions, licences or permits.
Existing offences in relation to advertising of therapeutic goods will be strengthened and clarified to deter inappropriate or misleading advertising of therapeutic goods. With respect to advertising, the review recommended that a single agency be responsible for handling complaints about the advertising of therapeutic goods but that the government should consider whether this should be a national regulatory authority—that is, the TGA—or another Commonwealth agency or put this function out to tender. The bill changes the advertising requirements for therapeutic goods by, firstly, repealing the requirement for certain advertisements to be pre-approved, shifting to a more self-regulatory approach; and, secondly, by providing provisions to support the TGA as the single body responsible for implementing the complaints management process about advertising of therapeutic goods and by broadening sanctions and penalties to deter inappropriate and misleading advertising of therapeutic goods.
The bill also makes changes to properly recognise Australian conformity assessment bodies. Most of the legislative changes required to enable the TGA to authorise Australian companies to undertake conformity assessments were made in the first tranche of legislation. Additional changes will enable the TGA to publish information in relation to Australian conformity assessment bodies and will ensure that it has the same powers in relation to conformity assessment certificates issued by Australian conformity assessment bodies as it does for assessment certificates that it issues.
Finally, these reforms will enable greater use of assessments of comparable overseas regulators when the TGA makes its own assessments of medical devices. Medical devices were not included in the first tranche of legislation. For the inclusion of a kind of medical device in the register, applicants will be required to certify that an appropriate conformity assessment procedure, or an equivalent procedure carried out by a comparable overseas regulator, has been carried out in relation to medical devices of that kind. I understand that the overseas regulators would be specified in a notifiable instrument. The use of overseas reports in evaluating medicines is already allowed by the act. If we trust the use of overseas agencies in our assessment process for medicines, it seems reasonable that the same should apply for medical devices.
Notwithstanding the changes, there have been several issues with medical devices in recent years, as there have been with medicines. In speaking on the Therapeutic Goods Amendment (2016 Measures No. 1) Bill 2016, I highlighted some high-profile cases where medical devices had failed in some way. Those cases included hip and breast implants. In many cases those failures had disastrous consequences for patients. Furthermore, the Senate Community Affairs References Committee is currently inquiring into transvaginal mesh implants and related matters. I understand that many women who have received the mesh implants have experienced severe and life-changing pain and complications. I have no doubt that the TGA will closely follow the progress of the Senate inquiry, which is due to report on 30 November, and I will also have a close look at that report when it is presented.
Labor appreciates the complexity and difficulty in the regulation of therapeutic goods, but there is a need to balance the desire to ensure patients have timely access to new treatments with ensuring safety. This is more difficult when it comes to medical device regulation, which has a shorter history than regulation of medicines. Again, I have met with both patients and manufacturers of both medical devices and medicines who would like to see products on the market sooner rather than later. If you're a patient who is in a very serious medical state, any hope that is brought by a new device or a new medicine is something that you would want to see the government allow you access to. Indeed, I understand that sometimes people travel overseas to get such devices or such medicines because in overseas countries they have been approved. Therefore, if we can in any way safely fast-track access to those products, we should do so.
But there are obviously qualifications in the way we should do that, because, as we have seen with devices and medicines, in some cases problems have arisen. We never know with certainty until, sometimes, many years down the track whether those devices or medicines have side effects that were not known or not listed. Indeed, when it comes to medical devices, there is the added complexity of determining whether the device itself is at fault when an adverse event occurs or whether it was not implanted correctly. It could be either, and I suspect that in some cases it may be that it was the procedure that went wrong rather than the device itself. So all of those matters need to be taken into account.
But the important thing, and the main focus, is to provide patients with earlier access to medicines and medical devices. That's even more the case when we know that, almost on a daily basis, new products and new medicines are being brought onto the market or are being researched and developed, and it's happening at a faster rate than perhaps ever before. For the manufacturers, understandably, with the costs that go into the research and development phase of any new product, it's important from a financial point of view to have the products on the market as soon as possible in order to recoup the expenses that they have incurred when they have researched and developed the product.
For many people with a serious condition, as I said earlier, every day counts, and earlier treatment should not be unnecessarily delayed. That said, however, Labor again sounds a word of caution: great care is required when dealing with the regulation of therapeutic goods, particularly in making use of assessments of medical devices by overseas regulators over whom we have no control and on whom we rely for their integrity, or allowing bodies in Australia, for that matter, to conduct the conformity assessments. In that respect, I will quote from a letter submitted by the Royal Australasian College of Physicians in respect of the cautious advice that needs to be taken. The letter, dated 2 March 2017, which was submitted to the Senate inquiry, says:
Faster access to medicines and medical devices comes with significant implications, and a considered and at times slower approach can have advantages as it allows for more rigorous evaluation of medicines and medical devices in a real-world setting, as opposed to the homogenous setting of the clinical trial.
I believe that statement quite responsibly sums up the situation that exists and the position that we should try and adopt.
Labor support these bills, as I said at the outset, and we do so because we believe that on balance—and it is a case of having to make a judgement whether, on balance, it is in the public interest to do so—it is in the public interest. We do so with some provisos. These include that we will again look carefully at the regulations that the government draws up that will be associated with this legislation, because much of the detail and the matters that were also contained in the recommendations of the Sansom review will be contained in the regulations. Of course the regulations will not be debated in this House, although they will lie before the parliament and can be rejected. Nevertheless, the point I strongly make is that many of the changes will be made by regulation, and we will have a close look at that at that time.
The other matter I want to reinforce is a matter that I talked about when I spoke the first time with regard to the first tranche of changes that were made to the TGA process—that is, the TGA has a very sound track record on ensuring that medicines and medical devices not only comply with the claims made by manufacturers but are also products that can safely be used, based on all the evidence presented to the TGA. Indeed, it has been the TGA that at times has been a leader in identifying problems or unreported risks of products and, in turn, has then asked for those products to be removed from the market. It is an authority that I believe Australians can have a great deal of confidence in. The outsourcing of some of the responsibilities to private bodies may lead to a downsizing of the TGA. That is a concern that we have, because if the TGA is downsized then its ability to continue to carry out its functions and its responsibilities may also be compromised. It is a matter that we will also watch over with close interest, because we don't want to see the TGA in any way diminished in its ability to carry out the role that it has done so well for so many years and in which the public have a high degree of confidence.
In closing my remarks, I say that this has been a long process. It is a process that started in 2014, when the inquiry was established, and then continued with the report in 2015 and finally the legislation that was brought before this parliament in 2016. It is now 2017. It just highlights the cautious approach that is required when we're dealing with medicines and medical devices. That caution will continue, and it's my view that, with all of the changes that have been proposed both in the first tranche of legislation and in this legislation, there ought to be a consistent, close monitoring by both the TGA and the government of the changes and how well they are working out there in the community. We will watch with interest not only how well these changes are received but also what impacts they have on the community. With those comments, I repeat: Labor will be supporting this legislation.
Debate adjourned.
Reference to Federation Chamber
Mr CHESTER (Gippsland—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) (12:15): by leave—I move:
That the following bills be referred to the Federation Chamber for further consideration:
Therapeutic Goods Amendment (2017 Measures No. 1) 2017; and
Therapeutic Goods (Charges) Amendment 2017.
Question agreed to.
Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Mr HART (Bass) (12:15): Mr Deputy Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to speak in continuation on the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017. Before I was interrupted, I was speaking about the fact that mandatory sentencing provisions can lead to unjust results. If it is thought desirable to have some form of mandatory minimum sentencing scheme, then it should be drafted in such a way that it allows the court to exercise its discretion apart from the minimum mandatory sentence, if a particular case calls for it.
The submission that was made by the Australian Human Rights Commission to the Senate inquiry held on 6 January 2016 is instructive. This comprehensive submission sets out in detail by reference to legal principle and also to experience elsewhere, particularly in Canada, that mandatory minimum sentences do not—that is, do not—assist the orderly administration of justice. Paragraph 30 of the submission says:
If a sentence is fixed in advance without regard to the circumstances of the offence and the offender, and the court is not permitted to make an assessment of whether such a sentence is appropriate, then the sentence is bound to be arbitrary. There will be no rational or proportionate correlation between the deprivation of liberty and the particular circumstances of the case.
It is also significant to note there's been considerable judicial criticism of mandatory sentencing both on a court being required to impose a mandatory sentence and also in an academic setting. The Hon. Wayne Martin, Chief Justice of Western Australia, in his then capacity as Chair of the National Judicial College of Australia, addressed a federal crime and sentencing conference on 11 February 2012 on the topic of sentencing issues in people-smuggling cases. His observations as to the efficacy of mandatory sentencing are particularly appropriate in the context of this particular legislation. As at 2012, His Honour noted:
On at least 11 occasions … judges imposing the mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years imprisonment for people smuggling have made observations critical of the mandatory minimum varying degrees of stridency.
His Honour stated:
When a legislature is considering exercising the power to set a minimum bound for the exercise of the sentencing discretion, it will hopefully take account of the fact that the prescription of a minimum sentence creates the risk that a court may be required to impose a sentence which is disproportionate to the culpability of the offender, or the seriousness of the offence, or which may prejudice the prospects of rehabilitation and which is to that extent unjust, and will evaluate those risks against the perceived advantages of a mandatory minimum sentence.
These are all very important issues of judicial principle in an area of core competency for judges. It should not be overlooked that errors in sentencing may be able to be rectified upon appeal in certain circumstances, and the law relating to the application of sentencing principles is well traversed and is comprehensive. In fact, it's interesting to note Chief Justice Martin's observations within his address to the federal crime and sentencing conference as to the residual application of sentencing principles, notwithstanding the specification of a mandatory minimum. We as lawmakers should take into account the submissions of the Law Council of Australia, the Human Rights Commission and other civil liberties organisations that have made submissions in connection with this legislation or the prior attempts to impose mandatory minimum sentencing.
In summary, the grounds which I seek to emphasise as the basis upon which this House should oppose, in this legislation, the imposition of mandatory minimum sentences are as follows. Firstly, the fettering of judicial discretion is inappropriate, as a matter of principle. It is generally for the judiciary to determine appropriate punishment. Secondly, there is little, if any, evidence that the imposition of mandatory minimum sentences works to reduce or deter crime. There is certainly nothing in the explanatory memorandum to support the proposition put forward by the minister. The imposition of a mandatory minimum sentence can lead to unjust or unduly harsh sentences. The imposition of mandatory minimum sentences is inconsistent with Australia's human rights obligations, particularly concerning arbitrary detention and the ability to appeal sentences.
Dr ALY (Cowan) (12:20): This bill was first introduced in 2016 to see the introduction of mandatory minimum sentencing for those found guilty of trafficking illegal firearms. Parliament has already rejected these specific measures twice: once in February 2015, specifically around minimum sentencing, and again in August 2015, again around minimum mandatory sentencing. But it seems that the justice minister is determined to introduce something that just doesn't work. The government go on about listening to the advice of experts. It seems that they roll out the experts when it suits them.
Let's hear what the experts have to say about mandatory minimums. The Minister for Justice's own department says that they create an incentive for a defendant to fight charges. The Attorney-General's Department's own guide to framing Commonwealth offences states that minimum penalties should be avoided because, firstly, they interfere with judicial discretion to impose a penalty appropriate to the circumstances of a case; secondly, they preclude the use of alternative sanctions such as community service orders; and, thirdly, they may encourage the judiciary to look for technical grounds to avoid restriction on sentencing discretion. The Law Council of Australia refers to a number of unintended consequences of mandatory minimum sentencing, including undermining community confidence in the judiciary and criminal justice system. And state prosecutors have raised the concern that mandatory minimums could lead to unjust results and impose significant burdens on the justice system.
So does the government only take the advice of experts and brag about it when it suits them? We know the justice minister is notorious for being totally out of his depth. He continues to think that he knows better than the experts; better than even his own department. While he continues to pursue this bill to distract from the coalition's bitter division on guns, the government have actually lost control of guns and risk undermining Australia's strict gun control laws, which are the envy of nations around the world. Under this minister's watch, a record number of weapons have flooded the illegal market. There are currently as many as 600,000 illegal firearms in the market, and yet the government are divided on gun control. Just two weeks ago we had Bridget McKenzie on Q&A stating that she would like to see gun laws relaxed. Both Tony Abbott and the Prime Minister were willing to allow the Adler A110 shotgun into Australia in exchange for votes. The government are willing to trade the safety of Australians for votes and ignore the advice of experts to pursue a measure that will not—I repeat: will not—be effective in curbing the importation of dangerous weapons, which has grown exponentially under their watch. Indeed, in WA, the minister's home state and my home state, the number of guns stolen has doubled in a year. Last year, around 3½ thousand guns were stolen from legal gun owners and entered into the illegal market—an increase of around 630 from the previous year.
I want to turn my attention a little bit to the kinds of debates we have around gun control and gun laws here in Australia. We often hear those who are for the relaxation of gun laws and want to water down the gun laws say that guns don't kill people, that people kill people. It certainly is a popular mantra among those who argue that our strict gun laws are unfairly targeting legal gun owners. This is what I would say to people: it's not that guns kill people, certainly, but that people with guns kill people.
I want to talk a little bit about the recent incident in Las Vegas because the Las Vegas shooter—that man who managed to inflict so much harm and so much tragedy in such a short space of time—actually had no background of violence. Like many mass shooters that are terrorists or non-terrorist actors, he led a fairly unextraordinary life. He was unknown to police and law enforcement. These are the kinds of people about whom neighbours say: 'Oh, but he was such a lovely man. I can't believe that he's carried out this atrocious act.' And in fact in Pantucci's research there is a typology of lone-wolf actors, which includes terrorists and mass shooters. The research confirms that there is a group of lone actors who are, for all purposes, law-abiding citizens who tend to get access to guns, either legally or illegally, and carry out acts of mass shooting.
My own research on what I termed the rapid escalation to violence also confirmed that there was a group of terrorist actors—that is what I looked at—who do have these unextraordinary backgrounds and unextraordinary histories. Should these people have the opportunity to accumulate or to access illegal firearms, then, through the rapid escalation of violence, through a will to commit violence, they are likely to use them in atrocious tragedy acts killing innocent people.
One of the key factors that we have in assessing the risk to public safety is looking at how we stop or create opportunities for crime and then how we mitigate those opportunities. In maintaining public safety, it's absolutely vital that we remove opportunities for criminals, terrorists and violent actors to have access to firearms. And we have a very strong gun control regime that does that under legal firearms, but we also need to ensure that we do that with illegal firearms as well to ensure that people who may want to do harm to innocent Australians don't have access to illegal firearms. It's why we need to ensure that those who undermine or circumvent our gun laws by trading in illicit firearms get loud and clear the message that their crimes will attract the maximum possible penalty. Labor has been saying all along that we need to ensure that people who smuggle firearms; who trade in illicit firearms; who make those firearms available to terrorist actors, to criminal actors, even to people who have no extraordinary histories in violence but may want to or may be at the point of committing an act of violence—lone shooters, for example, or what we might also term lone-wolf actors—get the message that their trade in illegal firearms, the way that they are providing an opportunity to people who would do us harm by giving them access to illegal firearms by circumventing Australia's strong gun laws—which are, as I mentioned, the envy of the entire world—will attract the maximum sentence.
It's also why we need to ensure that everything we do in this space, whether it's around organised crime, whether it's around terrorism or whether it's around other forms of violent action, is effective and that the laws that we pass actually in practice have outcomes that are conducive to safety and that meet our obligations to public safety and the standards we set for public safety.
That might seem like I'm saying something as obvious as 'water is wet', but that fact seems to be lost on members of the LNP who want to play politics with this issue, because we've actually been waiting months to pass this bill. The bill, as amended by Labor to include a maximum penalty of life imprisonment—measures that were previously passed by a Labor government in 2012—received bipartisan support in the Senate. In fact, it passed the Senate in February and was introduced into the House the next day. So the government has had all of those months, from February to now, to pass this bill, but it has dillied and dallied on it because of a preoccupation with a measure that we know doesn't work. As I said at the beginning of my speech here today, there are several experts within the judiciary who attest to the fact that minimum mandatory sentencing does not work. Not only does it not work, it has adverse outcomes for and adverse impacts on the judicial system, on people's trust in the judicial system and on the capacity of the judicial system to actually incarcerate people who have committed serious crimes—in this case, in relation to the smuggling of and trade in illicit firearms. The government has had months to pass this bill. It has dillydallied on it because of its preoccupation with mandatory minimum sentencing. Importantly, that measure, of mandatory minimum sentencing, has already been rejected, twice in the past and now once again. It has already been rejected by the parliament, as I mentioned.
This government needs to take heed of all of this. Let's just stop and take stock of all of this. We've got experts who say it doesn't work. We've got a dire situation here, where we have an unprecedented number of illicit firearms out there in the market. We have evidence and research that shows that the profile of mass shooters, of terrorist actors, of violent actors, is that they are likely to go undetected by law enforcement and may have access to illegal firearms. If there is an opportunity to access illegal firearms, there could be a rapid escalation of violence that could, in a short space of time, lead to a violent act of the proportions of Las Vegas, for example. That's the evidence we've got. So we need to take stock of all of that evidence and we need to move on with this bill.
The government needs to get on with this job. Unfortunately, we're dealing with a government that has a track record of stalling and tinkering around the edges, and of weakness from its leader when it comes to dealing with some of the vocal elements on his backbench. So we have a government that is divided on gun control. Why would you be divided on gun control when our gun control policy, what Australia does, is held up time and time again around the world as a model of what to do—as a model of the ideal situation in controlling guns? And I must stop here and pay tribute to John Howard and the Howard government for passing those gun reforms quite swiftly in the face of the very terrible tragedy in Tasmania a couple of decades ago.
Let's do the right thing. Let's listen to the experts when they tell us what works and what doesn't. Let's take on board what they say about minimum mandatory sentencing. And let's understand that, in this particular instance, when we're dealing with illegal firearms trafficking, minimum mandatory sentencing undermines the judicial system but also undermines the capacity of the judicial system to actually give a penalty that fits the crime. Let's listen to the experts when they tell us that. Let's get this done. Let's stop dillydallying on matters of community safety.
I would urge the government to have a look at the numerous articles that are written by academics and to look at the profile of lone actors around violence with guns. Look at the relationship between gun ownership and access to guns, whether they are legal or illegal, and cases of domestic violence. We don't want to turn into the United States. We want to keep our gun laws. The Australian public wants to keep our gun laws the way that they are, but we want to strengthen them. We want to strengthen them by having maximum penalties for the people who smuggle and who trade in illicit firearms. So let's get this done, let's get this through, and let's stop stalling on it.
Mr KEOGH (Burt) (12:35): I rise to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017. We're here again on this legislation because the government is more focused on political pointscoring than good public policy to protect our community. We could have had such good law if the government had agreed some two years ago, but alas its bloody-mindedness delivers us back here today.
The Labor Party and I support tougher penalties for firearm trafficking, but mandatory sentencing is an ineffective measure. Labor has consistently opposed the use of mandatory sentencing regimes for firearm trafficking, as in other cases. This is because these sorts of regimes impose unacceptable restrictions on judicial discretion and independence and undermine the fundamental rule-of-law principles. The rule of law underpins Australia's legal system and ensures that everyone, including governments, is subjected to the law and that citizens are protected from arbitrary abuses of power.
Mandatory sentencing is also inconsistent with Australia's voluntarily assumed international human rights obligations. Back in 2015, Labor successfully moved amendments in the Senate to remove the introduction of mandatory minimum sentences contained in the government's Crimes Legislation Amendment (Psychoactive Substances and Other Measures) Bill 2014. Later, Labor successfully moved amendments to remove the introduction of mandatory minimum sentencing in the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Powers, Offences and Other Measures) Bill 2015.
Now the coalition government has introduced the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017, which would see the introduction of mandatory minimum sentencing for those found guilty of trafficking illegal firearms. The Australian Labor Party maintains its position that the introduction of these minimum sentences should be avoided. These provisions have now been considered three times and rejected three times by this parliament, including by this parliament in relation to the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Powers, Offences and Other Measures) Bill 2015. The government has, for a fourth time, failed to justify the need for these proposed provisions. The reintroduction of these measures is a desperate attempt by the government to distract from the fact that it is hopelessly divided on the issue of guns. Labor has proposed amendments to introduce new offences for aggravated firearm-trafficking offences, with maximum sentences of life in prison.
Mandatory sentencing laws are arbitrary, and they limit an individual's right to justice by preventing judges from imposing an appropriate penalty based on the unique circumstances of each offender and of each offence. Such regimes are costly, and there is a lack of evidence as to their effectiveness as a deterrent and their ability to reduce crime. Mandatory sentencing results in unjust, harsh and disproportionate sentences where the punishment does not fit the crime. It is not possible for parliament to know in advance whether a minimum mandatory penalty will be just and appropriate across the full range of circumstances in which an offence may be committed. There are already numerous reported examples of mandatory sentences that have been handed down and applied with anomalous and unjust results. When adopted, mandatory sentencing fails to produce convincing evidence to demonstrate that increases of these sorts of penalties actually deter any crime. It also has the potential to increase the likelihood of recidivism because prisoners are placed in a learning environment for crime when they otherwise would not be, which reinforces a criminal identity and fails to address the underlying causes of the crime.
The minister's own department says that mandatory sentences may create an incentive for a defendant to fight charges even in hopeless cases. The Attorney-General's Department document Guide to framing Commonwealth offences, infringement notices and enforcement powers states at 3.1 that minimum penalties should be avoided. Of course, this is just another example of the government failing to follow its own policy. This, of course, is because such sentences interfere with judicial discretion to impose a penalty appropriate to the circumstances of the case; they create an incentive for a defendant to fight the charges even when there is little merit in doing so; they preclude the use of alternative sanctions, such as a community service order, that would otherwise be available under the Crimes Act; they encourage the judiciary to look for technical grounds to avoid a restriction on sentencing discretion, leading to quite anomalous decisions and outcomes; and they even serve to encourage law enforcement to prefer lesser charges in order to avoid perverse results.
The Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee received evidence from a number of stakeholders in inquiries for the two previous bills that strongly opposed the introduction of these amendments. The Law Council of Australia said that it had consistently opposed the use of mandatory sentencing regimes because mandatory sentencing regimes undermine fundamental principles underpinning the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law. Those are not just words; they are meaningful points about the foundation of our democracy in this country. The Australian Human Rights Commission said that they had concerns with mandatory sentencing because it could 'run counter to the fundamental principle that punishment for criminal offences should fit the crime'. How can anyone actually argue against that proposition? State prosecutors also had concerns that these provisions could lead to unjust results and impose a significant burden on the justice system itself.
Public safety is incredibly important, and we should be doing what we can at all stages to promote the reduction of crime, but when we stack up the evidence it becomes clear that mandatory sentencing in this regard simply doesn't work. Proponents of mandatory sentencing argue that, when faced with knowing that they would go to prison, potential offenders would not commit such crimes. While a superficially attractive argument—superficial like all of this government's policies, in fact—the fault in this argument comes down to the idea of knowing. What they never appreciate is that the people involved in such crimes do so with the supreme belief that they won't get caught. The reality is that the penalties that the offenders would confront if they thought they'd get caught are already sufficient to deter and will be more so with the increase in maximum sentences that we propose. Such crimes are committed by those who don't think that they are going to get caught. So, no, it is not the case that potential offenders know what they may face, nor do they care. Mandatory sentencing also removes the discretion of a judge to take into account particular circumstances and removes any incentive for the defendant to plead guilty, which leads to longer, more contested and more costly trials for the state. It also means that witnesses have to be brought before the court when they otherwise would not necessarily have had to be.
In a classic from the minister for overreach, the member for Stirling, when he was speaking yesterday on the bill, he spoke about the need for mandatory minimums to 'guarantee the judiciary will impose an appropriate minimum sentence'. I have this to say to the minister: increasing maximums will result in higher sentences. The task of sentencing is that justice be done in all the circumstances, and mandatory minimums inhibit that. Criticising the appropriateness of sentences was tried by some of your ministerial colleagues recently, and the minister would be well advised for once to try not to overreach in this area and be a little bit more circumspect in the way in which he refers to the job of the third arm of government, the judiciary. Such critiques of our judiciary actually risk undermining confidence in our judicial system, and they further demonstrate the minister's own lack of understanding of the criminal justice system. For the Minister for Justice, you would think it might be useful to at least have a passing understanding of how it all works. However, such a high level of competence appears to be all too much for this government to muster in this and many other portfolios.
The Australian Labor Party maintains its opposition to mandatory sentencing for firearms. We note these provisions have already been considered and rejected by parliament numerous times, and the government has failed to justify the need for such provisions now.
Imprisonment also has to be recognised as being very expensive. With all this talk of debt and deficit, you would think that the government would think twice before coming up with a policy that is costly and ineffective. It costs more than $350 a day to keep a person in jail and more than $600 a day to keep a juvenile in detention. In states where mandatory sentencing has operated for the longest period of time—unfortunately often my own state of Western Australia—taxpayers are forced to cover the cost of higher rates of imprisonment. In 2013, the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee found that, while crime rates had declined in Australia, the rate of imprisonment had actually increased. The committee considered that one of the factors contributing to the increased rate of incarceration was the introduction of mandatory sentencing regimes. I can only surmise that, as these costs are actually borne by the states and not the Commonwealth, the government just doesn't care.
As I said before, the reality is that this legislation is more about politics than policy. Last year, the government lost control of its members on the issue of guns. Tony Abbott, the member for Warringah, and the member for Wentworth were willing to let the dangerous Adler A110 lever-action shotgun into Australia in exchange for a vote in the Senate. The National Party voted to let an incredibly dangerous firearm into Australia, causing a split between the Nationals and the Liberals on the floor of our Senate. The Deputy Prime Minister—for now—Barnaby Joyce, contradicted the Prime Minister's position on guns, even on national television.
What's worse is that members of the coalition, members of the Prime Minister's own party, then came out in favour of weaker gun laws. Under the Liberal government's watch, a record number of weapons have entered the black market here in Australia. The Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission estimates that currently there are more than 260,000 firearms in the illicit firearms market and possibly as many as 600,000. They estimate that 10,000 of these are handguns. Yet these proposals put forward by the Abbott and Turnbull governments to tackle firearm trafficking contain maximum sentences of only 20 years.
The Turnbull government's proposed measures are an ineffective and expensive distraction from its disastrous record on firearms. Prosecutors should be able to pursue higher penalties in the worst gun-trafficking cases, and we support that. We are seeking to amend this bill to implement the provisions which we proposed when we were in government—an aggravated offence for firearm trafficking with a maximum sentence of life imprisonment, the same as the maximum penalty for drug trafficking; and new aggravated offences for people who traffic 50 or more firearms or firearm parts either within Australia or across our borders in a six-month period, for which the maximum penalty would be life imprisonment. This will actually send a strong message that trafficking firearms, and the violence and destruction it creates in our community, will not be tolerated—as opposed to the petty politicking that is being played by the 'Minister for Overreach', the Minister for Justice in this government.
Mr BRENDAN O'CONNOR (Gorton) (12:46): I rise to speak on behalf of federal Labor to support the amendments and raise concerns that we have with the construction of the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017. As a former Minister for Justice and Home Affairs, I take child sex offences very seriously. Indeed, in one of my first acts as minister, I introduced legislation to ensure that we had sufficient sanctions against the grooming and procuring of children online. That legislation was enacted in 2009. I also enacted legislation that went to ensuring we screen people who work with children in the Commonwealth jurisdiction. Up until then, there were screening provisions in state legislation, but the previous conservative federal government had done nothing to ensure that screening arrangements for adults working with children were also required within the Commonwealth jurisdiction. I'm honoured to have enacted that legislation; it was really a response to deficiencies in the law not recognising that the internet was being used increasingly to seek to groom and procure children. The former Labor government is very proud of those initiatives. As I have said, it was in a sense a belated act by this country; it should have happened earlier.
When, as minister, I enacted legislation on working with children and to bring in serious sanctions against those who choose to groom and procure children online, I did not seek to politicise that matter. Indeed, we understand that everyone in this place supports every effort by law enforcement agencies and the courts to deal with child sex abuse and child sex offences. That's why we have been concerned with the language of the minister and the government in asserting otherwise. When I was enacting such legislation, which is certainly similar in its subject matter—very serious legislation—we sought the support of the opposition at the time and didn't seek to politicise that. That's why we have some concerns in relation to the provision that we contest—namely, mandatory sentencing.
It's not just that we have a concern in principle with mandatory sentencing; it is known that it is sometimes more difficult to prosecute more serious crimes when, indeed, such penalties, which do not provide discretion for the courts, are put in place. So, from our point of view, we do this with a view to ensuring that we jail for those most egregious and disgusting offences that are conducted by adults against children, and we want the government to desist from continuing to assert that in any way we're soft on crime in this area.
Mr DREYFUS (Isaacs—Deputy Manager of Opposition Business) (12:50): I rise to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017. Labor will be supporting this bill as amended by the Senate. We will not be supporting the government amendment. Labor is tough on guns. We want laws that will protect Australians from gun violence, but we want to do it right with laws that are practically effective in making sure that gun traffickers are imprisoned. We have a responsibility to crack down on the illicit trade of guns in Australia by ensuring that offenders are punished to the full extent of the law. It is Labor's priority to ensure that our laws empower our courts to give gun traffickers the punishment that they deserve. And we want to make sure that the punishment for gun trafficking acts as an effective deterrent to reduce the rate of illicit trade.
There are currently estimated to be around 600,000 illegal weapons in the illicit market in this country. Tens of thousands of these illegal weapons are handguns, which is the weapon of choice for many of those involved in criminal activity. And, because guns are designed and built to last, once these illicit guns are in Australia, they may be available to be used as weapons for committing crimes almost indefinitely. Last year, 3,542 firearms were stolen from legal gun owners and entered the illicit firearms market. That's an increase on the previous year, so we know that gun trafficking is getting worse.
Labor will be supporting this bill as amended by the Senate, and that's because we practically wrote the bill in the form in which it's now before the House. We have made this bill tougher and we have made this bill more effective. The government presented in the Senate a piece of legislation that they must have known Labor would not support because it contained mandatory minimum sentences. But we recognised that this was a useful opportunity to make Australia's gun laws stronger. We sought amendments in the Senate to ensure that offenders are appropriately punished. We put in life sentences for serious gun traffickers, and we supported the Nick Xenophon Team in the other place, who also introduced amendments that strengthened the bill.
The government, regrettably, seems to be single-mindedly focused on attacking Labor for our position on this bill or the government's original bill, but the Nick Xenophon Team also recognises that mandatory minimums do not work. We stand with the government in wanting tougher penalties for gun traffickers, or perhaps I should say the government stands with us, because that is why the government supports our amendments in the Senate. There ought to be no room left for the government to play politics.
I say again: Labor wants courts to be able to lock up the worst kinds of gun traffickers for life. We want aggravated offences to be available that courts can apply to those who traffic more than 50 firearms or firearms parts or a combination of firearms and firearms parts within Australia in a six-month period or for the trafficking of more than 50 firearms. Those aggravated offences will attract a maximum of life imprisonment or 7,500 penalty units or both. Putting in these kinds of increased maximum penalties is modelled on the penalties that apply under divisions 302 and 307 of the Criminal Code for the trafficking of controlled drugs and the importing and exporting of commercial quantities of border-controlled drugs or plants.
The measures that have been put into this bill in the Senate were previously proposed by Labor in 2012, and, happily, they now form part of the bill, as amended by the Senate, and that's the form of this bill, I say again, that Labor will be supporting. The government have an opportunity right now to pass a law through this House that would make Australia's communities safer. But instead, they're now trying to move amendments in the House that they know Labor will not support. It is a pathetic attempt by this minister to play politics. The government have a clear choice: they can choose to pass the bill, as it was agreed to in the Senate—a stronger and more effective set of laws that has Labor's support right now—or, alternatively, they can continue, as they appear to be set on doing, to move an amendment which they know Labor will not support because the amendment inserts mandatory minimum sentences. And this failure of a minister—this hopeless, small-minded, failure of a minister—has chosen the latter course.
I'm going to say again about mandatory minimum sentences what I said just last week on the other bill that the government is pursuing, in relation to child sex offences. Mandatory minimum sentences are not the solution to Australia's crime problems. They're not the solution to Australia's gun problems. And they're not the solution to child sexual abuse, which we debated only too recently when considering the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Sexual Crimes Against Children and Community Protection Measures) Bill 2017 just last week. There is no evidence that mandatory minimum sentences act as a deterrent. In fact, they actually make Australia's criminal justice system less effective because they make juries less likely to convict.
It's for this reason that the Attorney-General's Department, the department in which this failure of a Minister for Justice actually sits and does his work, has issued formal guidelines for legislative drafting, which recommend against mandatory minimum sentences. Perpetrators who should be convicted may escape punishment altogether because mandatory minimum sentences have been included in legislation. Juries may decide not to convict, even though they think the offender is guilty, because juries may not want to inflict on an offender a sentence which they think is disproportionately harsh based on the circumstances of the crime. Mandatory minimum sentences also make offenders less likely to plead guilty, and offenders facing mandatory minimum sentences lose an incentive to provide useful information or assistance to prosecutors.
I will say this: the government has attempted, in the amendment it is now putting before the House, which seeks to reintroduce to this bill mandatory minimum sentences, to address these last two issues by including a provision allowing for a reduction of the mandatory minimum penalty if a person pleads guilty or cooperates with law enforcement agencies in the investigation of the offence. But tinkering around the edges, and that's all this is, of mandatory minimum penalties misses the point. The point is that mandatory sentences take away judicial discretion, and the tinkering doesn't change the fact that mandatory sentences don't work and that there is no evidence that they do. We do have very good evidence that juries are less likely to convict a perpetrator of a crime if mandatory minimums are in place.
Might I also say that the government is ignoring concerns that have been expressed repeatedly by the legal profession through the state and territory law societies and the Law Council of Australia, the peak body for lawyers in Australia. The Law Council has repeatedly called on the government to take the mandatory minimum penalties out of this bill and to work with Labor to make the Australian community safer. The Law Council of Australia has raised concerns that there will be unintended consequences of the mandatory minimum penalties. I'll cite the example that the member for Hotham, the shadow minister for justice, eloquently used in her speech yesterday on this bill. It's this: a farmer who has never been overseas before might go to the United States and attend a gun show; she may find a gun part which she thinks will improve the firearms she uses for controlling pests on her farm back in Australia; she might buy one for herself and buy another one that she intends to sell to a friend; she could get caught by Customs when she returns to Australia and might tell the officer that she intends to sell one of the gun parts to a friend. That scenario would satisfy the elements of trafficking that are contained in this bill. She would be facing a five-year sentence in jail under the mandatory minimum provisions.
Labor is firmly opposed to mandatory sentences. It's the role of the judiciary to make decisions about sentencing criminals, and that is what our system of justice is founded on. It is a clear separation of powers issue. It is not up to the legislature to decide what the sentences should be for individual offenders, regardless of the particular circumstances of the case. Our system of government is based on a fundamental principle of judicial independence. I should hardly need to state that in this House, but apparently, because of the ignorance of the failed Minister for Justice, I do. And there is the intent of the government to press on to seek only partisan political advantage rather than being concerned, as the government should be, about the safety of Australians. It is the role of judges to decide on sentencing, because they are impartial and unbiased. They come to each decision with a clear mind and determine what justice requires in each case. It is the role of judges to make the punishment fit the crime. That role can only be carried out by a court which has examined all of the circumstances of the particular crime, which is something that this parliament cannot seek to do in legislation.
The role of this parliament is to indicate to courts the seriousness with which parliament views different classes of crime, in particular by setting maximum penalties. The High Court of Australia is not in any doubt about the importance of setting maximum penalties. In a recent decision, just a couple of weeks back, in Director of Public Prosecutions v Dalgliesh, the Chief Justice and Justices Bell and Keane quoted with approval from a 2005 decision of the court, Markarian v The Queen. In that case, former Chief Justice Gleeson and Justices Gummow, Hayne and Callinan said:
... careful attention to maximum penalties will almost always be required, first because the legislature has legislated for them; secondly, because they invite comparison between the worst possible case and the case before the court at the time; and thirdly, because in that regard they do provide, taken and balanced with all of the other relevant factors, a yardstick.
The High Court has been equally forthright about the importance of judicial discretion in sentencing in judgement after judgement for decades. Former Chief Justice Barwick of the High Court of Australia, a former Liberal Attorney-General, while recognising the power of the legislature to determine penalties for offences in Palling v Corfield, in 1970, said:
It is both unusual and in general, in my opinion, undesirable that the Court should not have a discretion in the imposition of penalties and sentences, for circumstances alter cases and it is a traditional function of a Court of justice to endeavour to make the punishment appropriate to the circumstances as well as to the nature of the crime.
A decade later, Chief Justice Gibbs, in Sillery v The Queen, said that even in the case of a most serious crime:
… there may exist wide differences in the degree of culpability of particular offenders, so that in principle there is every reason for allowing a discretion for the judge at trial to impose an appropriate sentence not exceeding the statutory maximum.
He said that mandatory sentencing 'would lead to results that would be plainly unreasonable and unjust'.
In the Dalgliesh decision just a couple of weeks ago, the Chief Justice and Justices Bell and Keane noted the observation of a previous High Court:
… [t]he administration of the criminal law involves individualised justice.
They then said:
The imposition of a just sentence on an offender in a particular case is an exercise of judicial discretion concerned to do justice in that case.
Many other legal figures have voiced the same principle. John Dowd, a former Liberal Attorney-General and New South Wales Supreme Court Justice, in 2012, said: 'It is a breakdown of the rule of law and sentencing, where the court determines what is appropriate.'
Last week, when I spoke on this subject, I quoted from Nicholas Cowdery, a former New South Wales Director of Public Prosecutions, who said this about mandatory sentences:
It is unrealistic, therefore, and unjust, to prescribe a penalty or minimum penalty that must be imposed for any serious offence before it has been committed or is even in contemplation (or can even be foreseen by Parliament), before all the facts and circumstances are known and without knowing anything of the offender; and experience has shown that such measures do create injustice. Justice requires proper consideration of all the circumstances of the offence and the offender.
The Australian Human Rights Commission and the Judicial Conference of Australia have expressed similar concerns.
The government has produced no evidence that mandatory sentencing works and has not even bothered to explain its reasons for seeking to impose it. Mandatory sentences will not make our communities safer; juries are less likely to convict; perpetrators are less likely to plead guilty, and perpetrators are less likely to cooperate in bringing down the trafficking ringleaders. (Time expired)
Mr KATTER (Kennedy) (13:05): I strongly endorse the remarks of the previous speaker, the shadow Attorney-General. I was asked by one of the most powerful people in this place and I said, 'You know, you have to put up with a bunch of bludgerigar ministers.' He said, 'Who would you say are the failures?' I said, 'Well, start with Minister Keenan, because he's the only person in one week who can put the whole government in jeopardy, with statements that clearly indicated that someone had flagrantly lied to Leyonhjelm putting'—
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Irons ): Order!
Mr KATTER: That's an order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The government which I belonged to in Queensland was much maligned as being a right-wing extremist government—the Bjelke-Petersen government. In my 20 years in that parliament, when we were ruling, I can't remember one single case of a reverse onus of proof or any mandatory sentencing. We might have been a bunch of extremist rednecks, but even extremist rednecks can realise that you don't have mandatory sentencing. Like the shadow Attorney-General, who I applaud for his speech, Minister Keenan, as I understand it, is a lawyer. There is no excuse if you are a lawyer. He knows the implications of what they're doing here.
Let me give you a case, Mr Deputy Speaker. This actually occurred in the Kennedy electorate. They're not allowing me to give their name out, so I must respect my constituent in that area. He had been away and he hadn't seen all his accounts. One of his accounts was for his licence fee, which was due. He went over time, so his gun licence was automatically suspended, abolished—done away with. Then six armed police in flak jackets—bulletproof jackets!—surrounded a prominent businessman in the town. He was the president of the local Rotary Club, as I understand it, and president of the local golf club. They surrounded his house and were carrying automatic weapons. Now, if this legislation goes through, this person, who has done absolutely nothing wrong, is going to be put in jail for five years!
The people in government complain: 'Oh, the cost of government. We can't afford to make welfare payments.' Well, we've had three proposals cutting welfare payments in the last week. When the much-maligned Bjelke-Petersen government fell, we had 2,000 people in jail. There are now 8,000 people in jail in Queensland, so who are the rednecks? Who are the extremists—us, who only had 2,000 people in jail, or those who have 8,000 people in jail?
The implications for the public purse here are quite profound. I had to do a cost analysis of the cost of putting a juvenile in prison, and it turned out that it was $580,000 a year. These prisoners are costing us half a million dollars a year! If he wants to go away and throw decent law-abiding citizens into jail and turn them into criminals, and impose upon the taxpayers half a million dollars a year in cost structures, then this would be the bludgerigar of all bludgerigar ministers, this one!
There is no intelligent person that could agree with him on this issue. Having finished that, this minister consulted with virtually nobody on his proposals. He knows everything about everything, so he didn't have to consult with anyone that knew anything about the issue.
As to the police: well, you know, it suits the police—and I'm not knocking the police for it—to have nobody with guns except the police. Well, we know what sorts of states they are where the only people with guns are police in uniforms. We know what sorts of states they are.
Now I turn to the general issue of guns. The strongest people to assail the improper use of guns are we gun owners. I mean, every time there is a death with guns, we get flogged to death. So we are the people that desperately want no deaths with guns. We are the people most at risk.
The fair dinkumness of this place! The three huge massacres in Australia—Hoddle Street, Surry Hills and Port Arthur—were all committed by people that were illegally in possession of a firearm. So much for the usefulness of your laws! But why did not the police apprehend these people? In those cases, it was not a matter of the Tarasoff rule. But the ruling in the Tarasoff case in the United States says that a psychologist or a psychiatrist cannot divulge that a person is dangerous, unless the person specifies that he's going to shoot Joe Bloggs. That's the ruling from the Tarasoff case. The rule should be reversed so that, once they think that he's dangerous, they have an onus to disclose that. But the rule works the other way—and there's good reason for that: to protect your patients and all that sort of thing—so that you cannot divulge it, when you know the patient is dangerous, unless he actually specifies who he's going to shoot. Well, in the cases of Surry Hills, Hoddle Street, Port Arthur, and, if you like, Wickham Terrace in Brisbane, going back a fair bit, they weren't specifying anyone. They were just going to go down there and spray lead everywhere. They were nut cases. Their psychologists and psychiatrists knew them to be nut cases and knew they were dangerous. And the rule says they can't divulge that. Well, that rule needs to be reversed.
As to the effectiveness of gun laws: there is a very naive belief in this place that the more you ban guns, the fewer murders you have with guns. In the three years before Port Arthur and the ban on guns, there were 107 deaths with guns in Australia. In the three years after the ban, there were 129 deaths with guns. In other words, if you ask, 'What was the effect of the bans?' the effect of the bans was to put the number of gun deaths up, not down.
In Europe, guns were banned in East Germany, as they are in all totalitarian countries. They ban guns and only the people in uniforms are allowed to have guns; that's characteristic of totalitarian regimes, of course. But in Switzerland—one of the more civilised countries on earth; a central European country—every single home has a gun by law and has nine rounds of ammunition for the gun. So we have two countries side by side: one bans guns; in the other, every single household has a gun. I might add: Switzerland has never been invaded. There's a good reason why you don't invade a country where there are two million people that can shoot you, and know how to shoot you. The highest death rate with guns in Europe is in East Germany. The lowest death rate with guns in Europe is in Switzerland. You say, 'This is a bit weird.' Well, quite frankly, I think it is a bit weird. In every interview I do, the interviewer always steps on the dingo trap; if you leave it out there then sure enough he will step on it, every time. He says, 'What about America?'—like, you know, he's got me. 'What about America? You left America out. There are deaths with guns all the time in America.' Well, where are the deaths coming with guns in America?
Oh, look at this: the worst case is District of Columbia—Washington, DC—with 11 deaths for every 100,000 people, easily the highest in the United States. In fact, no other state gets to double figures. Guess where the most stringent, restrictive gun laws exist in America? Need I tell you, it's under federal legislation; it is Washington, DC. The politicians there also want to protect themselves a bit. But there it is: the state with highest death rate from guns in the United States is District of Columbia—Washington, DC.
The states with the lowest death rate from guns—in fact, one of them doesn't even have a death rate at all—are North Dakota and South Dakota, the hunting states. When I went to South Dakota I went to the biggest gun shop in the world; it was really exciting for me! North Dakota and South Dakota are hunting states and they have the highest ownership of firearms of any state on earth yet they have the lowest rates of death from guns. I don't purport to understand why this phenomenon occurs, but it does occur. If you go down to your local clay pigeon shoot, you will see your local doctors, your local Lions Club members and your local diesel fitter in charge of the council workshops. You will see all the most prominent people in the town down there enjoying having a bit of a shoot, a bit of fun and a good social outing.
I represent the Barrier Reef, and we have terrible turbidity problems. It was thought the sugar cane farms were the problem. Sugar cane now is not burned. Do you remember Fields of Fire? There are no fields of fire now; we don't burn. We put the trash, which is the leaves and cane tops, on the ground. There is an eight-inch layer of cover, so there can't be any run-off from the cane fields. Cane farms also have salination traps. I won't go into that, but there is no run-off from the cane fields. There is no mining taking place. The cost of electricity has closed down most of the mining. I don't know of any mines offhand—there will be some—that are on the Barrier Reef, so it's not coming from mining.
It seems to me quite obvious that the turbidity is coming from pigs. In one morning, two blokes with SLR rifles took out 800 pigs from a helicopter in the bush. It is very hard to hit anything from a helicopter The place is alive with pigs. They have pig shoots and might get a thousand pigs on the weekend, just blokes just going around shooting. They have a competition to see who can get the most pigs. They are enormously destructive animals because they don't attack the leaves; they attack the root systems. I had 10 acres on my property which was a little weaner irrigation paddock I was setting up. We had a flood and the whole paddock went straight down into the ocean. The pigs had taken all of the root system out and there was no underlying protection. Should we bait them? Maybe a quarter of our birds are carnivores, most certainly a tenth are carnivores, so we don't want to bait; that's not good. Should we trap them? We can use traps. We caught a cassowary and four little chicks in the trap last year. The only thing that works here is a gun; that's the only weapon you've got against pigs.
The government wants to do something about firearms coming into this country illegally. This is the most fascinating figure of all: in 2012-13, Customs screened 25 per cent of mail and seized 60,000 prohibited imports. That was with just 25 per cent inspection. If they did 100 per cent inspection, which I know would cost a whole lot of money, how many prohibited imports would they get? To put it the other way, 75 per cent of the prohibited imports are coming into the country without ever being inspected. If you want to bring an illegal firearm into the country, you've got a 75 per cent chance that you won't get caught.
They're usually sent in containers because that's how they are sending in tractors and all of our motor vehicles coming in from overseas. There are a thousand pipes on a tractor—there are pipes everywhere on a tractor for hydraulics and everything else delivering fuel to the engine. A thousand pipes. A gun is only a pipe. An X-ray will only tell you that it's a pipe. In any event, only 0.2 per cent of these containers are inspected. So the guns are coming in, in the containers, and there is only a 0.2 per cent inspection rate. And here we are throwing decent human beings into jail compulsorily for five years. They go into the clink, but is it fair dinkum? No, because they are inspecting 0.2 per cent of containers, and they are inspecting 25 per cent of mail.
This is the worst minister— (Time expired)
Ms HUSAR (Lindsay) (13:20): I think this is the first time where the member of Kennedy and I have agreed on something; he called this minister quite disgraceful. I rise to speak in support of the amendments to the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017. This legislation is the product of detailed analysis and, I have to say, a great deal of cross-party negotiation over a long period. I candidly say 'cross-party', as the divisions on the other side of this House are very, very clear. I will get to that shortly.
It's important to note that it was a Labor government who first introduced similar legislation in the 43rd Parliament—legislation that was passed in this House but not ratified by the Senate. This legislation is similar because it is good legislation that will deter the illegal trafficking of guns and gun parts in Australia and offers tough penalties on those who seek to profit from this insidious trade. We are proud of our existing gun laws and actions to prevent the ownership and use of certain firearms. Labor is committed to strong legislation that will strengthen criminal penalties for gun related crime. We must do absolutely everything possible and within our power to ensure that our communities are safe. There are an estimated 600,000 weapons in the illicit firearm market, and 10,000 of those are handguns. We need to be vigilant, but above all we need to send a strong message that if individuals or groups seek to profit from illegal firearms trade they will face the full force of the law and our judicial processes.
The overwhelming majority of Australians support strong and effective gun control. As we all know, our laws are amongst the strongest in the world, and the use of firearms for nefarious actions and self-harm is amongst the lowest in the world. Recent events in the USA have borne out the effectiveness of our stance. However, while we need vigilance, we also need to send a message that our judiciary can do their job. They need tough laws that match the seriousness of the crimes. What they don't need is for their discretion to be taken from them because of differences among those sitting on the other side who are politicking and seeking to play football with this important measure. They are a weak mob that seek to divert attention from their lack of leadership. They have shown a cavalier attitude to our protection by shouting insanities in relation to mandatory sentencing. Firearms-trafficking control is not a debate for political handball or pointscoring. The attitude of the National Party, led by Barnaby Joyce, is out there in plain sight whenever he has a dummy spit, and the Prime Minister is absolutely powerless to reel him in. They were willing to let the notorious Adler shotgun into our country to buy a vote in the Senate. Buying votes on gun reform is the opposite of keeping Australians safe and protected from gun violence.
The minister's amendment reintroduces mandatory minimum sentences, which have already been knocked back by the Senate. Labor do not support the mandatory minimum sentences, because we know they just don't work. We support the bill as amended by the Senate. Mandatory minimums don't protect us and they don't protect our communities; in fact, they may make them more dangerous. The minister's own department says that mandatory sentencing will not deter people from committing any crime but will simply create greater backlogs while those who participate in these activities, whether in a minor or major fashion, are forced to fight charges no matter the weight of evidence or merit to a case. Let's face it: we could have had these laws in place eight months ago if the minister who crows about being tough had got over his obsession with mandatory sentencing. Labor supports strong laws that include the provision of imprisonment for those convicted of serious criminal activity. Seeking to undermine our hardworking judiciary to divert attention from a party divided is indeed morally bankrupt and is frankly disappointing.
The Attorney-General's Department and the Law Council are both in furious agreement that mandatory minimums do not work. Why does the justice minister believe he is above taking directions and advice from the experts? That is incredibly arrogant. We know that we need to strengthen Australia's firearms control regime to deter potential offenders.
The Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission's report on illicit firearms in Australia tells us there is a historic illicit grey market for firearms and instances of legislative loopholes relating to deactivated or inoperable firearms. Contemporary diversion methods to move firearms or firearm components to the domestic illicit firearms market include illicit imports, illicit assembly, illegal manufacture and theft.
We believe that effective deterrence is achieved by increasing penalties applicable to the most serious firearms offenders rather than by imposing prison terms on the least serious offenders. We know mandatory minimums can lead to fewer prosecutions and convictions, sometimes leading juries to acquit rather than sentence, and can conflict with the role of the judiciary. Mandatory minimums produce unintentional consequences. People do not have an incentive to plead guilty or to inform the police on other's actions if they know they are facing a mandatory sentence. It builds on the incentive to fight an appeal against convictions.
Even former Prime Minister John Howard has previously commented that, as a matter of principle, he doesn't agree with mandatory sentencing and, in the end, he does think that these matters ought to be determined by judges and magistrates. It is a shame Mr Howard is only getting rolled out for his opinion on mandatory sentencing. There is no evidence that mandatory sentencing has the effect of reducing crime rates. Increasing the maximum penalties for illegal firearms trafficking provides ample ability for the court to adequately punish those who seek to use weapons to do our communities harm.
If there is one thing the people in my electorate of Lindsay expect, it's that we work together on these issues. We don't seek political gain from certain sections of the community. This is division and diversion from a desperate, disparate government that seeks to limit our rights as far as hearing an appropriate response from people who know that mandatory sentencing simply does not work.
The relevant Senate committee, the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, recently heard compelling evidence from the Law Council of Australia, who referred to the consequences of mandatory sentencing's potential to undermine the 'confidence in the judiciary and the criminal justice system as a whole'. The Australian Human Rights Commission also raised their concerns, noting that these amendments would give rise to the 'potential for injustice to occur' and 'run counter to the fundamental principle that punishment should fit the crime'. These are two respected institutions that have a serious job to do. We do not take their views lightly. Why is this minister so arrogantly obsessed with mandatory minimums? Does he think he knows better than the experts?
I note that state prosecutors, whose political masters love to spruik law and order policies, also oppose mandatory sentencing on the same grounds. Further to this, the Law Council of Australia, in its submission to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee:
… voiced its unconditional opposition to mandatory sentencing as a penalty for any criminal offence on the basis that raises the potential for unintended consequences, such as:
the imposition of unacceptable restrictions on judicial discretion and independence which is inconsistent with rule of law principles;
the potential imposition of unjust or unduly harsh sentences;
the infringement of a fundamental sentencing principle that a sentence and punishment should be proportionate to the gravity of the offence, having regard to the circumstances of the case …
Labor will always listen to those experts and understand the consequences of action. We will always oppose mandatory sentencing, because we understand the limitations. Labor sought the amendments relating to mandatory sentencing twice in 2015 and were unsuccessful. The message is clear and unambiguous. Again, that does not mean we don't agree that severe punishment should not be meted out to serious crimes. Serious crimes require serious consequences. They also require serious consideration, not spurious shouting and accusations from those opposite.
The Australian Crime Commission undertook a national intelligence assessment of the illegal firearms market in the first half of 2012. While the report on its assessment is not publicly available, some of the key findings were released by the Minister for Home Affairs and Minister for Justice on 29 June 2012 following a presentation of the report to the Standing Council on Police and Emergency Management. The findings included that there are over 2.75 million registered firearms in Australia held by more than 730,000 individual firearms licence holders. The ACC conservatively estimates that in the Australian illicit firearms market there are 250,000 longarms, such as rifles, and 10,000 handguns, around 6,500 of which would be semiautomatic, and the durability of firearms means that once diverted to the illicit market they remain available for decades, with the ACC tracing the oldest firearm to a revolver that was manufactured in 1888.
This is a global challenge for our law enforcement agencies that reaches far, far beyond our shores. We want tougher penalties for gun smugglers. A single illegal firearm in the hands of a criminal—
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Coulton ): Order! The debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour, and the member for Lindsay will be given an opportunity at that time to complete her contribution.
STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS
Intersex Awareness Day
Ms BUTLER (Griffith) (13:30): The 26th of October is Intersex Awareness Day. It's very important that we observe this day, because there is a lack of understanding of people with intersex conditions in the community. And those organisations that represent people with intersex conditions have made it a mission of theirs to improve visibility for people who are born with intersex conditions. This parliament should take an interest in improving that visibility, so I want to extend my congratulations to the LGBTIQ Friendship Group for hosting the first ever parliamentary intersex-specific event last week. In particular, I want to acknowledge the Labor chair, the member for Moreton, Graham Perrett. And there are other parties that have chairs, and they have done an excellent job of bringing this group together.
In fact, a couple of my constituents spoke at the breakfast. One of them, Alex, has been instrumental in getting the Story Bridge and Victoria Bridge lit up in purple and yellow for Intersex Awareness Day. I thank Alex very much. I also acknowledge Cody, Morgan, Bonnie and Tony, who were kind enough to come to the breakfast and talk to us about some of the issues facing people born with intersex conditions and their parents, who are often confronted with something they don't understand—whether it's a physical condition or different forms of chromosomes. This can be quite confronting for a parent and for a young person as well. (Time expired)
Forrest Electorate: The Grove Distillery
Ms MARINO (Forrest—Chief Government Whip) (13:31): Saturday is Small Business Day. The Grove Distillery is a small family business in the Margaret River region, a vibrant business. It began as an olive grove on that property and became a winery in 1995. It is now a multi-award-winning business producing top-shelf spirits, liqueurs and traditional ales. The property is an experience in itself. The owners, Steve and Val Hughes, have a lively sense of humour—and you certainly see that. The Grove's quality beverages are ideally matched with wonderful stone-fired pizzas, tapas and a fantastic view—a match made in heaven. The Grove is a multi-award-winning business. It won a small business innovation award. It is internationally acclaimed, with its Caribbean spiced rum taking out a double gold at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition last year and best in show in the judging of all double-gold winners. What a tremendous result for Steve, Val and their dedicated Grove team. They have won numerous awards. It's a premium beverage small business working constantly to produce high-quality and innovative products. That's great work by Steve, Val and their fantastic team. It adds to the many and varied food, wine and tourism experiences in the Margaret River region. This is another one of those fantastic small businesses that we see right around Australia, and I wish them all a very happy Small Business Day on Saturday.
Australian Workers' Union
Ms CHESTERS (Bendigo) (13:33): Yesterday we witnessed an extraordinary attack on our democracy, with the AFP raiding the AWU offices in Melbourne and Sydney. In a letter released by Ben Davis, the Victorian branch secretary of the AWU, the branch said: 'Registered Organisations commenced an investigation last Friday afternoon, at which time they did not request any of these documents. That they chose to take an extreme measure of an AFP raid and called the media beforehand to make sure it was witnessed shows that this was a political stunt and a publicity exercise rather than a legitimate exercise of the law.' And he is right.
In a time and on a day when we are talking about AFP resources, we have seen a prioritisation of a relationship between GetUp! and the AWU. Who are GetUp!? Why is the government so scared of GetUp!? They're keyboard warriors who send emails to their MPs. They are engaged in the political process. Perhaps the government needs to focus on the real crooks who are out there—such as people who are involved in wage theft. Never has the AFP raided 7-Eleven, for example. Never has the AFP focused on wage theft, a real problem in our community and in our businesses. Never has this government actually engaged with or talked to the AWU Esso workers, who have been locked out for days and days in Longford. Perhaps the government needs to stop attacking unions with every element of its arm and focus on workers.
Groom Electorate: Pittsworth Craft and Fine Food Spectacular
Dr McVEIGH (Groom) (13:34): The Pittsworth Craft and Fine Food Spectacular and spring garden week has been held successfully in the Darling Downs for a number of years; this year commencing on 29 September. It's a combination of the spring art competition, spring gardening competition and the local quilters exhibition, amongst many other community activities. Funds raised maintain St Andrew's Anglican Church, which has some of the most renowned stained glass windows in Australia. It's quickly become one of the best craft and food fairs in our region and further afield, achieved by inviting the best craftspeople and artisans to exhibit their produce and their products.
My wife, Anita, and I were pleased again to attend the Pittsworth art group's 17th spring art exhibition at the Pittsworth Art Gallery, opened by Allan Bruce, President of the Toowoomba Art Society. This event celebrates the commencement of the fine food and craft spectacular and the spring garden week. Anita and I have attended for many years, and it's always good to catch up with great friends such as Lyndal Madden, a former councillor, and her sister, Ros Scotney, a former mayor of Pittsworth. This year we came away with a delightful Pittsworth landscape piece by renowned local artist Mrs Krieg and a woodwork piece in the form of a multitimbered rolling pin.
National Week of Deaf People
Ms OWENS (Parramatta) (13:36): I would like to wish the deaf community in Australia a happy National Week of Deaf People. It's an opportunity for deaf people to celebrate their community, language, culture and history. It's a time for all Australians to join with deaf people and recognise their achievements. This year's theme is Full Inclusion with Auslan. Thanks, Kate, for helping me with Auslan today. I hope I haven't made too many mistakes and that you can understand me. Happy National Week of Deaf People.
Kennedy Electorate: Health Care
Mr KATTER (Kennedy) (13:37): I rise to speak on probably the most important issue that exists in our society today. In Mareeba we had a meeting and a thousand people turned up. I know that because I counted the number of people outside—I thought the meeting hadn't started—and then I went inside, where there were 700 chairs. We have no outpatients services. In Queensland, effectively, all of the outpatients services are being closed. That means that, if you are sick or need medical care, you have to go to the local private medical practitioners. In the case of Mareeba, the major medical practitioners are turning away 23 people a day. Dr Grant Manypeney is a very good citizen. Because the state government has almost doubled the wages for doctors, if he charges by bulk-billing, he cannot pay his doctors. There's just not enough money there to do it, and that is happening throughout all of Queensland. That was in Mareeba. I was down in Callide meeting with people. I had lunch, and a number of elderly people came over and said that exactly the same situation exists in places like Biloela and Theodore as well. (Time expired)
Tangney Electorate: Local Sporting Champions
Mr MORTON (Tangney) (13:39): The Local Sporting Champions grant is extremely popular in Tangney and appreciated by my local community, so popular that each round in Tangney is oversubscribed. Last round we saw 53 applications for 22 grants. The Australian Sports Commission is reviewing the Local Sporting Champions grant, and I have made a submission asking for this important program to be expanded and for fair consideration of athletes that fly longer distances to compete.
I like the examples of the young sports men and women travelling from Attadale or Riverton in my electorate on long flights to Canberra for the nationals, when kids coming from Sydney might be able to drive with family or catch the $64 return bus. A fairer consideration may come in the form of additional grants or grants greater than the current $500 grant. Any unsubscribed grants at the conclusion of each round might also be pooled. Unsuccessful applicants Australia-wide could also, on merit, access additional grants outside their electorate.
I have included feedback from Tangney sporting clubs who received the grant and those who have, sadly, missed out. Our young athletes train so hard, applying their effort to reach their full potential in their chosen sport. We cannot let the costs of travel and equipment be a barrier to those trying to achieve their dreams. Extending the Local Sporting Champions grant program and a fairer distribution of grants that better factors in the distance of travel to the competition will get more young competitors involved in sport and will help them to achieve their full potential.
National Disability Insurance Agency
Mr MARLES (Corio) (13:40): On 3 June 2013, Prime Minister Gillard came to Geelong, to the Pier restaurant, and announced there that the national headquarters of the National Disability Insurance Scheme would be based in Geelong. It was a joint decision of the Gillard Labor government and the Napthine coalition government of Victoria. It was a critical decision for a city that had just experienced the decision by Ford to stop manufacturing cars in Australia, and within 12 months of that decision there would be a similar decision by Alcoa to close its Point Henry smelter. Because people knew how important this decision was for Geelong, it was supported across this parliament. Indeed, Opposition Leader Abbott at the time lent his support to this as well. It was to be the home of 450 staff. A new building is changing the skyline of Geelong as I speak; there is a $120 million commitment for building that.
But this morning in Senate estimates, when the new CEO of the NDIA was asked where he was based and would be based, he said, 'I typically spend a day to two days a week in Melbourne and Geelong'—a day to two days a week in Victoria, between Melbourne and Geelong. We're getting less than a day a week out of the new CEO. There were very unconvincing answers about where the senior leadership of the NDIA are based as well. The scheme's actuary is based in Sydney. I get that the CEO is going to travel, but where the CEO is based defines the headquarters of an organisation, and that must be Geelong.
Bennelong Electorate: Leukaemia Foundation
Mr ALEXANDER (Bennelong) (13:42): Members who were here in 2015 may remember my 100-kay walk around the electorate, raising money and awareness for motor neurone disease. All will be pleased to know that it's back this year, with the only change being that we are supporting the Leukaemia Foundation. A letter and a map of my walk will be hitting MPs' letterboxes today with details of where I have been walking and where I'm going to and, importantly, how to donate.
I started walking the week before parliament came back. I've already covered about 40 kays, visiting dozens of schools and shops and even taking my good friend the Minister for Aged Care—he was more aged after the walk!—to some of the local aged-care homes. The response has been outstanding. I'm always amazed by the generosity of local residents, especially the kindness of the schools, who are amongst the biggest fundraisers so far. At the end of the walk, I'll be participating in the World's Greatest Shave, with the honour of shaving going to the school, business or MP who donates the most. The member for Fisher took part in this excellent event earlier this year, so, if you wish me to look like him, give generously.
Prime Minister
Ms RYAN (Lalor—Opposition Whip) (13:43): I rise today to ask an important question: where is the Prime Minister Australia voted for? Where has that man gone? He does not resemble anything he used to stand for, and yesterday and today have been a wonderful expression of that. This is now the fifth year the country has been waiting for good government, and what do we get? We get an adviser apparently saying, 'PM, the rabble are criticising your NBN,' and the PM's response is, 'Call the cops.' 'PM, the rabble want to protect Medicare.' Response: 'Call the cops.' Most recently it was, 'PM, the rabble want renewable energy and cheaper energy.' The PM responds, 'Call the cops and the media. Make sure everybody knows.'
What Australia wants, what Australia needs, is not the man masquerading as our Prime Minister. What Australia needs is a proactive government, a proactive government that is committed to a fair and civil society. And 'a fair and civil society' means that unions can bargain collectively for workers. It means that people are free to advocate for other people in our community and it means that we have community legal centres. That's the Australia that Australians want to see. (Time expired)
Child Sexual Abuse
Mr LLEW O'BRIEN (Wide Bay) (13:44): Child sex offenders are evil—often highly manipulative and skilled at their vile practices. Child sex offenders are people society can never trust. I don't care what rehabilitation is available or how successfully a child sex offender completes it: a person who takes pleasure in or profits from the abuse of children is no longer fit to be considered a normal human being and should never enjoy the trust and freedoms of a normal citizen.
Since 2012, less than 60 per cent of child sex offenders have received a prison sentence. Many were released after six months, placing our kids at risk. The coalition is introducing tough new laws to catch and jail paedophiles by targeting all aspects of their activities, from the commission of their offences, to bail, sentencing and post-prison arrangements. Under these reforms, child sex offenders will face mandatory minimum sentences; spend longer time in jail; bail and parole will be less likely; and they'll be closely supervised after release. These reforms are the toughest crackdown on paedophiles in a generation, sending a strong message that these subhuman offenders will not be tolerated. I implore Labor to change their position on mandatory minimum sentencing so that child sex offenders get the treatment they deserve in sentencing, in jail and forevermore.
Touched by Olivia
Ms HUSAR (Lindsay) (13:46): Today I have the privilege of welcoming Touched by Olivia to parliament. I have spoken many times in this place about the important work they're doing, including in my own electorate of Lindsay.
Alex Coombs has come to parliament today and will speak at an event later about his experience of being included in play. Alex is from Western Sydney. He likes to do all the same things that other kids do, including those his sister enjoys. Alex has cerebral palsy. That means he uses a walking frame and sometimes a wheelchair. Today, his dad carried him in. Alex says that when he's at school and being included by his peers and teachers that it has helped him to learn to be confident and to make friends. These are goals that every single one of us has for our children. He feels let down when he's excluded and cannot go to play in a playground, in a neighbourhood, in his own community and make friends. Alex is amongst five million Australians who cannot play at their local playground because of their disability, and this kind of covert discrimination, where their needs are an oversight, is most keenly felt by children.
Alex is a champion of inclusion, and so are his parents, Brendon and Debbie, and his little sister, Marley. They don't just want inclusion for their son, they want it for all children. They live these values everyday through their support of Touched by Olivia. Today, the Parliamentary Friends of Accessibility and Inclusion will host Touched by Olivia and the amazing Coombs family. They are here to spread the word of inclusion and the endless possibilities that being included bring to the lives of those who for so long been have shut out of opportunities that many of us take for granted.
The aims of the NDIS to include people in our community are supported. However, we cannot have inclusion without infrastructure. The only things disabling people are the attitudes of those who should know better and the built environment that confines them.
Flynn Electorate: Maritime Rescue Services
Mr O'DOWD (Flynn) (13:48): Today I rise to pay respect to the six men tragically lost at sea on board the fishing boat Dianne. My deepest sympathies go to the families for their loss.
In times of utter despair, often it's the true spirit of the community that shines brightest. The communities of Agnes Water, Seventeen Seventy and surrounding areas supported the search effort in a manner that's hard to put into words. The relentless and unforgiving weather slammed the Central Queensland coast day after day, continuing to impede the search operations. Search craft, both by air and sea, had near zero visibility in treacherous conditions. Without hesitation, our brave emergency services personnel placed their own safety in danger in their search efforts.
Community members combed the beaches and estuaries in search of the missing men. A variety of organisations, including the police, voluntary marine rescue and the SES joined in the search effort. They answered the call in their typical dedicated and selfless manner. Private vessels also volunteered their services. Our hearts go out to the affected families, thank you.
Lyons Electorate: Bushfires
Mr BRIAN MITCHELL (Lyons) (13:49): For the past week, a bushfire has been raging in the north-east of my electorate, and I stand to pay tribute to the hundreds who are battling the flames. Since last Friday, some 7½ thousand hectares has been burned out, and there's no sign of the flames abating. The fire now has a 35-kilometre perimeter and is just 10 kilometres west of St Helens, a town of 1,500 souls. People in Pyengana, north of St Helens, have been warned to prepare in the event that embers spread. Volunteer brigades battling the flames include St Helens, Falmouth, Scamander, Avoca, Fingal, St Marys and Mathinna. There are also personnel from the State Emergency Service, parks and recreation, and Sustainable Timber Tasmania, formerly known as Forestry Tasmania. Every one of these people deserves our thanks for their commitment, and this is a view shared by the St Helens community itself. Local man Stephen posted on the St Helens fire brigade Facebook page: 'Is there anything we in the community can do for you guys—make sandwiches, drinks, wash clothes or anything else?' That's the level of commitment from the local community.
Before this speech, I just got off the phone with Ian Bounds, the fire service regional chief for northern Tasmania, and he's worried about challenging conditions predicted for the weekend. He says the Tasmanian Fire Service is considering asking interstate authorities to lend a hand, particularly with air support. That's how serious it is. I urge everyone, as we're now in bushfire season, to prepare for a hot, dry summer ahead.
Mackellar Electorate: McHappy Day
Mr FALINSKI (Mackellar) (13:51): On Saturday, 14 October, I had the pleasure of meeting Warwick Hokins at his McDonald's franchise in Beacon Hill to celebrate McHappy Day. On McHappy Day, McDonald's donates $1 from every Big Mac, Happy Meal and hot beverage sold to Ronald McDonald charities. In Australia, these charities have been providing vital support and accommodation for families with seriously ill children since 1981. The famous Ronald McDonald houses are a home away from home for families of seriously ill children being treated at nearby hospitals. They try and make the awful and, very often, long experience of caring for a very ill child just a little bit more bearable. For the families of those children, that little bit makes a world of difference. I'm grateful to have been able to support, albeit in a small and chaotic way, the efforts of our local McDonald's restaurant in raising money for these projects. The people of the Beacon Hill McDonald's—Warwick, AJ, Jordan, Jennifer and many others—show great enthusiasm, going the extra mile to make it a fun day that all Aussie families can be involved in, because you never know when you might need that helping hand.
Bass Electorate: Ringarooma
Mr HART (Bass) (13:52): For the last nine months, Dairy Australia has been searching for the 'Legendairy Capital of Australia'. The 2017 winner is the dairy town of Ringarooma, located in my electorate of Bass, about 90 kilometres north-east of Launceston. Ringarooma is home to just 230 people, but its passion for dairy dates back to the 1860s, when the land was first opened up to farming. It's amazing to see old photographs which underscore the sheer toil and effort which was necessary to convert native forests into productive pasture, in an age before mechanical assistance. The valley now has 20 dairy farmers producing around 52 million litres of milk each year. Ringarooma was nominated for this prestigious title by Marcus Haywood, a local share farmer who this year was the joint winner of the Tasmanian Young Dairy Farmer Encouragement Award. Marcus, with his partner, Simone, backed their community for the title of Legendairy Capital of Australia.
Communities like Ringarooma need to be celebrated. Ringarooma is a tight-knit community that has well and truly earned the title of Legendairy Capital of Tasmania and Australia. These titles have delivered the community $2,500 and $7,500 respectively in grant money. The community plans to invest the grant money to renovate a recreational area for students at the school and restore the school's 100-year-old dairy. Ringarooma has shown what an inclusive community can achieve when they work together. Inclusive communities are healthier and more sustainable. Congratulations, Ringarooma—you truly are 'legendairy'.
Diabetes Australia
Mr RAMSEY (Grey—Government Whip) (13:54): Diabetes Australia is 60 years old, and last week in the Great Hall in this place we held a 60th birthday celebration. Diabetes Australia is a wonderful organisation with wonderful partners like the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and the DANII Foundation, and they were all there. We were privileged to be addressed by Susan Alberti AC, a resolute, determined and inspirational foe of diabetes whose daughter was claimed by the disease. The member for Moreton and I are the co-chairs of the Parliamentary Friends of Diabetes Group, which I prefer to call the enemies of diabetes. For us Diabetes Australia is a pleasure to work with as we strive together to raise awareness of the issues.
Diabetes Australia is chaired by the former member for Pearce, Judi Moylan, who was unfortunately unable to attend on the night. CEO Greg Johnson was there and reminded us that there are an estimated two million Australians living with diabetes. It is the sleeping giant of health. It is a sobering fact that it is the leading cause of blindness, of amputation and of coronary heart disease. However, Diabetes Australia and its partners have been successful, with the establishment of the Diabetes Support Foundation, the support service; $35 million to clinical trials research; its constant glucose monitors; and, of course, the establishment of a national diabetes strategy. Well done, Diabetes Australia. (Time expired)
Burt Electorate: Kelmscott Show
Mr KEOGH (Burt) (13:56): Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending the Kelmscott Show, in the electorate of Burt, along with the state member for Armadale and show patron, Dr Tony Buti; and new WA Labor state members of parliament the member for Darling Range, Barry Urban; and the member for Jandakot, Yaz Mubarakai. With its genesis in the Kelmscott Farmers & Fruit Growers Society, the first Kelmscott Show was held on 3 February 1897. I attended my first show as a young boy in the early 1980s and have been attending nearly every show ever since. Now proudly run by the Kelmscott Agricultural Society, of which my family and I are proud members, the Kelmscott Show was a tremendous success this year.
The society has now introduced a KAS cadet scheme to get the next generation involved in the Kelmscott Show. The scheme is open to young people aged 10 to 18 to meet and work with community mentors and help organise the show. It is a great opportunity for local kids to gain event management experience.
To all the volunteers, community members and my dedicated Team Keogh volunteers who helped out on my stall at the 2017 Kelmscott Show: well done and thank you for all of your hard work. It is events like the Kelmscott Show that highlight the great work and the produce of our community and counter the negative stereotypes that are often imposed upon us. It is another part of how we can change the story for our community.
Wilkinson, Ms Lisa, AM
Ms PRICE (Durack) (13:57): I rise today to reflect on the events that transpired last week in regard to Lisa Wilkinson leaving Channel 9 and the Today show because of a perceived gap between what she was paid and what her co-host, Karl Stefanovic, was paid. Those opposite came in here enraged and made many statements condemning Channel 9 for not offering Ms Wilkinson equal pay to her male co-star. There is an argument that the pay difference was nothing to do with gender. There is an argument that there were other factors relating to talent availability and also who had the greater star qualities, but that argument was apparently lost on those opposite.
Where is the rage from those opposite on the disparity in pay conditions between male and female construction workers, for example? Where is their rage when we're talking about female surgeons or lawyers? I have experienced firsthand what it feels like not to be paid the same as your male colleagues when you're doing the same job, and you are also doing the same job as a young female lawyer.
Of course it galls me that this was happening here in Australia, so I would like to encourage my colleagues on the other side of the chamber to apply that same fight and fervour that we saw when they discussed Lisa Wilkinson to champion the plight of females working in other professions and not to jump on the coat-tails of a celebrity.
Men's Shed Movement
Ms HENDERSON (Corangamite) (13:59): It's my great pleasure to rise and speak about the wonderful contribution that men's sheds make throughout my electorate of Corangamite and across the nation. Men's sheds do so much for men—predominantly men, with some women—particularly as they get older. They help them connect with others. They give them the sense of belonging and a sense of purpose, a place to share friendships and to share experiences.
I'm absolutely delighted that our government has done so much to support men's sheds in Corangamite. Under our Stronger Communities Program, the men's shed at Linton received nearly $6,000 for tools, equipment, training and health improvement activities. In Ocean Grove, the men's shed received some $2,300 for various activities. It was just a couple of weeks ago that I had great pleasure in opening the Torquay Community Men's Shed garden, which was supported by a $5,000 grant under the Communities Program. It was a great day of celebration and a great aspiration for the men in Torquay. Of course, in Dereel, we were very pleased to support the Dereel and Surrounding Communities Men's Shed with a $40,000 grant, and they now have a wonderful new facility in the great community of Dereel.
The SPEAKER: In accordance with standing order 43, the time for member's statements has concluded.
CONDOLENCES
Kirkbright-Burney, Mr Binni
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:00): This morning I spoke with the member for Barton and expressed Lucy's and my deep sadness at the loss of her son at their home last night. As parents, our worst dread is the loss of a child. Linda's loss is unspeakably sad. She is not with us today—she has leave—but we are with her. We are all with her in love and in heartfelt sympathy. She is cast deep in grief, but she does not grieve alone. She is a strong woman—stronger because of the love that all of us, the sympathy that all of us and the friendship that all of us share with her at this tragic time for her and for her family.
Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Leader of the Opposition) (14:02): I thank the Prime Minister for his heartfelt words. As honourable members are aware, the member for Barton has taken leave from this parliament following the tragic death of her 33-year-old son, Binni. As she said in her touching and sad statement this morning, she returned to Sydney last night to be with him one last time. On behalf of Chloe and myself, and on behalf of the whole Labor family, I want to offer our deepest condolences to Linda and her family. This is just so sad. As Jenny Macklin and I were speaking to her last night, the grief was terrible. Losing a child is every parent's nightmare. It is, as Shakespeare once said, a grief that fills up the room. We know how much Linda loved her son and we know how much her son loved Linda.
In this time of deep sadness, can I please request that the media respect her family's privacy, and I know that they will. And I should add that the family have asked that, instead of flowers, if people are so inclined, could they please contribute to the Central Coast Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Centre. All of us send our love and our solidarity to our friend and colleague and her family at this time.
The SPEAKER (14:04): On behalf of the House, I thank the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition for speaking so eloquently on all our behalves.
QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Australian Federal Police
Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Leader of the Opposition) (14:04): My question is to the Prime Minister. Yesterday it was revealed that the Federal Police did not have the resources to investigate the importation of 1.6 tonnes of cocaine, but on the very same day the Prime Minister's Registered Organisations Commission sent at least 25 AFP officers to look at a 10-year-old donation to GetUp!
How can the Prime Minister find the resources to investigate his political opponents but not the importation of— (Time expired)
The SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition's 30 seconds had concluded. There was one question that got asked after the preamble. I call the Prime Minister.
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:05): The Leader of the Opposition talked about a 10-year-old donation. Is he suggesting that breaches of the law and breaches of union rules should not be investigated because they're 10 years old? That would be very convenient for the Leader of the Opposition. That would, indeed, be very convenient for the Leader of the Opposition. What we have seen from the Labor Party since that search warrant was executed is an attack on the integrity of the Australian Federal Police. This is what they know as well as we all do: the Australian Federal Police are absolutely independent in their operations. They decide who to investigate and how to investigate. That is a matter for them and so it should be. But we heard yesterday the member for Gorton say: 'The government is using the power of the state to attack its political opponents. The Prime Minister is willing to use the police like his plaything.' They are accusing the Federal Police of acting on political direction. That's what they're doing. It is very, very familiar rhetoric because this is exactly what John Setka said in that notorious speech in Melbourne when he accused the Federal Police of being a political police force and of being political henchmen of the government.
The reality is this: the Labor Party do not respect the integrity of the Federal Police. They are all too ready—
Ms Catherine King interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Ballarat is warned!
Mr TURNBULL: to accuse them of being a political police force. And, absent a few four-letter words, there is nothing in substance that differs from what the member for Gorton said yesterday and what John Setka said on his platform in Melbourne—the same denial of the rule of law; the same contempt for the rule of law; the same contempt for the independence of the police.
The question for the Leader of the Opposition is not just why the AWU gave $100,000 to an organisation whose principal objective seems to be shutting down industries in which members of the AWU work but also why he has not apologised for and disowned the outrageous attacks on the independence and the integrity of the men and women that keep us safe.
Ms Butler interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Griffith is warned, as is the member for Ballarat. Members who are mentioned regularly are on notice.
Energy
Mr CRAIG KELLY (Hughes) (14:08): My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister advise the House of what action the government is taking to reduce power bills and improve energy reliability for hardworking Australian families and businesses, including in my electorate of Hughes? And is the Prime Minister aware of any alternative approaches?
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:09): I thank the honourable member for his question. Australians are all too aware of the alternative, because it is a Labor Party committed to more expensive and less reliable energy. That is the consequence of their policies and we don't need to theorise about it; we know exactly what Labor's policies have done. Australians are living with higher electricity prices and less reliable electricity because of Labor policies, and none more so than the people of South Australia where the policies were taken to their natural culmination, with completely unreliable power and the most expensive power in Australia.
It's not just, of course, the cost of power that impinges on Australian families and Australian businesses. What about tax? What about the 3½ million Australians who work for companies and businesses that are benefitting from our enterprise tax cuts? What about them? Today I was out at a bakery in Sutton—a family business, a husband-and-wife business—with Nick and Louise, and they said they had built their business out of the earnings from their own business. They built it up from a small business in Fyshwick, expanded it, and now they've moved to Sutton. They have 60 employees. It's not a big business in terms of turnover, but there are 60 jobs there. What they will have now, as a result of our policies and our legislation, is more money after tax to keep putting back into that business, to grow it and to employ more people. That's what they will be able to do.
Mr Hill interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Bruce is warned.
Mr TURNBULL: And they have the prospect of lower electricity prices, thanks to the National Energy Guarantee, because of the reduction in wholesale generation costs, as forecast by the Energy Security Board. We know what Labor promises: much more expensive electricity and much less reliable electricity. But where does Labor stand on tax? The member for McMahon was cross-examined earlier this week by Samantha Maiden, and he didn't enjoy it. She was very persistent, but she was not able to get him to say that they would maintain the enterprise tax cuts for small and medium businesses. So he is saying that he denounces cuts to company tax. What he is saying to Nick and Louise and thousands of other businesses and the millions of people they employ is that a Labor government will not only make your energy more expensive, it will jack your taxes up as well. And what is that going to do? Less investment and less jobs—that's the Labor way.
Dr Chalmers interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Rankin is warned.
Australian Federal Police
Ms PLIBERSEK (Sydney—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:12): My question is to the Prime Minister. Yesterday it was revealed that the Federal Police did not have the resources to fully investigate a 1.6 tonne cocaine importation. When the Federal Police already don't have enough resources to do the important work they do, why is this born-to-rule Prime Minister diverting the limited resources of the Federal Police so that he can attack his political opponents?
The SPEAKER: The Leader of the House, on a point of order?
Mr Pyne: We give fair tolerance to the opposition, but—
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: Members on my left will cease interjecting.
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: If members on my left don't cease interjecting, I will just remove them from the House, interjection by interjection.
Mr Pyne: The standing orders are very clear about insults and epithets inside the questions, and, while we are quite tolerant of the opposition's questions, I think the Deputy Leader of the Opposition's epithet flung at the Prime Minister should be withdrawn and not included in future questions.
The SPEAKER: The Manager of Opposition Business, on a point of order?
Mr Burke: If the reference that the Leader of the House is complaining about had been at the start of the question, in terms of who the question was directed to, then, certainly, that would be out of order, as is often the case when questions are asked by government backbenchers. But words like 'elitist' or 'snobbish' have often been included. 'Born-to-rule' is of the same order as 'arrogant' and a series of words that have always been allowed, and, probably, are pretty appropriate
Government members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The Minister for Health and members on my right are not assisting. As I said yesterday—and I won't make as long a ruling as I did yesterday—I spend a lot of time reading the practice. Whilst I don't like the term and I don't approve of those sorts of descriptors in questions, I couldn't sit here and say they haven't been allowed for many, many years. I will allow the question.
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:14): I thank the honourable member—
Mr Watts interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The Prime Minister will pause. He doesn't need to sit down. this won't take long. The member for Gellibrand will leave under standing order 94(a).
The member for Gellibrand then left the chamber.
Mr TURNBULL: I thank the honourable member for her question and I accept the rather snide barb in her question. Let me say this to the honourable member: throughout my life, my wife and I have started one business after another. We've created jobs; we've invested. We know what creates enterprise and jobs, and we know that families like Nick and Louise, who get on with investment, create jobs.
There are all of those hereditary union princelings opposite, all of those people blessed with the largesse of the union movement, regardless of the contributions they get from union members—giving them away and paying them away—
Mr Hill interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Bruce will leave under standing order 94(a)!
The member for Bruce then left the chamber.
Mr TURNBULL: for their own political causes—giving them to political organisations that want to put their members out of work. But on this side of the House, we know what enterprise and jobs are about. We know it's investment. Every one of our policies—every one!—is focused on creating more investment and more employment. That's why we are resolute in our determination to deliver lower electricity prices. Affordable power and reliable power: that's our commitment. And we're already reducing the burden of tax on thousands of small and medium businesses.
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr TURNBULL: The members on the other side can mock and scoff as much as they like, but not everybody has a privileged ride to power through a union job.
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr TURNBULL: No, they don't. No, they don't! The reality is hard work, enterprise and investment. That's what delivers the jobs. That's what has delivered 371,000 jobs over the last year. And so I say to those who have done so well from the union movement and who have ridden on the backs of the workers into parliament: think a little about how the jobs those workers have were created—not by you, but by hardworking business men and women like Nick and Louise!
Energy
Mr VASTA (Bonner) (14:17): My question is to the Treasurer. Will the Treasurer outline to the House what action the government is taking to address cost-of-living pressures for hardworking Australian families and businesses? How will the National Energy Guarantee support the government's objectives to put downward pressure on the cost of living and grow our economy for more and better paid jobs?
Mr MORRISON (Cook—Treasurer) (14:17): I thank the member for Bonner for his question. He would be interested to know that, according to the Energy Security Board, which is the independent panel of experts established by COAG to advise Commonwealth and state and territory governments, the National Energy Guarantee will reduce household power bills by $115 a year. Now, according to the Climate Change Authority, Labor's 50 per cent Renewable Energy Target will increase electricity bills by $192 per year, while knocking out—
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr MORRISON: I'm sure that the member for Shortland and the member for Hunter will be thrilled to know that it is knocking 75 per cent of our existing coal-fired power generation out of the system, including Liddell.
Mr Fitzgibbon interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Hunter will cease interjecting!
Mr MORRISON: Liddell should stay open, member for Hunter! You should do something about backing that up, rather than walking away from the people who count on you to stand up for them!
Mr Fitzgibbon interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Hunter is warned!
Mr MORRISON: But that means that under Labor's electricity bill, there will be $300 more that is paid by households compared to what will occur under the Turnbull government's National Energy Guarantee, as recommended by that board.
Now, it's interesting because in the shadow Treasurer's train wreck interview from February of this year—which I'm sure he has not forgotten and I'm sure David Speers has not forgotten—he was asked about this by David Speers, and David Speers painfully extracted this from the shadow Treasurer. He was asked for a commitment about Labor's 50 per cent renewables policy and its impact on electricity prices. In response to the direct question:
So you are saying we can get to 50%—
on renewables—
with no net impact on power prices …
That was the question, and the shadow Treasurer stated in response:
… there's no impact on electricity prices out of that policy …
The shadow Treasurer has a lot to apologise for from his time in government. There was cash for clunkers, Fuelwatch, Grocery Watch, 25,000 illegal arrivals from almost 400 boats, and standing there and doing nothing while bikie gang bosses had their visas renewed on his watch. What he should apologise for is the mistruth he spoke to David Speers earlier this year. He knows that his policy will drive up electricity prices, and it's important that he corrects the record on his own policy. But what's even more important is that the Labor Party get on board with the National Energy Guarantee. We've seen in the inflation figures today that electricity prices in Adelaide went up 21.3 per cent
Mr Perrett interjecting—
Mr MORRISON: That is even more than they did when Labor whacked their carbon tax on them. It's time for Labor to get on board with the National Energy Guarantee.
The SPEAKER: I will just say to the member for Moreton: every day we have the same conversation; we're not having it today. Okay?
Australian Federal Police
Mr BURKE (Watson—Manager of Opposition Business) (14:21): My question is to the Prime Minister. Given TV cameras turned up at the sites of AFP raids yesterday before even the Federal Police did, can the Prime Minister guarantee that his employment minister or her office didn't notify anyone in the press gallery before the raid?
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:21): The employment minister is, I think, in estimates even as we speak, so I'm sure she will be dealing with that, but I can assure—
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr TURNBULL: Well, that can be addressed. But I can assure honourable members opposite that the real question here is: what happened to that $100,000? That's the real issue.
The SPEAKER: The Manager of Opposition Business on a point of order? Just before I call the Manager of Opposition Business, members need to cease interjecting or I'm going to take severe action. The Manager of Opposition Business—and I'm not criticising him here—insists quite rightly that I listen to every word that's said to ensure it complies with the standing orders. It doesn't help the House, the dignity of the House or its operation, frankly, for there to be a wall of uncontrollable interjections. The Manager of Opposition Business on a point of order.
Mr Burke: I have a point of order on direct relevance. The question, on a very specific issue, involves no preamble. The Prime Minister is now saying what the 'real' question is and wanting to go to a completely different issue. I ask you to draw him back to the question.
The SPEAKER: Over that wall of interjections, I did manage to hear the Prime Minister clearly at the very start of the answer talk about the substance of the question, and he related it to the minister being in Senate estimates. It couldn't have been more relevant. He is now 30 seconds into the answer. I showed some latitude on the member for Sydney's question. I show latitude on preambles, and it cuts both ways. The Prime Minister has the call.
Mr TURNBULL: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. The Minister for Employment has assured me that she did not advise any journalists about the raid. But she's in estimates, I believe, this afternoon and will no doubt have the opportunity to go into this in great detail. But the real issue is this: why did the AWU give $100,000 of its hardworking members' union dues to GetUp! and was it authorised under the rules? That is the matter that the Registered Organisations Commission is investigating, and that inquiry was the subject or the context of the search warrants that were exercised yesterday. As honourable members would know, the Registered Organisations Commission said yesterday in a statement:
Since the investigation commenced, the ROC received information which raised reasonable grounds for suspecting that documents relevant to this investigation may be on the premises of the AWU … and that those documents may be being interfered with (by being concealed or destroyed).
They went to a magistrate, they secured a warrant and the warrant was executed. And now I see that the AWU's lawyers are in court trying to stop the police having access to the documents.
Mining
Mr BANDT (Melbourne) (14:25): My question is to the Prime Minister. As former environment minister Peter Garrett pointed out this week, the Queensland Labor government is strongly backing the Adani coal megamine, which will make global warming worse, threaten our way of life and mean more deaths from heatwaves and bushfires. Prime Minister, will you take steps to step in and override this rogue state government, like Bob Hawke did with the Franklin Dam? Or is the only way now for the people of Brisbane to stop the Adani mine to elect the Greens' Amy MacMahon, Michael Berkman and Kirsten Lovejoy to hold the balance of power in the Queensland parliament?
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:26): As I've said to the honourable member once before, I can only conclude from his question that he believes that Queenslanders should go without jobs and Indians should go without electricity.
Energy
Mr BUCHHOLZ (Wright) (14:26): My question is to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Will the minister update the House on how the government's energy policy guarantees affordable and reliable energy for hardworking Australian families and businesses, while also meeting our international obligations? Is the minister also aware of any other approaches?
Ms JULIE BISHOP (Curtin—Minister for Foreign Affairs) (14:26): I thank the member for Wright for his question and for his deep interest in the National Energy Guarantee, which will ensure that affordable and reliable energy, electricity, is provided to Australians by adopting an innovative model that integrates climate policy and energy policy for the very first time. The policy is pro-market, in that it enables the energy retailers to decide how to meet the reliability and emissions targets so that they are able to respond to advances in technology and still support reliability—'reliability' meaning keeping the lights on and ensuring that we don't have blackouts like South Australia has suffered so recently.
The policy has been widely welcomed by the largest employer groups in Australia: those who employ union and non-union workers, who provide the jobs for Australians. It has been welcomed by key industry groups and by key energy suppliers. This policy has also been widely praised by respected international commentators. For example, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, in a research paper entitled 'Ending the climate wars: Australia's National Energy Guarantee', has labelled the government's policy as 'innovative and elegant' and said it 'could well prove ingenious'. It also says it is 'likely to be environmentally effective' because we will meet our international emissions reductions targets. The paper goes on to say it 'would be a template for policymakers worldwide'. The coalition has a solution to provide affordable and reliable energy. It will be efficient and effective and it will also meet our international obligations.
I'm asked about alternative approaches. The fact is Labor's policies are unaffordable and unreliable. They mean that power prices will go through the roof, that jobs will be lost, that the economy will be hit and that there will be the kinds of blackouts that we've seen under Labor policies elsewhere. Labor's embrace of Greens' policies is utterly reckless. A 45 per cent emissions reduction target is way beyond any comparable economy. The 50 per cent Renewable Energy Target will drive power prices up and will cost jobs. And we now know, through independent modelling, that Labor's policy will add at least $200 a year to household power bills. The choice is clear: Labor stands for higher power prices; the coalition stands for affordable and reliable electricity.
Australian Federal Police
Mr BURKE (Watson—Manager of Opposition Business) (14:29): My question is to the Prime Minister. In his previous answer, the Prime Minister said that Senator Cash had assured him that she did not advise the press gallery of the raids. Did Senator Cash assure the Prime Minister that her office did not advise the press gallery of the raids?
Mr Dutton interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The Minister for Immigration and Border Protection will cease interjecting. The Prime Minister has the call.
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:30): The honourable member can attempt to cross-examine Senator Cash by proxy here in the House. She is in estimates in the Senate at the moment, and he should make sure his friends in the Senate can address all of those questions to her firsthand.
Energy
Ms LANDRY (Capricornia—Deputy Nationals Whip) (14:30): My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources and Minister for Resources and Northern Australia.
Opposition members interjecting—
Ms LANDRY: Will the Deputy Prime Minister update the House on how the government's energy policy will guarantee an affordable and reliable energy supply for hardworking Australian families and businesses across the country, including in my electorate of Capricornia? How does this compare to alternative approaches?
Mr Burke: Mr Speaker, on a point of order, there was one part of the question early on that was hard to hear, so it might have been there, but I didn't hear any reference to the minister's portfolio in the question that was asked.
The SPEAKER: The question was about energy policy. Look, I'll hear the question again. Let's do that. The Manager of Opposition Business makes a very good point in chastising those behind him for interjecting.
Ms LANDRY: My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources and Minister for Resources and Northern Australia. Will the Deputy Prime Minister update the House on how the government's energy policy will guarantee an affordable and reliable energy supply for hardworking Australian families and businesses across the country, including in my electorate of Capricornia? How does this compare to alternative approaches?
The SPEAKER: I do have to say, having heard all of that question, that is very, very lineball. I will rule it in order on the basis that it talked about businesses and the Deputy Prime Minister is responsible, certainly, for agricultural businesses. But I do say to the member it is very important that questions relate to ministerial responsibilities. I will hear the Deputy Prime Minister.
Mr JOYCE (New England—Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources and Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) (14:32): I thank the honourable member for her question. Of course, mineral resources have a lot of business in the seat of Capricornia. Mineral resources are very important for the seat of Capricornia.
What we also note, first of all, is that we do have a policy to make sure that, in the member's electorate, we keep coal-fired power going and we keep people in those jobs. It's vitally important that we keep over 1,500 people in Gippsland still employed. We want to keep them employed. We want to make sure in the member's electorate we have over 700 people employed in coal-fired power. In the Hunter Valley—I'm sure the member for the Hunter Valley would be interested in this—there are over 650 people. In the electorates of Paterson, Charlton, Shortland and Newcastle, there are over 600. In the Darling Downs there are close to 600. In the seat of Forrest there are 560.
Mr Conroy: Charlton doesn't exist anymore! Hopeless! Sack your staff!
The SPEAKER: The member for Shortland is warned.
Mr JOYCE: There are all these blue-collar workers that we're trying to keep in a job. We're trying to keep blue-collar workers in a job. But, of course, to keep them in a job we have to keep base-load power going, because we have to make sure we keep those in Emu Park, Depot Hill, Allenstown, Sarina, St Lawrence, Nebo, these people in the weatherboard and iron, with affordable and reliable power—that we believe in the dignity of their lives so that they are able to get affordable, reliable power.
You ask for alternative policies. One of the greatest alternative policies, of course, comes from the vastly left-wing organisation, supported by the Australian Labor Party, called GetUp!. A hundred thousand dollars went to GetUp!.
Honourable members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: I'm just trying to listen. The Manager of Opposition Business on a point of order?
Mr Burke: Mr Speaker, in terms of direct relevance, the Deputy Prime Minister's now responding to that part of the question that allegedly referred to alternative policies. I don't think that part of the question was read out loud.
The SPEAKER: Yes, it was. The words were: 'How does it compare to other approaches?' The Deputy Prime Minister has the call.
Mr JOYCE: Any port in a storm when you're in trouble, Mr Speaker! This is what GetUp! says: 'No more coal. No more excuses.'
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: Members on my left!
Mr JOYCE: It's good to see that they're clapping GetUp!. It's good to see that they stand behind GetUp!, because GetUp! believes in no more coal and no more excuses. Is this now the policy—no more coal; no more excuses? Is that now the policy for the member for Hunter—no more coal; no more excuses? Is that now the policy for the member for Shortland—no more coal; no more excuses? Is that now the policy for the member for Charlton? Is that the policy for the member for Paterson?
It's about time that people understood that the member for Maribyrnong has turned his back on blue-collar workers. He's chuckling away there, thinking about them losing their jobs. He's laughing about them losing their jobs. He thinks blue-collar workers are politically incorrect, and he sits back there in an arrogant fashion, turning his back on blue-collar workers. The AWU, who used to stand up for coal workers and used to stand up for shearers, now stand up for GetUp!. They have given up on Bourke and they are now residing in Balmain. They've given up on the Hunter Valley—and they've given up on your workers too, by the way, Member for O'Connor. (Time expired)
Registered Organisations Commission
Mr BRENDAN O'CONNOR (Gorton) (14:36): My question is to the Prime Minister. Can the Prime Minister confirm that the Prime Minister went to a double-dissolution election to establish his Registered Organisations Commission, the commissioner was hand-picked by the employment minister and the only reason the commission is even looking into a 10-year-old donation to GetUp! is that the employment minister told it to do so?
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:36): What we know about this matter is that the Registered Organisations Commission received information which, they say, raised reasonable grounds for suspecting that relevant documents were maybe being interfered with by being concealed or destroyed. Now, we know there have been examples of documents being concealed, with attempts to destroy them, in respect of other union investigations. This is a concern that is a fact. What the honourable member is suggesting is that a regulatory agency, designed to ensure that unionist members' funds are not being dealt with improperly or unlawfully—
Ms Chesters interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Bendigo!
Mr TURNBULL: and investigating that and believing that relevant documents were at risk of being destroyed, should do nothing.
Ms Chesters interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Bendigo is warned.
Mr TURNBULL: How very convenient that would be for union officials who misuse union members' money. When the member for Barton gave his extraordinary Setka-like interview yesterday, he said—
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: Yes, the Prime Minister named the wrong member.
Mr TURNBULL: The member for Gorton, Mr Speaker, gave that extraordinary interview yesterday in which he made substantially the same criticisms of and attacks on the AFP as had John Setka.
Mr Dreyfus: No!
Mr TURNBULL: Oh, he did. The member for Isaacs objects. What John Setka did was say that the government uses the police for political purposes, and that is precisely what the member for Gorton said yesterday. What he also did was follow the same line as the member for Sydney. He said, 'Let me just say this: I do know of allegations made of a civil nature against the AWU 10 years ago. None of the allegations, even if any of them were true, warrant this conduct.' So is he seriously suggesting that, if a regulator charged under law to investigate wrongdoing believes that evidence is about to be destroyed, it should do nothing? That would be very convenient for those who misuse union members' money.
Ms Claydon interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Newcastle will cease interjecting.
Energy
Mr CREWTHER (Dunkley) (14:40): My question is for the Minister for the Environment and Energy. Will the minister update the House on the government's action to guarantee affordable and reliable energy for hardworking Australians and businesses, including in my electorate of Dunkley? How does this compare to the risks associated with alternative approaches?
Mr FRYDENBERG (Kooyong—Minister for the Environment and Energy) (14:40): I thank the member for Dunkley for his question. I know that he's been deeply engaged with his constituents on the energy issue, and he was pretty pleased to receive contact recently from Denton, who said to him that he was initially quite sceptical of the ability to contact your retailer and get a better deal, but he did so, and, as a result, he got a 29 per cent discount on his gas and a 46 per cent discount on his electricity—a bit like the retired couple in Sydney with a $1,500 bill, who got, as a result of contacting their retailer, a $265 saving; a bit like the family in Brisbane who had a $2,800 bill, contacted their retailer and got a $630 saving; a bit like the three students living in St Kilda who, on their $1,430 bill, saved over $230. So Denton from Dunkley is like hundreds of thousands of Australians who are benefiting from the government's intervention in the energy market to get a better deal.
We know that this builds on the National Energy Guarantee, which will see savings for Australians. That has been widely accepted and widely praised by a whole range of sectors and a whole range of industry representatives. But all those savings, all those gains, will be lost if those opposite get their chance in government, because we know, from modelling that was reported yesterday, that—under the Labor Party's emissions intensity scheme, which the member for McMahon confirmed this morning is still their policy—families across Australia will be, on average, $300 worse off a year, because they won't be getting the saving from the National Energy Guarantee and they'll be getting the added costs of the emissions intensity scheme.
It's understandable if you're a little bit confused by the Labor Party's policy: the CPRS one day; ETS; carbon tax; cash for clunkers; citizens' assembly; EIS; even the CET. So I was a bit surprised to see, yesterday, the member for Port Adelaide do an interview, and, when he was asked about the Labor Party's policy, say that the Labor Party has been 'the one consistency' in this debate on policy—'the one consistency'! Then, four questions later, in the same interview, the member for Port Adelaide said, 'We've shifted our position twice in the last 12 months'. Forget about holding a position from lunchtime to Lateline; the member for Port Adelaide can't even hold the same position in the one interview.
When it comes to reliable and affordable power, the only way forward is the National Energy Guarantee. And it's time the Labor Party got on board.
Australian Federal Police
Mr BURKE (Watson—Manager of Opposition Business) (14:43): My question is to the Prime Minister. Can the Prime Minister confirm his government has sent in the AFP to raid parliamentary offices during an election campaign because the failings of his second-rate NBN were exposed, referred Queensland Labor to the Australian Federal Police over a text message that upset him, and yesterday sent in the AFP to look at a 10-year-old donation to GetUp!? Why does this government leave the AFP with no choice but to take police resources needed to fight drug syndicates and divert them to protect the political interests of a born-to-rule Prime Minister?
The SPEAKER: The Leader of the House, on a point of order?
Mr Pyne: Mr Speaker—
Ms Husar interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Lindsay will leave under 94(a).
Mr Pyne: Mr Speaker, if we're looking for—
The SPEAKER: No, the Leader of the House will just pause for a second. The member for Lindsay will leave under 94(a).
The member for Lindsay then left the chamber.
The SPEAKER: Before I call the Leader of the House: I've made it clear—those who are waving goodbye might be following.
Mr Pyne: But the member was waving at them, Mr Speaker, inappropriately.
The SPEAKER: I take the Leader of the House's guidance and I'll give it the consideration it deserves. The Leader of the House, on a point of order?
Mr Pyne: I put it to you that the question is not in order, because it clearly contains mistakes by saying that the government sent an independent agency in, suggesting that we somehow direct the AFP to launch raids on any offices. That is clearly not true, and I'm not sure how it can be in order to state a mistruth in the question and then expect the Prime Minister to respond to it. I think, therefore, it should be reworded or ruled out of order and, if they're looking for hereditary members of parliament, they should look on the Labor side, because that's where most of them have been over the last few decades.
The SPEAKER: This issue's come up before. In a nutshell, when it comes to both questions and answers, the Speaker is not the arbiter of the truth—can't be. That's a matter that can be addressed by the person responding to the question. In allowing the question to go ahead, the Speaker does not verify the factual accuracy of the question or, for that matter, the answer. There's been a 30-second question. If it's felt that it contains factual inaccuracies, there are three minutes now for that to be responded to, and I've addressed that before, as did Speaker Andrew in some detail many years ago. I should point out the member for McEwen is warned, of course. I just should point out, of course, that, through the course of the answer, the Prime Minister is entitled to address all of those matters and when these sorts of questions are allowed there shouldn't, as I indicated earlier, be complaints with the answer itself. The Prime Minister has the call.
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:46): It was bad enough to see John Setka attacking the integrity of the AFP—bad enough to see the way in which he flaunted his and his union's defiance of the law. Then it was even worse when we saw the member for Gorton echoing that disrespect, that contempt for the law last night. But now we see the member for Watson standing up here in the parliament and stating what he knows to be utterly untrue, alleging that the Federal Police does the political bidding of the government. That is a shocking allegation against the Federal Police. It's a shocking allegation against the government. But above all it impugns the integrity and the professionalism of the men and women of the Federal Police who work so hard to keep us safe. Labor should be ashamed of themselves.
Energy
Mr LLEW O'BRIEN (Wide Bay) (14:48): My question is to the Minister for Health. Will the minister outline to the House why affordable and reliable energy is crucial for regional and rural health services in Queensland? Is the minister aware of any alternative approaches that may jeopardise the delivery of essential services for patients?
Mr HUNT (Flinders—Minister for Health and Minister for Sport) (14:48): I want to thank the member for Wide Bay, who hasn't just made a great start on the ground as a new member of parliament representing people in towns such as Gympie and Maryborough and their health service needs; but, just like the member for La Trobe, was a policeman's policeman before he came into this House. He knew a few things about collaring crooks, about identifying criminals, about enforcing the law. One of the things he also knew was how to find a basic truth. One of those basic truths is that Labor loves higher electricity prices. Another one is that that is bad for hospitals in rural Queensland. Higher electricity prices are bad for hospitals. They're bad for health services. They're bad for patients. They're bad for doctors. They're bad for pharmacists. That is the sort of world that the people on that side want: higher electricity prices. The consequence is that, wherever you are in Australia, if you believe in better health services, you don't believe in higher electricity prices.
We have an approach through the Prime Minister's National Energy Guarantee and the work of the Prime Minister and the energy minister in taking an axe to limited merits review, in putting the heat on the gas companies, in putting the heat on the electricity companies, in abolishing the carbon tax and in fighting Labor's new electricity taxes, which is completely the opposite of Labor's attempt to drive up electricity prices. That has been bad for the people of Wide Bay and bad for the hospitals of Wide Bay in the past and the present and will be bad in the future.
In the past, the cost of Labor's electricity tax was $2,425 per hospital bed in Queensland. That was wasted money that could have gone to better hospital services. Right now we are seeing warnings of unreliable energy this summer for Queensland and Queensland hospitals. Queensland has a 50 per cent renewable energy target and that will hurt reliability in Queensland hospitals. But none of that compares with the proposals for the future that the current Leader of the Opposition and the opposition have at federal level: a $66 billion impact on Australia's electricity prices. That translates to a $300-a-year difference between the pressures that we would put to reduce electricity prices and the amount by which they want to increase electricity prices. At the end of the day, they want higher electricity prices and that's bad for Queensland hospitals.
Australian Federal Police
Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Leader of the Opposition) (14:51): My question is to the Prime Minister. Why hasn't the Prime Minister asked government agencies to undertake any investigations into Australians caught up in the Panama Papers scandal? Why does the Prime Minister continue to protect the banks from a royal commission despite reports that the Commonwealth Bank allowed money to be laundered by terrorists? Why won't this born-to-rule Prime Minister use his power to do something about misconduct at the top end of town and stop abusing his power to attack people and organisations who highlight his failings?
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:52): I am so glad that Melbourne's greatest sycophant has raised the top end of town. One enterprise bargain after another was sold out to big business—one deal after another; one set of penalty rates after another; one sweetheart deal after another. And, all the time, he postured as the great friend of big business. There he was. We know how much time he spent sucking up to Dick Pratt and all the other billionaires.
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr TURNBULL: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Yes, you. You. There is nothing more sycophantic than a Labor politician in the presence of a billionaire. Believe me, I've seen quite a few of both, and I know these are the great sucker-uppers of all time. He talks about big business. What was the party—let me remember—that voted against our bill to tackle multinational tax avoidance? It was the Labor Party. That's right. That's how committed they were. The grovelling, the compromises, the special deals—we've seen them all; their members have seen them all. But nothing takes the cake quite so much as paying members' money to GetUp! which, after all, wants to put AWU members out of work.
National Security
Mr WALLACE (Fisher) (14:54): My question is to the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection. Will the minister update the House on the vital work the Australian Border Force has undertaken with the Australian Federal Police to secure our borders and keep all Australians safe?
Mr Rob Mitchell interjecting—
Mr DUTTON (Dickson—Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) (14:54): The member for McEwen is interjecting again. 'HIH!' he yells out. Why don't you practise the alphabet outside this place? He's stuck on H still! Give me a break. Take your routine outside.
Honourable members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The Minister for Immigration and Border Protection will resume his seat. Members on both sides!
Mr Sukkar interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Deakin is now warned. I made it very clear for members who'd been warned earlier. The member for Deakin now joins them.
Mr DUTTON: We're being asked about the resources of the Australian Border Force and the work they're doing with the Australian Federal Police. I'll tell you what the Australian Federal Police and the Australian Border Force are not doing under this government. They aren't diverting resources to pull people off boats. They aren't diverting resources to pull bodies out of the water. They aren't diverting resources to lock up children in detention.
Mr Rob Mitchell interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The minister will pause for a second. The member for McEwen will leave under 94(a).
The member for McEwen then left the chamber.
Mr Falinski interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member for Mackellar is warned.
Mr DUTTON: The work of the Australian Border Force is second to none, in my judgement, compared to any other border agency in the world. They are doing world-class work. Along with the Australian Federal Police, they were successful recently in a seizure of 3.9 tonnes of drug precursor—enough to manufacture up to $3.6 billion worth of methamphetamine. They're doing that because this government is putting more by way of resources into the ABF and into the Australian Federal Police.
Let me remind the House that, in actual fact, it was the Labor Party, in the great glory years of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, that ripped 700 staff and $735 million from the Customs agencies. What did it result in? Labor ripping that money out of the agencies didn't result in more raids or more interventions at the border. It meant that we saw a reduction in sea cargo screening and a 75 per cent reduction in air cargo screening. We've reversed that. In fact, in 2016-17, ABF officers made over 24,000 detections of major drugs, precursors and the like. By weight, approximately seven tonnes of major drugs and precursors were detected. By comparison, in 2012-13, under Labor, there were 13,000 detections compared to our 24,000 last year. Five tonnes were seized during that year of 2012-13.
When you hear the Labor Party protesting, they are protesting on behalf of union leader crooks around the country, because the reality is that Labor union leaders believe that they are above the law. It's demonstrated in courts around the country every single day. The reality is that the Australian Federal Police eventually catch up with crooks.
MOTIONS
Prime Minister
Mr BURKE (Watson—Manager of Opposition Business) (14:58): I move:
That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the Member for Watson from moving the following motion immediately:
The House:
(1) notes:
(a) yesterday, it was revealed the Australian Federal Police (AFP) did not have the resources to investigate the importation of 1.6 tonnes of cocaine;
(b) on the very same day, the Prime Minister’s Registered Organisations Commission sent at least 25 AFP officers to look at a 10-year-old donation to GetUp;
(c) in so doing, this Government diverted police resources needed to fight drug syndicates to protect his own political interests; and
(d) that this is just the latest example of this Prime Minister’s willingness to abuse his power and debase the Office of Prime Minister; and
(2) therefore, condemns this born-to-rule Prime Minister for his grubby attacks and blatant abuses of power designed to protect his own political interests instead of protecting Australians.
We have full respect for the integrity of the AFP, but no respect for the integrity of those opposite.
Mr PYNE (Sturt—Leader of the House and Minister for Defence Industry) (14:59): I move:
That the Member be no longer heard.
The SPEAKER: The question is that the Manager of Opposition Business be no further heard.
The House divided. [15:04]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
The SPEAKER (15:06): Is the motion seconded?
Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler) (15:06): I second the motion. This mob have contempt for workers and hatred of workers' representatives.
Mr PYNE (Sturt—Leader of the House and Minister for Defence Industry) (15:06): I move:
That the Member be no further heard.
The SPEAKER: The question is that the member for Grayndler be no further heard.
The House divided. [15:08]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
The SPEAKER (15:10): The question is that the motion moved by the Manager of Opposition Business be agreed to.
The House divided. [15:10]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (15:15): I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper.
DOCUMENTS
Presentation
Mr PYNE (Sturt—Leader of the House and Minister for Defence Industry) (15:15): Documents are tabled in accordance with the list circulated to honourable members earlier today. Full details of the documents will be recorded in the Votes and Proceedings.
PERSONAL EXPLANATIONS
Mr CREWTHER (Dunkley) (15:16): Mr Speaker, I wish to make a claim with respect to being misrepresented.
The SPEAKER: Does the member for Dunkley claim to have been misrepresented?
Mr CREWTHER: Most grievously, Mr Speaker.
The SPEAKER: The member for Dunkley may proceed.
Mr CREWTHER: Yesterday the member for McEwen, a Deputy Speaker of this House, who I note was also kicked out of question time today, made an astonishing—
The SPEAKER: The member for Dunkley will come straight to his personal explanation!
Mr CREWTHER: He made a claim on social media that I had misled the House and that I had made a dishonest attack on a small business. The member for McEwen accompanied his remarks with an unsavoury personal attack. I will not repeat it here, but I will note that my own family member had learning difficulties and short-term memory loss growing up and had to have speech therapy. The word he used is an assault on all people with this issue, and I note that my family member was bullied with the same word.
The member for McEwen commented on Twitter in the context of sharing a Twitter post from the member for Frankston, who in turn retweeted a post from a Mr Brad Hill, a former Frankston councillor and a local Labor member. His post stated, 'Yesterday in federal parliament, Chris Crewther MP said this Frankston business had closed due to Young Street roadworks; doesn't look like it.' This was accompanied by an image—a screenshot from this business's Facebook page, namely—
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: Members on my left!
Mr CREWTHER: namely, Jenna Louise Hair and Beauty, with the statement, 'We have moved, come visit us at Ali Baba,' and so forth.
To put this in context, I spoke in parliament on Monday on the many businesses that are being closed due to the Young Street precinct works in Frankston, due to the delayed works by the state member for Frankston and the state Labor government. I raised the example in that speech of one of the businesses that—
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: The member will need to resume his seat for a second. Members on my left will cease interjecting. The member for Dunkley needs just to go to where he's been misrepresented. If he's done that already, he can wrap up his remarks—
Opposition members interjecting—
The SPEAKER: If members on my left interject, they won't be here for the matter of public importance! The member for Dunkley just needs to go to where he's been misrepresented and state how he's been misrepresented, and, if he's done that, he can wind his remarks up—otherwise, he needs to go to that point rapidly.
Mr CREWTHER: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I'm coming to the point here. I raised the example in my speech that one of the businesses had closed because of the Young Street works, that being Jenna Louise. I stated in my speech on Monday, quoting Jenna directly, the reasons for her closure due to the Young Street works. The member for McEwen is trying to claim that, because of the screenshot from the business, the business simply moved and did not close. He is therefore claiming I misled the House. The fact is that her post refers to the fact that she herself moved to work for another employer and is not moving her business. Her business itself closed and she is now working under Ali Baba—someone else's business.
The SPEAKER: The member for Dunkley will resume his seat. I'm satisfied he's gone to where he believes he was misrepresented.
Mr BRENDAN O'CONNOR (Gorton) (15:19): Mr Speaker, I seek to make a personal explanation.
The SPEAKER: Does the member claim to have been misrepresented?
Mr BRENDAN O'CONNOR: I do.
The SPEAKER: The member for Gorton may proceed.
Mr BRENDAN O'CONNOR: Today the Prime Minister accused me of defending thugs and criminals. This is offensive and untrue. I abhor violence and would never support criminal behaviour. Also today, on multiple occasions, the Prime Minister accused me of attacking the integrity of the Australian Federal Police. As a former Minister of Home Affairs and Justice for three years, I have nothing but the utmost respect for the independence, dedication and professionalism of the Australian Federal Police. My criticism and allegations, which I stand by, were levelled at the government and its agency the Registered Organisations Commission.
MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE
Economy
The SPEAKER (15:19): I have received a letter from the honourable member for McMahon proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:
The Government's failure to deliver inclusive growth.
I call upon all those honourable members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.
More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—
Mr BOWEN (McMahon) (15:20): As the government continues its obsession with witch-hunts and with taxpayer-funded smear campaigns, there are big issues that the government should be addressing in this House and should be addressing when it comes to policy. Economic growth is very important amongst them. We've had 26 years of uninterrupted economic growth, which is a great achievement for Australia. We on this side of the House know that this economic growth has lifted people out of poverty and turned aspiration into reality, and driving economic growth is part of our mission in public life, because we want to see people move from poverty into better circumstances and we want to see aspiration return to reality. That's why this side of the House, the Labor Party, engaged in those reforms of the 1980s and 1990s to see those 26 years of uninterrupted economic growth. That's why this side of the House kept Australia out of recession in the face of the most difficult economic circumstances that had been faced in 70 years, under the treasurership of the member for Lilley. That's what we believe in: economic growth. That's what drives our economic policy.
We know also that that growth needs to be inclusive, and I was glad to see the Productivity Commission this week agree. The Productivity Commission said in their report on economic growth:
A key issue will be to ensure that future economic, social and environmental policies sustain inclusive growth …
Opposition members: Hear, hear!
Mr BOWEN: 'Hear, hear,' this side of the House said. That sits well with this side of the House. It doesn't sit so well with those opposite, because they don't know what it means. When we say they don't know what it means, we mean it, because they say they don't know what it means. Just last week, the member for Jagajaga was talking about inclusive growth and she said:
We need social investment in our people and in health and education, inclusive growth …
Did the other side say, 'Hear, hear'? No. The member for Mitchell said, 'What does that even mean?' He didn't know what inclusive growth meant. For the benefit of the House, we'll explain it. Inclusive growth means ensuring that every Australian, regardless of their background, regardless of their educational experience and regardless of their parents' wealth, is able to contribute to that growth, is invested in to grow to their full potential and is included in the benefits of that growth. To spell it out, that's what inclusive growth means.
We on this side of the House have understood that. We've understood that for a long time. In 2008, the Labor government ensured that investment in our people, human capital, was at the centre of the COAG Reform Agenda. We wrote it in. We got the agreement of the states. The other side of the House came to office and ripped that up in that document which is known as the 2014 budget. They ripped into health, ripped into education and ripped into investments in our people. That's what that side of the House believe in. What we had is five wasted years when it comes to growth which includes all Australians.
We've seen this week the Productivity Commission report. It's a lengthy report, a substantial report. It was best summed up, perhaps, by Phil Coorey on the front page of the Financial Review this week. He said:
The report and speech will more closely mimic Labor's inclusive growth strategy, which is based on a smarter, healthier population.
We're happy to lead the debate. We're happy to set the agenda. We thought, 'Well, maybe this is an opportunity for the government to finally get it, to get the message and to understand what inclusive growth looks like.' I listened to what the Treasurer had to say in response to the Productivity Commission inquiry. He went out and he made a speech, and what was his big message out of the Productivity Commission inquiry? What was the big message that he took away that was going to influence government policy?
He said, 'This makes us even more determined to pass our corporate tax cuts'—inclusive trickle-down from the Treasurer! I thought: 'Maybe I've missed something. I'll go and double-check the report to find where the report recommends $65 billion be spent on corporate tax cuts.' Well, they go to tax. They talk about land tax. They talk about stamp duty. They talk about alcohol tax. There are 28 recommendations, but not one of them says to cut corporate tax. Not one of them in this Productivity Commission review says we should cut corporate tax.
What we know from the government and their plans is that they intend to have a $65 billion hit to the budget bottom line over the next decade. That is their one trick. That $65 billion is the one bullet they have in their locker. It's not even as if the government actually believe in lower tax. No, they don't believe in lower tax; they believe in different tax. They don't believe in shrinking tax; they believe in changing tax. To give them their credit, they're very happy on the government benches today because they just passed through this House a $44 billion tax rise on working Australians. They are very pleased. Who's paying that tax rise? Every Australian who earns more than the princely sum of $21,000 a year. They're the people who will pay more tax as the government reduce corporate tax. They are shifting the burden onto every Australian.
This comes at a time when many of those same Australians who are earning low and middle incomes are getting a cut to their wages because they work on the weekend. It comes at the same time as they are dealing with record-low wages growth. It comes at the same time as they're dealing with a massive increase in electricity prices as confirmed today in the inflation figures. And the government say, 'You should be grateful because we're going to get you a 50c-a-week saving.' That's what they get at the same time as people will pay more through the increase in tax. A person on $55,000 a year will pay an extra $275 in tax. A person on $80,000 will pay $400 a year. The Treasurer likes to boast about the tax cuts he introduced last year. Somebody on $85,000 would have been better off if he did absolutely nothing. This is their idea of inclusive growth.
And all this means that their big plan, paid for by Australian workers—well, almost paid for, because the tax cut costs $65 billion and the Medicare levy raises $44 billion, so they've still got a gap—is shifting the tax burden all for the sake of growing our economy by one per cent in 20 years time. That's their big plan. The same plan will increase wages by $2 a day in 20 years time. That's what they've got.
There's a better way: investing in schools and investing in vocational education and training, which was the centrepiece of the Leader of the Opposition's budget reply. And we see this in this Productivity Commission report. You look through this report, and you see recommendations which go to health and education. You see the Productivity Commission say:
Health inequalities and educational underperformance present big opportunities for Australia.
We get it. We know that, if you have a better and fairer school-funding model, you're actually investing in Australians regardless of where they live, regardless of how wealthy their parents are, and we want them included. We want them included in contributing to the growth. We want them included in benefiting from the growth. We want their contribution, and we want them to benefit from our economic growth going forward. You don't get that from a $65 billion trickle-down tax cut. You get that from investing in people. You get that from investing in vocational education and training, lifelong learning, helping Australians build their skills and adapt to the changing workforce. That is the first priority when it comes to vocational education and training.
The economy is changing and changing rapidly. We want to give Australians the skills they need to prosper, not to suffer, in that changing economy. In regional economies in Central and North Queensland, in South Australia and Tasmania, we want them benefiting from that economic growth. We want them contributing to it and benefiting from it. Does the government $65 billion tax cut do that? No, and neither does the Medicare levy increase do that. Neither of those plans involves inclusive growth. You can't deliver inclusive growth if you don't know what it is, if you don't understand what it means, if you just don't get it as a concept, as a principle. I feel sorry for some members of the government; they don't understand what inclusive growth is. Well, I'll tell you what inclusive growth looks like: it looks like growth delivered by a reforming Labor government, a government which is actually prepared to make difficult decisions and lead the reform debate from opposition and then from government. We have a government that is out of touch and out of puff, a government that is born to rule, a government that doesn't believe in inclusive growth, a government that will be replaced at the next election.
Mr SUKKAR (Deakin—Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) (15:30): I'm not sure who to believe—the shadow Treasurer who was just at the dispatch box or the Chris Bowen who wrote Hearts & Minds: A Blueprint for Modern Labor, in which he spoke eloquently about corporate tax cuts. I don't think I believe either of them. We've got to remember that this shadow Treasurer was the worst immigration minister this country has ever seen—25,000 people arrived on his watch. This is the man whose great idea was Cash for Clunkers, that absolutely outstanding piece—
An opposition member interjecting—
Mr SUKKAR: It was his idea! It was a great idea—I don't think it ever happened! What about Fuelwatch? Whatever happened to Fuelwatch? But what happens in the Labor Party when you're the worst immigration minister this country has ever seen and you come up with absolutely crazy schemes like Fuelwatch? You get a promotion.
But to be a bit more serious about the substance of this MPI: the Labor Party take growth for granted; that's the problem. They think there is a God-given right for this country to have growth, that we don't have to work hard for it and that the government doesn't have to put in place policies that encourage growth. This is the position of Labor. I feel for the shadow Treasurer. I suspect he's a patriot, but every time good economic data comes out, he goes hiding. He can't speak about it. It's almost as though he's desperate for some bad economic data—and it's not coming. In the last 12 months, jobs have grown by 371,000. In the last 12 months, 371,000 Australians have found a job. Importantly, when we talk about inclusive growth—so called—315,000 of those 370,000 jobs are full-time jobs. A job is what gives people the best start they can possibly have in life. The Labor Party think you can take growth for granted. They think that we have a God-given right to all of the investment that creates those jobs without doing any of the hard work to make it happen.
The Labor Party think that those in small business just open the shop and the customers just roll in and the profits just roll in. Otherwise, how could you explain why Labor believes that a small business with a turnover of just over $2 million should be treated the same as Apple and Google and be denied a tax cut? In a number of interviews on television today, we saw Labor MPs evading questions about what they will do with these small business tax cuts. I think we know what it means. It means that, if a Labor government were elected, small businesses would pay higher taxes. According to the Labor Party, small businesses are doing it easy. Well, I can tell the shadow Treasurer, I can tell the Labor Party, that small family businesses fight for every single dollar of profit. Small businesses pay the rent first, the employees second, the suppliers third and the tax fourth. They pay themselves last. So, when we can give them a tax cut, hopefully they can invest and grow that business. We know that a lot of the jobs growth I have spoken about here—the 371,000 jobs in the last 12 months—has come from the small to medium enterprise sector. This is the place that is creating opportunity for Australians. These are the sorts of businesses that create the growth, the inclusive growth, that the shadow Treasurer talks about.
Words are cheap. Words are absolutely cheap. You've got to do the hard work to encourage small businesses and encourage Australians to create the economic growth that can deliver these opportunities. We can't take it for granted, and the Labor Party thinks we can. Yes, we've had 26 years of uninterrupted growth, and 17 of those years were stewarded by coalition governments. We've got a shadow Treasurer who often evokes the memories of Keating and Hawke. In fact, he jumped the shark by evoking John Howard a few months ago. John Howard's not as charitable about you as you are about him. The legacy that you are claiming is one that you are completely repudiating. The legacy that you are supposedly proud of, you are completely repudiating. You have now gone back to a pre-Hawke-Keating era of thinking that says, 'You encourage more investment and therefore create more wealth for Australians and therefore create more opportunities for Australians by having a higher corporate tax rate than our competitors.' That is plainly wrong. Page 63 of this fantastic book, Hearts & Minds: A Blueprint for Modern Labor actually says it. There's a very big heading here. It's in bold. It's not a particularly lengthy tome, but there's a bold heading here: 'Promoting growth through cutting company tax'.
Mr Husic: Mr Deputy Speaker, I'm loath to interrupt, but he's reading from a document. I'm wondering if he could table the book. It's a good book.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Coulton ): There is no point of order. The member for Chifley will resume his seat. I give the call to the assistant minister.
Mr SUKKAR: I say to the honourable member: it's pretty easy to get your hands on one of these. They're only a couple of bucks, just in the bargain bin at the front of bookstores. They're not that hard to find.
'Promoting growth through cutting company tax'. What has happened between then and now? I think I know what's happened between then and now. Bill Shorten's become leader of the party, and the Left is large and in charge of the Labor Party. What is sad is that someone like the shadow Treasurer has not been able to stand up to them—someone like the shadow Treasurer, who evokes the memories of Hawke and Keating, who cut company taxes, is now someone who wants higher company taxes and higher taxes on small family businesses. This is a man who wants small businesses with a turnover between $2 million and $10 million to be denied tax cuts and be denied the ability to access concessions like the instant asset write-off. They are not rich people. They are not Apple and Google. They are small businesses that might have one, two or three employees; small businesses that treat their employees more like family members than employees. But he wants to deny them a tax cut. He hurts not only those small businesses but also their employees, because, if those small businesses are doing it tough, then it's harder to provide the opportunities for inclusive growth that he talks about.
Speaking of growth, in the last quarter we had growth at 0.8 per cent in one quarter. It must be hard, it must be tough, as someone in the role of shadow Treasurer. Every time some good economic data comes out, he is torn. I'm sure that, as a patriot, he thinks this is great for the country—good on the coalition government for delivering 0.8 per cent growth—but he's torn. He can't say it. It must be a very difficult position to be in.
We've also seen the dividends for the government, and we've seen dividends for the country due to the encouragement of growth under this government. We saw the final budget figures come in at $4.4 billion better than expected. This is very important. This is the first time since the last Costello budget, the last coalition government budget before the rabble of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government, where we've exceeded expectations, and this was delivered under Treasurer Morrison's watch. We have exceeded expectations. It's very important because, unlike the Labor Party, we underpromise and overdeliver. That is what that shows.
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr SUKKAR: The Labor Party might think that $4.4 billion is a trifling amount worth laughing at, but we think that is extraordinarily important and absolutely telling. The economy is seeing growth and strength in a way that we have not seen since the Howard and Costello government. But we've got a lot more to do and we cannot take it for granted. The Labor Party thinks we can take it for granted and thinks that we can tax our way to prosperity. It's false. I say to the shadow Treasurer: we don't want you bringing what you brought to the immigration portfolio in government to this debate. (Time expired)
Ms BIRD (Cunningham) (15:40): I thank the assistant minister for his dissertation on growth. I would suggest there's a lot of content in that that's debatable. He seems to have forgotten the bit that's called inclusive growth, so I'd encourage him to have a bit of a look at some of the other economic outcomes that are currently facing this country that might enlighten him around issues such as stagnant wages growth. In the last two hours or so we've had a really interesting indication of where exactly those opposite are on inclusive growth. Perhaps the shadow Treasurer could follow up his book with 'Inclusive Growth for Dummies'. Since those opposite seem to be keen to buy his books, I think that would be a particularly useful addition.
Just before question time, we had the most astonishing performance by the member for Corangamite, who wanted to lecture us on this side for having some concerns about a senior member of the media, a woman who had an issue with not getting equal pay. The member for Corangamite was outraged about women across a number of industry sectors and why we weren't talking about them. I don't know where she's been for the last 50 years. One of the very first committees I sat on did an inquiry under a Labor government on pay equity which led to significant reforms in the Industrial Relations Commission that saw pay equity cases successfully prosecuted. Why did we do that? Because we understand that inclusive growth means that women across what were undervalued sectors of the economy deserved wage equity and pay equality.
That was followed up by the Prime Minister, during question time, informing us from his lofty heights that not everyone has had a privileged ride to power. Well, he'd know! He'd know, wouldn't he? I tell you what, Mr Speaker: from the top to the bottom, those opposite epitomise a complete inability to understand what we mean by inclusive growth and what the Australian community expects of growth in this country and the way in which it is shared. We are one of the great examples among OECD countries with a structure in our economy and society that has meant a significant increase in the wellbeing and welfare of working-class people. Over time, that is what has driven growth in this country.
The assistant minister wanted to talk about small business. I have done some local events with small businesses in my area who understand that if you go cutting people's wages you are hurting their customers. You are attacking the base of their community—the people who come in and buy from them, who come in and have a meal at their restaurant or who come in and do a bit of that discretionary spending you can do when you have a decent wage in place. Instead of doing that, what those opposite are doing is cutting away at the heart of the customers who feed those small businesses, by refusing to take action on penalty rates, as an example. I can't believe they're making comments about needing better wages growth in this country whilst not only doing absolutely nothing to deliver that but taking actions to cut away the base of that. As the shadow Treasurer said, this week we've had bills through this place to attack the wage level of people earning only $21,000 a year. These are people who go out and shop in the businesses in my electorate. These are the people who spend the additional money they have. The big end of town don't do that; they put it in a bit more of their own investments or into shares and so forth. If you want inclusive growth, you have to understand how the economies in our local communities operate. They operate on the strength of the incomes that come in to the people who live in those communities and the purchasing power that they deliver to the businesses in our local area. Those opposite, from top to bottom, say people in Western Sydney don't even own cars or drive very far. They say: those of you who can't afford a new house, just beg mum and dad for a bit of money—I'll tell you what: as a mum, I'm not keen on that solution—or that getting paid $4 an hour is a gift. (Time expired)
Mr GEE (Calare) (15:45): It does beggar belief that the member for McMahon can come into this House with his pious bleating about inclusion and inclusive growth on the very day those opposite try to sabotage full funding for the NDIS. It beggars belief and just epitomises those opposite. They talk a good game on inclusion and inclusive growth but they just can't deliver. They can't fund the NDIS. The NDIS was never funded and they were never able to fund Gonski either. But over on this side, on the government's side, we have plans to fully fund the NDIS and fully fund Gonski, backed by David Gonski himself. As you walk around these corridors, you'll see all the Gonski posters those opposite had up in their rooms have all come down because they know we deliver on all of these inclusive policies.
At the core of inclusive growth is giving Australians a shot at a job. And as Deloitte Access Economics has recently stated, Australian job growth is a thing of beauty. Why wouldn't Deloitte Access Economics say that? Over the past 12 months, 371,500 Aussies got a job, the strongest jobs growth since before the global financial crisis. I think I'd know what the Treasurer would say about that. He would say the better days are arriving. Twelve months of consecutive jobs growth is the best result in over 23 years—that's better days ahead. Annual jobs growth is now running at over three per cent—that's 15 times greater than it was in 2013 when the coalition government was first elected. And since then, 825,000 jobs have been created and almost two-thirds of those jobs have been secured in the past two years. Better days ahead there, better days indeed.
Nowhere have the better days economically been felt more so than in country Australia. If you look at the economic growth figures for regional Australia, you see they are quite astounding. Agriculture is now Australia's fastest growing economic sector and was the largest contributor to national GDP growth in 2016 and 2017. Growth in agriculture, as you would know, Deputy Speaker Coulton, is up 23 per cent, proving the sector is the fastest to grow of all of the 19 industries. The nation's economic growth is at 1.9 per cent, and Australian agriculture contributed 0.5 per cent of that. So it just keeps getting better and better in terms of inclusive growth, because our young farmers can finally see a future on the land. That's giving everyone a share and a part in that great Australian vision.
In more good news: in 2016-17, agriculture contributed over $500 billion in exports, compared to $41 billion just five years ago. So you can see how the better days have indeed arrived. In contrast, those opposite have turned their backs on working Australians, working families. They have turned their backs on miners. I know in our neck of the words, in the Central West, in Lithgow, the miners are very disillusioned about the whacky energy policies of those opposite. The miners out at Mudgee, the miners out at Ulan, they know. You go into the pubs and clubs and they'll tell you how disillusioned they are at being cut loose by those opposite.
Of course, the Productivity Commission spoke about better health and better educational outcomes, which of course we all support. The Treasurer has said that universities need to focus on teaching, to get those practical outcomes going. Out west, we're certainly pushing hard for that Murray Darling Medical School to train doctors in the bush for practice in the bush. So out west, where we are, we're already working on those key recommendations of the Productivity Commission, and I know that that project is something that the communities of the west support wholeheartedly.
But, if you go right across the economy, right across the sectors, you'll see better days and inclusive growth. According to the NAB, business conditions have risen to their highest levels in almost a decade. If you go to manufacturing activity, AiG has stated that it's at its highest level in 15 years. There are better days ahead. And we've also seen that new private business investment has increased in each of the past three quarters in the national accounts, following 12 consecutive quarters of decline. Better days have arrived. Inclusive growth is here. (Time expired)
Mr HAYES (Fowler—Chief Opposition Whip) (15:50): Can I just acknowledge those young people up in our gallery here, because this debate really is about them. This is about our futures, and those young people over there are the ones who are going to either benefit or otherwise from what's occurring in this place today.
We've been lectured, time and time again, by the government about budget repair. They talk about deficit disaster and they talk about a budget emergency. And yet what was the first thing they did in the last budget? They found the notion of giving a $65 billion tax cut to big business—corporate Australia—which, by the way, last year made record profits, if you can believe the financial analysts out there. So it wasn't that they needed to stimulate big business, because they're actually doing pretty well at the moment. We might need to fine-tune a number of aspects of trade, which we work on, hopefully, on a bipartisan basis.
But, in terms of actually justifying their $65 billion tax cut to big business, they did it on the basis of a belief, believe it or not, in trickle-down economics. Pretty hard to find that—I went through my books and it wasn't mentioned anywhere. But I did find one reference to it earlier this week. There were members on both sides of the House who turned up to hear about the latest issue of the Catholic Social Justice Series Papers, released by Catholic Social Services Australia, entitled 'An economy that works for all'—not dissimilar to the debate we're having at the moment. I was interested: was there anything about trickle-down economics in this publication? And there was, believe it or not! The Catholic bishops' Social Justice Statement this year was entitled 'Everyone's business: developing an inclusive and sustainable economy'. It focused not just on the distribution of wealth but on how it is created and used. I thought, 'That's appropriate for today's debate.' So I thought I'd read on a little bit to see what it said, because it talked about trickle-down economics. It seems these Australian bishops agree with Pope Francis that 'trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world' have not been proven. But this is the government's whole policy! The bishops go on to say that even 26 years of continuous economic growth has been insufficient to assure the poorest Australians of a dignified, if frugal, existence. As to those opposite, I'm sure I saw some familiar faces there—I'm sure they turned up to see the publication of that document and hear Father Frank Brennan introduce it.
They want to talk about economic vandalism. Have you noticed that? It sort of rolls off the tongue over there. This is the mob—and, by the way, this might be interesting for the teachers up there—part of whose strategy for social inclusion is cutting $17 billion from education. That's their view of investing in our future. This is the same mob that comes in here and says, 'We're going to take $3.8 billion out of our universities.' That's hardly investing in our future. And, by the way, when it gets to vocational and TAFE courses, they want to take over $600 million out of them! I introduced these young people up here because they're the ones you're supposed to be investing in. They're our collective future, which you're ignoring.
They do this at a time when there's record low wage growth.
Mr Gee: The good times have arrived!
Mr HAYES: I just heard the last member who spoke saying that the good times have arrived: wage growth of 1.9 per cent. Can I just tell that member that this is the lowest wage growth in living memory. And this is the same government that wants to cut the penalty rates for 700,000 Australian workers on low pay, which will take away about $77 a week. And, by the way, the cut won't just apply for this year; their cuts are going to apply for the next four years. These people in the hospitality and the retail sector are on the lowest wages in our country, and they're not going to get a pay rise for the next four years. And those opposite say that the good times have arrived! Well, I'd hate to see what the bad times are like!
And bear in mind that none of them have ever mentioned the global financial crisis. This is the side that actually protected the Australian people and the Australian economy in the face of the worst financial disaster— (Time expired)
Mr TIM WILSON (Goldstein) (15:56): I start my address on this matter of public importance by making a confession, a confession that I'm not proud of, but it's important to put it on the record. I was one of those people who paid full price for a copy of the shadow minister's Hearts & Minds book.
A government member: Surely not!
Mr TIM WILSON: I did! There aren't many Australians who can claim that, because it was such a low print run and it has, as the Assistant Minister to the Treasurer conceded, gone straight to the reject bin. But I have done so, and I have then had the dubious honour of reading said Hearts & Minds. The principle that sits at the heart of it is actually that you create economic opportunity by creating economic growth. A shocking proposition, I know! A shocking proposition! Something that's come from the shadow Treasurer's mouth and in words as well as in deed.
But, in practice, everybody on this side of the House knows that's a statement of the expletive obvious. And that's what's at the heart of this motion: an absurdity—the idea that you can get up and pander and postulate to the parliament about how you think you can create a better society by simply sharing the dividends rather than creating the opportunity that this nation needs. The Assistant Minister to the Treasurer was 100 per cent right: those opposite take economic opportunity and growth as a given, rather than recognising it as a cause we must strive for continuously if we want to create the prosperity and opportunity for the children in the gallery that so many on the other side simply seek to gesture to.
The absurdity of their position is how much hypocrisy sits at the heart of the arguments put by those opposite. They talk about the challenges of wage growth—and there are challenges to wage growth; I'm not going to pretend otherwise. But hypocrisy sits at the heart of it when, for the past 12 months, the member for Fraser has done a job and never got paid for it because of factional union deals over the past 12 months. Only because of a recent reshuffle has he been honoured with the commitment to a boost in his income that he was entitled to in fulfilling his role as a shadow minister. These people like to talk it, but they don't like to deliver it—especially when it's one of their own.
Inclusive growth is about creating economic opportunity for every Australian. It's about creating an opportunity society, and at the heart of it is actually understanding some pretty basic propositions of economics. Firstly, you have primary industries, which create the economic opportunity and the wealth that make this nation rich. Secondly, you use that wealth to create a manufacturing sector to value-add and to create opportunities for the next generation, which is ultimately provided for by a service based economy—the sector in which millions of Australians work. But, if you do not create the right economic environment for those primary industries, the country is cactus. And that is what they are doing every single day when they seek to regulate and legislate them out of competitiveness.
Their policy on energy fundamentally undermines the opportunity for our mining industries, our agriculture and our manufacturing services economy to compete, and it slugs households and businesses at every step of the way. That's the point of the National Energy Guarantee. It provides a framework for making sure we get investment in new technology and new energy to make us competitive, so that we can reduce our costs and improve the opportunity for households to reduce their electricity bills.
On top of that, you have to judge what they want to do to our economy against the outcomes of the Turnbull coalition government. Let's face facts: in the year 2016-17 we have had but a measly, a dolorous, if you take the position of the opposition, 371,000 new jobs. Apparently creating job opportunities is not inclusive growth. We have been delivering job opportunities for 371,000 Australians, completely against the rubbish narrative that is being run in this motion today. And 315,900 of those jobs are full time, creating opportunities for hundreds of thousands of Australians to be able to stand on their own two feet, to understand the dignity and opportunity that comes with being able to work and to provide for their families and pay their mortgages. There are so many things this government has done to deliver inclusion and opportunity for Australians. It's about time the opposition woke up and recognised it.
Ms O'TOOLE (Herbert) (16:01): Unlike the member for Goldstein, I'm going to talk about 'inclusive economy' as opposed to 'exclusive economy'. Yesterday we saw the Productivity Commission release their five-year productivity report into Australia's productivity and economic growth. Let's just say this review is more like a report card on the five years that we have had under the Abbott-Turnbull governments. What is clear from this report card is that the Abbott-Turnbull governments have received Fs across the board: wage growth, fail; support for universities, fail; support for education, fail; investment in health, fail.
The Abbott-Turnbull governments have failed Australia because they have failed to understand a vital notion, a notion that was outlined on page 30 of the Productivity Commission's review:
A key issue will be to ensure that future economic, social and environmental policies sustain inclusive growth—
a phrase the Turnbull government probably aren't too familiar with, and we've just heard that, considering it includes the term 'inclusive'. So allow me to educate those opposite in the Turnbull government on what 'inclusive' really means. 'Inclusive' does not just relate to the wealthy and the elite. 'Inclusive' does not relate to billionaires and millionaires. And 'inclusivity' is certainly not about providing a $65 billion tax cut to big business. 'Inclusive' means all, everyone, every citizen, all Australians—workers, pensioners, students, teachers, nurses, tradies, electricians, small business owners.
Labor has always understood that investment in people and our human capital is key to economic growth. You cannot have a strong economy without a thriving and inclusive society. That is why it has only ever been Labor that has invested in education, universities, health care and jobs. That is the backbone of who we are. But the Turnbull government does not care about all Australians, and this is very evident with its Medicare levy. This government wants to reduce the taxes for big business by $44 billion over the next decade, with the Medicare levy rise hitting workers who earn as little as $21,000 a year. Quite simply, the Turnbull government is giving away $65 billion in tax cuts to big business but slugging working Australians with a $44 billion income tax hike. This government's tax increase will mean a worker on $55,000 will pay an extra $275 tax a year. It is clear that the Turnbull government is not at all interested in inclusive growth when it is implementing government policies and tax increases that detrimentally affect this vulnerable group of people. The Turnbull government is completely blinded by trickle-down economics. Well, there is something trickling down on Australian workers, but it certainly isn't wealth!
This government needs to stop treating workers like they are fools. Workers know the facts, but allow me to enlighten the government about these facts. Wage growth hasn't been this low since the retention of records started. Since 1975, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has collected data on earnings inequality. Profits have gone up by 40 per cent, wages by less than two per cent. Real wages have grown by 72 per cent for the top 10 per cent.
In 1975, the top ten per cent of earners earned twice as much as the bottom 10 per cent, yet by 2014 they earned nearly three times as much. If low-wage earners had enjoyed the same percentage gains as the highest paid, they would be $16,000 a year better off. The richest one per cent of Australians collectively own more wealth than 70 per cent of Australian citizens combined. So what will the Turnbull government do regarding this massive issue of wage growth? When will wages go up? When asked during a national radio interview last week, the Prime Minister said, 'When businesses are able to, when the economy is growing fast enough and strongly enough so that businesses are able to afford to pay more for labour.' That rambling answer is simply not good enough. And the government's $65 billion tax cut is not good enough either. This farce of a tax cut will only provide one per cent of growth in 20 years' time. That policy is a joke to all Australians.
The Turnbull government is a government that puts profits before people. It is not a government for low-income workers. It is certainly not a government that cares about inclusivity for all Australian citizens, because, under the Turnbull government, workers not only will be taxed more but will certainly be paid less.
Mr COLEMAN (Banks) (16:06): The economy is strong and it is getting stronger and stronger every day, with some tremendously good economic figures in recent months. Over the past 12 months, 371,500 Australians got a job, the greatest incremental number of jobs since before the financial crisis, a fantastic rate of growth. And the overwhelming majority of those jobs were full-time. There have been 825,000 jobs created since we came into government, two-thirds of those in the last two years, so it is a very strong economic performance.
We contrast that with the bleak and depressing economic vision of those opposite. The opposition leader said in a speech recently that the wealth of your parents is becoming the defining feature and source of your future and that there is a sense that your success in life is predetermined by your parents' income. That is not right, because, in Australia, we know that it is our own efforts that determine our level of success. We know that this is a country where people can come from any walk of life, from any background, and, through dedication and application, can make so much of themselves. That is so fundamental as to who we are on this side of the House and, indeed, who we are as Australians. But those opposite believe in a sad and depressing vision that your success or destiny in life is predetermined by your upbringing, and that is absolutely false. I'm sure there are many people in this House who know from personal experience that that could not be further from the truth, but this is an opposition that is anti-business, anti-aspiration and, frankly, anti-success.
What do those opposite want to do to small- and medium-sized businesses? They want to say you can't have any tax relief, because a business with $2 million of revenue or more is some sort of evil multinational that must be denied tax relief, even though most of these businesses are very small and are massive employers of millions of Australians. This could be instructive for those opposite. If you've got $2.1 million of revenue, it doesn't mean that you have made $2.1 million. It doesn't mean that your profit is $2.1 million. It means that you have revenue of $2.1 million and you might have a profit margin of five per cent. Many small businesses have profit margins of three or four or five per cent. So if your profit margin is five per cent and your revenue is just over $2 million, you're making $100,000. You are making about the same as the average family income, and those opposite say this is some sort of huge corporation that must be denied tax relief. That is an extraordinary and absurd proposition, and it just shows a complete lack of understanding from those opposite of how the economy works.
The other thing those opposite want to do is increase the investment tax on everything by 50 per cent. They want to increase capital gains tax on everything by 50 per cent. This is under their so-called housing affordability policy, but Labor's housing affordability policy says that on any investment in anything at all, if there's a capital gain, that person should pay 50 per cent more tax. So, if you invest in a factory in the electorate of Petrie or in a cafe or whatever, there would be 50 per cent more tax. If you invest in a farm, there would be 50 per cent more tax when you sell that asset. That is, again, a ridiculous policy which will be anti-investment. That policy supposedly was designed to address housing affordability issues in Sydney and Melbourne, so why would you apply it to all of these other industries and to the entire country? One reason is that you want to raise more revenue, because you want to spend more and you have absolutely no understanding of how the economy works. It is an extraordinarily bad idea.
We have very strong business conditions at the moment and very strong business confidence, and that's because this Treasurer and this government are unashamedly pro-investment and pro-growth. We have already legislated, with the support of some sensible crossbenchers in the Senate—not those opposite but some sensible crossbenchers in the Senate—for tax relief for businesses with revenue of up to $50 million. That should be extended further, because it will mean more jobs. The proof of the pudding is the very strong performance on jobs that this government has generated in recent years. We have a very strong economic record here. The economy is getting stronger every day. There is a depressing antibusiness, anti-aspiration agenda opposite which must be rejected.
Mr GOSLING (Solomon) (16:11): I'm pleased to have an opportunity to speak to this MPI today. In the Federation Chamber earlier today, I heard some of the comments from the member for Boothby about the closing down of the Holden plant in Adelaide. She really did not have a sense for what that meant to so many families and workers. Then we heard the member for Goldstein's Freudian slip when he talked about the other side's passion for 'exclusive growth'; he belled the cat there about where the focus of those opposite lies. Then we had the member for Calare talking about how things have never been better. I hope that, when he got back up to his office, his staff removed his cranium from his rear end so that he could appreciate and maybe listen to some other contributions, because it may come as a surprise to those opposite, who generally do better from electorates that do better—well done and good for you, guys, and that's fantastic—but a lot of people in this country are struggling and don't feel included in this growth thing.
Let's have a think about that growth. There are $65 billion worth of corporate tax cuts going to the big end of town. For what sort of growth? By their own admission, for one per cent growth in 20 years. Those in the gallery should know a lot of that money gained through those corporate tax cuts will go offshore—that is, not for Australians but for those incredibly wealthy people and companies offshore. How is that inclusive? I don't think it is. So what people are starting to wake up to—with Mr Point Piper with his mansion, our current Prime Minister and all his wealth, and good luck to him—is that people in this country are struggling, and they don't appreciate that those opposite's idea of inclusivity is to increase taxes on every single Australian earning more than $21,000. That's shocking. It's not a surprise. Those opposite don't understand inclusivity.
I was very happy to hear the member for Fowler on our side point to the findings of Catholic Social Services in their look into the state of inequality and inclusiveness in our country. They also mention the fact that the current Pope, Francis, isn't necessarily an adherent to trickle-down, and that's interesting, because a lot of those opposite like to profess a profound communion with the ideals of Christianity. However, taking from poor people and giving to those with abundance is not really in the nature of the teachings of that religion. Forgive them, Deputy Speaker Coulton, because they do not know what they are talking about. They do not understand what inclusivity is.
In fact, the member for Goldstein belled the cat, talking about an exclusive policy of growth excluding those on the margins. I come from the Northern Territory, where people are living on those margins. I understand what communities of disadvantage look like. I understand what it's like to represent people coming from a jurisdiction that depends on something like horizontal fiscal equalisation, which is about us sharing the GST, the glue that holds the federation together. Yet this Treasurer of Australia seeks to change the model by which some areas of our country that are doing less well get to share in the common wealth of our nation. He is saying the Productivity Commission is going around the country doing consultations about this change to the glue of our federation. Do you think they're coming to the Northern Territory? No. They're not coming to the Northern Territory, the very jurisdiction with the most disadvantage in our country, for Territorians to be heard. Territorians' voices should be heard on this issue. Labor will always be for an inclusive economy.
Mr HOWARTH (Petrie) (16:16): We've seen over the last 12 months some really positive results in the Australian economy. We've seen job creation soar, with over 370,000 new jobs in the last 12 months, and over 300,000 of those being full-time. We've seen the unemployment rate fall, not just nationally but also in my electorate. In the last four years since the coalition came in, we've seen the youth unemployment rate come down considerably in Petrie on the back of projects like PaTH. We've also seen rent fall in some areas, particularly in Brisbane a little bit, which has helped some people. Housing prices have remained stagnant or gone up a little bit. They have remained very stable. Goals are being achieved by local people and local community groups, so I thank the RDA and others in the community that are working hard.
The shadow Treasurer came in here and talked about inclusive growth, but the problem is that his policies and the policies of those opposite are actually making the gap larger. I look at their policies around higher taxes and their policy around making existing homes only available to be positively geared, because they want to get rid of negatively geared housing. When you only allow positive gearing, for the people who rent and who can only ever afford to rent, it means that their rents will go up. Naturally, if they cannot negatively gear, owners need to make sure that rents are higher than interest repayments. Some people out there may remember when interest rates were 17 per cent under Labor. Right now, they are quite low and there'll be very few investors that are negatively gearing compared to when interest rates were high. When interest rates are very high and when they go up in the future and you cannot negatively gear, it means rents will increase.
Labor also want to push up the cost of the electricity bill. We know the Climate Change Authority says their policy will increase prices by $200 and ours will decrease prices by over $100. That is a $300 difference between Liberal-National policy and Labor policy.
They want to punish family-owned business trusts that employ local people. They basically believe we have to tax them more because they must be ripping people off. But when you tax investment there are fewer jobs. We know, since we went to the last election with jobs and growth, that the coalition has a proven record of delivering.
They also want to tax people half of what they earn. If you've got any incentive to earn $300,000, they want to take half of it. We know that people who are earning $37,000 a year pay $3,572 tax. If you earn $52,000 you pay $8,400. If you earn $79,000—around the average in Australia; I think the average is $81,000—you pay $17,222. If you earn $300,000, if you are really earning more than the average, you pay $108,232 in tax. Lisa Wilkinson, who just left Channel Nine and now works for Channel Ten and has landed a contract for $2.3 million, will pay $1,008,232 in tax. So Labor's solution to growing inequality is that a woman who has just landed a $2.3 million contract, who currently pays over $1 million in tax, must pay more. That is why we are in this situation—according to Labor. What they should be focusing on is not the top earners or the middle-income earners but encouraging everyone to do better. They should not be voting against policies like the Super Saver Scheme. Members opposite voted against the $6,000 tax cut that we introduced into parliament last week to help first home owners save more of their own money for a deposit on their own house.
Labor's policies are all wrong. The inclusive growth that they're talking about is actually exacerbated under Labor—the rich and poor are getting wider apart. If you tax Lisa Wilkinson an extra two per cent, she's still going to be earning a lot of money. Focus on the bottom end. Look at those earning $0 to $18,200, who currently pay no tax—and each year maybe link that to CPI so that their $18,200 goes up. It will help everyone on the tax scale, including those at the lower end. You'll see a bigger gap between the minimum wage—what they take home—and what they currently get in welfare. This party believes in lower taxes and lower spending, and that's the only way to equality for all.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Coulton ): The discussion is now concluded.
DOCUMENTS
Department of Education and Training
Presentation
Mr HARTSUYKER (Cowper—Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) (16:21): I present the annual report of the Department of Education and Training 2016-17 for the information of members.
BILLS
Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Dr LEIGH (Fenner) (16:22): As the member for Hotham has ably set out in this chamber, Labor will support tougher penalties for firearms trafficking but what we won't support are ineffective measures. The reintroduction of these measures is a desperate attempt by the coalition to distract from the fact that they are hopelessly divided on guns. Labor will seek to remove the mandatory minimum sentences because they don't work. We need to draw a distinction in this House between being tough on crime and being dumb on crime. Labor will listen to the experts because we want to make sure that we have less gun crime in Australia. We're proposing amendments to introduce new offences for aggravated firearms trafficking, but we won't support measures which will simply cause judges to be less likely to convict.
In the case of mandatory minimum sentences, the Attorney-General's Department document 'Guide to framing Commonwealth offences, infringement notices and enforcement powers' states that minimum penalties should be avoided on the basis that they interfere with judicial discretion to impose a penalty appropriate to the circumstance of a particular case; that they may create an incentive for a defendant to fight charges even when there's little merit in doing so; that they may preclude the use of alternative sanctions such as community service orders; and that they may encourage the judiciary to look for technical grounds to avoid a restriction on sentencing discretion, leading to anomalous decisions. The Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee received a wide range of evidence from stakeholders in inquiries on the two previous bills, which strongly opposed the imposition of mandatory sentences.
The Law Council of Australia has written most extensively on this issue. In their policy discussion paper on mandatory sentencing in May 2004, they went through in considerable detail the risks that mandatory sentencing creates. They noted that mandatory sentencing is inconsistent with Australia's international obligations, including the prohibition against arbitrary detention, in article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The right to a fair trial and the provision of prison sentences must, in effect, be subject to appeal, as per article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. They also noted that mandatory minimums may breach Australia's obligations under articles 3, 37 and 40 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
More importantly than our international obligation is the simple fact that mandatory minimum sentences make it less likely for convictions to be recorded and can lead to manifest unfairness. The Law Council gave examples of instances in which mandatory sentencing has led to outcomes which I don't think any member of this House would believe are just. They give the example of a 16-year-old with one prior conviction who received a 28-day prison sentence for stealing a bottle of spring water—a month in jail for stealing a bottle of water. A 17-year-old first-time offender received a 14-day prison sentence for stealing orange juice and Minties. I have to say, I went to a decent school, and I'm afraid there were classmates of mine who at some stage would have shoplifted orange juice and Minties, but I don't think anyone would have thought that they should have received a fortnight behind bars. The Law Council gives the example of a 15-year-old Aboriginal boy who received a 20-day mandatory sentence for stealing pencils and stationery and died while in custody. An Aboriginal woman, a first-time offender, received a 14-day prison sentence for stealing a can of beer. These manifestly unjust outcomes occurred as a result of mandatory sentencing.
The Law Council points to research which found that, when the public is fully informed about the particular circumstances of a case and an offender, there is a 90 per cent tendency to view judge's sentences as appropriate. That is from work by Geraldine Mackenzie and co-authors, published in 2012, in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology. The Law Council notes too that the imposition of mandatory minimum sentences can lead to unjust outcomes. The Law Council concludes by quoting the then Australian Human Rights Commissioner, the 'Freedom Commissioner', Mr Tim Wilson, now the member for Goldstein. He said:
… mandatory sentencing 'is an incremental stake stabbed in the heart of the foundations of our liberal democracy because it assumes that a centralised government with less information can make better decisions about individual cases than a decentralised courts with more information'.
The member for Goldstein has always stood for freedom, or so he tells us, so it will be interesting to those on this side of the House to see whether he exercises his freedom of conscience to cross the floor and vote with the Labor Party and uphold the principles that he stood for when he was Human Rights Commissioner—the principles he stood for in 2014 when he described mandatory sentencing as 'an incremental stake stabbed in the heart of the foundations of our liberal democracy'.
The criminologist Mark Kleiman describes the trade-off between severity and certainty in his book, When Brute Force Fails, and points out that, if you want to have less crime and less punishment, you need to recognise that offenders who are driven by the present are much more likely to respond to certainty—to the probability of conviction—than to severity, to the duration of the sentence. If you are thinking about committing a serious weapons offence, you are probably living in the moment and it is relatively unlikely that severity will play a bigger role in your mind than certainty. Yet that is the trade-off that this bill fails to recognise.
The Law Council noted that mandatory minimum sentences could increase Indigenous incarceration rates. We on this side of the House believe that incarceration should be added to the Closing the Gap targets, given that Australia's Indigenous incarceration rate is high and rising. Indeed, our overall incarceration rate is now the highest it's been since 1901. In all the time since Federation, Australia has never locked up as large a share of our population as we do today, with 207 out of every 100,000 adults currently behind bars. It's a higher incarceration rate than in Canada, Japan, France, India, Germany, Indonesia or Britain. We are incarcerating a higher share of our population than we have since Federation, at a time, over the last two decades, in which the murder rate and car theft rates have fallen significantly.
This comes at a significant cost to Australians, given that incarceration costs around $300 a day and $110,000 a year. In the United States, where nearly one per cent of adults are behind bars, there's a bipartisan movement towards being smarter on crime, recognising that we need to make better use of monitoring technology and that there are smarter approaches than mandatory sentences. This is a bipartisan push from Democrats and Republicans in the United States. It's a smart-on-crime measure, exactly the opposite of what we see in this government's call for mandatory sentences. We have a government that says we need mandatory sentences in order to make sure offenders are put behind bars. But the Law Council tells us that they will do just the opposite, because when mandatory sentences are in place judges and juries may be less likely to convict, knowing that there is no sentencing discretion.
Finally, I want to do something which is a little unusual in this place, which is to pay tribute to those on the other side of the House. One of the great legacies of the Howard government was the package of gun reforms put in place after the Port Arthur massacre. It is too easy to forget how quickly Australia acted at that time. The police ministers' meeting took place 12 days after the Port Arthur massacre, before all of the 35 victims had been laid to rest. It is to the credit of John Howard and Tim Fischer that they were willing to act and tighten our firearms laws. We refer to the gun buyback, the 600,000 firearms—about a fifth of all guns in Australia—that were handed back into police stations. But it's important to remember, too, the tightening of licensing and regulation requirements, the restrictions on access to semi-automatic weapons and the limits that were placed on sales.
The United States occasionally misreads the lessons of Australia's tightening of gun laws, which took place in 1997-98. Disappointingly, following the mass shooting in Las Vegas that took place so recently, Leah Libresco wrote in The Washington Post that mass shootings were too rare in Australia prior to the buyback to show any evidence of progress and that the Australian gun law tightening did not provide clear evidence for the United States.
In fact, that is not true. If we define a mass shooting as the killing of five or more victims, Australia was experiencing an average of one mass shooting per year in the decade leading up to Port Arthur. In the decade afterwards, there was not a single mass shooting. The odds of this being due to chance alone are less than one in 100.
But the work that Christine Neill and I did when I was at the Australian National University found this had a significant impact on reducing gun deaths—principally through reducing gun suicides. After all, the person most likely to kill you with a gun is yourself. We found when we looked at the time series that the reforms seemed to cause the death rate to fall a little faster. But, in particular, if we looked at cross-state differences and compared jurisdictions where more weapons were bought back and those where fewer weapons were bought back, the largest fall in gun deaths occurred in the jurisdictions where the most guns were bought back. We didn't see any evidence of displacement effects, and we estimated that the firearm reforms of 1996 save around 200 lives year.
It is in no way in my political interest to praise those on the other side of the House, but it is vital for our friends in the United States to get a clear-eyed reading of the impact of the Australian gun reforms of 20 years ago. They were smart gun reforms. They were supported by this side of the House. We supported them because they were based on clear evidence.
We call on the coalition today to make sure that their firearms measures are, again, based on clear evidence. We call on them to listen to the Law Council and to prosecutors, who say that mandatory sentences may make us less safe, not more safe.
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (16:35): I thank all honourable members for their contribution to the debate on the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017, which will introduce new mandatory minimum sentences and increase maximum penalties for firearms-trafficking offences. There have been a wide range of statements made in this debate. In particular, we heard repeatedly from those opposite that mandatory minimum sentences should be opposed as they remove incentives for offenders to cooperate with law enforcement or to plead guilty. However, if members had read the amendments introduced by the government, they would have known that they do, indeed, provide for discounts on the mandatory minimum sentences if offenders plead guilty or if they cooperate with our law enforcement agencies. These amendments provide clear incentives for offenders to plead guilty and to cooperate with law enforcement.
We also heard from those opposite about the case of former Victorian police chief commissioner Simon Overland, who, of course, would not be captured by this bill. The bill is aimed at traffickers—people with intent—not those who make honest mistakes. This was clearly an honest mistake and, of course, he was not charged with any offence. This, as I indicated previously, reflects the discretion that our law enforcement agencies have and continue to exercise each and every single day when it comes to deciding whether to initiate a prosecution.
We also heard that juries would be less likely to convict gun runners if they knew they would get a mandatory minimum sentence. As my colleague the member for La Trobe, who has a lot of experience in these matters, being a former police officer, said in his contribution, 'Juries are actually tough, and they don't have a problem convicting people who are guilty of crimes, and they wouldn't have a problem convicting gun traffickers.'
We also heard from a number of speakers opposite that they do not support mandatory minimum sentences, as a matter of principle. That's interesting because they actually introduced, when they were in office, mandatory sentencing for the crime of people smuggling, in 2010. At the time, Labor's then Attorney-General said:
The use of mandatory minimum penalties reflects the seriousness of the activity being prosecuted. It allows the court to determine an appropriate penalty within the minimum and maximum set by parliament.
The then Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, said at the time:
This legislation includes mandatory minimum penalties for organisers and created a new offence of providing material support for people smuggling …
It was supported at the time by members on that side of the House who are still in the House. The member for Gorton, who was once the Minister for Home Affairs, supported mandatory sentencing at the time. Others who, funnily enough, even spoke in these debates against mandatory sentencing spoke for mandatory sentencing when the people-smuggling bill was introduced in 2010.
The fact is that a combination of mandatory minimum sentences and increased maximum penalties sends the strongest possible message that the illegal trafficking of guns will not be tolerated. Unless a mandatory sentence is introduced, it will remain possible for low sentences to be issued to offenders. I reiterate the fact that, when this bill was debated in the Senate earlier this year, the government, in good faith, supported amendments related to increased sentences for firearms trafficking. This was obviously in line with our election commitment—but also in line with our election commitment that we took to the Australian people in 2016 was the fact that there would be a mandatory sentence for this heinous crime.
If members are truly serious about ensuring that courts impose adequate sentences on gun traffickers, they will support all of the measures contained within this bill—but, sadly, it appears that members opposite will not be supporting mandatory minimum sentences. I implore them to get on board with this tough legislation. This bill and bipartisan support for it within the parliament will send the strongest possible message that we won't tolerate gun crime, and it will create the strongest possible deterrent. The Australian people shouldn't be subject to the sorts of violence that can result from gun smuggling. It actually complements the very tough gun law regime that we have place in Australia. Again I would urge the Labor Party to rethink. If it was good enough to introduce, support and pass mandatory sentences for people smuggling in 2010, it's good enough to support mandatory sentences for gun smuggling in 2017.
Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Consideration in Detail
Bill—by leave—taken as a whole.
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (16:40): by leave—I move government amendments (1) and (2), as circulated, together:
(1) Schedule 1, page 7 (after line 10), after item 1F, insert:
2 After section 360.3 of the Criminal Code
Insert:
360.3A Minimum penalties
(1) Subject to subsections (2) and (3), the court must impose a sentence of imprisonment of at least 5 years for a person convicted of an offence against this Division.
People aged under 18
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to a person who was aged under 18 years when the offence was committed.
Reduction of minimum penalty
(3) A court may impose a sentence of imprisonment of less than the period specified in subsection (1) only if the court considers it appropriate to reduce the sentence because of either or both of the following:
(a) the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (g) of the Crimes Act 1914, the person pleading guilty;
(b) the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (h) of that Act, the person having cooperated with law enforcement agencies in the investigation of the offence.
(4) If a court may reduce a sentence, the court may reduce the sentence as follows:
(a) if the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (g) of the Crimes Act 1914, the person pleading guilty—by an amount that is up to 25% of the period specified in subsection (1);
(b) if the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (h) of that Act, the person having cooperated with law enforcement agencies in the investigation of the offence—by an amount that is up to 25% of the period specified in subsection (1);
(c) if the court is taking into account both of the matters in paragraphs (a) and (b)—by an amount that is up to 50% of the period specified in subsection (1).
(2) Schedule 1, page 12 (after line 4), after item 3M, insert:
4 After section 361.4 of the Criminal Code
Insert:
361.5 Minimum penalties
(1) Subject to subsections (2) and (3), the court must impose a sentence of imprisonment of at least 5 years for a person convicted of an offence against this Division.
People aged under 18
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to a person who was aged under 18 years when the offence was committed.
Reduction of minimum penalty
(3) A court may impose a sentence of imprisonment of less than the period specified in subsection (1) if the court considers it appropriate to reduce the sentence because of either or both of the following:
(a) the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (g) of the Crimes Act 1914, the person pleading guilty;
(b) the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (h) of that Act, the person having cooperated with law enforcement agencies in the investigation of the offence.
(4) If a court may reduce a sentence, the court may reduce the sentence as follows:
(a) if the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (g) of the Crimes Act 1914, the person pleading guilty—by an amount that is up to 25% of the period specified in subsection (1);
(b) if the court is taking into account, under paragraph 16A(2) (h) of that Act, the person having cooperated with law enforcement agencies in the investigation of the offence—by an amount that is up to 25% of the period specified in subsection (1);
(c) if the court is taking into account both of the matters in paragraphs (a) and (b)—by an amount that is up to 50% of the period specified in subsection (1).
5 Application of amendments
The amendments made by items 2 and 4 of this Schedule apply in relation to conduct engaged in at or after the commencement of this Schedule.
Ms O'NEIL (Hotham) (16:41):We were very pleased to support the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017 on the second reading, and that's because this fundamentally was a Labor bill. The legislation that we had before us today was a bill that had actually been completely rewritten by Labor and the crossbench up in the Senate, and that's a bill that we were really proud to work on. Early in the term here, the minister sitting opposite me decided that he would try a little political exercise and try to wedge the Labor Party. So he created a bill that was not much more than something that contained mandatory minimums.
We don't support mandatory minimums, and we don't for a very good reason: we know that they won't work. We'll have plenty of opportunities during this consideration in detail to go to the evidence that supports that claim. But, because we on the Labor side of the House have such strong concern about gun violence, what we did was take that law—that foolish political exercise—and decide to try to make out of it a good bill that would improve the community safety of Australians. That's why, when it got into the Senate, Labor moved amendments to add aggravated offences to this bill. Those aggravated offences are deliberately targeted at people who are gun running guns into this country, and for the first time it would give courts in Australia the ability to lock these criminals up for life as we believe that some of them deserve.
Those reforms received bipartisan support. That is to say that reforms that Labor moved over in the other place received the support of the government. And we were very pleased with that. The Senate also made the good decision to remove the mandatory minimums from that bill. As I said, mandatory minimums do not work. The minister probably thought he was being terribly clever trying to wedge Labor. It was an utter failure and an embarrassment in the Senate because what the Senate did was take that political exercise and make it into a law that was going to make Australians safer.
If the government was not going to be bloody-minded about this, we could actually have a law that protects Australians better right now. If the government and the minister sitting opposite me had the fortitude to stand up and say that these bills would be separated so we could get a good law that appropriately protects Australians and deal with this political distraction of the mandatory minimums later, we'd be very pleased to support that. All of us could leave this House tonight knowing that we had done a good day's work creating good laws that better protect Australians.
I wrote to the minister last night on this subject because for eight months we have been waiting for this bill to return from the Senate. For eight months we could have had a tougher, stronger law against firearm traffickers, but, because of this minister's bloody-mindedness, we have not had the ability to deal with the reform in the House as we should have. Now, eight months later, when it has come back to us, it has, inserted back into it, mandatory minimums, something the government knows that we are not going to support and something the government knows the Senate will not support, because they've rejected it three times already. And so what we have here is the minister opposite me pretending to care about community safety but instead using this chamber as a political exercise. This is not a student representative council. It's not a local council. This is the federal parliament, where we're supposed to act like adults. It's no wonder so many Australians have lost faith in this chamber's ability to deal with the issues that affect their everyday lives.
I wrote to the minister last night. I laid out the case for splitting these bills so that we could have tougher, stronger laws against firearm trafficking today and we could deal with the separate political debate that he's evidently so keen on without continuing to hamper the safety of Australians. I have not received a response from the minister. So my question to the minister is: will you split the bill so we can have a better law right now?
Mr DREYFUS (Isaacs—Deputy Manager of Opposition Business) (16:45): It's extraordinary that this minister cares so little for the substance of his own amendment that, on moving the amendment, he could not even bring himself to give a speech in support of it. It shows the hollowness and the grubbiness of this failure of a minister that he's not even prepared to speak in favour of his own amendment. What an extraordinary state of affairs that we have a minister, the justice minister, who, with a bill that is already complete—a bill that has come to us from the Senate, a bill that has bipartisan support, a bill that achieves tougher penalties, a bill that does something about gun trafficking in this country—wants to actually worsen that bill and weaken that bill. He is putting forward an extraordinary and pathetic amendment which he's not even prepared to give a speech in favour of. What kind of minister is this? He is a failure of a minister.
It's extraordinary. He likes to talk about the 2010 mandatory minimum that was introduced by a Labor government for an offence called 'aggravated people smuggling'. Is this failure of a minister seriously suggesting that the introduction of that mandatory sentence stopped people smuggling? I don't think so. If he is, let him say it. But I don't think he is saying that, and he's clearly not listening—
Honourable members interjecting—
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Hastie ): Order! The member will resume his seat. Now that we have some silence, the honourable member for Isaacs.
Mr DREYFUS: Thank you, Deputy Speaker. As I was saying, this failure of a minister is clearly not listening to anything that has been said by Labor in this debate. He was clearly not listening to me now, and I'll repeat it. He likes to call in aid the fact that Labor legislated, for a new offence of aggravated people smuggling in 2010, a mandatory minimum sentence. One has to ask: is this minister seriously suggesting that the introduction of this mandatory sentence stopped people smuggling? If he is, let him say it. But I don't think that this minister is saying that.
Mr Keenan interjecting—
Mr DREYFUS: If he'd just shut up for a moment and listen, if this failure of a minister had any rigour, he would accept that that one example that he loves to give, because he's only interested in partisan political game-playing, is in fact evidence that mandatory sentencing does not work and has no effect at all. That's the problem with this government. The minister doesn't want to listen, and the government doesn't want to listen, to the Law Council of Australia.
Mr Keenan interjecting—
Mr DREYFUS: He loves the sound of his own voice, which is why he's still not shutting up. He doesn't want to listen to the Law Council of Australia. He doesn't want to listen to the Judicial Conference of Australia. He doesn't want to listen to Chief Justice Barwick of the High Court—a former Liberal Attorney-General—to Chief Justice Gibbs of the High Court or to Chief Justice Kiefel of the High Court, all of whom, along with the rest of the High Court for decades, have condemned mandatory minimum sentencing being imposed by this or any other parliament in Australia, because they understand the proper role of the courts, which is to make punishment fit the crime.
This minister calls himself the Minister for Justice, but he has no idea of justice. He has no idea of the criminal justice system. He has no idea of the damage that he wishes to do with this amendment.
Mr Keenan interjecting—
Mr DREYFUS: He's still not listening, Deputy Speaker. He won't shut up. You should try to shut him up because he would be far better off if he listened, not just to me; not just to my colleagues in the Labor Party; and not just to the eloquence of my colleague the shadow minister for justice, the member for Hotham; but to the lawyers of Australia; to the Law Council of Australia, the peak body to every state law society; to every bar council and bar association in this country; to the Australian Bar Association; to the International Commission of Jurists; to the Australian Human Rights Commission; and, as I said before, to the Judicial Conference of Australia; all of whom have condemned mandatory minimum sentences, which do not work and which damage our system of justice.
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (16:50): I think we need to be very clear about what's happening here. Labor have come into this chamber and want to weaken what we are trying to do to put gun smugglers in prison, using the same rationale they have used about us wanting to put child sex offenders in prison. This is the modern face of the Labor Party: overtaken by left-wing ideology against all common sense.
The Australian people want gun smugglers to go to prison. They want paedophiles to go to prison. What we have had is this fake argument where Labor come forward and say, 'Well, you know what? We don't want mandatory sentencing. We don't want mandatory sentencing for these horrendous crimes. What we're going to do instead is increase the maximum penalties.' We on this side are happy to support that. I'm very happy for the government to commit itself to increasing maximum penalties. In fact, that would have been part of both our bills. But, of course, that does not guarantee that gun runners or paedophiles will spend one day in prison. This is the problem with the approach of those opposite. This is the problem with having left-wing ideology dominate what should actually be an argument dominated by the safety of the Australian community but, instead, we find they have been overtaken by this nonsense ideology.
Now, apparently, the Labor Party are deeply opposed to mandatory sentencing, even though when they were in office they introduced it for people smuggling. We have mandatory sentencing in Australia currently for people-smuggling and terrorism offences—two very significant offences. The Labor Party have been making the argument on this bill and on the other bill we have for locking up paedophiles that they don't support mandatory sentencing. If that's the case, are they going to repeal mandatory sentencing for people smuggling? They've just been saying it doesn't work.
Ms O'Neil: What's that got to do with anything? This is your bill.
Mr KEENAN: What's that got to do with it? Are they going to repeal mandatory sentencing for terrorism offences? The Labor Party have just been up here in this debate saying that they don't believe in mandatory sentencing, so I think it's fair enough that they explain to the Australian people about whether they will repeal the mandatory sentencing laws that exist at the moment for people-smuggling and terrorism offences. You've got an opportunity to get up and explain what Labor's position is.
This is very simple: you are either want gun runners to go to prison or you don't. Our proposal will make sure that they serve a minimum time in prison. The Labor Party's proposal will make sure that the government's tough measures don't move forward. These amendments are vitally important to secure community safety, and I would urge the Labor Party—
Mr Dreyfus: In what way? Tell us one way.
Mr KEENAN: What? By putting gun runners to prison! The shadow Attorney-General doesn't think community safety is enhanced by putting gun runners in prison. Is that right? I honestly can't believe the position that's being put by those opposite. Usually the shadow Attorney-General and the shadow minister for justice are brought back to some semblance of common sense.
Mr Burke: Deputy Speaker, a point of order: there's a specific reference in Practice to putting words into someone else's mouth. We just saw a very precise example of that from the minister, claiming that the shadow Attorney-General had uttered words which he had not uttered. I ask that it be withdrawn.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Hastie ): I will allow what the minister has said and we'll proceed. I don't see the issue. Explain exactly what you're referring to.
Mr Burke: Deputy Speaker, because this will affect future editions of Practice, can I ask then if you are changing the ruling on whether or not people are allowed to put words into someone else's mouth? There's a specific reference to it in Practice. If you're changing that ruling—
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, I'm not changing that ruling. Minister for Justice?
Mr KEENAN: I'm happy to withdraw, Mr Deputy Speaker. I will just draw this argument to a conclusion by saying that the choice here is very clear. It's whether you want to make sure that people who engage in gun smuggling—a very serious crime, because you don't move guns around the community unless you've got a very nefarious purpose for doing so—spend one day in prison. If you do, you will support the mandatory sentencing that we're proposing. And, if you don't support that, then clearly you're supporting the arrangements which are the status quo. I think that would be shameful, and I'm very surprised that the Labor Party has yet again stood in the way of us toughening up laws for gun smuggling.
Mr Burke: How's voting for the bill in its current form supporting the status quo?
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! There are a lot of words being thrown around the chamber at the moment.
Mr KATTER (Kennedy) (16:55): I was asked by a very powerful person in this place, when I intimated to him that he was working under a great handicap because he had the worst group of ministers that I've ever seen in my life in 44 years in parliament, 'Who do you reckon is the worst?' and I mentioned the Minister for Justice immediately. I said that within two months he'd managed to have the government in very serious trouble, and everyone in this place knew that.
It is very interesting to listen to his shadow say that he has defied and treated with contempt every one of the judicial representatives in this country. I can tell you that, from my side, every one of the people involved in firearms in this country is treated similarly. So he has very cleverly managed to antagonise all whom he accuses as being of the right wing and the left wing. He has managed to get both the left wing and the right wing in bed and to have no support whatsoever for his extremist persecution of people associated with these industries, and I would say that these are the valid people.
He doesn't like to listen to what I'm saying, so he will use you as an excuse so he doesn't have to face the music. I'll tell you how genuine this bloke is, because we'll talk about the amendment. In 2012-13, which is the latest year for which we have figures, 67,000 prohibited imports were seized from the 25 per cent of mail inspected. Are you doing anything about that, Minister? I'm giving you an opportunity. Are you doing anything about it?
Mr Keenan: I'm not sure what you're talking about.
Mr KATTER: He's not going to talk about that. If I were in your shoes, I wouldn't either. I'd try desperately to hide. Border Protection inspects 0.22 per cent. Almost all the firearms come in in containers, and there's a 0.2 per cent inspection rate. When we have a look at the postal services, we find that 67,000 prohibited imports were seized from the 25 per cent of mail inspected. So, if we inspect the containers, how many seizures are we going to see there? But we're not inspecting them at all. In fact, he is going to punish people—and I'll give you an example in a moment of the punishment that he wants to mete out to people—but is he doing anything about stopping the illegal firearms from coming in? Obviously, they're coming in in containers and with metal items such as motor cars, tractors et cetera, and he's doing absolutely nothing about it.
This is what he wants to do—and I have the classic case. A bloke had been away on holidays overseas with his wife for two months. He came home, got the mail and found out that his gun licence was overdue and had been automatically terminated. So he was holding guns illegally. Now, under this minister, he would do five years in jail. He's president of the Rotary club. He's president of the local golf club. He has been very active in supporting the local rugby league. He is, in fact, the town's leading citizen. What he was subjected to by you, Minister, was six police, wearing bullet-proof vests and with automatic weapons, surrounding his house. This is the leading citizen in the town. This is what you want to subject these people to through legislation. I belonged to a government which—using the terms 'right-wing' and 'left-wing'—was the most right wing government the country has ever seen. But, in my 20 years in the state house, not once did the government get through legislation that reversed the onus of proof or imposed mandatory sentencing—not once. So we might have been bushwhackers or rednecks or whatever you want to call us, but we did know elementary justice and fairness when we saw it.
You come into this place. You have once again succeeded in getting every single person in this place offside—every single person. There could be no two people more unalike than me and the Greens representative here, Adam Bandt, and yet you've got us together. Congratulations! (Time expired)
Mr HART (Bass) (17:00): Deputy Speaker, thank you for allowing me to contribute to this debate. In my former career as a legal practitioner, I had the distinction and the honour of being able to serve as the President of the Law Society of Tasmania in 1993, and then I had the privilege of serving as the state representative on the Law Council of Australia. In my time dealing with the legal profession and, in particular, dealing with the political side of the legal profession—that is, in the Law Council of Australia and the Law Society of Tasmania—I have yet to experience an issue like this where a minister of the Crown, the Minister for Justice, has described the courts, the Law Council of Australia, the law societies, the Australian Institute of Criminology, the Sentencing Advisory Council of Victoria and other esteemed bodies as 'infected with leftist ideology'. This is an extraordinary attack on the rule of law and the separation of powers which this minister should be ashamed of. But I'm afraid there is absolutely no shame for this minister. He does not listen to the legal profession, and he ought to listen to the legal profession.
There are perfectly good reasons of principle for the minister to listen to these issues and the arguments with respect to the rejection of mandatory minimum sentencing. These are important questions of principle, but this minister is without principle when he considers this issue. He relies purely upon base politics. Indeed, the government's own Attorney-General's Department's paper 'Guide to framing Commonwealth offences, infringement notices and enforcement powers' states that mandatory minimums should be avoided. We know that there are important considerations which operate to ensure that juries are unlikely to convict when they know that people face mandatory minimum sentences. The Law Council just last week said that mandatory sentences actually make it harder to prosecute criminals by removing the incentive for anyone to plead guilty or to provide information to police. There is every incentive for the defendant to fight on and appeal against convictions. Minister, mandatory minimums let guilty people off the hook. You understand that, or you should understand that, and you should listen to the legal profession.
The Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017 will lead to unintended outcomes because mandatory minimums remove judicial discretion. This is at the heart of the separation of powers. The Law Council of Australia has provided very significant examples as to how this will produce injustice. The first example is:
Former Victoria Police Chief Commissioner, Simon Overland, inadvertently carried a magazine containing live rounds of ammunition on a flight from Melbourne to Canberra in 2010. Prior to travelling, Mr Overland had removed a firearm from his bag, but forgot to take out the magazine. Under the proposed laws he may be facing a mandatory five year jail term.
That is what happens when you remove judicial discretion.
In the next example, a farmer who has never been overseas goes to the US and attends a gun show. He finds a gun part that he thinks would be helpful to use in controlling pests when he returns to the farm. He buys one for himself and he buys one for his mate down the road that he intends to sell to him. This is a situation very similar to that which was referred to previously. He gets caught returning to Australia when he's going through Customs. He is honest, as we all must be, when dealing with the officer and tells the officer that he intends to sell one of the parts to a friend. Minister, that would satisfy the elements of trafficking, and this defendant would be facing a mandatory five years in prison. A judge, the person who should be determining the sentence, would have no choice but to jail him.
The third example is that a prominent businessman exported gunpowder cartridges, primer and propellant from Australia to Papua New Guinea without a permit when the Lae pistol club was short of ammunition after the defendant's home in Lae, where the club's ammunition was stored— (Time expired)
Mr DREYFUS (Isaacs—Deputy Manager of Opposition Business) (17:06): I need to make clear to the Minister for Justice, who has been having difficulty listening to anything that Labor has said in this debate, that not supporting mandatory sentencing on this bill does not mean support for gun traffickers; not supporting mandatory sentencing on this bill does not mean supporting the status quo; and not supporting mandatory sentences on this bill does not mean support for lighter sentences. To explain that a bit further, Labor stands in this parliament having moved amendments in the Senate, where this bill commenced its passage, to increase sentences. So it is not possible for this minister or any other representative of this government to suggest that Labor, in not supporting mandatory sentencing, in some way is supporting lighter sentences. I repeat: Labor does not support lighter sentences.
The reason for increasing the maximum sentences in any criminal offence bill is so that this parliament can send the clearest possible message to every court in Australia administering those criminal statutes that what this parliament is indicating is that sentences should be increased. That's what happens in the sentencing process—just for the benefit of the Minister for Justice. When this parliament increases maximum sentences, courts take notice. That's the way the sentencing process works. Every court in Australia, from the High Court down, takes notice when this parliament increases maximum sentences. I'm pleased to see that the minister's taking notes. Not supporting mandatory sentencing on this bill does not mean supporting the status quo. Again, Labor has moved amendments so that the bill now comes before us in a form which has increased maximum sentences, which will lead, over time—because, again, this is the way the sentencing process works in Australian sentencing law—to increased sentences being imposed on people who are convicted of these offences.
As for the laughable and offensive suggestion that the minister seems to like to keep making—that not supporting mandatory sentences on this bill means that in some way those opposing mandatory sentences support gun trafficking in any way—that is such a laughable suggestion I need say no more about it.
We've also heard from this failure of a Minister for Justice that opposing mandatory sentencing is somehow left-wing ideology. The member for Kennedy might well take issue with the suggestion that opposing mandatory sentencing is left-wing ideology. But I'd invite this minister to put that same proposition to the judges of this country, from the High Court down, who have for decades patiently explained, to anybody in the community who cares to listen and anybody in the community who, like the Minister for Justice, should be listening, that proper and just sentencing requires attention to all of the circumstances of the particular case—to the circumstances of the victim, to the circumstances of the offender and to the circumstances of the crime, the nature of the crime and the seriousness of the crime—and, as part of that process, to what tariff has been set by this parliament in passing legislation.
Most importantly, it's about making the punishment fit the crime. As judges have tried to explain, as legal professional bodies have tried to explain, as the Australian Human Rights Commission has tried to explain, as the Judicial Conference of Australia has tried to explain: making the punishment fit the crime is not something that this parliament can do in advance. This parliament does not know the circumstances of the crime for which a future offender is going to be convicted. This parliament does not know the circumstances of the offender, of the victim, of the nature of the crime, of the seriousness of the crime compared to other crimes of a similar nature. And it's because this parliament does not know, and cannot know, those circumstances that this parliament should never seek to impose a mandatory minimum sentence in respect of a crime yet to be committed about which this parliament knows nothing.
Mr KATTER (Kennedy) (17:11): Mr Deputy Speaker—
Mr Burke: Left-winger!
Mr KATTER: If I'm called left wing outside this chamber, I'll take defamation action I can assure you! There have been very few times in this place I've seen a person who can get such unanimity between the left and right so effectively. I would not like to be a country member of parliament running in the forthcoming federal elections. Everyone regularly goes overseas these days—I'm one of the few who doesn't—and people from the country, by their very nature, have firearms. I mean, it is an absolute necessity. It's not what you like to do; it's what you have to do.
I don't know, the estimates seem to be that there are about 10 million pigs in North Queensland and there are problems on the Barrier Reef—arguably very much coming from this area. The Julia Creek dunnart is the most threatened species in Australia, and Stephen Malone, the expert in this field, has said that unless something's done about pig populations, then it will be extinct. It's only one of many, many items that will be extinct. So these people have guns around all the time.
When you have guns around all the time, you forget when you put some brass in your pocket. You take your trousers off and pack them. You go overseas. You come back into Australia with a shell in your pocket and you go to jail for five years! Now apart from anything else, in Queensland it costs the taxpayers $580,000 a year. A conservative estimate would be about 2,000 people going to jail each year. Minister, we can't afford you. We really, seriously just simply can't afford you—and you won't be able afford anything if you call me a leftie outside of this place!
I do want to seriously say about mandatory sentencing that anyone who has gone to law school, and as I understand it the minister has—I don't talk about it much, but I was president of the law faculty at Queensland university. My brother lectures in law, and I have the privilege of saying I was right on Mabo to the Queensland government. I know the law intimately. In Magna Carta, they died for the principle of being judged by your peers. This is not judgement by your peers. This bloke, this minister, thinks that he can do the judgements forevermore, because we're locked into automatically putting people in jail—whether we like to or whether we don't.
Each of the Labor speakers have quite rightly pointed out that a lot of people will be getting off the hook here who should be on the hook, because people will baulk at putting a human being in jail for five years. But the sorts of people who will be caught in this net are not the people who are the bad guys. The bad guys are not going to be stupid enough to bring a shell casing back in a trouser pocket. Once again I reiterate: you know how—but you don't know, Minister, because you've never spoken to them.
The gun people in Australia have the greatest vested interest in no-one running amok and shooting people, because every time it happens we get punished. We're the ones that desperately don't want this to happen. And of course we are pointing it out to the government and the minister—well, we can't point it out to the minister, because none of the gun groups said they had any listening with him. Either they had a meeting in which he didn't listen and treated them with absolute contempt or they couldn't get a meeting at all.
I find out today from the opposition that he believes in equality, apparently, as he treats the gun people with exactly the same contempt as he treats the judicial people of Australia! And he must be a very clever person, because he knows more than all of them put together!
I repeat that only a quarter of the mail was inspected, and they found 67,000 prohibited imports. This is coming in not through all the mail but the 25 per cent of the mail being inspected. Only 0.2 per cent of the containers coming in are inspected. Should the police and the government spend their money on this stupidity or on stopping the containers? (Time expired)
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (17:16): I do need to respond to a few of the things that the member for Kennedy has just said. I'm sorry to hear of the member for Kennedy's very low opinion of me as a minister; I thought we got on better than that, but apparently not. But I do need to say a few things because what he was alleging there, of course, is not right, and that is not the way this legislation will work. The way it will work, of course, is that there are significant safeguards in the way that the police and the CDPP operate every day when making judgements about whether or not to prosecute crimes. That is exactly the way this will work. The member for Kennedy might not be aware of it, but the police are called upon to make judgements—
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Hastie ): Order! The minister will resume his seat. The member for Kennedy.
Mr Katter: What he's saying is that police forces have a discretionary power and that they can apply it where they want and don't have to apply it where they don't want to. You understand what you're saying, Minister.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Kennedy will resume his seat or state a point of order. If you have a point of order, state it clearly up front.
Mr KEENAN: That is exactly what I'm saying. Police forces all around the country every single day use their discretion about whether or not to prosecute matters, and they are required to take into account the public interest in whether they do so. The same applies for the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions as it does for other offices that the states run around that as well.
I do want to take issue with a couple of other things that the member for Kennedy said which are completely and utterly inaccurate. I've said in this place and outside of this place on many occasions that the threat to community safety in relation to guns is in the illicit and black market. That is where the threat to community safety is. Our focus since we arrived in office in 2013 has been cracking down on that. Legal firearms owners, who are registered firearms owners who actually store their weapon well, are not a threat to community safety. I repeat that over and over again. We have been targeting the black market for guns, and that's what this legislation is about. It's the people who smuggle in guns, the ones who have intent to cause harm, who are going to be captured by this.
And I do talk to the firearms-owning community on a regular basis. In fact, I have a firearms consultative committee that has met on a regular basis since I have become minister. It's got representatives from a very broad cross-section of the shooting community on it—both owners and sporting shooters—and I've been meeting with them on a very regular basis since I have become minister. I will continue to meet with them. We've got very good relationships with them. The advice that they give me is always welcome, and we act on it as appropriate.
Mr HART (Bass) (17:19): I welcome the opportunity to address this legislation, because it is fundamentally flawed. The minister does need to take into account the views of the legal profession, in particular the concerns that have been expressed by the New South Wales Director of Public Prosecutions, the Tasmanian Director of Public Prosecutions, the Australian Human Rights Commission and Law Society of New South Wales. We know that the legal profession as a whole, in a single voice, oppose minimum mandatory sentences, and we know why that is the case: because they simply do not work. We know that they are not capable of putting people in jail, because the juries do not convict. We know that, where there is an opportunity for a judge to exercise sentencing discretion, the justice of the case can be met. We know that, where you impose a mandatory minimum sentence, you can't take into account the individual circumstances of the case—the justice, that is, that has been handed out by the judiciary for nearly a thousand years. It's vitally important that we respect the separation of powers and that we reserve to the judiciary the power to adjudge as to the sentence, taking into account the maximum sentence, which of course will be determined by this place.
The Labor proposal is that we absolutely condemn gun running and gun smuggling by increasing the maximum sentence. That sends the appropriate message to the judiciary and the general public that we are very strongly against gun smuggling. But the answer is never—never—to impose mandatory minimum sentencing. The experience wherever mandatory minimum sentencing is imposed is that it is unsuccessful. It is not capable of dealing with the evil that it is designed to combat. We know that the incentive for a defendant facing a mandatory minimum sentence is to fight the charge. We know that—when it comes to a question of fettering the discretion that's available to a judge, whether it's admitting somebody to bail or dealing with an issue of the sentence—the judge needs to have regard to all of the circumstances, particularly the circumstances of the commission of the offence and the personal circumstances of the defendant.
This is not the way to deal with the evil of gun trafficking. We know that the examples that have been given by the Law Council of Australia provide powerful evidence of the injustice that will be visited upon any defendant that is facing a mandatory minimum sentence.
Before I was interrupted, I gave an example of a prominent businessman who exported gunpowder cartridges, primer and propellant from Australia to Papua New Guinea without a permit, when the Lae Pistol Club was short of ammunition after the defendant's home in Lae, where the club's ammunition was stored, was destroyed in a fire. The defendant disguised the export in order to try to get the items into Papua New Guinea quickly. The magistrate who sentenced him accepted that he was a passionate sporting shooter and was only motivated to assist the club. All of the ingredients are there to enable that defendant to be sentenced to a minimum mandatory term of five years under this legislation.
We know that the circumstances of the case need to be taken into account in determining what a just sentence is for the individual circumstances of the case. We know that this justice minister—this justice minister with a tin ear—needs to be listening to the legal profession. He needs to be concerned about the principles that are involved here, rather than base politics.
Mr KATTER (Kennedy) (17:23): There is one other fact that should be raised. The minister said earlier on that he'd spoken to all of the gun representatives and they were all very happy. It would be no news to anyone in this place that I would speak to gun representatives almost on a weekly basis, and I take great pride in being their representative in this place. We don't have a sporting shooters party in Queensland, but we most certainly hold our hands up for that purpose. And there is one thing that needs to be brought to the attention of the House.
There are two magnificent machine-guns in all the world's history: the Owen gun and the Bren gun. They never break down; they just work forever. The Owen gun was built by a 19-year-old kid, who went down to the local machinery shop and said, 'Could you machine up these parts?' He gave them a photograph and diagrams, and six hours later he walked out with an Owen gun, which was, for those people who used it, one of the greatest pieces of machinery that the world had ever seen in weaponry. You see, any diesel fitter, boilermaker or fabricator—anyone—can get hold of this. And we have a vested interest in saying, 'Would the government's resources be used in separating the madmen?' As I said earlier today: reverse the ruling in Tarasoff's case. I'll take a bet, I will put $200 on the table, that the minister can't explain what the ruling in the Tarasoff case was. And don't go ringing up to find out before you get up to speak! If you reverse that rule, Hoddle Street wouldn't have taken place, Surry Hills wouldn't have taken place and Port Arthur wouldn't have taken place if the laws had been enforced.
There are 600 police employed in Australia persecuting all the innocent people that have gun licences and their time is not being spent pursuing the bad guys and separating them from their guns, and separating the people who are both bad and mad from their guns. There's no time being spent on that. If you look at the Port Arthur case, there is no justification for the police not having separated that person from those guns. I mean, they knew he had the guns, they knew he was crazy and they knew the evidence of his relatives that had been murdered and girlfriends that had been murdered. They knew all the evidence and yet they left him there. The time is not being spent on that.
The minister is going to punish anyone that's found bringing a shell case in his pocket back from overseas. I live in North Queensland, Minister, and we interface with New Guinea all the time. It is now the biggest rugby league area in the world and North Queensland is the biggest rugby league area in Australia so we are backwards and forwards all the time. In the Torres Strait, they let us go backwards and forwards as they have for 10,000 or 20,000 years. And because of the dangers that exist for us with the crocodiles, snakes, everything else, sharks in the water—we go diving for crayfish; my cousins and brother are up in the Torres Strait—there are guns going backwards and forwards because they are in their canoes. You 'll have half the population of Torres Strait in jail for five years! I don't know where you are going to get the money from to pay for all these people that you're going to have in jail. You have not thought this through at all. I have to advise the House that either all the gun groups in Australia are telling lies or the minister is telling lies, because they have said to me: 'They may well as have had a conversation with a gum tree.'
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Hastie ): Order! The member for Kennedy will resume his seat. I will remind you of standing orders, section 90, reflecting on member's character. It is highly disorderly.
Mr KATTER: I could argue that I'm reflecting on behalf of all the gun representatives in Australia.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I remind you to tread carefully there. You've got 40 seconds if you want to keep going.
Mr KATTER: We concentrate all the time on trying to separate the dangerous people from their weapons, and it seems to us that all the authorities want to do is to persecute people that have guns. The minister wasn't here earlier when I said that the bloke who had six police around his house was president of the local Rotary Club, he was president of the golf club, he was very active in rugby league in his town, and he was the town's leading dentist. You are criminalising the most decent people in our society. (Time expired)
Ms O'NEIL (Hotham) (17:28): I want to thank those who have made a contribution to this discussion, especially the member for Kennedy, who is making incredible sense over there, which is great to hear. Thank you so much for the contribution. On behalf of Labor, closing this debate, we abhor crime and violence, especially when it relates to gun violence, and that's why we have approached this debate with only one goal in mind—how we can keep Australians safe.
When we got a bill coming into the Senate that was a petty political wedge to make a political point about Labor, we decided to approach that bill in good faith and make a good law. So what we did was worked hard with the crossbench to make changes to that law so that, for the first time in this country, people who seriously run gun-trafficking operations can be put away in jail for life. The government actually supported those amendments. It is quite rare that we see this happen. Labor wanted to make a law that works, we got bipartisan support and it went through that other place.
I want members of parliament to be absolutely clear about what is going on here because we have agreement on new laws that will help make Australians safer. Instead of taking that agreement and making a good law that we could have in place in this country in a matter of a few minutes, the bloody-mindedness of the justice minister has taken hold. This is petty politics at its absolute lowest form. In the time that I have been involved in politics I have never seen someone so obviously put petty politics in the path of the community safety of Australians. I want to repeat that we could have a better law now or we could do what the justice minister wants us to do, which is to bring this parliament into deadlock over a law that everyone in this chamber agrees is very important. That is pathetic. It is absolutely pathetic.
I want to respond to one of the issues that the minister has raised in his contribution so far. He has said that Labor wants to support the status quo. Has the minister been asleep for this whole debate? That is completely and utterly wrong. What Labor wants is tough new sentencing for gun traffickers, because we don't want gun traffickers walking the streets; we want them in jail and, if necessary, in jail for life. The only thing that is standing in the path of this becoming Australian law in a matter of minutes is this minister here—this minister who is so willing to put petty politics ahead of the safety of the people that he professes to represent. This is disgraceful. It is a disgraceful use of time in this chamber.
We all know what's about to happen here. I just want to lay this out very clearly because I want people on the government side—the good people on that side of the House—to understand what it is they are about to come and vote for. They are about to come in here and vote for a bill that will send this parliament into deadlock. I want every person on the conservative side of politics who's listening to this right now to understand what this minister is making them do in front of their constituents. This minister is putting your votes in the path of tough new laws to stop gun traffickers and to put gun traffickers in jail for life. What's about to happen here is because of the minister's bloody-mindedness. We're going to vote a bill up to the other place and it's going to get rejected by the Senate, where it has been rejected three times already. This is pathetic. It is utterly pathetic. I don't know if there's a minister on the other side of the House who practices a form of politics which is as low as this.
We will not be supporting the amendment, as the minister knew we would not be supporting the amendment. Those amendments are not going to make Australians safer. We actually want to take a practical approach which is going to make good laws in this parliament. I only wish I could say the same of the minister and the government he represents.
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (17:32): Again I repeat that these amendments are important because the people on the government side of the House believe it's actually important that if you're involved in gun smuggling you spend a certain amount of time in prison. If the parliament were to come together to agree to these sensible amendments, what would happen is that parliament would send a very strong message that we believe that this is an extraordinary crime. We believe that gun running is a very serious crime; it's as severe as people smuggling, for example. We believe it's a very serious crime and, as a result, the parliament should come together and make sure that people who are engaged in it serve a minimum period in jail. That is what we're proposing here. That is what we have been proposing in relation to our crackdown on child sex offenders as well.
Labor, even though they introduced mandatory sentencing for people smuggling when in office, apparently now think that mandatory sentencing is a terrible thing in principle. Some of the members that spoke in this debate expressing that point of view actually spoke in 2010 expressing the opposite. But the point is that if mandatory sentencing is somehow evil in principle, then is Labor in office going to repeal the existing mandatory sentencing offences that we have for people smuggling and terrorism? Nobody on the Labor side has answered that question, which is a very reasonable question under the circumstances. Apparently they've had some road-to-Damascus conversion and now say how terrible mandatory sentencing is.
The government won't be changing its position, because we believe firmly that gun smuggling deserves a serious and appropriate sentence. That's what we on this side of the House believe. We believe it because smuggling just one gun can have enormous consequences for community safety and because you're not involved in gun smuggling unless you're doing it for the worst possible purpose. We know that guns are used by organised crime. They use them for standover tactics and violence. When guns fall into the wrong hands and they're moved about the community, they can do an enormous amount of damage.
We've been very concerned about the illegal firearms market since we arrived in office. Since 2013, we've taken very significant measures to crack down on the black market for guns. The National Anti-Gangs Squad, for example, is incredibly successful. We have strike teams based in every mainland state. We also have officers based in Tasmania, the ACT and the Northern Territory as liaison officers. They work side by side with their state and territory police colleagues, and they have successfully taken about 5½ thousand firearms or firearm parts off the streets.
These are the sorts of measures that we've been taking since we arrived in office. But this legislation and the amendments that I've moved to it remain a very important piece of the puzzle. I am disappointed that the Labor Party continue in their apparently ideological opposition to mandatory sentencing. I had hoped that they could join us in making sure that people who engage in gun smuggling actually serve an appropriate amount of time in prison, but clearly they're not prepared to change their minds. I think that is unfortunate for the Australian people. It's going to have detrimental effects on community safety, and they deserve to be condemned for it.
Ms BUTLER (Griffith) (17:36): In international Disarmament Week, we are definitely all united in this parliament in seeking to end gun smuggling and to ensure that gun smugglers receive the prison terms that they deserve. I also want to join with members on the Labor side to say that the best way to ensure that gun smugglers and gun runners get the prison sentences that they deserve is not to implement a law that will act as a disincentive to people coming forward with information about gun-smuggling offences and to juries committing people in respect of the offences connected with gun smuggling.
We are very concerned about those issues, and we're also very concerned about unintended consequences. I am a vice-patron of the Queensland Rifle Association. I'm not the only one, I hasten to say, but I'm one of the vice-patrons of the Queensland Rifle Association, along with my friend the member for Bonner. Unfortunately, he is not in here tonight, but I know that he takes his vice-patron duties very seriously, as do I. I would hate to see a situation where a member of that rifle association or of any other rifle association, or any other person who had a legitimate and lawful interest in firearms in this country, was caught up in the unintended consequences of what this government and this minister are seeking to do.
Take, for example, a farmer who goes overseas. I've got farmers in my family. Some of them enjoy shooting for sporting purposes. Obviously, they've been pretty handy with guns their whole lives. In fact, I was speaking with one of my cousins about this when I saw him in country North Queensland over winter. What of a farmer who has never been overseas before who goes to the United States, attends a gun show and finds a gun part that he thinks will be helpful to use when he's controlling pests back on the farm? He buys one for himself and one for his mate down the road, thinking that his mate might find it useful as well. He intends selling one to his mate down the road when he gets back to Australia, so he buys two. Upon returning to Australia, he gets caught when he goes through Customs. He's honest with the officer and tells him that he intends to sell one of the parts to his friend. That would satisfy the elements of trafficking, and he would be looking at a mandatory five years in prison if this government's legislation were allowed to get up. Judges would have no choice but to imprison him in the event of that occurring.
What of the unintended consequences? We talk about judicial discretion. We're not talking about ill-informed or unprofessional discretion; we're talking about a situation where judges are entrusted with the obligation to impose a sentence that is appropriate. And the job of our parliament should be to arm those judges with the ability and the power to impose heavy sentences where heavy sentences are warranted. That's the job of this parliament. The job of this parliament is not to restrict unreasonably the sentences that a court can impose in the event that they're appropriate.
The job of this parliament is not to issue directions to a judge to impose sentences mandatorily. If we do that we're not only undermining judicial discretion and the separation of powers but putting judges in a position where they will have to convict and imprison people in the circumstances that I just described. In the circumstance I just described there is somebody—innocently and thinking that it's okay—bringing back these gun parts from another country and intending them to sell them to the farmer down the road. That's not someone who should, in my submission and in my view, be sentenced to five years imprisonment mandatorily because of a decision of this parliament—a parliament!
Parliaments are not ideally suited to predicting every possible combination or permutation of events. We can't lay down a code that describes what should happen in every circumstance or in every event. What we can do is to make laws for the peace, good government and order of this nation; we can set down criminal offences; and we can then equip judges with what they need to ensure that sentences are appropriate. Let's not determine the sentences in individual cases; let's have appropriate laws. (Time expired)
Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler) (17:41): I rise to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017. I rise to support the bill that was carried by the Senate in February and which the government has sat on for eight months in an act of petulance, which typifies the attitude of this government towards the democratic processes.
Of course, the fundamental disagreement that we have over our position about maximum sentences versus their position of mandatory sentencing shows that they not only act in a petulant manner in the political sphere; they also don't seem to comprehend the need for the separation of powers to be at the core of the functioning of our nation. That principle is something that can't be bargained away. It's a principle which applies at the local, state and federal levels, and it's a principle which people who profess to support the rule of law should just understand as—dare I use the term—a mandatory principle.
But what we see today is a minister who, unlike most people in this place—we often get told that we grow older by multiples of the calendar while we're here—gets less mature the longer he is here.
Mr Keenan: A personal attack, is it?
Mr ALBANESE: The minister who is prepared to act in a petulant way and an entirely inappropriate way raises the issue of personal attacks. I wasn't going to raise what was said about the member for Cowan during the last election campaign—the member for Cowan, someone who has brought great dignity to this House of Representatives, someone who, in spite of the fact that it was at great risk to harmony and community cohesiveness in Perth, Western Australia, and in our nation, was attacked in the most outrageous way, including by someone who has the title of the Minister for Justice. And that is what is quite extraordinary.
Here we have a bill that could have become law in February. Instead, it's been sat on for month after month, and there has been a failure to bring it on for debate, a failure to accept that the principles that we were putting forward weren't divisible and a failure to act in a mature way, as a minister of the Crown should. The minister was sat down by the Speaker this week—something that doesn't happen too often, I've got to say. I was a minister for six years and it never happened to me. Most people in this place will go through their entire political career and, if they have the honour of being a minister of the Crown, they will never be sat down. It is quite an extraordinary occurrence. But this minister chose to engage in a debate which suggested that the support of paedophilia was something that was a partisan issue, whereas it is something to which everyone in this parliament is opposed in the strongest possible way, which is why he was shut down.
I won't cop that from a government that launches royal commissions based upon politics, whereas the single most significant royal commission that we brought about when in government was into institutional sexual abuse against children. And we did that at great political risk. We did that and it's made a difference to people's lives. To people who all of us know, it has made a difference, and it's made this country better. It's made this country better because we made this decision. Those opposite are just determined to play politics with everything—everything's about politics, which is why you have no credibility and why you're increasingly clutching at straws.
The SPEAKER: The question is that the amendments be agreed to.
The House divided. [17:51]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
The SPEAKER (17:56): The question is that this bill, as amended, be agreed to.
The House divided. [17:56]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Third Reading
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (17:58): I ask leave of the House to move the third reading immediately.
Leave not granted.
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (17:58): I move:
That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the motion for the third reading being moved without delay.
The SPEAKER (18:00): The question is that the motion moved by the Minister for Justice be agreed to.
The House divided. [18:00]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Mr KEENAN ( Stirling — Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism ) ( 18:01 ): I move:
That this bill be now read a third time.
Ms O'NEIL ( Hotham ) ( 18:01 ): Labor abhors crime and violence. We were very proud to support this bill in the second reading, and I wanted to say a few words because I want members on the other side of the House to understand what exactly it is that they are doing in this vote that they are having right now. We could have dealt with this bill in February, and those of us on this side of the House who have community safety as our top priority have been waiting for eight months for this bill to come back into the House so we can make a good law. But, because of the utter petulance of the minister who sits across from me in the chamber, we are sending this parliament into deadlock.
Honourable members interjecting —
The SPEAKER: The member for Hotham will resume her seat for a second. I'm going to caution members on both sides: 94(a) applies at all times of the parliamentary day. The member for Hotham has the call.
Ms O'NEIL: We have been waiting eight months for the minister on the other side of the House to bring this bill back into the chamber so we can pass good laws in this parliament that have bipartisan support. The bipartisan support comes for Labor amendments that were moved in the other place and that for the first time in this country would allow serious gun traffickers to be put away for life. They were amendments moved by Labor senators, and they were voted for by your political parties. But, because of the petulance of the minister who sits opposite me, we have not had the opportunity to pass these laws. What your minister is doing—and you can go back to your electorates and talk to your constituents about this—is inserting into this bill something he knows that Labor will not accept.
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (18:03): I move:
That the question be now put.
The SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be put.
The House divided. [18:07]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
Mr KEENAN (Stirling—Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter-Terrorism) (18:10): I finally moved that the bill be read a third time.
The SPEAKER: The question is that the bill be read a third time.
The House divided. [18:11]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)
COMMITTEES
Joint Standing Committee on Trade and Investment Growth
Membership
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr S Georganas ) (18:14): I have received advice from the Chief Opposition Whip nominating Mr Hart to be a member of the Joint Standing Committee on Trade and Investment Growth in place of Mr Hill.
Mr TEHAN (Wannon—Minister for Veterans' Affairs, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of ANZAC, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Cyber Security and Minister for Defence Personnel) (18:14): by leave—I move:
That Mr Hill be discharged from the Joint Standing Committee on Trade and Investment Growth and that, in his place, Mr Hart be appointed a member of the committee.
Question agreed to.
BILLS
Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Ms RISHWORTH (Kingston) (18:15): I rise today to speak about the Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017. This bill contains eight schedules, which deal with different elements of veterans legislation that seek to clarify, improve and streamline the operation of law and processes within the Department of Veterans' Affairs. Given the detail in the bill, it was referred to the Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade. The committee thoroughly examined the legislation, held public hearings and reported back to the parliament on 13 June 2017. I would like to thank the committee members and all those submitters on their work in reviewing this legislation.
As we understand it, schedule 1 seeks to amend the provisions under which the Veterans' Review Board operates by aligning certain provisions of the board with similar provisions to that of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. As members may be aware, the board is a statutory authority whose role is to provide independent merits review of decisions about disability pensions, war widow and war widower pensions and attendant allowances under the Veterans' Entitlements Act, rehabilitation compensation and other benefits under both the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act and the new Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Legislation Amendment (Defence Force) Bill 2017.
The amendment in schedule 1 seeks to modernise and improve the operations of the board in a number of ways. Item 1 deals with the board's objectives. As it stands, the board's objectives are listed as providing a mechanism of review that is fair, just, economical, informal and quick. These amendments do align the VRB with the changes made to the AAT under the Tribunals Amalgamation Act 2015. It provides that, in carrying out its functions, the board must pursue the objective of providing a mechanism of review that is accessible, fair, just, economical, informal and quick, is proportionate to the importance and complexity of the matter and promotes public trust and confidence in the decision-making of the board. This section also imposes an ongoing obligation on both the claimant and the Department of Veterans' Affairs during the period until the board has determined the matter to lodge with the board a copy of any document that is in possession which is relevant to the review that has not been lodged previously.
In addition, it provides the board with the power to vary or revoke a decision made under the alternative dispute resolutions process with the consent of the parties and where the board is satisfied that it is within its powers and otherwise appropriate to do so. The section also requires the Repatriation Commission and any person representing the commission in a review to use their best endeavours to assist the board in fulfilling its legislative objective in line with the expanded objective, which deals with the proportionality and public trust.
Finally, this section provides the principal member with the power to dismiss an application for a review of a decision if they are satisfied that the application is frivolous, vexatious, misconceived or lacking in substance, has no reasonable prospect of success or is otherwise an abuse of process. The final element which gives the principal member the power to dismiss an application has caused some angst within the veterans community for a number of reasons. The Veterans' Review Broad is a unique board that recognises the exceptional nature of military service. It provides an opportunity for veterans to be heard and, while rulings are legal, it is meant to operate in a less adversarial way. It is for this reason that veterans historically have been unable to be represented by lawyers at this point. As stated by the Returned and Services League of Australia in their submission to the Senate inquiry, the Veterans' Review Board has always been the first level of appeal. The veteran should always have his or her say and this should remain as such. In addition, the RSL argued that individuals should be able to present to the board, as it gives them the opportunity to be heard by three individuals in contrast to one DVA delegate.
There was also concern raised during the Senate committee process about the ability to delegate these powers, which the bill was silent on. Consequently, during the Senate committee process, the principal member of the board, Mr Doug Humphreys, provided written information to the committee to allay these concerns, stating that the power would rest wholly with the principal member. In his correspondence, Mr Humphreys also stated that there were few occasions where he would utilise this provision, claiming that, during the current principal member's tenure of seven years, there have been only three matters where it may have been appropriate to hold a preliminary hearing to consider whether the matter should be dismissed on these grounds. Given the small number of times that this would be utilised, Labor does not believe the benefits outweigh the significant concerns.
Labor believes that the Veterans' Review Board was always meant to be a chance where a veteran could be heard. It is meant to be a less adversarial process which accounts for the unique nature of military service. We do support the intention of the bill to align the principles of the VRB and the AAT and are supportive of the broader changes. While we respect that the principal member has outlined their process and how they will engage with an individual, we do not believe that this clause is fitting with regard to the overriding philosophy of the board. As such, Labor proposed—and communicated with the government on this—an amendment which would remove this section. However, it is my understanding that, in the third reading stage, the government will move this amendment, along with a number of other changes. We welcome this change. Labor made very, very clear that this is something that we believe, as a result of consultation with the community, needs to occur. I am very, very pleased that the government has taken that on board and will relieve us of having to move our amendment. We will support the amendment of the government.
Schedule 2 seeks to simplify the appointment process of individuals to the Specialist Medical Review Council, progress whole-of-government requirements for digital transformation, remove red tape in commencing reviews and provide reimbursement of certain travel expenses. The Specialist Medical Review Council is an independent statutory body that reviews the contents of the statements of principles or a decision of the Repatriation Medical Authority not to issue such a statement. The council consists of medical practitioners and medical scientists appointed as councillors by the minister and selected by the convenor of the council for a particular review on the basis of their expertise on the injury or the disease relevant to the statement of principles subject which is under review. Essentially, if someone believes there is an issue with a statement of principle, they will take it to the council for review. The council then appoints a panel which reviews the statement of principle. If they agree there is an issue, it is then returned to the RMA for review.
Under the current arrangements, the minister must select members for the panel from a list or lists of nominations submitted by colleges or other bodies of medical practitioners or scientists. In practice, colleges forward the names of candidates who have responded to advertisements without assessing or recommending candidates. In addition, when making appointments, the minister must have regard to the branches of science or the expertise as necessary to decide review matters and must appoint not fewer than two councillors with experience in each branch. Given these requirements, the process of appointing members takes around three months or longer. This affects the council's ability to perform its functions. It's our understanding that under the amendments the requirements which fix the number of councillors with experience at each branch of medical science will be repealed.
While the minister is still required to have regard to the branches for the expertise needed to decide matters referred to the council, they will have greater discretion as to the number of councillors needed. While it makes sense to have a standing membership from which to draw councillors, there are not necessarily always at least two members from each area of expertise, particularly when it relates to uncommon specialities. This section also includes a requirement that at least one councillor must have at least five years experience in the field of epidemiology, the branch of medicine which deals with the study of the distribution and determinants of disease in populations, and with investigation into the sources and causes of infectious disease.
The review process, as it stands, also requires the council to advertise the date of its first meeting with respect to a particular review. This is described as unnecessary and prescriptive, given the practicalities of arranging a meeting with specialists with busy schedules. Changes to this section will still require notice published in the Gazette at least 28 days before the first meeting of councillors.
Schedule 2 also seeks to provide financial assistance for individual representatives of organisations for any necessary attendance to accompany individuals or representatives to attend a council to make an oral submission. It will make several amendments which enable the convenor of the council to give written directions about the manner of lodging requests for reviews or applications, enabling the council to adopt electronic lodgement of requests for reviews rather than requiring a hard copy form as required by the Veterans' Entitlements Act.
In the light of the ongoing Digital Transformation Agenda, it is appropriate that the council should have the capacity to develop online forms and lodgements. This will streamline the processes and reduce unnecessary red tape. The government assures us that these amendments will not change the threshold for the specialists who are appointed to the panel; rather, the amendments focus on streamlining the process of appointing specialists to the panel, providing financial assistance and reducing red tape. Given these assurances, Labor is supportive of these amendments.
Schedule 3 relates to the international agreements and gives the minister power to make agreements with foreign governments to cover the provision of benefits and payments for the benefits under the MRCA and DRCA. This amendment is required as under the current arrangements the minister can only enter into the agreement for the provision of benefits and treatment, including rehabilitation, that are comparable to those provided under the Veterans' Entitlements Act. Current and former ADF members now have coverage under other veterans' entitlements portfolio acts in addition to the Veterans' Entitlements Act and, as such, there is a need for arrangements which refer to benefits and payments, including rehabilitation, that are provided by the Repatriation Commission or the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Commission under the VEA, the MRCA, the DRCA or the Australian Participants in British Nuclear Tests (Treatment) Act. This is a logical extension of the current arrangements that ensures that all veterans' legislation is covered. I understand there will be an amendment to the title of this and that, rather than calling it 'agreements', it will be 'arrangements', and we will support that amendment by the government.
Schedule 4 legislates the employer incentive scheme payments, which are made to employers in the form of wage subsidies to encourage them to engage an injured veteran who has found it difficult to compete in a tight labour market. The department provides vocational rehabilitation to eligible serving and former Defence Force members, reservists and cadets following service related injury or disease. Vocational rehabilitation delivers assistance to members to help them achieve sustainable employment where possible and return them to the workforce at at least the level of their pre-injury employment. These services include assessment, guidance or counselling, functional capacity assessment, work experience, vocational training and jobseeking assistance. It also may involve incentive payments to employers to facilitate civilian employment of veterans. While the department has been able to facilitate these payments under existing provisions, this amendment will strengthen and clarify the legislation around these payments.
Labor is supportive of measures which assist veterans to move to and retain employment. Vocational rehabilitation plays an important role in assisting eligible veterans with finding or retaining employment. It can assist with transition from military to civilian employment for members of the ADF and peacekeeping forces who may experience difficulty in obtaining or holding civilian employment.
Schedule 5 amends the MRCA and the DRCA to facilitate information sharing between the MRCC and the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation with respect to certain service related compensation claims. These amendments will implement a recommendation by the Review of Military Compensation Arrangements which was intended to improve the information-sharing framework for incapacity and superannuation benefits between the MRCC and the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation. While the MRCC is authorised to request information from the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to assist with the calculation of incapacity payments, there is no express provision to allow the MRCC to provide information to the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to assist with their assessment of superannuation benefits. As such, at present all requests to the MRCC for information from the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation are undertaken in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 1982, which is a cumbersome and time-consuming process accounting for approximately 20 per cent of all FOI requests received by the department on behalf of the MRCC.
These amendments, we are informed, will provide a stronger foundation for the MRCC to provide the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation with the information needed to make an assessment of the superannuation benefit. Requests from the CSC to the MRCC for claims information are increasingly being received for the purpose of conducting superannuation investigations through the useful and relevant medical and rehabilitation information held by the MRCC. Enabling the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to use information held by the MRCC will also avoid the need to send Defence Force members for further medical assessment where the MRCC already holds the relevant information which could be used by the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to determine benefits. Apart from saving time and effort, this would also prevent Defence Force members from having to explain their circumstances to different medical professionals. This is particularly important in the cases of members who are suffering from psychological conditions, including those which have arisen from physical or psychological abuse. This will prevent any retraumatisation as a result of having to ongoingly explain their circumstances.
I must note that this section has caused some concern within the veterans community through the Senate inquiry process. Senators raised a number of privacy concerns with the committee, noting there is some confusion within the Defence community as to what type of information is being shared. Many of the submitters called for a privacy impact assessment to be conducted on schedule 5 of the bill, and I understand the government has completed this process.
Labor is supportive of the measures listed in schedule 5 to help veterans reverse the process and to reduce the unnecessary work. It is important, I think, that we note that the time taken to process claims by DVA has been a longstanding issue with many veterans. Veterans and their loved ones have regularly expressed to me the frustration of having to tell their story again and again. This amendment seeks to address this, and that is why we're supportive of it. However, I do understand these privacy concerns and certainly have supported the calls to conduct a privacy impact assessment. I am pleased that the government has done that.
Schedule 6 seeks to amend the MRCA to provide the minister with the power to delegate his or her powers and functions to the members of the MRCC, employees of the department or persons engaged or appointed under the Public Service Act 1999. This is a provision which exists under the other act, the VEA, but it appears to have been omitted from the development process of the MRCA in 2004. This omission has prevented the implementation of some of the administrative reforms to achieve efficiencies across the department as part of the government's commitment to reduce red tape. Examples that have been provided of the type of determinations which might be delegated include determination of an interest rate payable on a lump sum payment of permanent impairment compensation; minor determinations concerning reimbursement of travel expenses; requirements for medical examinations; and the types of payments that may be deducted from payments of weekly compensation. Delegating authority for minor matters to appropriate employees will enable quicker decision-making in relation to small issues and reduce unnecessary red tape. The department have assured Labor that delegation levels would be set at either band 1 or band 2 or at the chief operating officer level only, to ensure that the employee has the appropriate skill set to be approving these decisions. On that condition, Labor will support this amendment.
Schedule 7 will amend the legislation to exempt certain legislative instruments from section 14(2) of the Legislation Act 2003 and enable these legislative instruments to incorporate material contained in other non-disallowable legislative instruments or other non-legislative writings in force from time to time.
The current requirement to amend the Veterans' Affairs portfolio legislative instruments to incorporate changes in non-disallowable instruments has caused significant administrative issues for the department. These changes will essentially allow materials to be updated with new references to information without lodging each individual instrument into the parliament. Many of the legislative instruments include references to external documents which are incorporated by reference into instruments that are legally regarded as being parts of the instrument. As such, any change to such documents can't be recognised unless the changed versions are incorporated into the legislative instrument by an amendment or a replaced instrument. This can cause significant administrative issues and unnecessary delays.
An example of this can be seen in relation to the availability of new rehabilitation appliances. The availability of the new equipment will be delayed, as the legislative instrument in the case of the Treatment Principles, which incorporates the document under which the appliance may be provided, would need to be amended to refer to the changed date of the policy document. As we can see, that's quite an ordeal, and for that reason Labor will be supporting this amendment.
The final schedule deals with the repeal of redundant and spent provisions administered in the Veterans' Affairs portfolio concerning benefits that are no longer payable, and it makes consequential amendments in relation to the repeal. This was originally proposed as part of the Omnibus Repeal Day (Spring 2015) Bill 2015, which lapsed with the end of parliament in April 2016. The proposed amendments seek to remove the following spent provisions: the clean energy advance during a period before 1 July 2012; parts providing for one-off payments to older Australians in 2006, 2007 and 2008; the Economic Security Strategy payment from 2008; and the educational tax refund payment in 2012.
However, a provision has been inserted that will ensure that, in a circumstance where a person is found to have been eligible for one of the payments due to a retrospective assessment of the pension, they will still be able to access the spent provision. The Veterans' Affairs portfolio is supportive of these changes, and therefore we are also and think that this is an appropriate way to go.
The Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017 seeks to streamline the operation of the law and to improve processes for veterans. Labor is supportive of the changes, which will improve the process for veterans. However, as stated, we do believe that we need to remove one section of schedule 1. As I've said, it's my understanding that the government will move that amendment, and we certainly welcome them paying careful consideration to Labor's views. We certainly welcome the government doing that and look forward to continuing to work in a bipartisan way. I think that this legislation not only has bipartisan support but now accurately reflects the views of the veterans community. Overall, it will be welcomed by the veterans community as a sensible piece of legislation and one that we have worked together to land perfectly.
Mr SNOWDON (Lingiari) (18:38): Can I borrow your speech? I just want to say to the member for Kingston that I was only half joking!
Ms Rishworth: Yeah, right!
Mr SNOWDON: But I do want to say, whilst you're here, congratulations on being elevated into the shadow cabinet. It is great recognition of your good work and of your good work to come as a minister in a future government. So, well done to you.
Mr Tehan: Oh—
Mr SNOWDON: I'm going to talk about you in a minute, so be careful! There are a couple of things that I think are important in this Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017, though. The member for Kingston made this point towards the end of her speech, and I know she thinks this to be the case—and I know it to be the case. It's about the way in which there is strong bipartisan support for this legislation and the way in which the minister has been dealing with the opposition and the way in which opposition has been working with the minister to try to secure better outcomes for veterans, by and large, across the country. Now, there will be differences from time to time, but it's important that we accept our obligations as legislators to try to get the best possible outcomes that we can without politicising the process for our veterans. There are a couple of areas within this parliament where that seems to be happening and others where it's not.
If you'll forgive me, I just want to make the point that bipartisanship in trying to represent the interests of veterans in this place and to make changes which suit their needs is very important, and it's being done in a constructive way. I know that, in the context of the recent suicide report, we've heard both from the government and the opposition, through the minister and through the member for Kingston, and they have both made vital contributions to that discussion, but again showing very little difference, in terms of the final outcome and the desired outcome, from this parliament, represented by them as the spokespersons for both the government and the opposition, to get the best possible outcome for veterans. That, to me, is what this is about. I have to say that, in my own experience as a minister in this space, that was also the case when we were in government. And I expect it to be the case into the future, because we don't want the veterans community wondering why it is that we're playing politics around their interests and their concerns.
I have that same relationship in many ways with the member for Hasluck, in dealing with Indigenous health issues. We meet regularly. We discuss issues. We won't always agree, but we have a common interest in making sure that we try, as a parliament, to get the best possible outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and in other areas. We, Senator Dodson from Western Australia and I, are attempting to work collaboratively with Minister Scullion in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs space. That's somewhat more difficult, because it's a bit more of a contested space. But the bottom line is: there's a genuine desire to try to work in a bipartisan way.
I just want to contrast that, if I may, with the way in which we've seen the member for Stirling, as the Minister for Justice, operate in this parliament over the last two days and the very divisive nature of the way in which he has addressed this place. We don't need it. It's an insult to the parliament. It's an insult to the community and to all Australians who listen to this place. They expect us to do better. As to the responses that the minister made in question time yesterday, I think the member for Kennedy described, in a contribution in this parliament today, the member for Stirling as the worst minister he'd seen in 44 years in politics. I've never seen a contribution like that which was made by the member for Stirling in response to a question yesterday. And today we just had a debate which resulted in the opposition, with the support of the Independents and the crossbenchers, opposing the government on important measures relating to the justice portfolio. We've seen the government, through the Prime Minister and the member for Stirling, yesterday and today, try and insult the intelligence of the Australian community by saying that the Australian opposition, through the Leader of the Opposition and other members, were not supportive of the Australian Federal Police. That is just plain wrong. It debases this parliament for the Prime Minister to make those sorts of insulting remarks about the Leader of the Opposition and other Labor people—the opposition generally—by saying that, somehow or other, we do not support the work of the Australian Federal Police. That is not accurate, it's not correct and it shouldn't be done. In fact, we should be using the exemplar of the minister who is sitting at the table and his shadow who is sitting at the table to say: 'We can work cooperatively in this space, and let's sit down and do it. We don't need to be divided over issues of such great national importance as the role of the Federal Police in this country.'
It's very, very important, in my view, that we try and seek to do things in a cooperative way in this place. I know it's a contested space. I know that, in the way in which this parliament operates, oppositions oppose and governments try and kick the guts out of the opposition. That's all well and good. But it's not appropriate in areas of public policy of the greatest concern to the Australian community. We should be trying to resolve our issues in an appropriate way. We don't do that by denigrating one another and we don't do it, in my view, by insulting the intelligence of the Australian community and saying that the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Shorten, and his shadow ministerial team and the Labor backbench are somehow or other not supportive of the Australian Federal Police. That is just plain wrong. I know that any Australians who might be listening to this debate would say they agree that this should not be the case.
But I want to go back to the legislation. I know that the minister, working with the Department of Veterans' Affairs and with the opposition, through the member for Kingston, has come to a conclusion about eight schedules in this piece of legislation. We have heard from the shadow minister and the minister that they have agreed to amend schedule 1 to recognise the issues which were raised by the veterans community about a particular aspect of that schedule—and that is as it should be. And we know that the veterans community are exercised by the fact that they want to make sure that their interests are properly protected and advanced within this legislation. The proposals to dismiss the prospect of reviews, in schedule 1—an application dismissed as frivolous, vexatious, misconceived or lacking in substance, or which has no reasonable prospect of success or is otherwise an abuse of the process of the board—were of concern to the stakeholders. I'm indebted to the work of the Parliamentary Library and their excellent Bills Digest, which enumerates some of the concerns which were expressed about this particular part of the legislation by representatives of the veterans community.
And I think it's worthwhile pointing out that in accepting that there was no need for that amendment, which was proposed originally by the government, the government has actually responded positively to the concerns that have been expressed by the veterans community and by the member for Kingston—and that's a very good thing. Whilst a number of points of concern were raised, there is no question in my view that the amendments as proposed will have the result that's required and make the legislation better.
I'm not going to go through—as the shadow minister has done already—each of the schedules of this legislation. That will serve no particular purpose other than to bore those who are listening—because they have already heard it. I did ask in a flippant way whether I should just use the opposition spokesperson's speech—because it did, as the government has done, outline the detail of the legislation. But I do want to go more generally to the issue of how we have a responsibility to make sure, in a changing environment, that we do all we possibly can to support our veterans.
It was a salutary lesson the other day when I sat and listened to the minister talk about the suicides. The fact is that, when in uniform, the suicide rate for Australian serving men and women is a lot less than it is in the general population; but, for that group of young Australians under the age of 24 who are veterans, it's a lot higher. I think the average length of service—the minister can correct me—for Australian serving personnel is around 7½ to eight years. We know that there are people who serve until they're 60. Congratulations to them, and we thank them very much for their wonderful service. But the young Australians who join the Defence Force when they're 17, 18 or 19 and leave the Defence Force in their mid-20s are the most at risk. And one of the issues which has been of concern not only to the minister but to the Department of Veterans' Affairs and the defence organisations is that we lose track of people once they leave—and that's for a whole range of reasons. It's really difficult. You can't compel people who leave the uniform to remain in touch.
You can't compel people who separate from the Defence Force to retain contact with their unit. We can't compel them to be members of a representative organisation like the RSL or some other organisation. We just can't. There are some who leave dispirited, and perhaps with a whole range of issues around authority as a result of their service, and they don't want anything to do with the uniform—they just don't want anything to do with it. Yet, potentially, they are the ones most in need. Our aspiration must be, somehow or another, to be able to track those people so that there is someone watching out for them.
That is extremely difficult. It's not something that the minister or the department can manufacture. I think it's something that organisations supporting veterans may have better access to, because it really means people going out and looking. If you've got mates while you're in the Defence Force, let's hope you keep those mates after it. I know in my father's case—he was a serving member in the Second World War—that he kept very close contact with his unit right until his death. That was great, but it doesn't happen often enough for some young people.
When people do cry out for help we've got to do what we can immediately. If there are people who, say, have a claim against the Commonwealth because of their service, we need to expedite the process for their claim to be heard, to make sure their claim is properly represented and to make sure their voice is properly heard so that their claim is met as quickly as possible—as this legislation is designed to do. If we don't, then we may end up in a situation where someone might do something which we would not want them to do. That is really very important.
I know that the department is challenged by this all the time, because it's not something that's easily overcome. But I do know, and I want to commend the minister and ask him to tell his department, how much we do appreciate the work they do. We might have differences about some of the decisions made about staffing, VAN officer and those sort of things but, ultimately, the people I've met in the Department of Veterans' Affairs are very highly motivated towards attending to the veterans' needs and veterans' families' needs.
As I've said continually in this place, we should make sure that anyone who walks through the doors of Kapooka understands from the day they walk in that they they're a potential client of the Department of Veterans' Affairs until the day they die. If they can accept that proposition as early as that, they'll see it as normal, once they leave, to have an association with the department. I would say—and this is a message which I know shouldn't rest with the minister—that we need to make sure there's never ever again another thought about having the Department of Veterans' Affairs absorbed into another agency. That should never happen. I don't think it will happen. It certainly won't happen under a Labor government. I know there have been some who have posited that proposal over the years, but let's make sure it's rejected whenever it's put.
Mr HART (Bass) (18:53): I echo the sentiments expressed by the member for Lingiari about the spirit of cooperation and bipartisanship that infects the area of Veterans' Affairs. Unlike the unfortunate circumstances this afternoon with respect to equally important legislation dealing with gun trafficking, this minister understands that it's really important to develop and encourage a spirit of bipartisanship—particularly around this vitally important area of veterans' affairs.
I'm always very pleased to speak on legislation affecting our veterans community, like this Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017. I was very fortunate during my legal career to have represented veterans, commencing with veterans of the Second World War and then succeeding generations, in connection with pension claims. I have been able to gain an insight into that community, particularly those who sought to battle on and delayed making any claim for support from the taxpayer.
I fondly recall many veterans who recounted the fact that they tried to get on with their lives, despite in some cases having severe trauma which should have been the subject of an earlier claim. These veterans often found it difficult to make a late claim for TPI, for example, because of their willingness to put up with many conditions until pain or incapacity proved insurmountable.
It was and is a privilege to represent all of those veterans, each with their own unique stories of service, hardship, mateship and, of course, their postservice lives. If there was a common thread through all of these claims—whether it was a seaman who served in the Second World War in HMAS Shropshire and was exposed to high levels of radiation, someone who served in North Africa and washed his kit in petrol, or someone who damaged his knees, unsurprisingly, in parachute training—it was the volume of service and medical material that had to be trawled through in order to build a case for the veteran's claim. Often my involvement, for very practical reasons, only commenced once the matter had been unsuccessful before the Veterans' Review Board, the VRB. In many cases, delay in the resolution of a meritorious claim would have been avoided if some person with suitable knowledge and training had been in a position to review the material, advise as to the evidence and instruct medical experts as to what reports may have been required.
The object of veterans' affairs legislation is beneficial. In other words, the legislation should be construed in favour of the applicant veteran. The system should work in a manner which facilitates the resolution of claims in a manner which is fair, just, economical, informal and quick. My experience and the feedback I've received from veterans support groups would suggest that more work would need to be done to achieve that object. Labor is supportive of changes which will clarify, improve or streamline the operation of the laws and processes within the department. This is something that I strongly believe in and something which should also be subject to a process of continuous improvement.
The bill contains eight schedules which deal with a variety of different elements within the legislation. The bill was considered by the Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade. Labor supported the referral to enable a thorough examination of the legislation. The overriding consideration is to ensure that the legislation operates as intended and that veterans are no worse off as a result of these changes. Our obligation—that is, the obligation of this place—to those who have served on behalf of our nation is to ensure that we do not, through changes that we make in this place, place them at any additional disadvantage.
Schedule 1 within the legislation seeks to amend the provisions which govern the Veterans' Review Board. This is designed to ensure that these provisions are aligned with similar provisions of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. The VRB is a statutory authority. It's designed to provide independent merits review of decisions in connection with disability pensions, war widows and war widow pensions, a tenant allowance under the Veterans' Entitlements Act and, of course, the rehabilitation, compensation and other benefits under the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act. The amendments are designed to ensure that the operations of the board are modernised and improved to ensure accessibility, fairness, justice, economy, informality and speedy resolution. The operation of the board should be proportionate to the importance and complexity of an individual matter and, generally speaking, the operation of the board should promote public trust and confidence in the decision-making of the board.
As a legal practitioner, I know that independent merits review is a vitally important aspect of ensuring that, in the administration of complex systems of pensions entitlement, the applicant is able to have a decision reviewed without involving the expense of a legal practitioner in a complex formal process. One of the central aspects of merits review is access to proper material to found a decision. The legislation imposes an ongoing obligation upon both the applicant claimant and the Department of Veterans' Affairs to lodge with the board a copy of any document in their possession which is relevant to the review and has not been lodged previously.
It is notable that the Repatriation Commission and any person representing the commission in a review are required to use their best endeavours to assist the board in fulfilling the board's legislative objectives of accessibility, fairness, justice, economy, informality and speed of resolution. I must note that, whilst my experience in my dealings with representatives of the Repatriation Commission was almost without exception positive, there are and have been concerns expressed by the veterans community that the department and the commission often take a position towards the claimant applicant which is adversarial in nature. The formal introduction of an obligation to use best endeavours to assist the board in fulfilling those objectives is a positive step.
Schedule 1 also introduces provisions which would entitle the principal member to dismiss an application if they are satisfied that the application is frivolous, is vexatious, is misconceived, is lacking in substance, has no reasonable prospect of success or is otherwise an abuse of process. On balance, the provision of this express power is claimed by the minister to be appropriate, although it's unlikely there'll be many occasions in which it would be appropriate to dismiss an application without proceeding to a final hearing. I thank the minister for his ability to remove this particular clause from the legislation. As I said earlier, the spirit of bipartisanship with respect to this area of public policy is most important.
I know that on this side of the House, and certainly as conceded by the minister, we would be concerned if any power were used to deny an applicant an opportunity to put their case, even if their case appeared to have low prospects of success. It is understandable, of course, that our veterans community would be concerned about the introduction into legislation of any such power, but as a legal practitioner I understand and respect that courts have under their inherent jurisdiction a power to dismiss in these circumstances. Obviously, as a statutory tribunal, the Veterans' Review Board cannot exercise any inherent review powers, so these powers, if they were to be appropriate, must be conferred expressly.
This is obviously a balancing exercise. Lawyers are not permitted to appear before the Veterans' Review Board; the procedure is supposed to be informal. A case may not have been assembled with the assistance of a person with knowledge of procedure, as I have indicated earlier. It is important that the documents are reviewed and organised so that the Veterans' Review Board gets to consider the best possible case. As has been conceded, the veteran deserves an opportunity to be heard. It is always my preference for the applicant to have the opportunity to present their case.
Schedule 2 of the bill simplifies the appointment process for those who are to be appointed to the Specialist Medical Review Council. It progresses the whole-of-government requirements for digital transformation, removing red tape and commencing reviews and provides for reimbursement of certain travel expenses. The Specialist Medical Review Council is an independent statutory body that reviews the contents of statements of principle or a decision of the Repatriation Medical Authority not to issue a statement of principle. As a person who has practised in this area, I know that the existence of statements of principle provided some measure of certainty with respect to veterans' claims. Prior to the introduction of the statements of principle, aspects of the law required the establishment of a reasonable hypothesis linking service with a particular claimed condition. The statements of principle effectively codified reasonable hypotheses so as to assist in the resolution of claims.
It is obviously in the interest of justice for the statements of principle to have authority as to the matters that they cover. The people that determine the statements of principle should be appropriately qualified and possess appropriate expertise. Under the current arrangements, the minister must select members for the panel from a list of nominations submitted by colleges or other bodies of medical practitioners or scientists. However, that is not the way the process has worked in practice. In practice, the colleges have forwarded the names of candidates who have responded to advertisements, without assessing or recommending candidates. The minister, in making appointment, must have regard to the branches of science where expertise is necessary to decide review matters and must appoint no less than two councillors with experience in each branch. Obviously, given these requirements, the process of appointing members takes time—around three months or longer. This can affect the ability of the review council to perform its functions. These amendments, as proposed by the minister, are designed to streamline and facilitate the operation of the council.
Schedule 3 of the bill relates to international agreements and gives the minister the power to make agreements with foreign governments to cover the provision of benefits and payment of benefits under the MRCA, the SRCA and the DRCA. The current legislation only provides for existing agreements under the Veterans' Entitlements Act. The new provisions will cover allied veterans and Defence Force members with entitlements under whichever regulation gives them their entitlement. Labor supports the extension of agreements to cover all veterans' affairs legislation to ensure that veterans are covered under the relevant legislative framework irrespective of formal entitlement.
Schedule 4 deals with employer incentive scheme payments. These payments provide for wage subsidies which are payable to employers to encourage them to employ injured veterans who may be finding it difficult to compete in the labour market. That is particularly the case where we have a labour market where there is high unemployment. These amendments are commendable and strengthen the legislative foundation for the payments. Labor is supportive of measures which assist veterans to integrate into the community, to move on and to retain employment.
Schedule 5 introduces some important provisions to facilitate information sharing between the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Commission and the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, in respect to certain service-related compensation claims. Under the existing legislation, due to information-sharing provisions—indeed, restrictions—when somebody is medically discharged they will undergo a medical, but when they go to the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to organise those payments they may be required to undertake a second medical and, in turn, when they go to the DVA for assistance, they'll be required to undertake yet a further medical. These amendments are appropriate to enable information sharing between these bodies, reducing some of the intrusive medical examinations required. Access to the department's claims information, particularly relevant medical and rehabilitation information, enables the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to make speedier superannuation benefits assessments and, in turn, will assist the department to determine a person's entitlement to incapacity payments. A common theme of my former practice as an advocate in this area was the necessity to organise multiple medical examinations. This is extremely frustrating for a veteran, particularly where there is a sense that the deck is stacked against the applicant.
I support this bill—of course, subject to the concerns that were expressed by Labor, with respect to the power, which was initially contained in this bill, to dismiss certain claims. It's very pleasing, therefore, that the minister has agreed to amend the bill to remove those provisions. Our veterans deserve a fair, just, economical, informal and quick system to address their claims. We welcome this change, which recognises the unique nature of the Veterans' Review Board. The measures within this bill are designed to address that object. I commend the legislation to the House.
Ms O'TOOLE (Herbert) (19:06): I am sure that it is no news to anyone in this place how passionate I am about veterans, ex-service personnel and current and serving ADF members and their families. When I consider any piece of legislation that comes before this parliament, I always consider not only how it will impact on our community in general but also how it will impact on Townsville's strong defence population. I have, and always will, support necessary legislative changes that will improve the lives of Townsville's veterans, ex-service personnel and their families. This bill, the Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017, is a fine example of bipartisanship.
It is very important that all legislation is inclusive of all citizens in the community. For example, health legislation and education legislation needs to reflect an understanding of the uniqueness of the veteran community, to ensure that we do not enact legislation that has a negative impact. Our veterans, ex-service personnel and families have given selflessly of themselves to ensure that we enjoy the freedom that we have in this country today. For that, we owe them access to the services and supports that they require.
One of the most common issues regularly raised with me by the Townsville veteran community is the need to improve the processes of the Department of Veterans' Affairs. The changes in this bill will clarify, improve and/or streamline the implementation of the law and processes within the department. Thorough examination of this bill has occurred in the Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade to ensure that changes are implemented as intended and that veterans are no worse off as a result of enacting these measures.
Schedule 1 seeks to amend the provisions under which the Veterans' Review Board operates by aligning certain provisions with similar provisions to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. The Veterans' Review Board is a statutory authority whose role it is to provide independent merits review of decisions about disability pensions, war widow and war widower pensions and attendant allowances under the Veterans' Entitlements Act, and rehabilitation, compensation and other benefits under the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 2004.
The amendments in schedule 1 will modernise and improve the operations of the board to ensure the board is carrying out its functions. It will pursue the objective of providing a mechanism of review that is accessible, fair, just, economical, informal and quick and is proportionate to the importance and complexity of the matter and promotes public trust and confidence in the decision-making of the board. It will impose an ongoing obligation on both the claimant and the Department of Veterans' Affairs during the period until the board has determined the matter to lodge with the board a copy of any document that is in their possession, is relevant to the review and has not been lodged previously. It will provide the board with the power to vary or revoke a decision made under the alternative dispute resolution processes with the consent of the parties and where the board is satisfied that it is within its powers and otherwise appropriate to do so. It will require the Repatriation Commission and anyone representing the commission in a review to use their best endeavours to insist that the board fulfil their legislative objectives and will provide the principal member with the power to dismiss an application for review of a decision if they are satisfied that the application is frivolous, vexatious, misconceived, lacking in substance, without reasonable prospect of success or otherwise an abuse of process. The government has advised that these amendments will align with the board's objectives and the Administrative Appeals Tribunal objectives.
This final element of the schedule, which gives the principal member of the Veterans' Review Board the ability to dismiss an application for review, has caused some angst in the ex-service community. The Veterans' Review Board is designed to be a less adversarial process than the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and does allow veterans to be represented by lawyers at this stage. This is the veterans' opportunity to be heard, and Labor holds concerns about the insertion of these provisions. In addition, during the FADT committee process the principal member advised that there have been only three circumstances in the past seven years where he or she would have used this power. We understand that, following the Labor opposition urging the government, they are now moving an amendment which removes this section. We welcome this change, which recognises the unique nature of the Veterans' Review Board.
Schedule 2 simplifies the appointment process for individuals on the Specialist Medical Review Council, progresses whole-of-government requirements for digital transformation, removes red tape in commencing reviews and provides for reimbursement of certain travel expenses. The Specialist Medical Review Council is an independent statutory body that reviews the contents of statements of principles or a decision of the Repatriation Medical Authority not to issue such a statement.
Essentially, the process is as follows: if someone believes there is an issue with an SOP, they take it to the SMRC for review. The SMRC then appoints a panel to review the SOP. If the SMRC agrees there is an issue, it is then turned over to the RMA for review. The SMRC consists of medical practitioners and medical scientists appointed as councillors by the minister and selected by the convenor of the SMRC for a particular review, involving three to five members on the basis of their expertise in the injury or disease relevant to the SOP subject of review. Under current arrangements, the minister must select members for the panel from a list or lists of nominations submitted by colleges or other bodies of medical practitioners or scientists. In practice, colleges forward the names of candidates who have responded to advertisements but do not assess or recommend candidates. In making appointments, the minister must have regard to the branches of science where expertise is necessary to decide review matters and must appoint not less than two councillors with experience in each branch.
Given these requirements, the process of appointing members takes around three months or longer. This affects the SMRC's ability to perform its functions. We have been advised that these amendments will not change the threshold for the specialists who are appointed to the panel. The amendments focus on streamlining the process of appointing specialists to the SMRC, which in its current form is described as labour intensive. In addition, these amendments provide financial incentives for individuals, representatives of organisations and any necessary attendants accompanying those individuals or representatives attending the SMRC hearing to make an oral submission.
Schedule 2 will also make several amendments which enable the convenor of the SMRC to give written directions about the manner for lodging requests for review for applications, enabling the SMRC to adopt electronic lodgements of requests for reviews rather than requiring a hard copy form as required by the VEA.
Schedule 3 relates to international agreements and gives the Minister for Veterans' Affairs the power to make agreements with foreign governments to cover the provision of benefits and payments under the MRCA, SRCA and DRCA. As it stands, existing agreements concern only those payments which are payable under the VEA. The new section will now cover allied veterans and Defence Force members with service of the type for which benefits and payments, including rehabilitation, can be provided by the Repatriation Commission or the MRCC under the VEA, MRCA, SRCA, DRCA or the Australian Participants in British Nuclear Tests (Treatment) Act 2006. It is so important that all veterans are covered, and I support extending agreements to cover all veterans' affairs legislation to ensure that veterans are covered under the relevant legislative framework, whether that is the VEA, the SRCA, the DRCA or the MRCA.
Schedule 4 legislates the Employer Incentive Scheme payments. These payments are made to employers in the form of wage subsidies to encourage them to engage injured veterans who have found it difficult to compete in a tight labour market. While the department has been able to facilitate these payments, this will strengthen the legislative foundation of the payments. One of the concerns I hear, especially from young veterans, is about the issue of employment. Work is so very important for people to feel they are contributing. Having a job is a reason to get out of bed. That is why I am completely committed to supporting measures that will assist veterans to move into and retain employment.
Schedule 5 amends the MRCA and the SRCA/DRCA to facilitate information sharing between the Military Rehabilitation Compensation Commission and the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation with regard to certain service-related compensation claims. As it stands, due to information-sharing provisions, if someone is medically discharged, they undergo a medical. When they go to the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation to organise payments, they undergo a second medical. And when they go to the DVA for assistance, they undergo a third medical. These amendments seek to enable information sharing between the CSC and the DVA, reducing some of the rework.
These amendments are designed to enable the CSC to access relevant claims information held by DVA, where that access would assist the CSC in the performance of its functions and powers. Access to the department's claims information, particularly to relevant medical and rehabilitation information, would assist CSC to make speedier superannuation benefit assessments, which, in turn, would assist the department to determine a person's entitlement to incapacity payments. A common complaint from veterans and advocates relates to the complicated and lengthy claims process for people seeking assistance from the department. I want to make this point very clear: there must be adequate safeguards in place to ensure that veterans' privacy is protected regarding any changes in this legislation.
Schedule 6 seeks to amend the MRCA to provide the Minister for Veterans' Affairs with the power to delegate his or her powers and functions to members of the MRCC, employees of the department, or persons engaged or appointed under the Public Service Act 1999. This function already exists under the VEA but was overlooked during the development of the MRCA. It makes sense that they be the same.
Schedule 7 will amend the legislation to exempt certain legislative instruments from subsection 14(2) of the Legislation Act 2003, and enable these legislative instruments to incorporate material contained in other non-disallowable legislative instruments or other non-legislative writings as are in force from time to time. The current requirement to amend Veterans' Affairs portfolio legislative instruments to incorporate changes in non-disallowable instruments causes significant administrative issues for the department. These changes will essentially allow material to be updated with new reference information without lodging each individual instrument into the parliament. The current process can cause administrative issues and unnecessary delays. An example of this can be seen in relation to the availability of a new rehabilitation appliance. The availability of new equipment will be delayed as the legislative instrument—in this case, the treatment principles that incorporate the document that the applicant may be provided—would need to be amended to refer to the changed date of the policy document. The amendments in schedule 7 will improve the administration of the acts, but not have any impact on the provision of benefits under the acts.
Schedule 8 will repeal redundant and spent provisions administered in the Veterans' Affairs portfolio concerning benefits that are no longer payable under portfolio acts. This schedule will remove references to payments which are no longer able to be accessed by individuals, in order to simplify veterans legislation and make it more accessible for individuals wishing to interpret the current provisions. The proposed amendment seeks to remove the following: the clean energy advance during a period before July 2012; parts providing for a one-off payment to older Australians in 2006, 2007 and 2008; the economic security strategy payment from 2008; and the educational tax refund payment in 2012.
In some circumstances, a person may be found to have been eligible for one of the payments because of a retrospective assessment of pension. Following the repeal, such a person will retain eligibility to receive the payment on the basis that they were eligible for the underlying payment during the relevant period that the repealed legislation was still in force. I am with Labor that we hold concerns about enabling the principal member of the VRB to dismiss claims and have yet to be convinced of the necessity of these provisions. Overall, though, I am supportive of any changes that streamline processes in the department that will assist our veterans and make processes a lot easier for them and less stressful for their families.
Ms LAMB (Longman) (19:20): It really is a privilege to follow the member for Herbert in speaking to the Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill 2017. She is a fantastic advocate for her community up in Townsville and, like me, she really appreciates the work that our veterans have done in serving our country. I'm incredibly proud to rise today in solidarity with our veterans, who have already given so much to our nation. It is only fair that we, as their representatives, do whatever we can to support them. Whether it is supporting them to return to the workforce, helping them to live with a disability that they may now suffer from or even just helping them with the transition back to civilian life, it is important that we do what we can to support them. They deserve our support.
That is why I will continue to do what I can, and make sure the government does what it can, to provide Australia's veterans with the support they need in that transition to finding work or helping them in their community. I have been doing what I can already in my own electorate. I have been standing up for our veterans. Whether they live on Bribie Island, at Beachmere, in Caboolture, Morayfield, Narangba, Burpengary or Kallangur—we have wonderful communities of veterans throughout the electorate of Longman—I will always fight for our veterans and always support them. And, of course, I will always support legislation that helps them. I think it is fair to say that neither I nor Labor will ever stand in the way of good and sensible legislation.
I am standing here today agreeing to support the Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Omnibus) Bill. By no means is this is a huge overhaul; the majority of the bill streamlines processes and makes things easier for veterans, which is what is fair, reasonable and should be expected. Most of all, for most of it, it is sensible and it is practical. I would like to speak on a number of the schedules to the bill. Schedule 1 will modernise and improve the operations of the Veterans' Review Board. This is a change that I welcome.
The Veterans' Review Board is a statutory authority whose role is to provide independent merits review of decisions about pensions and allowances under the Veterans' Entitlements Act as well as rehabilitation, compensation and other benefits under the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 2004. The Veterans' Review Board is a body that serves a highly important function, so any changes that can be made to ensure it operates as effectively and efficiently as possible will always be welcomed by me on behalf of the veterans in my community. If these amendments ensure that the board pursues an objective of providing a mechanism of review that is fair, a mechanism that is accessible and just, a mechanism that is economical, informal and quick, a mechanism that helps to promote public trust and confidence in the decision-making of the board, then of course I will support these measures, as will my Labor colleagues.
These are sensible amendments, which is why I'm happy to support them, although I must point out it's no surprise to find that there was a proposal made by the government that apparently was suggested by the principal member of the Veterans' Review Board. I must commend the government for actually listening to suggestions. We all know that the only way for a government to formulate good policy is to listen and take heed of suggestions and to listen to those people who are affected, whether they be stakeholders or other organisations, or veterans or other people who live in the community. It is not possible to truly govern without listening to those who you represent, hearing what their needs and concerns are and listening to possible solutions or suggestions. It is just like hearing, I suppose, how many members of the ex-service community have expressed concerns with section 6 of schedule 1 of this bill.
I will go to section 6. It is understandable that this element has caused some angst in the community, as it gives the principal member of the Veterans' Review Board the ability to dismiss an application for review. Section 6 of schedule 1 of this bill effectively suppresses the voice of veterans who wish to stand up and represent themselves. The Veterans' Review Board is designed to be a less adversarial process than the AAT, the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. It is supposed to be less stressful, less painful and more accommodating to the needs of ex-service men and women. Lawyers won't be involved at this stage, which is welcome. This will be an opportunity for veterans to be heard, but I believe that making it so easy for the principal member of the board to dismiss an application for review puts this schedule at odds with the very principle of the process. It is not just me who thinks this—so do the Returned and Services League and my colleagues on this side of the House, in the Labor Party. Labor had prepared to seek amendments to this bill to remove that section in its entirety. We have been pressuring the government to do just the same.
Again, going against character today, I'm pleased to hear that the government has finally listened. I commend the government—twice in one speech!
Mr Byrne interjecting—
Ms LAMB: No, we won't. But when it is sensible, when it helps veterans in our community and right across Australia, of course we will commend and support the government on finally doing their job properly. We have been calling on them to listen to the RSL and other ex-service men and women for some time now, so it is fantastic that they have finally listened.
Schedule 4 stands out to me to be a very good move, one that I am happy to support and one that I think really will support and help the veterans in my community. Schedule 4 legislates Employer Incentive Scheme payments. These payments are effectively wage subsidies made to employers to encourage them to engage an injured veteran. I think this is important, and I really do welcome this. I have quite a lot of young veterans living in communities around Narangba and this is welcome for both the veterans and their families. We all know what the job market is like at the moment. It is a scant job market, a job market that is growing worse at an alarming rate. We as policymakers have a responsibility to do whatever we can to assist those who have served our country to find work post-service.
Some months ago, I hosted a visit by the shadow minister for defence, the honourable member for Corio, Mr Richard Marles, in my electorate of Longman. Along with the honourable member, we visited Remembrance House in Burpengary and spent quite a few hours sitting around the table talking to and listening to a group of returned service men and women.
Debate interrupted.
ADJOURNMENT
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Vasta ) (19:30): It being 7.30 pm, I propose the question:
That the House do now adjourn.
Turnbull Government
Mr WATTS (Gellibrand) (19:30): Unfortunately, it's been a shameful week in this parliament. It was a truly depressing moment in Australian politics yesterday when the Minister for Justice made the contemptible smear that members of the Labor Party were somehow opposed to locking up paedophiles. The extraordinary AFP raids on the Australian Workers' Union's offices in Sydney and Melbourne later that afternoon took us to a new low. Our democratic institutions are precious, but they are in perilous shape. We don't spend enough time looking after them and doing the things that strengthen the system rather than advance the interests of any individual actor, and that goes for all MPs in this building, not just me. As a result, trust in our democratic institutions has collapsed, and the public think that political actors are in it for themselves and will cynically use our institutions for their own benefit rather than the public good. That comes at a great cost to all of us, corroding the utility of our institutions to drive change in our society and implement reform.
One of the most insidious trends in this regard over the past four years has been the criminalisation of the political contest—the use of institutions with coercive powers created by the government of the day and designed to persecute political opponents of the government in the parliament and civil society more broadly. We've seen this in the Prime Minister's disturbing habit of calling the police on his political opponents when he doesn't get his way: in the past on the NBN during the last federal election campaign and with respect to the Medicare text messages sent during the campaign. But it's important to understand that this behaviour happens in the context of the establishment of an $80 million royal commission into the trade union movement designed to pursue the coalition's political industrial opponents, and the establishment of the Registered Organisations Commission to institutionalise those political attacks on a forward basis.
The Prime Minister likes to claim that these institutions are not, in fact, political exercises but are instead institutions designed to restore the rule of law to our workplaces. However, it is hard to take this claim seriously when you compare the government's attack-dog approach to the trade union movement with its response to the greatest moral scandal in our nation today: the systemic exploitation of many thousands of temporary migrant workers across our nation. This is lawlessness in Australian workplaces today. It's not from unions; it's from employers who have engaged in endemic wage theft, the payment of below-minimum-wage rates of pay and denial of basic workplace conditions, and the abuse of workers, including horrific sexual abuse, in thousands of documented instances.
From June 2015 to July 2016, the Fair Work Ombudsman recovered more than $27 million owed to more than 11,000 workers who were underpaid by their employers, and it's clear this is just the tip of the iceberg. A 2016 survey of 4,000 overseas workers who completed the eight-day regional work requirements found that 66 per cent felt employers took advantage of them by underpaying them. In 2015-16, the AFP received 75 referrals related to workplace exploitation that were suspected to amount to human trafficking or related offences under Commonwealth law and, of those, 39 related to sexual exploitation; the rest were other forms of exploitation. Indeed, this lawlessness is so widespread that it's impossible to imagine that it is not having an impact on wages growth across the retail and hospitality sectors, but where are the show trials for 7-Eleven, Domino's and Caltex? Where are the calls for the coalition to stop accepting campaign donations from the companies and directors related to this lawlessness? Where are the calls for coalition MPs to disassociate themselves from directors of companies who have employed business models designed to facilitate wage theft from the most vulnerable members of our society? Where are the criminal charges for the routine falsification of documents, time sheets and pay slips that we see in these cases?
Instead, we see an AFP raid of a union over a 10-year-old donation to a civil society group—a donation disclosed at the time to the AEC and, indeed, publicised by the AWU, and it was documented in material provided to the royal commission. It was a raid implemented by 32 AFP officers without first seeking the voluntary production of the documents; a raid that occurred in the context of 117 officers at the AFP having been cut and leaving the AFP's ability to investigate crimes like drug trafficking diminished; a raid that occurred when the media were informed in advance, with television cameras waiting outside to document it and the Prime Minister's media unit tweeting along as it went; and a raid at the request of a body established by government, with members appointed by the government, pursuing a referral from the employment minister.
The Prime Minister insists these raids were not political, but does anyone believe they would have occurred if the member for Maribyrnong were not the Leader of the Opposition? These attacks on political opponents and civil society using the coercive powers of state, begun by the Abbott government and continued by the Turnbull government, are reminiscent of the Bjelke-Petersen era. It's Joh for Canberra 2.0, and it's a demonstration of the desperation of those opposite, the paucity of their agenda, the hollowness of the government and the depths they have sunk to so early in this term of the parliament.
Puffing Billy Railway
Horatio Jones's House
Mr WOOD (La Trobe) (19:35): Mr Deputy Speaker Vasta, as an avid trainspotter you'll be greatly interested in my speech regarding Puffing Billy Railway. Puffing Billy, Australia's foremost tourist railway, is located in my electorate of La Trobe and is one of the most popular steam heritage railways in the world. It was completed in 1900. The original intention was that the line would run from Upper Ferntree Gully Station and serve the local farming and timber communities. It was one of five narrow-gauge lines that were opened around the beginning of the 20th century by Victorian Railways. Puffing Billy stopped running in 1953 after a landslide blocked the line between Selby and Menzies Creek, and was formally closed in 1954.
However, in 1955, the Puffing Billy Preservation Society was formed to reopen the line and keep it running indefinitely, and since then it has been kept in operation largely due to the efforts of society volunteers. We thank them so much for their vision and passion to keep the iconic Puffing Billy going. The society aims to preserve and restore the line as near as possible to how it was in the first three decades of its existence, with particular emphasis on the early 1920s. There are now 400 incredible volunteer members of the preservation society, ably directed by John Robinson and the members of the Puffing Billy board of management. I congratulate John, his board of management and the volunteers. It's always so nice to go out there and be greeted by the volunteers. They do such a wonderful job when it comes to greeting tourists who go there each day.
Nearly eight million international visitors come to Australia each year, and an increasing number of those visitors are beating a path to my electorate of La Trobe, in particular to experience the delights of Puffing Billy and the Dandenong Ranges. This iconic attraction has experienced an increase in the number of international passengers by an incredible 65 per cent over the past two years. Most trains start from Belgrave station and travel to Lakeside in Emerald.
When passengers alight at Lakeside in summer or on a nice day, there is a fantastic walk around Emerald Lake and there are so many things for children to do. However, in inclement weather it is very tough for people. When they get off at Lakeside they just stand in the rain; that's pretty much what happens. Hence the decision to build the Puffing Billy Railway discovery centre, with a $5.5 million project announced in the lead-up to the 2016 election. I sincerely want to thank the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull. We all had a fantastic day upon that announcement; I think it was one of his more enjoyable occasions during the election campaign. It was great to see all those volunteers at Puffing Billy and the excitement about this $5.5 million of funding. In total, I believe, the project will cost $15 million.
The discovery centre will enhance visitor enjoyment of Puffing Billy and will provide orientation and reinforcement of the Puffing Billy experience and place this historic railway in context. The discovery centre will heighten the desire to revisit the railway. All the passengers will receive an entry ticket to the centre as part of their fare. It will include exhibits, audiovisual programs, a railway diorama, a cafe and an auditorium. Exhibits will trace the prehistory of the area, the movement of Aboriginal people through the region, the arrival of Europeans and the impact these changes had. I believe they might even have a bit of the history of Ned Kelly, who actually visited the area of Emerald.
This goes hand in hand with something else I've been working on for a number of years, and that's the national heritage listing of Horatio Jones's house in the Dandenong Ranges. Horatio Jones was a First World War veteran whose guests after the war in his house, which he built out of kerosene tins, included Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton, Eugene von Guerard and CJ Dennis, who wrote The Sentimental Bloke. I'm trying to get the house a national heritage listing and am working with the shire at Yarra Ranges. It will be part of a ridge walk from Upwey to Montrose. It is a very exciting project, and this is a very exciting time in La Trobe.
Sutton, Ms Shayne
Jones, Mr Lindsay
Mr DICK (Oxley) (19:40): In my first adjournment speech in the House of Representatives, tonight I acknowledge the service of two great Australians and two wonderful friends. Firstly, I recognise someone that you know, Mr Deputy Speaker Vasta, a Brisbane city councillor, Shayne Sutton, a good friend of mine and a wonderful, devoted councillor for the inner south of Brisbane. For 13 years, Shayne has served as local councillor. She's been a role model as an advocate for the south side and a role model for young women leaders. She was elected in 2004 as the youngest woman ever elected to the Brisbane City Council, and this week she announced that she would be retiring from the council. When she was leader of the opposition and one of the youngest leaders ever in the city's history, I served as her deputy when Campbell Newman was Lord Mayor of Brisbane. It was a difficult and sometimes very personal, trying time when, as lord mayor, Newman played politics extremely hard. After sitting next to her for four years in the council, let me tell you, nothing in this place comes even close. Shayne rose to the challenge with an unshakeable commitment to her beliefs and the people and community she has loved.
Her knowledge as spokesperson for planning and development and infrastructure has kept the council of the day accountable but also led to some great outcomes for the people of Morningside ward and the wider city. As the local state member, Di Farmer, said this week:
Hardly a street, any park or any of the suburbs in the inner south of Brisbane haven't been touched by the hard work and devotion to local issues by Shayne.
Shayne has been a constant source of strength and a support for me personally. I couldn't possibly begin to describe it, but the fact that I'm a member of this House is partly because of her support and unquestionable loyalty. For the rest of the nation, take it from me: never get on the wrong side of Shayne Sutton! Her community has been her second love, after that of her beautiful family. This week, Shayne said:
My decision to retire early was not easy. I have loved and cherished my role as a councillor and I am sad to leave it. But as a parent I know this is the right choice for my family. It also paves the way for a new councillor who can give the people of Morningside Ward the dedication and commitment they deserve.
To her husband, Stephen, and her particularly wonderful children, Sarah and Riley: we're all proud of your wife and mum. Congratulations, Shayne, on 13 years of outstanding service to your community and to the city of Brisbane. Here's to sharing the next chapter of your life.
I wish to also pay tribute to the life of the late Lindsay Jones. Lindsay passed away a few weeks ago and was a lion of the Labor movement in Queensland. Joining the Queensland branch in 1959, for almost 60 years Lindsay Jones was a progressive, positive voice for change in Queensland—a warrior of the left of the party but a much loved figure of the right of the party. There would barely be a candidate across any level of government or a party official in Queensland who hasn't been supported or advised by Lindsay Jones. He served in just about every role within the Queensland ALP, including as a candidate, as an alderman on the Toowoomba city council and as a long-serving assistant state secretary at a time in the party's history that saw the end of the disgraceful Bjelke-Petersen era. Alongside the 1989 victory go the names of Wayne Goss, Wayne Swan and Lindsay Jones. Through the next 25 years, there was no-one better who knew marginal seats across regional Queensland or target messaging or, quite simply, helping Labor people get elected.
I place on record tonight my thanks for the life of Lindsay Jones and his service to good government, his integrity and his unselfish service to others. Lindsay Jones was a powerhouse inside the Queensland ALP. He was an enormous strength and an adviser to me when I was state secretary, and he provided particularly strong campaign support and knowledge to me as a candidate for local government and then for the federal parliament, and also to my brother, Cameron, in his campaigns, enabling us both to become elected. He'd always say, 'Are you with me?' To his devoted wife, Norma, his children and his beloved grandchildren: we are much better because of the life of Lindsay Jones. Lindsay, we will always be with you. Rest in peace, old mate.
Melbourne: Traffic Congestion
Mr ANDREWS (Menzies) (19:44): I rise tonight to highlight once again one of the most important issues for the people of Melbourne and in particular my constituents in the electorate of Menzies, and that is the increasing problem of traffic congestion. It's a concern for people right across the metropolitan area of Melbourne and it's a particular concern for the residents of Menzies. Roads such as Bulleen-Templestowe Road and Manningham Road, and the gridlock that occurs for a couple of hours each morning and afternoon around the Bulleen Heidelberg River crossing and the river crossings at Fitzsimons Lane and Warrandyte, are choke points for the city of Melbourne's traffic flow and major congestion problems within my electorate.
The reality is that for year after year after year, for decades now, the population of Melbourne has been increasing significantly. We see all the predictions that, in the not-too-distant future, Melbourne will become the most populous city in Australia, overtaking Sydney. Yet the reality is that the infrastructure, particularly the road and transport infrastructure of the city, has not kept up with the population growth.
A decade ago, Sir Rod Eddington advised the then Brumby Labor government in Victoria that there were certain major projects of importance. One of those projects was the East West Link. Sir Rod, who advised the Brumby government to build the road in 2008, has basically put the Premier, Mr Andrews, on notice that the growing Melbourne population now desperately needs new routes to combat rising congestion. He recently said:
I think the pressure of traffic will ultimately drive an east-west tunnel in the way I recommended … I think there are real challenges in the east-west corridor.
He lamented that this project has now become a political football. The reality is that, for close to a decade, political parties of both persuasions—both Labor, as recommended to the then Labor Brumby government, and the coalition—supported the concept that we needed this important infrastructure link between the eastern and western suburbs of Melbourne. As Sir Rod said more recently, that is something which still needs to be done. In a recent address, he acknowledged that the western portion of that link was the priority but went on to stress that the eastern part of it was also a priority that needed building and that what also needs building is the North East Link.
Both of these infrastructure projects, the East West Link and the North East Link, particularly affect residents of my electorate because of the congestion on the roads that lead into the eastern freeway roads like Bulleen-Templestowe Road and also the roads that lead to the missing portions of the metropolitan ring road—mainly between the Eastern Freeway and the northern ring road—which causes choke points through Bulleen and Heidelberg, causes a choke point in the morning on Fitzsimons Lane and causes not only a choke point but an endangerment to people should there be bushfires in the area at Warrandyte. These are the missing parts of important transport and road infrastructure for Melbourne, and they particularly affect the constituents of my area.
So the recommendations from Sir Rod Eddington that the North East Link and the East West Link are both priorities, both of which must be completed, are extremely important to my constituents. I will continue to campaign in this place to ensure that both of those links are built and once again to urge the government of Premier Andrews in Victoria to reconsider the East West Link. The proponent of this in the first place, Sir Rod, said recently it must be built. It's a priority, and I will continue to campaign for it.
Minister for Employment
Turnbull Government
Mr BURKE (Watson—Manager of Opposition Business) (19:49): A few moments ago, Senator Cash returned to Senate estimates to advise the Senate that she had misled Senate estimates, not once, not twice, but five times. Five times!
When Labor first asked Senator Cash whether or not her staff—her office—had been involved in making sure that the media turned up to a raid before the police did, she said that she was offended by the suggestion. She ridiculed Labor for asking it. We still decided to raise the issue in question time today. I asked the Prime Minister this question:
My question is to the Prime Minister. Given TV cameras turned up at the sites of AFP raids yesterday before even the Federal Police did, can the Prime Minister guarantee that his employment minister or her office didn't notify anyone in the press gallery before the raid?
The Prime Minister's response was to say that something else was the real issue. So I then went back and asked the Prime Minister a second time:
My question is to the Prime Minister. In his previous answer, the Prime Minister said that Senator Cash had assured him that she did not advise the press gallery of the raids. Did Senator Cash assure the Prime Minister that her office did not advise the press gallery of the raids?
And the Prime Minister refused to answer.
Let's not forget the abuse of power that we are talking about today. The abuse of power that we are talking about is by a Prime Minister and a government on a power trip. What they have done is decided that the most important thing within minutes of this House yesterday having an argument about the fact that 1.6 tonnes of cocaine was something that the Australian Federal Police couldn't pursue because of a lack of resources—the government's response, within minutes—was to notify the media that more than 25 AFP officers had been deployed to seize a document about a donation that was made to an online click-like-to-this campaign organisation 10 years ago. Ten years ago!
But, if we are to believe what Senator Cash has told the Senate tonight, here is the argument: she misled the Senate five times and her staff watched her do it. They then heard the Prime Minister asked the same questions and they did nothing. But hours later, during the dinner break, they said, 'Oh, by the way, Senator Cash, that was me.' That's what we are meant to believe! When the government were calling the media yesterday and saying, 'Oh, there's a scandal happening,' they were right. They were right, and they were it! They were right that there was a scandal, and the behaviour of this government is the scandalous action that's taken place.
And can I tell you that there might be a member of Senator Cash's staff who has just resigned, but the wrong person has resigned. There needs to be a resignation here, because it defies credulity that Senator Cash gave false information five times to the Senate and her staff said nothing. No, no, no! Is it just a coincidence that they waited until after it was too late—after the news programs had finished at 7.30—before this was revealed, and until after it was too late for a motion to be moved in this parliament and a debate commenced in this House? They waited until after all of that. It was just such a coincidence!
This is a government that thinks it owns the Australian Federal Police. This is a government that is willing, with a born-to-rule attitude, to say anything and to do anything. When they come in here and when they make decisions like this, they are trying to intimidate the Labor Party, the Labor movement and workers. Well, be in no doubt: when they come in here, they fight for their jobs; when we come in here, we fight for a cause. And people on this side will not be intimidated for standing up for workers or from continuing to fight for workers, no matter what this government does. (Time expired)
Media
Mr ALEXANDER (Bennelong) (19:55): Tonight I tell a story, a scandalous tale of untruths—perhaps unintentional ones; ones that may perhaps be newsworthy. Were they true? They were not.
Opposition members interjecting—
Mr ALEXANDER: Fear not; I'm not talking about you guys. There is a trend amongst gossip columnists and, of more concern, also amongst genuine journalists to write that I am thinking of retiring. This is not true. I am thinking about our housing affordability crisis. I'm thinking about high-speed rail and how to unburden our overloaded cities. I'm thinking about how to curb our obesity levels and get our young kids moving again—maybe even playing tennis. But I'm not thinking about retiring. It has never entered my mind.
The issue at heart here is the circular nature of unchecked sources. The latest reference to this untruth was a frankly bewildering article, if we could call it such, from The Daily Telegraph last weekend. Amongst some baffling, random warbling, it suggested that I was going to hang up my racquet. I can only presume its source was a different Tele article which had appeared two weeks earlier. Its source might have been The Sydney Morning Herald, where it had appeared before that, or it could have been the Australian opinion column in the Financial Review. In fact, this rumour has appeared numerous times in each of these publications, often just referring to the statements of the other papers as 'sources'.
With enough searching, you can find the source of all these stories. It all started at the beginning of the year in that bastion of journalistic integrity, BuzzFeed. An article appeared on their website devoted to the fictitious topic of my retirement, quoting 'sources'. I'd never heard of BuzzFeed—it was a better world then—but my staff noticed this and asked them to correct the article. When this didn't happen, they called again and again; they're a persistent little group. Eventually a change was made to the article—in the final, 14th, paragraph. They acknowledged that I am not going anywhere and that all previous paragraphs were incorrect. The remainder of the article's assertions remained online.
Now I don't necessarily expect much from online purveyors of listicles or the unidentified sources they quote, particularly sources who clearly have no knowledge of the facts, but it is sad that reporters from mainstream, respectable newspapers have taken their assertions as truth without checking their veracity. I am fully aware that as this is an adjournment debate on a Wednesday night, occupying the same timeslot as The Bachelor, no-one is listening to me right now, save the poor Hansard reporter, who's being paid to listen, and some of my friends across the way. So I'm going to name a few people whose attention I would like, in the hope that this pops up on their alerts: Paul Whittaker and John Lehmann of The Australian, Chris Dore at The Daily Telegraph, Lisa Davies of The Sydney Morning Herald, and Michael Stutchbury of the Financial Review. I have a favour to ask: as editors of major newspapers, please stop your journalists and columnists from peddling this untruth. As gossip goes, it's hardly going to set the world on fire. As fact-based reporting goes, it's an abject failure.
And to all aspiring journalists out there: please take a leaf out of the newspaper which employs Steven Deare—the top-shelf Northern District Times. When Steven heard these rumours, he thought he might have a story here, so he did something that was, so far, unprecedented in the national media: he called me and asked me—and I was able to furnish him with the truth. Steven has journalistic integrity. Be like Steven.
I pride myself on being a most approachable person. If any journalists would like to know my intentions in the seat of Bennelong, please ask before assuming. Please don't print rumours; it debases your fine reputations. As to the rumours themselves, anyone who has watched my career over a number of years knows that I'm best over five sets. I am no quitter; I am here to compete.
House adjourned at 20:00
NOTICES
The following notices were given:
Mr Porter to present a bill for an act to establish the Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse, and for related purposes. (Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017)
Mr Porter to present a bill for an act to deal with consequential matters relating to the enactment of the Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Act 2017, and for related purposes. (Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2017)
Ms Lamb to move:
That this House:
(1) notes that increasingly, employers are getting away with using a small cohort of employees to vote up inferior enterprise agreements, which are then used to reduce the pay and conditions of other much larger and often very different workforces;
(2) welcomes the announcement by the Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations on 18 October 2017 at the National Press Club that a Labor government will ensure that collective bargaining is not undermined by sham collective agreements;
(3) notes that Labor's plan will protect workers from exploitative collective agreements by changing the law to:
(a) ensure that workers who vote on an agreement must be broadly representative of those to be covered by the agreement, which will prevent for example, short term casual workers from reaching agreements on terms that bind permanent workers, and workers in one place from reaching agreements that cover people employed in different locations; and
(b) allow workers and unions to apply to the Fair Work Commission to renegotiate enterprise agreements; and
(4) notes the Government's inaction regarding the use of sham collective agreements.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms Price ) took the chair at 10:00.
CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS
Ryan Electorate: Schools
Ms RYAN (Lalor—Opposition Whip) (10:00): I rise this morning to say congratulations and well done to all of the year 12 students completing their education across the community that I represent today. There are 15 educational institutions offering year 12 studies to students across the electorate, and I know across this week and next week there will be celebrations for us all to attend. Facebook is filled with photographs of young people heading off to school for their last day. What was once called 'muck-up day' has changed its name to 'celebration day' to ensure the behaviour fits the traditions without going overboard. I want to congratulate all of those students on this wonderful effort as well as the school communities that have supported them from preschool through to year 12 and the families that have supported them. I give a special congratulations to those young people on their commitment that saw them see it through. There will be graduation ceremonies. There will be last-day celebrations. There will be valedictory dinners. But, for those people completing the VCE, there will also be an examination period. I know they have been working hard to prepare for it over the year and they particularly will be for the next little while. To their families I say: well done. To their parents I say: keep them well watered and fed over these next few weeks to see them through to the end.
But mostly I want to thank the committed teachers in the electorate of Lalor for the work they have done, from kindergarten all the way through to year 12. I want to thank them for their work and commitment and for the hours they do beyond what is required of them and for the times they sit with students through difficult times, hold them up and push them out the door. For all of the things that they've done for our students, I want to say a very, very big thankyou. I know lots of mums are sharing photographs and waking up this week and going, 'Where have the years gone?' when they look at their young people as they march out the door in their uniform for the last time.
I also want to give a special shout-out today to somebody else who woke up in my community this morning and said to herself, 'Where have the years gone?' And that's my mum, who turned 90 today. I have spoken to her this morning and she said to me, 'I just can't believe I could possibly be 90.' To my mum, I say: lots of love. I wish I was home in Werribee with you. I'll see you on Friday. I'm looking forward to the celebrations with the family on Sunday. I'm so proud to have had you as my mum for my lifetime and I know all of the lives you've impacted on, including many young people in our community. Thank you.
Capricornia Electorate: Schools
Ms LANDRY (Capricornia—Deputy Nationals Whip) (10:03): During the parliamentary break I spent several days touring the north of my electorate and meeting with a number of local schools. Many of the students I met on the trip had visited parliament through the year and it was a great pleasure to chat with them once again. Some who hadn't been to Canberra visited Canberra on a virtual tour, one of the advantages of modern technology. I am informed it was 'very cool'. I met with students at Walkerston State School, where extensive redevelopment is taking place. Classroom and administration facilities are getting a significant overhaul of what are essentially the original 19th century rooms. It is wonderful to see such effort being put into our small schools. Walkerston State School has a long history as one of the region's oldest schools. Founded in 1874, the school has taught generations of local children and always has an eye on its future. These new buildings will be a great asset to the school and its students and teachers. I was proud to deliver on a request from the student representative council for a new set of Australian and Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander flags to replace their well-worn and well-loved set.
I then travelled down the road to Mirani State School, where I met with Principal Bruce Torrens and the year 6 students. It was wonderful to hear about their Canberra trip and how much they had learnt about the federal government. Marian State School was next on the list, where my visit coincided with the school assembly. At Marian, the student leadership runs the assemblies, from setting up the microphone and sound, to putting out and packing away the chairs and MCing the whole event. It was marvellous watching our future leaders run this assembly, and it was a pleasure to see so many students receive their awards.
My next stop was St Anne's Catholic Primary School at Sarina, where I discussed parliament with them, before heading to Marlborough State School. The Marlborough community celebrated their school's centenary on 19 September, a great accomplishment for a small rural town. It was fascinating discussing with such capable young minds the role of parliament, how a bill is passed and how I became the local member. I can certainly see these students becoming future leaders in the community in the years to come. That's why as a coalition government we are providing real needs based funding for our schools, to ensure every student can become what they dream to be.
I am proud to be a member of a government that values local communities and local schools. These kids are our future lawyers, graziers, engineers, tradespeople and leaders of our community, and I look forward to visiting more schools in the upcoming months.
Energy
Mr DREYFUS (Isaacs—Deputy Manager of Opposition Business) (10:06): I recently held at RSLs and community centres in my electorate of Isaacs five morning teas for seniors in my community. Held in Mentone, Mordialloc, Chelsea Heights, Carrum Downs and Noble Park, these morning teas are an opportunity for over-65s in our community to have a coffee, some cake and a chat with their local MP. I've held these morning teas for 10 years now, and, as they do every year, seniors in Isaacs came out in force, with 750 people turning up across the five events. I love these events because it gives me an opportunity to listen to the views and experiences of local seniors as well as an opportunity to thank them for the contribution that they have made to making our community the great place that it is. Most years, most of the people who come to these morning teas just want to have a cup of tea or a coffee, listen to students from our local schools sing and play their instruments, and perhaps have a quick chat about a local issue. This year was different. Again and again, those who came raised with me the issue of energy policy and how the government's failure to implement a coherent energy policy is pushing up their electricity bills.
I wish the Prime Minister could have joined me for these morning teas. He might have learned a lesson about just how smart and savvy the electorate is and why he shouldn't take them for mugs with his bluff and bluster and his hollow rhetoric about energy policy. If he had been there, he would have been told what I was told again and again, that he should grow a spine and commit to action on climate change and the energy crisis, starting with a commitment to implement a clean energy target as recommended by Australia's Chief Scientist, Dr Alan Finkel. He would have been told that, instead of letting energy policy be dictated by the member for Warringah and his muddle of conspiracy theories and misguided culture warriors, Australia's interests—and, indeed, Mr Turnbull's own political interest—lie in delivering downward pressure on power prices and action on climate change.
Energy and climate change policy is a bipartisan issue in most of the developed world. In the United Kingdom, climate change policy has been bipartisan for years. It is long past time for this government to start listening to Australian business and Australian industry and give some policy certainty to energy and climate change policy by implementing, at a minimum, a clean energy target. In the absence of that certainty we are not going to see investment and we are not going to see the price falls that we need in the electricity bills of Australians. That is the message from seniors in my electorate. High energy prices are hurting good, hardworking Australians. And, if Mr Turnbull cannot or will not take action on the energy crisis, if he will not do his job and commit to an energy policy based on science and not conspiracies, he should step aside and let someone else have a go, because Australians deserve better.
Swan Electorate: reSolve: Mathematics by Inquiry
Mr IRONS (Swan) (10:09): Education and mathematics go together, and I rise today to speak on the coalition government's reSolve program. Whilst back in my electorate of Swan, I had the pleasure of representing the Minister for Education at the opening ceremony of the reSolve: Mathematics by Inquiry leading Champions workshops. Science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, education is a key priority of the Australian government. We need our schoolchildren to have the appropriate mathematics and other critical STEM skills they'll need when they graduate. Whether they go on to further study at university or TAFE, take up a trade apprenticeship, as I did, or head straight into the workforce, we know that a strong knowledge of STEM will hold them in good stead and is often critical to their success.
When we finish school we never really know exactly where we're going to end up. As a schoolboy in Melbourne I never thought I'd become an electrician, move to Perth, own a business and then end up here in parliament. So, there is a journey that many of us take to end up in this place or anywhere where we find our vocation. But one thing we know is that a solid foundation in mathematics and appreciation of its power will give our young people the best possible chance in whichever career path they choose to take. The reSolve: Mathematics by Inquiry initiative is just one of the ways we can give them that, and this coalition government has continued to improve STEM education across the country. This initiative focuses on the importance of making mathematics more meaningful, attractive and relevant to students by teaching them how powerful mathematics can be and showing them how they can use mathematics in their own lives and careers.
Key to this improvement are our teachers. The reSolve program is creating learning resources for teachers that will engage all students in mathematics, igniting a passion for the STEM subjects as early as possible. This passion and understanding aims to boost the number of students taking advanced mathematics in their senior school years. The resources from the program will help students learn maths by teaching them the skills to think critically and solve problems rather than to answer questions in a school textbook. The Australian government has partnered with the Australian Academy of Science and the Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers for this project, and they have done an excellent job in leading and managing this important initiative. It was fantastic to hear about the progress of the 28 Western Australian reSolve Champions of the project and to see them so engaged in their workshop activities. I look forward to hearing about more positive outcomes for our students as the program grows to fruition. It was a pleasure to meet with such passionate educators as the teachers and champions of the reSolve program.
I hope every schoolchild has the opportunity to learn from teachers who are as enthusiastic about mathematics at the reSolve Champions are. I also congratulate the Minister for Education on the work he's put into the program, and I'm very proud to be part of a coalition government that is prioritising the education of Australian children through further education of the reSolve Champions. It was fantastic to meet the 28 teachers and to be there.
Marriage
Mr BANDT (Melbourne) (10:12): We never should have had a postal vote on marriage equality, but over the past two months people in Melbourne have come together to stand up for equality. I'm proud to represent a community where we care for one another and where all love is equal. So I rise today to thank some of the people and organisations in Melbourne who've been taking action. Hundreds of volunteers have knocked on thousands of doors. Greens offices have been full of volunteers and supporters making phone calls for a yes vote. To everyone who volunteered and had those important conversations: thank you. Thousands of people have attended massive rallies. I would like to acknowledge the years of advocacy from rally organisers Equal Love, who have been tireless in Melbourne and throughout Victoria in their pursuit of equality.
A division having been called in the House of Representatives—
Sitting suspended from 10 : 13 to 10 : 31
Mr BANDT: Thank you to the Equality Campaign Victorian team based at Trades Hall in Carlton, who, with the broader union movement, contributed so much to the 'yes' campaign. So much support has come from the grassroots. Community members organised postering and stickering, and a mass rainbow chalking is set to happen this weekend.
In Kensington, residents formed a 'Kensington votes yes' group. Residents from the group got together to organise stalls, badges, bunting and hundreds of signs that can be seen at homes around Kensington. You only have to walk down a Melbourne shopping strip to see the community support for equality. Racecourse Road, Bridge Road, Swan Street, Gertrude Street, Smith Street and Brunswick Street are all a sea of rainbow. Many shops are pushing to match the window display of Rose Chong, though her display for equality is, of course, unbeatable.
Bar SK hosted 'Vote Yesk'—an art exhibition in support of equality. Hares & Hyenas has been a community institution for many years and a valued hub for the 'yes' campaign. Loop Bar created a safe space for LGBTIQ people during the campaign, hosting 'queer' events, exhibitions, panel discussions and 'yes calling' parties, and so too has Joy FM been a source of strength and community. I would like to deeply and sincerely thank them for the contribution that they have made to the Melbourne community during this time.
Religious organisations have stood up for 'yes'. St Michael's Uniting Church wants to be the first church to marry an Australian LBGTIQ couple. Many other churches of many denominations displayed their support for equality, and the Richmond Uniting Church responded to vandalism of their rainbow banner with love and a new sign. The Yes Alliance—Multicultural Australians for Marriage Equality brought together community groups from many faith and cultural backgrounds, including many with a home in my electorate.
The cities of Melbourne, Yarra and Moonee Valley have displayed a strong message of equality and so have many businesses, major organisations and big footy clubs like North Melbourne, Collingwood and Richmond. Many people looked out for those who were doing it tough during the campaign, including Melbourne Affordable Psychology in Ascot Vale in north Melbourne and North Richmond Community Health, who offered free counselling sessions to anyone impacted by the postal vote. I am so proud to represent a community that cares so much.
Queensland Government
Mr LAMING (Bowman) (10:33): The great state of Queensland will be making a decision in the next couple of months on who will run that fantastic state economy, which currently ranks fifth out of the eight jurisdictions in Australia on the Commonwealth Bank's State of the States report. This shows how much Queensland has suffered understand a do-nothing, small target Labor administration. I guess there is a truism in politics, isn't there, that a do-nothing Premier usually gets a second term? That is definitely what this Labor administration is banking on in Queensland. They can choose the election date whenever they choose—the fight will occur. You will find that all parties will be very ready to stand in judgement, as will the people of Queensland. They will judge on three things: power prices; jobs for their families; and whether there has been investment in road infrastructure, which is fundamental to the productivity of a great state like Queensland.
Decentralised as Queensland is, its free-standing, strong, thriving regional cities respect and understand the importance of jobs. We will be judging a Labor government that basically switched off the economy on Stradbroke Island to keep the greenies happy. They switched off mining because they couldn't chew gum and walk at the same time. There couldn't possibly be sandmining on Stradbroke as well as promoting ecotourism and Indigenous-run national parks. Do you know what? This great island is capable of being more than just one thing, more than being a scapegoat for Labor's attitude of 'whatever it takes to get a Green preference'.
On power bills, you might remember the famous caricature of former premier Peter Beattie—not a bad bloke—in which his face had been turned into a power point. Well, place that same image on top of the Labor Premier who happily skimmed $1.5 billion out of the pockets of Queensland householders in inflated power bills, which are 30 per cent higher than those in the rest of the country. It is appalling that air conditioners are not able to be switched on. Even more appalling—a bit like a corner store owner who has been ripping off kids for years—is offering to give a bit of the rip-off back and asking to be thanked for it. They reach into someone's pocket habitually and skim off the profits and use it to cover up bloated public servant agreements they have drawn up in order to get more votes and more union members. They are about to be exposed for having done that.
Lastly, investment in roads, which is vitally important, hasn't happened for years. This is a state that has not invested in roads, having had long-term Labor administrations that preferred to skim the money and put it into areas of frivolity for them rather than into necessities for Queenslanders.
Veterans' Homelessness
Ms O'TOOLE (Herbert) (10:35): On Saturday night, 21 October, my family, two staff members, my daughter, my son-in-law, my two grandchildren and I participated in the Veterans Off The Streets Australia Community Sleep Out. We had had heavy rain for the past week in Townsville and it continued on Saturday night, but the sleep-out went ahead, because it was agreed that veterans living on the streets have to deal with bad weather. They have no choice as to where to go, so why shouldn't we be in the same position? My sincere congratulations go to Floss Foster and her team for organising this event, especially given the very wet weather.
Townsville is the largest garrison city in Australia. Together with current serving members, ex-service personnel, veterans and their families, our defence community totals an estimated 20 per cent of the population. The defence community makes a significant social and economic contribution to Townsville, for which we are very grateful. Veterans' homelessness is a growing issue. It is completely unacceptable that we have veterans living on our streets. These are the men and women who have given selflessly of themselves, as do their families, to ensure we enjoy the freedoms we do every day. Current estimates suggest that up to 10 per cent of Australians experiencing homelessness are of the veteran community, and we have 105,000 homeless people in Australia. But those numbers do not take into account those veterans and families who are at risk of homelessness.
The available research provides some insight into the complex needs of homeless veterans, with many experiencing mental health issues and substance abuse problems, as well as disability. Entire families are being affected. I am sure that, if the greater public knew we had young soldiers with war-caused mental ill health sleeping in cars with their wives and children, they would be justifiably outraged, but that is exactly what is happening.
Unfortunately, we have been here before, and there are lessons that can be drawn from the experience of Vietnam veterans. Whilst there were 55,000 Vietnam veterans, there are more than 67,000 contemporary veterans, so the scale of the problem we are facing is much larger. It will only get worse if we don't have the necessary supports we need on the ground in the community. One veteran on the street is one too many. I will continue to work with the local veterans, ESOs and ADF to ensure we provide the necessary supports.
A division having been called in the House of Representatives—
Sitting suspended from 10:38 to 10:50
Ms O'TOOLE: As I was saying, I will continue to work with local veterans, ESOs and the ADF to ensure that we provide the necessary support for these young men and women. As a result of the generosity in our community, I was able to present Floss Foster with a cheque for $1,005, which grew to $1,055, on Sunday, 22 October. Our veterans matter, and they deserve the very best. That includes a roof over their heads.
Boothby Electorate: Brownhill Creek
Ms FLINT (Boothby) (10:50): During my election campaign, I was delighted to secure a $200,000 commitment towards the Wirraparinga trail loop at Brownhill Creek. This was delivered through a Green Army project, and the project has just concluded. Brownhill Creek is a very special part of my electorate. It sits in the Adelaide foothills and contains significant local Kaurna Indigenous heritage and European heritage as well as several endangered plant and animal species. It happens to be where my mum spent a lot of time with her cousins when she was growing up, and it is a short walk from where I currently live in Mitcham. For all of these reasons, it is a place of particular personal and community interest. I'm really lucky to have it in my electorate. In fact, in my office here in Parliament House, I have a beautiful painting by one of my very talented local artists, a lady named Irma Denk, that's called A Brownhill Creek Summer Day.
I'm just one of many people in my electorate who appreciate the significance of Brownhill Creek, and I would like to pay tribute to all of my local residents and community groups who came together on the Wirraparinga trail loop project. I commend the Green Army team, who upgraded two kilometres of the trail and removed seven hectares of woody weeds, assisting in the rehabilitation of the grey box grassy woodlands and endangered species, and improving water quality in the creek. They conducted GPS mapping of the area, flora and fauna surveys and habitat rehabilitation for the southern brown bandicoots, which are also an endangered species.
As I mentioned, my local community groups played a key role in the project. These included the Rotary Club of Brownhill Creek, the Friends of Brownhill Creek, the Brownhill Creek Association, the Mitcham Historical Society and the Mitcham council—and I thank them all. Most thanks, though, must go to the Brownhill Creek residents association, in particular chairperson Professor Wayne Meyer, who lives nearby and works at Adelaide university's Waite campus, and to the community liaison officer, Mr Ron Bellchambers. Mr Ron Bellchambers is a remarkable member of our community. He tirelessly lobbied both me and the community groups I've mentioned for funding and support for the project. His passion for and dedication to the Wirraparinga trail loop and the Brownhill Creek Recreation Park and ensuring a healthy native ecosystem in the area was recognised when he was awarded the City of Mitcham's Citizen of the Year award in 2016. Ron has been and remains crucial to the ongoing success of the Wirraparinga trail loop and the preservation of the cultural significance of the site. At the event in October, the Green Army graduates remarked how Ron would be out there every day with them, rain or shine, to help and provide direction.
I encourage everyone to visit the Wirraparinga trail loop, which is not far from another local icon, Carrick Hill. Together they provide a wonderful, unique tourist and local attraction, combining natural, Indigenous and European heritage.
Fowler Electorate: Cabramatta Moon Festival
Mr HAYES (Fowler—Chief Opposition Whip) (10:53): Last month I had the pleasure of attending the Cabramatta Moon Festival, an event which is held annually and is certainly very significant in my electorate of Fowler. We attracted in that one weekend over 90,000 people to enjoy this wonderful festival. The event was hosted by the Fairfield City Council and provided a wonderful showcase of multicultural Australia, bringing our community together, day and night, with fantastic music, food and various cultural activities for the young and old alike.
I'm very privileged to represent one of the largest Asian communities outside Asia itself. That is a privilege that's given me the opportunity to learn much about the Vietnamese and Chinese cultures. Traditionally the moon festival—or, as it's sometimes called, the Mid-Autumn Festival—is a harvest celebration that celebrates the unity of family and communities as they bring in a bountiful harvest. The moon festival is widely celebrated in China, Vietnam and others of our Asian neighbour countries, and is traditionally celebrated when the moon is at its brightest and roundest in that part of the world, at the height of the autumn climate.
The Cabramatta Moon Festival was celebrated this year with an array of cultural performances, dragon dancing and lion dancing, mooncake eating, amusements and rides. It was a wonderful day for everybody, capped off with fantastic fireworks. The event once again reiterates the importance of nurturing the multicultural nature of this community. Multiculturalism in Australia builds a shared sense of national identity. It's built through mutual respect, common values and a commitment to fairness.
I'd like to acknowledge the great work by Cheryl Bosler from the Fairfield City Council and her organising committee. They do an excellent job every year to put on this fantastic event. It is one of the highlights of my community and an event which very much celebrates our multicultural country and the part of the world we have the honour to live in. I'd also like to acknowledge the work of Superintendent Wayne Murray, from the Cabramatta police, together with Detective Inspector Darren Newman and all their officers in keeping our community safe. As I said, this particular moon festival attracted over 90,000 people, which has significant challenges, but our police rise to the occasion each and every time. Finally, I'd like to thank all the volunteers and sponsors. Without them, this event would not be possible. It was our opportunity to show the rest of Sydney what multiculturalism is really about.
Energy
Mr HOWARTH (Petrie) (10:56): One of the things I love to do in my electorate of Petrie is get out and listen to local people. Whether they're talking about jobs or the cost of living, I love to listen to what they're saying and raise it here in parliament. One of the things they have been talking about, of course, is electricity pricing. They know that electricity pricing in Queensland has continued to go up. Part of that is because Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is using electricity as a secret tax. Let me explain why. When Annastacia Palaszczuk's Labor government came in in 2015, they said, 'We don't owe $80 billion as a state.' They moved some $4.1 billion in debt onto the state owned electricity assets. As a result of that, what's happened? Those wholesale companies have to make repayments—repayments of interest and principal. As a result of that, dividends from those electricity companies have risen substantially. In the last year of the Newman government, the dividends to Queensland were $90 million. In the last 12 months, the dividends to the Labor government have been $378 million—almost four times what they were under the previous Liberal National government. We know that Labor, by shifting debt onto those wholesale companies, has increased the price for Queenslanders. It is unfair for people in my electorate that the Palaszczuk Labor government are using electricity as a secret tax.
We've seen that Queensland has had double the number of spot-price spikes in the last 12 months. It's had the dearest electricity wholesale prices for the first six months of this year. It is unacceptable. The game is up. We saw the Labor Palaszczuk government wanting to offer Queenslanders a $50 credit on their electricity bill, but last night they voted to increase power prices again by a further $200. They lost $200 last night. There was a motion successfully moved by Mr Hart. It says:
This House:
(a) notes analysis of modelling commissioned by the Climate Change Authority that a 50% renewable energy target will cost an average household almost $200 a year; and
(b) calls on the Palaszczuk government to ditch its similar ideologically driven policy that will hurt Queensland families with higher electricity bills.
Shame on the Palaszczuk Labor government. All they want to do is drive up the cost of living for Queenslanders. We're awake to them and we won't stand for it.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Coulton ): In accordance with standing order 193, the time for constituency statements has concluded.
BILLS
Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
to which the following amendment was moved:
That all words after “That” be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:
“whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House calls on the Government to:
(1) abandon its support of the decision of the Fair Work Commission to cut penalty rates because it will mean nearly 700,000 Australians will have their take home pay cut by up to $77 a week; and
(2) legislate to prevent the decision from taking effect to stop Australians from having their penalty rates cut”
Mr BRIAN MITCHELL (Lyons) (11:00): This is a government that has declared war on the working men and women of Australia. Under this Liberal government, Australian wage earners suffer pay cuts and tax rises, while corporations enjoy record profits and tax cuts—tax rises for wage earners, tax cuts for corporations and millionaires. But that's not enough for this government. This government also wants to squash the ability of Australians to act in their own interests in the workplace. It does not want to negotiate fairly with Australian wage earners over pay and conditions. Instead, it wants to give itself and its corporate friends the whip hand, using the power of legislation, the blunt instrument of legislation, to permanently handicap wage earners' negotiating position.
This is a government enacting laws to entrench control in the hands of a corporate elite that believes it is born to rule. The Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 before the House today is a case in point: 80 pages of legislation, introduced to the parliament six days ago, rushed through this place in under a month in order to evade the usual scrutiny. There's been no consultation with the people and organisations most affected by this bill. What we know about this bill is bad enough. But who knows what forensic probing might uncover if the parliament was given the opportunity to examine it properly. It is disappointing that Senator Xenophon, in one of his last acts as a senator in this place, for one reason or another has used his crossbench influence to diminish rather than enhance the ability of the parliament and particularly the Senate to scrutiny the legislation. He has allowed this bill to be fast-tracked through the Senate and he should be condemned for it.
What we know about this bill is that it seeks to hobble the ability of unions to cooperate with employers. It establishes a raft of unnecessary new regulations around workers' entitlement funds, including prohibitions. Unions and employers have for many years jointly created funds that enable things like training, safety courses, bereavement payments, mental health counselling and so on. These are things that help create safer, better, more caring and more harmonious workplaces. So, of course, these things do not fit this government's agenda. The last thing this government wants is unions and employers working together. Industrial peace does not fit the Liberal script. For this government's political agenda to work, unions must be cast as bad, corrupt, evil things to be hated and demonised. It is only by fomenting hate that this government can galvanise its forces. Harmony and cooperation do not work for this government. It needs fear and division, and that is clear in nearly everything this government does and everything this government says on nearly all policy agendas before this parliament.
So, rather than congratulating unions and employers on working together for the common good, and in doing so contributing to historically long levels of industrial peace in Australia, the minister defames these arrangements as 'cosy deals'. No mind that they are transparent and that they are subject to rigorous scrutiny and regulation. No. Just throw out a lazy smear and hope it will be picked up by the tame poodles and minions in the Murdoch press. Never mind that this minister, always so ready to smear unions, had at her right side for a year a man who actually broke the law, and she did nothing. She didn't call in the police. There was no raid on her office, to send him away, shackled and handcuffed. No: she knew for a year he had broken the law, and she left him there—Nigel Hadgkiss, the so-called tough cop on the beat, who broke the law that he was meant to uphold. This minister will go off her rocker in the Senate if a union member so much as jaywalks, but she stayed silent for a year about the head of the ABCC breaking the law when it's his job to uphold it. It is absolute, abject hypocrisy.
This employment minister has done nothing to protect the workers of 7-Eleven and the raft of other rip-off merchants. This employment minister has done nothing to call in the authorities to deal with phoenix companies that go bankrupt rather than pay workers their entitlements. This employment minister has done nothing but smear unions and union members while 28 construction workers died at work this year alone; 28 men and women have died at worksites in Australia this year so far, and what are this employment minister's words? What are this employment minister's actions? Zero—nothing, nada. That is because this minister does not really see herself as an employment minister. She is the anti-unions minister. She doesn't see it as her job to ensure that employers pay their workers fairly or that employers keep their superannuation payments up to date or that employers ensure that worksites are safe. No: she sees it as her job to destroy unions, because they are just so damned inconvenient when it comes to this government's agenda of abolishing secure, permanent work and higher wages.
On that note, I note that the member for Gorton has moved an amendment to this bill on penalty rates. I just can't believe—I still shake my head—that this year we have seen this government back in a decision to actually cut penalty rates—
A division having been called in the House of Representatives—
Sitting suspended from 11 : 07 to 11 : 19
Mr BRIAN MITCHELL: On the issue of penalty rates, we've had the extraordinary situation this year of this government backing a cut in workers' pay. I never thought I'd see the day when a government would rejoice in Australian wage earners having less money to take home to pay the bills. Jannette Armstrong, who heads up the United Voice union in Tasmania, a union that represents hospitality workers, who are very affected by these penalty rate cuts, says this is just the beginning—and we know that's true. She says:
Yes, this is many students, but this is also many, many families who rely on these penalty rates to pay the rent, put food on the table, put petrol in the car and it’s just going to make life so much harder.
We’ve had members and delegates in tears, we’ve had people calling us asking us when it starts, how are they going to go home and tell their families this afternoon that Mum just got a massive pay cut?
It won't be long before other industries and more workers are affected by cuts to penalty rates if we let these cuts stand, and that is why Labor is committed to rolling them back. Families are doing it tough already under this government, and things don't need to be made any tougher. Penalty rates need to be restored.
Mr HAYES (Fowler—Chief Opposition Whip) (11:20): From the outset, I should say that I oppose this Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 but that I support the member for Gorton's amendment. In doing so, I want to talk a little about penalty rates. I know they have taken up a fair bit of airtime in this parliament this year, with the decision of the Fair Work Commission to move to cut penalty rates, effectively for some 700,000 low-paid workers in the hospitality and retail industry.
Unlike in the United States—fortunately, we haven't gone down that path of having to rely on tips—these are people who work for a wage and who work on Sundays. For most of us who can afford to go out and enjoy ourselves on a Sunday or go to a restaurant, we don't even mind paying the Sunday surcharge. By the way—the restaurants I've been to lately still have the Sunday surcharge on even though they have cut penalty rates for their employees under the award. This government had the opportunity to join with the opposition in the private member's bill from the Leader of the Opposition, the member for Maribyrnong, to prevent that from occurring.
It's not just what these workers have had their wages cut by this year; it's going to be what they have their wages cut by again in 2019 and then in 2020. Effectively, these workers will not get a pay rise for some four years. Now, they're not the sorts of workers enjoying the same benefits as we do in this parliament. They don't have a parliamentary allowance and they don't have many other things. They are working on minimum wages; this decision only applies to those workers on minimum wage agreements, therefore, the cut in penalty rates for them is very real. It's what makes the difference for many in being able to put food on the table and it's those little benefits for those who are supporting families and catering for kids in school activities. These are the things that make a difference. People don't just work on Sunday because they feel like they want to work on Sunday or because they've got nothing else to do! They work on Sunday because they know it's the industry and they know they have to do it.
And we know it doesn't stop there. This was the start in enterprise negotiations around the country. Employers are starting to lock on to this; they see this as a negotiable area to try to have workers trade off penalty rates. This was the green light given to them by this government that it's fair game now to try to negotiate with your workers to give away penalty rates.
It's a slippery slope. Working conditions were struck to ensure that workers had a fair and equitable outcome—that they were able to maintain a reasonable standard of living, clearly not to get rich under, for the labour they put in. And yet this government salivated at the notion that we could see a cut in penalty rates and, effectively, a real cut in wages as a consequence. This comes at a time when we have record low growth in wages. It's probably the lowest growth in living memory in wage growth. It has flatlined, it has plateaued: it's not moving—that is, for those at the lower end of the scale.
For those at the top end, we see what is written in the Fairfax media about what happens in the Murdoch press, and we see in the Murdoch press what's happening in the Fairfax media. We know that at the top end of the scale they're getting big contracts. The top five per cent of our workers are doing pretty healthily. They are commanding huge salaries. They're not being held back by restraint. Also, this government is going to give them more through tax breaks. I would have thought it was important for those of us on both sides to look after those who have a pretty constrained voice—people who work for only award rates of pay, people who actually do it tough out there. I think that what goes with the privilege of being in this parliament is the responsibility of looking after people at the lower end of the spectrum.
I know the big attack by this government is on the construction industry. It doesn't take much to get the Prime Minister to rattle off the acronym CFMEU. I accept there can be excesses, and we don't rail against having proper regulation covering both registered unions and registered employer organisations. There is no question about that, as long as it's appropriate. But the construction industry is one of the most dangerous industries in the country. I've got three kids. My eldest, my daughter, is a high-school teacher. My two sons, Nicholas and Jonathan, both work in the construction industry. I know—and it's not what gets spoken about in crib sheds or toolbox meetings—what happens on various job sites.
A couple of years ago my son Nicholas was working in a fly-in fly-out operation in Western Australia. I got a call from him late at night to say, 'Dad, I'm coming home.' The bloke he was working with had been crushed to death. I'm not asserting that anything was associated with that other than a workplace accident, but I thought at the time that if there had been another set of eyes looking at safety—if I had been that man's family, I would have been pretty keen to see that everyone was focused on safety, including those in the union movement that are paid for by employer and employee funds to have occupational health and safety inspectors on site. I know what sort of impact that had on my son, who is an electrician. This man was working with my son and having morning tea with him, but he wasn't around at lunch time. There is a touch of irony to it in that two weeks ago I was talking to Nicholas, who was working on another job, this time in New South Wales, and one of the formworkers fell through the formwork. He was working with his father, who found him unconscious. A couple of weeks later, the kid's still in a coma.
These things happen; they're not just things that you trot out in parliament when you need something to augment an argument. We know these things are real. Those on the other side know they're real. It's not just us in Labor representing blue-collar workers—God knows those opposite have a lot of blue-collar workers in their electorates—who depend on us to make decisions for their welfare. I can't understand how those opposite have locked themselves into a position based on trickle-down economics.
Like many in this place, the other day I attended the launch of a publication by NETWORK, a Catholic social justice organisation, entitled An Economy that Works for All. Its introduction is by Frank Brennan and it is authored by Joe Zabar. I thought I should read it if I have time. Its introduction refers to the social justice statement of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference entitled Everyone's Business: Developing an Inclusive and Sustainable Economy. The Catholic Bishops Conference focused on the distribution of wealth and not only its creation but its use in our economy. I thought it was interesting, because trickle-down economics got a mention. The Catholic Bishops Conference agreed with Pope Francis that trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world have not been proven. That seems to be echoed by many credible economists. They go on to say that, in the 26 years since the last statement they made on this issue, economic growth has been insufficient to assume that the poorest Australians can enjoy a dignified and at least frugal existence. They're talking about the people we should be representing—people at the lower end of the scale; people who do not have bargaining positions; people who are price takers, not price makers. The price makers are the CEOs up the top on multi-million-dollar salaries. These are the people on the bottom earning very low rates of pay, minimum wages, who rely on things called penalty rates.
It's not surprising, I suppose, that this bill is being advanced by the same people who brought us Work Choices. I know, when I look around the room, that not everyone here was in the parliament when Work Choices was introduced under the Howard government. Work Choices was very significant and will go down in Australian history as the first time in Australia that it was legal to pay people below the award rates of pay. Those of us who were around know there were many debates about this. But it wasn't until after the 2007 election, which John Howard lost to the Rudd government, that members opposite who were around at that stage said: 'Chris, we always thought that you guys were just playing a union line. We just didn't think it was true or that it was possible.' It wasn't until they started getting knocked-up and harangued in their own electorates, not simply by blue-collar trade unionists or CFMEU officials but by mums and dads and grandparents who were concerned about what was happening to their kids, that they started taking it seriously. It was no longer just playing with ideology; it was playing with the future of families. People railed against it and they threw a government out because of it.
There is a track record here. This is the same government that abolished the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal. Significantly, the tribunal was about setting rates of pay so truck drivers weren't doctoring their log books and cutting corners but taking their rests, with the genuine view of cutting accidents on our roads and protecting our communities. The government railed against the tribunal and abolished it, and the only reason was that they got a decision they didn't like. They've shown that, even if it's an independent tribunal that does something they don't like, they've got the answer: 'We'll abolish it.' That's precisely what they did.
The government's notion of mounting attacks on the trade union movement doesn't do them any good. They've got to understand that unions are not businesses. Unions are creatures of culture. They're in existence to do one thing—look after workers and workers' conditions. If we didn't have to look after workers' conditions, there probably wouldn't be unions here. But that's why they're here—to prosecute issues on behalf of workers. We're here in this Commonwealth parliament effectively as a union, a union in this parliament. We're here to look after the welfare of mums and dads out there. We're here to look after the interests of all in this country, not simply the corporates, who the government have rushed to give a $65 billion tax cut to in the vague belief that trickle-down economics will have people enjoying unrestrained wealth in this country. There is a concept that pigs might fly. I wouldn't suggest you believe in it, Madam Deputy Speaker Wicks, but obviously your Prime Minister does.
Why is the attack always on the lowest paid; the people at the most vulnerable end of the scale; the people who do not have a great bargaining position; the people who look to us in this parliament to defend them, defend their families and defend their way of life? What the government are putting through with their raft of anti-union legislation doesn't behove even a Liberal government; as a matter of fact, it makes a sham of the name 'Liberal', quite frankly. And this is at a time when in the United States, according to TheAustralian Financial Review, Donald Trump—and he's a person I don't often quote in this place—is talking about tax hikes for the rich, saying they might have to pay more and, if they do, they will. That's not the notion of trickle-down economics. He's going in a slightly different direction, whereas your position is to tax the low-paid and give tax cuts to the rich. It might be different if we were all relying on shares or corporate handouts. If we're going to do our jobs—and we intend to—we will always look after workers and workers' rights, and we will support those organisations that make that their core activity as well.
Ms HUSAR (Lindsay) (11:35): Today I'm very proud to rise in support of the amendment moved to the Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 by Brendan O'Connor, the shadow minister for employment and workplace relations. We cannot tackle inequality or build a better future unless Australia has a workplace relations system that is productive and fair. I emphasise 'fair'.
I am proud of my union membership. I belong to the oldest union in this country. A nefarious ideology, writ large when it comes to reducing union power, is to be shouted down at every opportunity. There has been an abuse of power, the use of regulatory bodies for political gain and a bid to stifle legitimate organisations and their right to act and protect their members. As the member for Fowler just indicated, their interests have been trampled on and stifled, and they have been bullied. This lot on the other side hate unions because they stand up for normal, everyday, hardworking Australians who weren't born with silver spoons in their mouths and who don't pay for private education or private health insurance—everyday working Australian people going about their daily business and trying to earn a living. It is absolutely deplorable that those on the other side seek to reduce the union membership in this country, which protects workers.
Such are the actions of this government, and they include the introduction of this bill last Thursday in an attempt to rush its passage through the parliament. This sets almost impossible time lines for stakeholders to prepare submissions and present evidence. It begs the question: what have the government got to hide and why are they in such a hurry? Where is the proper scrutiny and due process for consideration and consultation on this bill? This is yet another attack by the government on unions. These attacks are relentless. Once again, they are attacking Australian workers and their entitlements. The outcome of this proposed change will limit legitimate activities of unions. Those on the other side of the House attempt to gain, again and again.
Further, the outcome of the proposed changes will limit legitimate sources of income for unions. The Liberals have always been anti worker. The member for Fowler just spoke about the 'Your Rights at Work' campaign. I wasn't around for that—I think I was still in high school—but I am often reminded, out on the streets, when I talk to our union members and our Labor Party members, of how hard won that campaign was. We thought we saw that off, but all we've seen since is Liberal government after Liberal government attacking workers. They are happy to put their hands up for the big end of town, be a massive cheer squad for them and give them a handout, rather than give everyday Australian workers a fair go.
Living standards are what makes this country great—make no mistake. Now they are under significant attack. The government wants to attack workers and their entitlements by making cuts to penalty rates, cuts to holiday pay and cuts to working rights. For the life of me, I cannot understand why low-paid workers are always in the firing line when it comes to this cruel Liberal government. This is how out of touch they are with the lives of middle- and working-class people, the people I represent: the Prime Minister gives millionaires a $16,400 tax cut and gives a $65 billion tax break to big business, yet inequality is at a 75-year high. We wonder why. Actually, we on this side don't wonder why; we know exactly why. We look at it every single day that we are here.
For the benefit of people on the other side, inequality is not peeking over the back fence, looking at jet skis and realising you don't have one. There is stagnant wages growth, and 'wages growth' is an oxymoron when we haven't had any. I'd like to see 'wages non-growth' adopted as your three-word slogan at the next election, perhaps. They want to further undermine workers and their unions, and they have already cut the take-home pay of people across this country. Madam Deputy Speaker Wicks, these workers are people who I represent and, I dare say, people who those on the other side, including you, probably have the opportunity to represent in this place. Considering wages in this country have been stagnant ever since this government was elected, its decision is a kick in the guts to working people who are already struggling to get by. Pay and conditions are not supposed to stagnate or go backwards. We see productivity going up and up and up, and wages just flatlining.
The Prime Minister's press release claims that, through cosy deals with big business, unions have become a big business in their own right and are more focused on making profits than representing people. I don't know about him, but he obviously hasn't attended any union functions lately or he'd know that we are not big business and that the unions do not represent or look anything like a big business. They represent hardworking people and are out defending working rights every single day, not turning it up at silver-spoon lunches and ritzy dinners. After the Federal Court's decision on cutting penalty rates, the minister said:
… Federal Court decision once again highlights the hypocrisy of the Labor Party and the unions.
It is beyond comprehension! We keep hearing about workers being ripped off—7-Eleven and Domino's Pizza. Over the 12 months from June 2015 to July 2016, the Fair Work Ombudsman recovered more than $27 million owed to 11,000 workers for almost 30,000 allegations of Fair Work Act breaches. Who do you think stood up for those people? It wasn't the big end of town that this government seeks to give tax cuts to. It wasn't those people who got a handout and tax relief of $16,400. The union movement was standing up for those people. The astronomical numbers represent only those instances of underpayment and exploitation of workers that were reported to the ombudsman. We hear anecdotally on the street every day about such instances, and my office has certainly been regularly contacted by people who make such claims. We need to stand up for working people and their communities. We need to listen to business concerns, of course, and we need to stand up for a fairer, more equitable, inclusive and prosperous Australia.
Just how out of touch can this government get? The retail trade industry is the second-largest employment category in Australia. It employs 1.2 million people, or one in nine Australians, and 52 per cent of those workers have no post-school qualification. When it comes to my electorate of Lindsay, that equates to over 12,000 people. It is the second-highest employer in my community. The penalty rate cuts are just another milestone in this government's cruel attempts to hurt workers. Labor will never support undermining workers' rights and avoiding workers' entitlements. In fact, we will do the opposite. We will always stand up and fight for them. People need penalty rates to make ends meet. For many people every cent counts, but, if you've never been affected by it, that might be hard to understand. The government has effectively delivered a $77-a-week pay cut to all of those people. For the government, this has been a business decision, but, for the people in my electorate, this is personal. Worker entitlement funds provide for employee long service leave, sick leave and redundancy payments. They provide important services for workers, such as counselling, which we as members of this House also have access to; training; and safe workplaces. All people want is what is fair.
What is even more worrying is that women will bear the brunt of these devastating cuts. We often hear Malcolm Turnbull, the Prime Minister, refer to his lovely wife, Lucy, in terms of 'women hold up half the sky'. I would just like that 'half' to include equal pay for women in this country, not the absolutely shocking wage gap that exists now and the even greater gap that this decision makes. Women are most likely to be working on weekends and covering public holiday shifts. This is not through choice. It is not like they put their hand up and say, 'I'm happy to go to work on a Sunday, miss my kid's birthday, miss the family lunch, miss the family picnic, miss the opportunity to catch up with my kids who are at school during the week.' They do those shifts on the weekend because their families and their lives dictate that it is the only time when they can have the help and support that they need for their children, because, as we all know, child care is out of the reach of many people in this country. Cutting the pay of workers in industries such as retail and hospitality is the worst thing this government can do to worsen the gender pay gap. We know that, when local workers have less money in their pockets to spend, it actually hurts the local economies as well.
When I was at university I had four part-time jobs, two of which paid me penalty rates. I was the first of my generation in my family to go to university. I relied on every single cent from those four part-time jobs—which were all insecure, casual work—to run my car, pay my bills, pay my rent and buy my textbooks. Many people do more than four jobs; many people do more than one job. Without those penalty rates and those extra payments for those unsociable hours that I had to work just to get by, I wouldn't have been able to achieve what I did. From my story, I think it is absolutely important and vital to protect and stand up for people who are relying on those penalty rates every single day.
This government cannot deliver. The proof of the pudding is in the eating—their track record on the NBN; the issues with the Yarra III that we had; the citizenship debacle that we're now waiting on the results of; the robo-debt with Centrelink; the Bureau of Statistics bungle last year in trying to get our census together, which I had almost forgotten to mention; the energy crisis that we've had no movement on for five years; and their failing to do anything at all about alleviating the cost of housing and the unaffordability for so many Australians. Now they're cutting penalty rates. They've just wasted $122 million on a postal poll on equality and people's rights. If this were a report card, this government would be getting a F for fat failure.
Yet now, again, they are coming after the lowest-paid workers. The Turnbull government has no idea about how hard things are for people. From Point Piper over to Penrith is a big distance. I know the Prime Minister knows how to get there during an election campaign by train, but I haven't seen him since. I haven't seen him turn up on the doorsteps of those workers who he seeks to cut money from to say how much he supports and loves Western Sydney, which is a shame. Point Piper is not actually that far in distance, although some people do think they need their passport to come out to visit us, but it is a world away from the different standards of living that those people he represents enjoy compared with the people that I represent.
All this government is focused on is looking after the rich end of town and trusting that it will trickle down. Well, it doesn't. It absolutely doesn't. Trickle-down economics has been myth-busted and fact-checked, and all the experts and economists around the world have said, 'This does not work.' So why are we in here with a government so obsessed with trickle-down economics? We know that more must be done to reduce the gender pay gap, to make industrial relations more user friendly for small businesses, to make the Fair Work Commission easier to access, to create jobs pathways for people with disabilities or people who are marginalised, to tackle discrimination against older workers so they stay in the work force, and to help younger people.
A division having been called in the House of Representatives—
Sitting suspended from 11:47 to 11:59
Ms HUSAR: Cutting the pay of workers in any industry is the worst thing this government could do to the gender pay gap. The government cannot deliver, and so much proof is already in the pudding—their track record on the NBN, the citizenship debacle, robo-debt, and the energy crisis they are failing to do anything about after five years in power. They are also failing to do anything about housing affordability. And there was the recent $122 million waste of taxpayers' money on a survey. If the government had a report card, they would fail. Now we are seeing them come after the lowest paid workers.
We need to be doing more to help younger people enter work in the first place. We need to be doing more to reduce the gender pay gap. We need to be doing more to make industrial relations more user-friendly for small business and make the Fair Work Commission much easier to access. We need to create jobs pathways for people with a disability and those people who might be marginalised, and we need to tackle discrimination of older workers so they stay in the workforce for much longer and continue their contributions. We need to create a future for work, not continue to cut away at workers' rights.
This government isn't focused on helping workers at all. They are too busy saving their own jobs. We saw that at the last election, with the Prime Minister pouring in millions of his own money to protect his own job. The government are desperately trying to distract the public from the fact they have no agenda to address wage stagnation, underemployment, rising inequality or anything else, for that matter. They are failing the average Australian every single day they come into this place. The government are not meeting the challenges of low wages growth, rising inequality and job insecurity.
It is completely unsurprising, then, that, under this government, wages are falling in real terms while cost-of-living pressures are rising and workers are struggling to make ends meet. In my own electorate of Lindsay, we have a three per cent higher cost of living than those people Malcolm Turnbull, the Prime Minister of this country, represents in his electorate of Wentworth. According to the latest data, wages growth in enterprise agreements approved in the quarter fell to 2.6 per cent from 2.7 per cent, a 26-year low. This government has refused to stand up for working people time and time again, despite the many opportunities it's been given. It could not be bothered to lift a finger to assist our lowest paid workers.
Over the last 10 years, real labour productivity grew by 20 per cent and real wages growth grew only six per cent. Wages share of GDP is well below the average of the last 50 years. This country deserves better than a government which puts corporate profits above people's wellbeing. They are arrogant and out of touch. They would rather hand tax cuts to big business than stand up for working people and their hard-won and well-earned pay and conditions. We are very, very concerned that the Turnbull government are incapable, unable and unwilling to address consistently flat wages growth. In fact, they are making things worse by cutting the penalty rates of Australia's lowest paid workers. My constituents are concerned because penalty rates make a real difference to how they live. They ensure that those families who earn them can afford the extra things they pay for out of those penalty rates. They now face pay cuts as a result of this government. They were worried about how they were going to afford fuel to get to work. This means cutting back on their already tight spending habits. I know how tough some working people in my community in my electorate of Lindsay have had it. They've had a gutful of this government's bad decisions.
Mr CONROY (Shortland) (12:03): I rise to oppose the Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 because this is fundamentally an attack on working people in this country. It is an attack on working people's ability to bargain for improved conditions. This represents the latest round of this government's misguided ideological crusade against the union movement. This is a government that has been relentless in its campaign against the union movement and working-class people from day one, while giving out huge tax cuts to the top end of town and refusing to go after the big banks.
The tragedy of this unfair and misguided approach is that the real cost of it is inflicted on working people. This proposal to axe entitlement funds typifies this by aiming to cut essential services such as suicide prevention, OH&S and training schemes simply because they are provided for and protected by unions. These entitlement funds are bargained for by companies and workers in good faith, and they both make sacrifices to fund them. Whether they be suicide prevention programs, training schemes or safety officers, these are crucial aspects of providing safe workplaces and they are under attack in this misguided bill. These funds not only protect those who need it most but boost productivity by improving workplace conditions and worker satisfaction. To cut these programs based on an ideological vendetta with no evidence is callous and ill thought through.
It is no wonder this government do not understand how these changes will affect average Australian workers, because they have consistently ignored opportunities for inquiry and consultation. As has become an all too familiar trademark of legislation under this government, we have seen an unwillingness to consult widely and openly in an attempt to rush this bill through parliament before anyone can pull them up on it. Labor is meeting with these Australians, Labor is listening and the sentiment is crystal clear. This is a shoddy deal for workers and everyone knows it.
These entitlements are helping Australians across a number of industries, with programs that save lives and support families. For example, some of the most successful and well-known products of these entitlements funds are the MATES in Construction and MATES in Mining initiatives, funded by a trust set up by the CFMEU. These initiatives have seen thousands of people in these industries trained to assist in suicide prevention. This organisation, which is a product of good-faith bargaining between employers, trade unions and the workforce, raises awareness and runs programs that target the huge problems of suicide amongst workers in the construction and mining industries. These industries are very male dominated. They are industries that have high workplace fatalities—and I will return to that in a minute. As I said, these industries are male dominated, and blokes typically don't talk about their mental health. That is just a characteristic of most men. So these programs, which train their fellow workers to raise these issues with them, are very, very effective. I recently met with key participants in the MATES in Mining program and they are gravely concerned about the future of this lifesaving program under this legislation. Research into MATES in Construction has found it to be one of the most successful programs of its kind and found that it recoups investment many times over in community benefit.
Other funds also protect workers from redundancy, both financially and through training and professional development, and secure entitlements such as long service leave for ordinary Australians. Why the government would want to attack the providers of such vital services is beyond me. Coupled with the concessions to big banks, multinational corporations and the highest-income earners in Australia, it just reflects how out of touch this government is with the majority of Australians.
Safety is of paramount importance on our work sites. Every Australian and every worker in the world has a fundamental human right to go to work and return safely each day. In the construction industry, almost one worker a week dies on the job. In the mining industry, in the northern coalfields of New South Wales—the Hunter region, which I proudly represent—1,803 miners have lost their lives since coalmining began in 1803. Over the last nine years we have averaged one death a year. This is a disgraceful statistic, and this bill weakens efforts to stop these statistics. This bill weakens the ability to bargain for safety officers on workplaces. This bill undermines the safety of those work sites. This bill hurts safety and impinges on the human rights of Australians to go to work and come back safely.
I know this will be seen as potentially going over the top, but this bill represents an attack on safety in our work sites. Ultimately, the government have to be held responsible for this. The government have blood on their hands. The government have blood on their hands because they are undermining safety in workplaces right now. Members opposite can roll their eyes and can interject all they want, but look at the facts: every bill that impinges on the ability to employ safety officers, every bill that undermines the ability of workers to preserve safety in their workplaces and every bill that impinges on the right of unions to enter workplaces on safety complaints endangers safety in these industries. I proudly state, and I state accurately, that this government has blood on its hands when it undertakes such actions. So I am proudly opposed to this bill, because it hurts safety, like so many other bills this government puts forward.
A second part of their blind persecution of the union movement is their attack on wages in this country. We have international organisations such as the IMF and OECD citing declining union density and collective bargaining as major factors in the stagnation of wages and the growth of inequality around the world. In Australia, this is being experienced right now. The latest data on EBA pay rises found that in the last quarter EBA pay rises rose by 2.6 per cent, the lowest on record since the EBA system was put in place. We have flat or declining real wages, we have workers who are struggling to meet the costs of living because their wages are going backwards, and we have insidious actions by companies, such as the widespread attack on enterprise agreements, assisted by terminating agreements willy-nilly. It is no wonder workers are finding it difficult to bargain for wage rises, if there is a very real danger their EBA will be terminated and they will suffer a 40 per cent pay cut. We are seeing a systematic attack on wages and conditions in this country through a concerted push to de-unionise, and this bill is the latest example of that.
Another example of this is penalty rates. We have seen this government's cheer squad cheering on and refusing to do anything to stop the cuts to penalty rates that have now been put in place. Cuts to penalty rates have hit hundreds of thousands of the lowest paid workers in this country. It is the worst example of trickle-down economics—an example that was totally discredited in the Great Depression—where if you cut wages you suddenly boost economic activity and, somehow, businesses will employ thousands more Australians. This theory, based on Say's law, was discredited in the 1930s, where we saw a 25 per cent across-the-board cut in workers' wages and it didn't improve employment and put Australians back in work. It actually led to more unemployment because it reduced aggregate demand dramatically. When penalty rates for workers are cut, it means they have less money to spend in shops in Australia. The lowest paid Australians have the greatest propensity to consume and the least ability to save, and are living from pay cheque to pay cheque, so they spend basically every dollar they earn. If you attack them by cutting their wages, you are attacking consumption directly, and this is what the cut to penalty rates has done. So, not only is it hurting those workers individually but it is actually hurting our economy by suppressing aggregate demand in the economy and, thereby, employment.
We have also heard the government say that it only affects hospitality and retail workers and doesn't affect anyone else. Well, that's the thin end of the wedge. It will lead, no doubt, to attacking workers in other sectors of the economy.
My electorate is home to a significant hospital, Belmont Hospital. We are right on the border with the John Hunter Hospital, which is the largest hospital between Sydney and Brisbane. It is the third-largest in the state and is the only tertiary-level hospital between Sydney and Brisbane. If you get seriously sick north of the Hawkesbury River, that's where you are sent. Without penalty rates, John Hunter Hospital, and Belmont Hospital in fact, will close at five o'clock on a Friday night and won't open until 9 am on a Monday. Penalty rates are the only reason those hospitals stay open, because it is the only compensation for the nurses and support staff who keep the hospitals running. An attack on penalty rates for hospitality workers will no doubt lead to a subsequent attack on penalty rates for nurses and for support staff such as orderlies, thereby imperilling our health system.
This bill is another attack on the wages and conditions of Australians. It's all about weakening the union movement. This government's raison d'etre is to destroy the labour movement. They figure that if they can destroy the labour movement they can destroy the Labor Party as an effective opposition in this country. This playbook is classic John Howard. He tried it in 1998. He thought that if he could destroy the MUA, one of the most militant, democratic and progressive unions in this country, the rest of the union movement would follow. We saw the lockout by Patrick and a government conspiring to sack a workforce. They conspired to unfairly dismiss an entire workforce to break the MUA—and they failed. They failed not just because of the union movement but because the broad swathe of the Australian community said, 'No, we support progressive causes, we support trade unions in this country and we will take part in community pickets to protect the MUA and its members.' We've seen them attack the MUA and we are seeing the current attacks on the CFMEU that are contained in this bill. You just have to listen to question time every day to hear these attacks. I dare those people who are leading these attacks to go to the memorial day for miners in Cessnock each year—which commemorates the 1,803 miners who have lost their lives in the northern minefields—and look those families in the eye and say, 'I'm improving the safety of your workplaces by attacking the CFMEU.' I can assure you, without the mine workers federation, safety in those coalmines would be a lot weaker.
I can say without fear of contradiction that, if you deunionise the construction sector, you won't see improved safety; you will see fatalities rise. Almost one worker each week in the construction sector dies. So this is not just an attack on the labour movement; it is an attack on the wages and conditions of Australian workers and an attack on the safety of Australian workers. It represents an ideological crusade that takes no prisoners. It is an ideological crusade to deunionise this country, to weaken the labour movement and thereby weaken the Labor Party, and to maximise profits for some of their corporate mates.
Quite frankly, most employers don't want this. Most employers are genuine, decent people who just want to employ Australians, make a profit and support their family. Most of the employers I talk to want a level playing field. They want fair industrial relations, which means they're not competing with the workplace down the road on wages; they're competing on innovation and productivity. Anything like this that invites more shonks into the business, anything that makes it easier for shonks to set up and rip off their workers by not paying long service leave into portable funds, and anything that allows more repeats of the 7-Eleven fiasco hurts legitimate, caring, responsible employers who aren't it in for the quick buck for six months but are in it for decades.
So, like all my Labor colleagues, I am proud to reject this legislation, because we've also charted the middle course. We've always condemned inappropriate behaviour on worksites, whether it's by employers or unions, and that's why the question time behaviour by various ministers is farcical, because we're not out there defending criminal behaviour; we're saying everyone should respect the rule of law in workplaces, but the rule of law has to be fair. It has to not tilt the playing field towards one particular group. It has to allow Australians to bargain collectively to have their rights at work respected, to bargain collectively for decent pay rises to support their families and to bargain collectively to improve the safety of their workplaces so that they preserve the ultimate human right, which is to return home safely from work each day. I proudly condemn this legislation as another egregious attack on working people in this country and, like all my Labor colleagues, I stand opposed to it.
Mr GILES (Scullin) (12:17): The Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 once again demonstrates a bitter irony when it comes to this government's approach to changes in the world of work. We know, as Australian workers know and as their representative organisations—unions and the ACTU—know, that it's time to change the rules which govern power at work. But the government is determined to change the rules to reinforce inequality and inequity, not to address it. At the core of Labor's agenda is confidence in Australians, confidence in Australians' capacity to do more, particularly at work. This government is bereft of that confidence and is further determined to constrain the capacity of Australians in the workplace and around the workplace when it comes to skills, when it comes to schools and when it comes to university.
What this bill demonstrates is that, once again, this government is prepared to put forward its ideological obsession with constraining the rights of individual workers, and in particular the rights of unions to represent workers in workplaces, in defiance of the evidence. On this side, we understand—as international bodies like the IMF and the OECD have made very, very clear—that increasing inequality is a constraint on economic growth. It hurts all of us as well as individual workers, and this bill is just another demonstration of this preference, this determination on the part of the government, to continue to tilt the playing field in workplaces in favour of employers and against working people and their representatives.
So I am very pleased to join my Labor colleagues, and, in particular, the shadow minister, in opposing this legislation and supporting the amendment which deals with a small but very significant aspect of this debate. At the moment, we understand that wages growth continues to be at a record low and the wage share of the economy continues to be in consistent decline. I think this is the problem, and I think we should all take stock of a couple of facts that characterise the Australian economy today. We all congratulate ourselves on 26 years of consecutive economic growth, and that is a significant achievement, but focusing simply on this ignores some deep realities that shape the lives of too many Australians. At the moment, we have record company profits at a time of record low wage growth. This is a gap that we, as lawmakers, should be trying to close, but the government is determined to exacerbate that gap. We see it most obviously in the insane giveaway of an increased push for more corporate tax cuts, and we see it in the continued insistence on further seeking to diminish the rights of workers in their workplaces to bargain.
Today we find that growth is at a 26-year low, the same time span as that period of continuous economic growth for the economy as a whole. That demonstrates, again, why we need to change the rules in the opposite direction from that which is contended by this government and exemplified by this legislation. Wages, real wages, for too many Australians are simply going backwards. Of course, this is wage growth in the formal economy. It doesn't account for those Australians pushed into informal and even more insecure forms of work. Living standards for these people aren't simply under pressure; they are being squeezed. And that's why it's more than a little bit rich to hear the government talk about cost-of-living savings when they talk about their National Energy Guarantee—or national energy aspiration, as it probably should be called—because the big issue with the living costs of Australian working people and working families is this anaemic wages growth. The cost of living isn't just what you have to pay for things; it's the money you have at bank to be able to pay for things, and it is extraordinary that the government continues to ignore this pretty fundamental fact. We need to change the rules to give workers and their representatives more power in workplaces, not less.
I mentioned briefly the amendment on penalty rates. The government's consistent attack on penalty rates is simply abhorrent, and it doesn't reflect the choices that are being forced on too many working Australians: to work antisocial hours and to discount their life to maintain their income. A pretty fundamental proposition that Australian governments of all sides of politics have accepted is that penalty rates are fair compensation for a drag away from time with family and time with friends—the ability to engage in social life and cultural amenity. This government talks blithely, through the Prime Minister, about a 24-hour economy, but has no regard for those forced to pay the price, because there isn't a 24-hour society, is there? People's capacity to engage with family and friends is constrained by working patterns that don't reflect the Prime Minister's confident view of how the economy should work.
In supporting the amendment of the shadow minister, the member for Gorton, I want to make very clear that I'm standing in solidarity with 700,000 Australians who are having their penalty rates cut, having their standard of living cut and having their sense of dignity and sense of agency cut. But I also stand in solidarity with those many, many more Australians who aren't directly affected by the current decision, but whose penalty rates are affected. I know that many nurses, in particular, and other shift workers in my electorate are deeply concerned by the signal that has been sent by an unfortunate decision of the commission and an abhorrent refusal of the government to remedy it. I guess the crux of the problem is this: we have a government that talks about the cost-of-living issues in energy and flicks the problem off to the states, whilst claiming to have fixed the issue, but, in an area of direct legislative competence of the Commonwealth parliament, it does nothing—or, in this case, it does less than nothing.
I think it is worth touching on some particular features of the bill that is before us now. This bill is a product of the Heydon royal commission—although, as is always the case with this government's law-making, it is important to be careful and test the claims. The claim here about it being a response to the royal commission is one that I think will be found wanting and, I suspect, is one of the reasons for the appalling failure of process which governs the introduction of this piece of legislation. The bill before us deals with matters that are quite technical—matters that actually do require this government, if it were serious, to attend to a problem. Perhaps we can come back and ask what problem this legislation is intended to solve. Unfortunately, we don't seem to be assisted by government member contributions to this debate, which is of itself rather telling. This bill would make very significant technical changes to entitlement funds, which play a very significant role in many industries. These are issues which, if there were matters to be addressed, should be properly ventilated through a Senate inquiry process. Instead, here we are in the Federation Chamber debating a bill—or perhaps not debating a bill but putting on the record—
Ms Bird interjecting—
Mr GILES: Yes, as the member for Cunningham says, there isn't a debate here. It is disappointing that, once again, government members aren't here to show the courage of their convictions, are they? So we are putting on the record our concerns about this bill, and we do so at two levels. When we look at the government's broad attitude, there is its failure to respond to fundamental changes in the world of work which are disadvantaging workers, at a time when corporate profits are at a record high and at a time when the Treasurer adds insult to injury by mouthing words like 'inclusive growth'. If you want inclusive growth, how about looking to workers? How about looking at recasting the distribution of the national pie? How about paying some attention to those levers available to the federal government which can redress the imbalance of power and which are not only constraining the ability of individuals to earn an income but also constraining our wider prospects of economic growth and, with it, doing untold damage to communities and to our society?
This bill imposes a range of additional restrictions on the governance of entitlement funds and imposes further restrictions on bargaining, which is precisely the opposite of the approach that we should be undertaking. I hope that members opposite, if they're not going to participate in this debate, would have regard to the contribution of the member for Gorton at the National Press Club a couple of weeks ago, where he looked squarely at the questions that confront Australian workplaces and the Australian economy and set out some proposals that would address the problems. The member for Gorton was very frank in doing so, because he conceded that in our last period in government, in responding to the aggressive, antiworker, anti-union, anti-democratic Right agenda of the Howard government, we didn't pay sufficient regard to the changing nature of work in Australia—in particular, how a model of bargaining which initially served all Australians pretty well in the 1990s was losing pace with the demands of the modern economy, particularly the changes in the structure of work. The member for Gorton accepted that. He pointed to some examples, and some of those were around termination of agreements—in particular, at Murdoch University. There we have an attack on working people that not only is the government simply ignoring but the Minister for Education is encouraging other employers in the sector to follow. It's pretty clear that that is no way to deal with slow wage growth—quite the reverse. It's going to further depress wage growth, to no-one's benefit.
So here we have a bill that is all about imposing further prescriptions, a series of red-tape obligations, on important bodies. Again I recall at the start of the last parliament the great excitement that government members put on about their red-tape reduction exercise. Well, it's interesting: when it comes to their other ideological hobbyhorses, too much red tape is barely enough. Every week we get an amendment to the Migration Act and every week we get an amendment to the Fair Work Act. Those amendments are really all about doing one thing, which is constraining workers' ability to collectively exercise their rights and secure themselves decent outcomes.
I was really pleased to be in the chamber for the contribution of my friend the member for Shortland. He dealt with a critical aspect of this debate that is too often ignored in the wider commentary, and that is the impact of these imbalances of power that are being codified in legislation on workers' safety. I would have thought it a pretty unexceptional statement, for anyone who's concerned for their fellow Australians, to set out the proposition that anyone who goes to work is entitled to return home safely. It is simply appalling that this government is determined to strip away the capacity of workers to attend to that on their own behalf and on behalf of their colleagues and comrades in workplaces.
But no, this legislation is simply a reheat of tired ideological obsessions. They've found another device whereby unions have been able to offer some protection to workers in difficult times and have done the right thing to redress particular imbalances of power. But, again, the response isn't to recognise this or to look at how it might have broader application to deal with this fundamental problem that's characterising the Australian workforce and the Australian economy at the moment. It's simply to carry on down this blinkered ideological path of further constraining workers' rights and doing everything they can to deny unions their legitimate, democratic capacity to carry on their roles on behalf of their members.
Coming to the end of my contribution, I want to again raise this fundamental point: what is the problem that this bill is responding to? I thought members opposite were interested in leaving things alone from government, but instead they seem to simply want to interfere. We on this side of the House know that the time has more than passed to address some of these imbalances of power in the labour market. We do need to change the rules, but we need to change the rules to do the right thing by workers, to strengthen the capacity of unions democratically to work for them—not the reverse.
Ms BIRD (Cunningham) (12:32): Time after time I find myself frustrated, bemused and quite often angry about the range of legislation that comes before this chamber when those opposite are in government. I spent my first term at the end of the Howard era among the infamous industrial relations changes around Work Choices. Quite rightly, there was not only a union driven campaign but also a community supported campaign rejecting that dog-eat-dog view of how industrial relations should be managed and regulated in this country. But we now see, under both the Abbott and Turnbull prime ministerships, continuing, ongoing—time and time again—pieces of legislation that, at their heart, are about one thing, and that is destroying the capacity of workers to unite through a formalised union in order to raise issues in a workplace where they don't have the balance of power.
At the heart of it is what sits at the heart of the Liberal and Nationals parties: a belief that only those who can break through that dog-eat-dog world and make good for themselves are deserving of decent pay conditions and a decent lifestyle and that if somehow you can't do it on your own then that's a reflection of you individually, rather than having an understanding of the way our society is structured. It often means that power is enormously twisted to one side of the equation. We have known for generations that those who own the workplaces, those who are putting the money into those workplaces, have an enormously stronger capacity for power than the workers who work in those workplaces.
It's a very simple function of a decent society that those workers are able to organise, to elect union representatives to represent them and to work in a concerted, united manner not only to improve their pay and conditions but on issues such as health and safety. We supposedly don't have a conservative party in the Liberal Party. They're supposed to be a 'liberal' party. They're not supposed to be out there on the far-right-wing fringes of the political spectrum. But on some of these issues—to be honest, on so many issues in general in recent times—they're taking themselves off to that far-right wing.
Like many of my colleagues, I meet regularly with my local unions. I meet regularly with the South Coast Labor Council. I also meet with my business chamber. I meet with other peak bodies around the electorate that represent a variety of views. I would be very surprised if any of those opposite had regular meetings with trade unions in their local area. I would never consider ignoring the views and issues of my local business chambers. I wouldn't even consider it. I wouldn't consider spending all my time in this place attacking their right to be peak groups representing the views of their memberships. Yet so often those opposite do exactly that with the trade union movement. Of course we'll have policy differences. We are born out of the trade union movement; we were born out of the fact that trade unions realised they had to have a political voice as well as an industrial voice. Those opposite, according to how often they say, 'Put your hand up if you've been in business,' have obviously been born out of the view that the business and investment sectors need a voice in parliament too. That's fine. But if those opposite want to be effective they should make sure they're engaging with and respecting the role of all those institutions in our society.
We are seeing growing inequality. We are seeing stagnant wages. We are seeing greater exploitation in the workplace. We are seeing an increasing number of deaths in workplaces. There are real challenges for us in what's going on in our economy and in the workplaces of Australia. If we were serious about creating a society that shared wealth fairly, that understood that the people not getting their fair share weren't just workers but also consumers—and that's what our great social experiment in Australia for over 100 years has been about; we've built up a middle class who have gained the capacity to be effective consumers because they've had good pay and conditions and safe workplaces, and these things complement each other—we would be addressing these issues. We would be looking at why these things are going astray in our current environment. But, no, we're back here with another bill that's about micromanaging the unions, about trying to put handcuffs not only on their capacity to represent, advocate and negotiate and be political but even, in this case, on their capacity to work cooperatively with employers on the sorts of things one would think they both had a common interest in. Employers obviously think they've got a common interest in these areas, because they've often jointly funded, with the unions, things like counselling, preventing suicide in workplaces, and the health and wellbeing of workers. I'm absolutely bemused by the ideology of those opposite—that they could go to this level of attack on unions simply to handcuff their capacity to work effectively on behalf of working people, and, in this case, as I said, in a type of activity that unions undertake in partnership with employers because both see the value in these sorts of programs.
In the Minister for Employment's press release on this bill, what did she say? She said:
Through cosy deals with big businesses, unions have become a big business in their own right, more focussed on making profits than representing people.
If I ever believed she was the least bit interested in unions' capacity to represent people, I might have some sympathy for what she was trying to say. She doesn't. She never does. She has no respect for the trade union movement's capacity to represent people. It is a constant ongoing attack. I can't even imagine what those opposite would be doing. They certainly wouldn't be completely absent from the debating list, as is the case with this debate. Other than the minister's speech, I think there have been hardly any contributions from those opposite.
But I can imagine what would be happening in this place if we were in government and introducing bill after bill like this but trying to hobble the capacity of peak employer organisations to prosecute a case, run campaigns, implement programs and raise funding in order to progress the wellbeing of their members. Forget calling us socialists—they'd be calling us communists and dictators. That's the sort of reality we'd be facing if we tried this sort of stunt on people who form organisations and peak bodies in order to advocate and represent employers, whether they're big business, like the Business Council of Australia; particular industry sectors, like the Australian Industry Group; or small businesses, like COSBOA. If we were trying this sort of stunt and treating those organisations with the arrogance and disrespect that this government shows to the trade union movement, there would be a riot on the other side of this place. I personally am sick and tired of the double standards that this government has about the capacity of people in our civil society to form membership based organisations and advocate on their own behalf. They would not tolerate it if we did that sort of thing, nor will we tolerate it when they decide they're going to do it to trade unions.
The other problem I have with this bill before us, as is too often the case, is that it appeared last Thursday on the list. It's an extensive piece of legislation—five schedules going to 80 pages. It will amend five different pieces of legislation. One would think that something this significant should be given the respect of a proper and considered debate in this place. It has very significant implications, as I've outlined, not only for unions but, as I indicated, also for employer groups. You would think they would want to be able to have some say and some input into this process.
I actually think that the sort of work that this bill attacks is some of the best stuff that I've seen in workplaces. I've spent time with things like MATES in Construction—a fantastic organisation that works with unions and employers around suicide prevention. Some of the best things that happen in our workplaces are the things that employers and unions do together, because often they're going to the heart of very challenging social issues, things we're facing as a society, that are coming into workplaces and really seriously need addressing. That's often when employers and unions come together and say, 'We have a common interest in this so let's jointly fund, organise and run these sorts of programs.'
It is true, sadly, that mental health challenges are a serious matter for workplaces now. I remember talking to a peak body of hairdressers when we were in government and I had responsibility for skills. The one big issue hairdressers wanted to talk to me about was mental health—young apprentices coming in with complex anxiety and depression issues. This is not a one-off. It's a really common challenge for this generation. As employers they were not just worried about that as a productivity issue, about how it was impacting on the work in their workplace and about that young person's capacity to finish their apprenticeship but also, like the vast majority of employers, deeply concerned about these young people and wanted to know what they could do as an employer to help in those circumstances.
This is the reality of workplaces in the modern world. These sorts of programs should be supported. Employers who engage in them should be lauded for doing that; unions that engage in them should be lauded for doing that. It is astonishing to me that the government is so hidebound in its hatred of unions that it can adopt the sorts of measures that we see before us in this bill, and do so in a rushed and hurried manner without proper consideration. I'm very disappointed that the Nick Xenophon Team didn't support our proposal to have a Senate committee inquiry, because I think these really important issues should be teased out and considered.
In the couple minutes I've got left to speak, I want to touch on some of the matters that are playing out in my local area that, if the government were really interested in workplaces, they could be spending a lot more time on. I want to touch firstly on the issue of penalty rates. It has been a big issue in my electorate. I recently surveyed my electorate on issues of importance to them and had a very strong response back on the issue of penalty rates. While the vast majority of people who responded to my survey didn't actually work in an environment where they received penalty rates, 80 per cent of them supported people getting Sunday penalty rates. Even people who weren't getting these rates themselves saw fairness and justice in people who lose their Sundays being recompensed, getting that additional support, yet the government flat out refused to take any action to ensure that people continued to get decent pay—even though, apparently, they've now discovered there is a problem with pays and incomes and perhaps we should have higher pay rates.
Finally, I want to give an example of why unions are so important at the local level. In my area, the South Coast Labour Council for quite a while has been running a campaign around the exploitation of young workers. A young woman from the University of Wollongong had put up a post on her Facebook about a very exploitative experience she'd had in the workplace and was just blown away by the massive number of young people who went on her Facebook and commented, having had very similar experiences—not being paid, being underpaid, being exploited in terms of their work conditions. It was quite shocking. The South Coast Labour Council became aware of this and then worked with these young people—Ashleigh Mounser was the young woman from the university—to start a campaign to raise awareness. It is true that some of the employers didn't intentionally get things wrong, but it was so unregulated and so unchecked that terrible exploitation went on. If the government wants to spend its time on something useful, I suggest it could spend it in this space.
Ms LAMB (Longman) (12:48): This is getting quite ridiculous. It seems every second day I'm up on my feet in parliament speaking against a government attack on workers and on the trade union movement. It is bordering on ridiculous. But pathetic attacks like these are all that a pretty desperate government seems to have up its sleeves. They have no vision; they have no plan. It seems that this is what we're stuck with—attack after attack on workers or the trade union movement. There certainly is no action or policy that will help move Australia forward. If we don't hear, 'Blame Labor, it's Labor's fault', we hear, 'Let's blame the trade union movement, let's blame workers.' This blame game has to stop. It's a game the Liberals keep playing; it's getting quite tiring and it has to stop. I know I've had enough of it, and I think Australia's has had enough too. I think you'd be hard pressed to find an Australian who wouldn't rather have their government just stand up and govern. People are sick and tired of this. I think they want their government to stand up, take a little bit of responsibility and show a little bit of integrity. That would go a long way. But, with this government, even that appears to be too much to ask.
Despite having led the country for some years—five years is not a short amount of time—the mess they've created seems to be somebody else's fault. Apparently even the failed NBN, their failed NBN, is Labor's fault. Can you believe that? The second-rate copper NBN, which the coalition fought tooth and nail to implement over our superior policy, is somehow Labor's fault! It's outrageous. They are fooling nobody, but this is what they continue to parrot about.
How about this week in the Federation Chamber? I'm glad the member for Boothby is here. She attempted to lay the blame for the collapse of the Australian automotive industry on the trade union movement. Here was a government member again blaming the trade union movement for something. It was truly, truly ridiculous. What a blatant attempt by the member for Boothby to distance herself from the failings of her government. It's pretty common knowledge right across Australia that the collapse of the Australian automotive industry can be directly linked to the actions of the Liberal government. In true Liberal fashion, rather than showing some integrity, she sought to blame—guess who?—the unions. She sought to blame the unions, the very people who fought against the Abbott government's foolish mismanagement of the manufacturing industry, the very people who fought to keep this industry alive and who fight to keep many industries alive. They are the very people who fought for and won annual leave, sick leave, long service leave, pensions, Medicare, superannuation—where shall I stop? I say to the member for Boothby and to the government: I'm sure the trade union movement would welcome and accept a letter of thanks for all of those things that I'm sure the member for Boothby and other government members have enjoyed themselves and which their constituents as workers of this country enjoy every single day. I'm sure they'll look forward to that letter.
But, instead, we've got a government in crisis mode, a government that are going down and that will stop at nothing to drag everyone down with them. The government's actions are so desperate. The government are demonstrating an inappropriate use of taxpayers' money. But it's clear to see why they're doing it, of course. They're doing it in an absolutely pathetic attempt to shift the blame from their misdoings and at the same time malign the unions who stand up to them when they attack workers. With a government so determined to undermine the rights that Australians—their constituents and my constituents—have worked so hard for, it seems that unions have to stand up to them pretty regularly.
It really comes as no surprise that we're here again today—as I said, this is bordering on ridiculous—debating yet another bill that this government has introduced in yet another desperate attempt to undermine workers in the trade union movement. This bill, the Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017, is not just an attack on unions; it is an attack on every worker in this country. This bill has very significant implications for anyone who benefits from their entitlements being protected through a worker entitlement fund and anyone who benefits from the counselling, training, OH&S and other support services that those funds invest in. A worker entitlement fund is a fund which is for the purpose of paying out worker entitlements and death benefits, like leave payments, payments in lieu of leave, payments in relation to termination of employment—any payments that contracts, awards or agreements provide for an employer to make to an employee. This bill puts additional requirements on those funds.
From a party that once claimed it wanted to cut red tape and government intervention, this looks a lot like a government intervening and actually adding red tape. That's what it looks like to me. The coalition really doesn't care about any of the outcomes of this bill except that it wants to be an inconvenience to unions. That's why it's so foolhardily rushing this bill through. Why else would it so carelessly deny proper scrutiny, proper discussion and transparency with stakeholders before introducing this into parliament?
When you think about this rushing the bill through, it's pretty clear that—with the support of their ever-faithful crossbench comrades, Senator Xenophon and his team—the Liberals have denied calls to conduct a thorough Senate employment committee inquiry into this legislation. Instead of carefully considering the implications of this bill and what effects it would have on workers, what effects it would have on business and what effects it would have on the Commonwealth; instead of looking at this through a really clear lens and actually scrutinising it, they have imposed a reporting date of 10 November 2017. That's just over two weeks away. There are 80 pages to scrutinise and we've been given two weeks.
In typical Liberal fashion, they are blinded by union-hating rage. It's typical. 'Cover your ears and put your blinkers on.' That's what we have come to expect from this government. How can stakeholders and any affected business or employer groups properly prepare a submission and evidence with a deadline of just two weeks? Eighty pages in two weeks? How can you properly do that? The simple answer is you just can't. You can't possibly do that. But that's exactly what this government wants, isn't it? They don't want the opportunity for this to happen properly. They don't want any interjections and they don't want anyone disparaging their plans, whether that's justified or not. It appears that this government just don't like being told what is wrong and they just don't like being held to account.
Accountability and transparency are the hallmarks of good governance. They are the foundations of a respectable parliament. But it appears to me, again, that the Turnbull government wants none of that. It appears—it is very evident, actually—that the government's intention with this bill is to undermine and erode the rights of all of Australia's workforce. This is a government for the top end of town, not for ordinary Australians like those who live in my electorate of Longman and who will be affected by this bill. This government is not for the ordinary people of Longman, who have been attacked time after time after time by reckless legislation that only benefits those who actually don't need it. I'd love to hear any member of this government try to explain to the vulnerable people of low-income Australia just what they're doing to help them in any way, shape or form. I'd love to hear it, but I suspect it would be a pretty short list.
An honourable member interjecting—
Ms LAMB: Yes, a 50c list—if that. In comparison, Labor's list is pretty long. Labor's list is comprehensive. It's fleshed out and has been fleshed out for a long time. This government has been in power for four years and is now in its fifth year, and it still hasn't formulated any strong policies that will benefit all of Australia. You will remember that Labor went to the last election with 100 positive policies. We showed Australia that we weren't just here to fight in parliament. We showed Australia we were listening to ordinary people all around Australia, to Australians from all walks of life, because everyone deserves a say. We heard from people—and we continue to—and we formulated strong policies that we took to the election. Since then, we've continued to build upon them. We know what Australian people want, and it's not what this government is offering. It's not huge cuts to the taxation rates of millionaires and it's not throwing billions of dollars at corporations or banks. It's policies that protect ordinary, everyday Australians. That is what Australian people want. It's policies that protect workers in Australia, the people who are the backbone of this nation.
Australians are sick of the wars that the coalition keep waging on workers. They are sick of them. They know that they serve no benefit to the Commonwealth and they serve no benefit to the Australian people. Australians know that cuts to the take-home pay of ordinary Australians is a terrible idea. These are cuts to the take-home pay of people who work weekends and nights, people who work unfavourable hours, and give up time with their families. Australians know that you don't cut the take-home pay of those workers. You'll remember the member for Gilmore saying this was a gift to young people. A gift—to cut their take-home pay? She can keep that gift, that's for sure. She might have called it a gift; I reckon it's a lump of coal. We know that those opposite have a real affinity for black coal! But the people of Australia would rather have the money they so badly need and that they work really hard for. It is money that puts food on the table.
On the same note, and to pick up on another area, the Australian people also know that PaTH internship placements make absolutely zero sense. They see straight through that as well. They know that if a business wants to employ someone—you know what?—it goes ahead and employs them. If you've got a job vacant and you want to employ someone, go ahead and employ them. This government doesn't need to throw thousands of dollars at businesses just so they can get free labour.
People know that tax cuts for big businesses are an absolutely terrible idea. The national debt is sitting in such a terrible position, thanks to this government's economic mismanagement. How could anyone in their right minds justify $65 billion worth of cuts to big business? What an absolutely ridiculous idea. The more I talk about it, the more I realise just how strongly this government have taken a side. They have turned their backs on workers and they're staring up at big business, and that just isn't right. It's not right. From this government, in bill after bill and motion after motion, there is never any reprieve. It's attack after attack on Australian workers and handout after handout to big business. I oppose this bill. It is, plain and simple, an attack on the services that unions provide to workers. Workers don't deserve this. They deserve more, and I will be standing up every single day opposing this bill.
Debate adjourned.
Sitting suspended from 13:02 to 15 : 58
Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
to which the following amendment was moved:
“whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House calls on the Government to:
(1) abandon its support of the decision of the Fair Work Commission to cut penalty rates because it will mean nearly 700,000 Australians will have their take home pay cut by up to $77 a week; and
(2) legislate to prevent the decision from taking effect to stop Australians from having their penalty rates cut”
Mr ZAPPIA (Makin) (15:58): The Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 is another coalition attack on workers and unions. Coalition governments have never been friends of unions—or workers, for that matter—but their attempt, since 1996, to destroy unions has been unprecedented. It began with the waterfront episode in the late nineties involving the Patrick Corporation and Howard government minister Peter Reith. Then there was a royal commission into the building and construction industry, otherwise known as the Cole royal commission. That was followed by an interim building industry task force, which, by 2005, had become the Australian Building and Construction Commission. But that was not sufficient for the coalition. So Work Choices was created, with its real objective being to weaken workers' rights, drive down wages and, most importantly, cripple unions.
The Howard government underestimated the Australian people, and John Howard not only lost government; he also lost his own seat in parliament. I think he was the second Prime Minister that that ever happened to. Again, that is a good example, just like the Patrick Corporation fiasco, of how Australian people will not be fooled. They can see politics when it's being played by whichever side of politics is playing it. They can also see unfairness when it's being perpetrated on the wider community, again regardless of who is perpetrating it. Most people understand common sense, decency and fairness. If that wasn't enough, in the aftermath of the 2007 federal election, as opposition leader, the member for Warringah said Work Choices was 'dead, buried and cremated'. The member for Warringah may well have been right in his reference to the term 'Work Choices', but the coalition ideology of being anti-union is as strong as it ever was.
When Labor was elected in 2007 it put an end to Work Choices and it abolished the ABCC. By contrast, after being elected in 2013 the coalition government's agenda of priorities was to set up another anti-union royal commission—they had had one only a decade earlier, but they needed another one—and to reinstate the ABCC. But that was not all. Every opportunity the Abbott-Turnbull government has had since to weaken unions, it has run with. We saw examples of that with respect to the use of 457 visa holders working in Australia without labour market testing. That was nothing less than an attempt to undermine Australian workers. We saw foreign-flagged ships being allowed to work in Australian waters—we have legislation before the parliament right now to do just that. The real purpose of that is again to weaken Australian workers in the industry and, by weakening them, to weaken the unions. We've seen the use of backdoor methods, such as the registered organisations legislation, to control unions as well. There are examples of that happening right now, as I speak.
Still not satisfied, the coalition now has this legislation before the House. It is simply another attempt to strangle unions. The government claims it is implementing recommendations of the Heydon royal commission—a royal commission that was set up by this government for a very specific purpose, and we know what that purpose was. The real objective of this legislation and of every other anti-union move of the Turnbull government is to weaken the Labor Party by weakening the unions. That is their real objective. Their philosophy is: if we can weaken the unions, we will in turn weaken the Labor Party, who are our strongest opposition on the political landscape.
Indeed, I suspect the car-making industry was killed off by this coalition government because it was a major source of union membership. Killing off the car-making industry, with 200,000 workers across Australia—mainly union members—is a severe blow to the unions in this country. I don't for one moment discount the real motive behind that, because no logical scenario would have you believe that this coalition government couldn't see the economic stupidity of bringing down the car-making industry. In fact, a former minister in their own government, Nick Minchin, strongly advocated for the car industry and believed that the decision of this government to turn its back on the industry was a foolish one. I agree with him. That was a person who was putting the national interest first and not ideology. I have no doubt that the previous minister for industry in this place, Ian Macfarlane, also understood the value of that industry. That's why I believe—I have no evidence—from my analysis of comments he made and my discussions with him, that he was, indeed, supportive of the industry. But it is not to be.
This legislation, as I said, is another attempt to control unions. The minister, in his second reading speech, said, 'The bill implements 10 recommendations of the royal commission aimed at stopping corruption, coercion and financial mismanagement,' and, 'There is no place for this sort of bullying and coercion in the workplace.' Labor do not condone bullying, coercion, corruption and financial mismanagement. We never have, and we never will. But we believe there are already mechanisms available to authorities to ensure that, where bullying, coercion, corruption and financial mismanagement occur, actions can be taken against those who deserve to be investigated and, if necessary, prosecuted.
In fact, only yesterday in question time the Prime Minister, in response to a question, boasted about the number of cases currently before the courts in which union members are being prosecuted for breaches. The list is quite long. There are quite a number of cases, and they were reported widely in the media as well. All of those prosecutions, charges or alleged misconduct matters were brought to the court under existing laws, and there is ample scope, whether through our police forces, through the ABCC or through the Registered Organisations Commission, to take action if they believe action is warranted. So we do have the ability to deal with the matters that the minister, in his second reading speech, says this legislation is seeking to address.
My view is that this is simply another way of saying: 'Well, we have all these other mechanisms available to us, but they are not sufficient'—because, quite frankly, in most cases the charges and accusations are frivolous—'so we need to find other ways of stopping this. If we can control the way they manage their funds, that will also serve our purpose, because then obviously we will control their activities. And if we control their activities, they will not continue to be a thorn in our side,' which is what this is all about. It's not about justice or a need to do anything.
This legislation was referred to a committee for inquiry. I understand that the inquiry is meant to report on 10 November. Given that we are now almost at the end of October, that doesn't give the committee a great deal of time to seek submissions and listen to representations and then report back to parliament. But, with the support of the Nick Xenophon Team, the inquiry is now scheduled to report on 10 November. Again, one would have to question why the government wants to rush this. Why is there a need to rush it? What would another couple of weeks have mattered, other than to have given people who want to make a submission more time to do so? I suspect it would have made very little difference. But one difference is that it enables the government to keep talking about unions and accusing unions of wrongdoing without evidence to back up their claims.
As the member for Gorton has quite rightly pointed out, there are other matters that need to be addressed and that the government could be focusing on that are much more important. The member for Gorton has moved an amendment that goes to the heart of the abolition of penalty rates or the winding down of penalty rates in this country. When penalty rates were wound down, several independent, objective commentators made it clear that it would hurt a lot of vulnerable Australians—and hurt them hard. Indeed, the people who are likely to be receiving penalty rates are those who do the out-of-hours work, and the only reason they do the out-of-hours work is that they are in a desperate situation in which they need to do whatever work is on offer. So they not only work out of hours but they generally work for a lower hourly rate, and I will come to that in just a moment. As soon as the penalty rates decision was handed down, the St Vincent de Paul Society said, in a public statement they put out:
Cutting penalty rates will not create jobs but it will build inequality.
… … …
This cut will disproportionately affect women, young people and people who already carry the burden of inequality. The rights of workers should take priority over the maximisation of profits.
They couldn't have said it better. That sums up exactly what the cut to penalty rates is all about. It is about profits over giving workers a fair income.
I just want to talk about the hourly rates of some of these people because this is a point that is often missed. Quite often the talk simply centres around saying that penalty rates are 175 per cent, 150 per cent, 125 per cent or whatever they may be, but the real dollar figures are rarely mentioned. Let me give you a case study. For a fast-food worker, the current 150 per cent loading means they get $29.16 an hour working out of hours. With the cut, it will be down to $24.30. The minimum wage hourly rate is $18.29. That is the minimum. The average weekly wage hourly rate is around $35. So what we're saying to these people is, 'You can work Saturday or Sunday nights or throughout the night,' as many fast-food workers do, 'and you'll get paid $24.30 for your work,' when someone on the average weekly wage—and this is not a high wage but the average weekly wage—is on $35 an hour. So you're paying those people considerably less than the average weekly wage for doing out-of-hours work. It is simply not right and simply not fair.
Not surprisingly, the unions are standing up for those low-paid workers and trying to have that decision reversed. That is what the government should be trying to do if it genuinely cares about people who are struggling in this country, people who are now being made even more worse off than they already were. Again, this is making the gap between rich and poor in Australia even wider. Those are the issues that the government could be addressing and should be addressing rather than attacking the unions, who are the very organisations that are standing up for those low-paid workers who are struggling to make ends meet. When people can't make ends meet, there are two things that happen: they turn to the government for help, which means the government now has to pay out more money, or they turn to organisations like St Vincent de Paul. So it's not like the community doesn't pick up the cost. It does.
Worst of all for the government itself, which is trying to balance its budget, the foolishness of cutting penalty rates undoubtedly will create another hit to the tax income stream of the government. So what does the government then do? It turns on lower paid workers even more, as we have seen with the legislation we were debating in the House only yesterday, to do with NDIS, where the government wants to tax people on lower incomes even more in order to make up for the lost revenue that it has incurred as a result of making decisions which are not in the national interest. (Time expired)
Dr MIKE KELLY (Eden-Monaro) (16:13): I really feel privileged to be able to add my voice to that of my colleague the member for Makin in this debate, because this is a serious issue. We have seen a pattern of behaviour emerging now for some time where, when a coalition government gets confronted with rejections by the public of policy proposals such as Work Choices or the destruction of Medicare, there is always some alternative door it tries to go through—or it has a plan for death by a thousand cuts to attempt to bring down these structures that have served the purpose of providing not only universal health care for our community but protection of workers' conditions and rights. This, again, is disturbing in the context of the way we've seen policy development entered into without a substantive policy process.
There used to be a tradition in serious policymaking in this country where you would go through green and white papers, draft legislation and consultation, but this legislation is another example of the rush in which things get done now. I guess a lot of the internal dynamics of this government support that, because any proper consultation or development process, even within the party room, leaves itself open to being leaked, to being attacked, by the insurgents within the party room.
We have here a major piece of legislation, with five schedules in 80 pages, amending five other pieces of legislation. It should have been dealt with by a Senate employment committee inquiry going thoroughly through it. I am privileged to serve on the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security in an extremely bipartisan way, with a good group of people from both sides of politics. Inevitably, and always as a matter of course, we are presented with legislation that is in the national security space. Every piece of legislation that ever gets submitted to that committee always emerges at the other end of that process the better for it. It is a thoroughgoing process. We have public inquiries. We have closed-door inquiries. We're open to public submissions. This results in good policy. So I have a major objection to the way policies like this are being handled in this space in particular.
There are again real concerns about the agenda, following on from what we saw with Work Choices—that this legislation is just another way to destroy the union movement. We saw that philosophy writ large under the member for Warringah's jurisdiction as the former Prime Minister, and there were effectively two strands to his attack in that space. One was to roll over on any of the free trade agreement negotiations which we were involved in. It is apparent that the Korean free trade agreement was the death knell for our car industry. It was effectively the last straw for our car manufacturers. As my colleague said, no-one in the government was interested in defending that industry, because it was a unionised workforce.
Then Prime Minister Abbott compounded that approach by destroying all of the hard work that had been done during the time of the Labor government to put us on track to become a shipbuilding nation, particularly and initially in the national security space in terms of our maritime capabilities. We had developed the Future Submarine Industry Skills Plan, which was going to set us up not only to become a shipbuilding nation in that maritime naval space but also to potentially branch that out into commercial shipbuilding. But he made some massive strategic errors in that process, and they put us behind the eight ball in having a timely delivery of our future submarines. He and his government initially attempted to go to the Japanese. Again, it looked like it was being done in the context of promoting a free trade agreement with the Japanese for a vessel that would never have suited any of the capabilities which we needed it for and that certainly wouldn't have been built in Australia. They gave away our supply vessel construction. I had advice from the Department of Defence that it not only could have been built here but should have been. I still have that advice to this day. It specifically spelled out how we would have avoided the valley of death. This saw the bleeding-out of our workforce, which, while in government, we had spent a billion dollars on rehabilitating and restoring capacity to. So those jobs were being lost. Again, it seemed that the approach of the former Prime Minister, the member for Warringah, was simply to destroy any industry that was unionised. It seemed that he had a philosophy of directing his efforts so as to create an economy that was services based, where we would no longer make anything serious.
That's not our view. Certainly I am pleased to see that the rhetoric has changed since the advent of Prime Minister Turnbull, but we are yet to see flesh on the bones of how we will deliver those workforces for our shipbuilding industry. But this bill obviously seeks to target arrangements that unions enter into with employers and that benefit employees in a range of ways. A lot of the worker entitlement funds that we are talking about here not only protect and ensure workers' entitlements but provide important services to them, such as training, safety training in particular; counselling support and suicide prevention; and the funding of OH&S officers.
At the same time—and I salute the Minister for Veterans' Affairs for doing this—these issues have been well-recognised at last in the Defence workplace in relation to the ex-Defence members. These are the sorts of measures we are trying to ensure are in place so that we can prevent Defence member and veteran suicide, and we should be no less promoting these measures in the workplace in general. So anything that attempts to undermine that should be opposed. We have deep suspicions about where this will go. We simply need to probe that more carefully and that's why this legislation needs much greater forensic examination.
We are also deeply concerned about how much discretion it places in the minister, through regulation capability. That is of deep concern because the minister does not give us any confidence in their ability to ensure that the interests of workers are looked after in this process. So, from all perspectives, it looks to us that this is another attempt to erode, to destroy, the ability of workers to negotiate for good outcomes to look after their people. Really it reflects a philosophy that workers are widgets, that they are factors in the production process, but not something to be celebrated as part of the free market process of negotiation and bargaining. That collective bargaining regime has led to enormous gains in productivity in our workforce. If you look at the statistics on productivity, labour productivity gains have been enormous. We need to look, obviously, at continuing improvements in capital productivity, which is a job for the employers, but labour productivity has been outstanding. Notwithstanding that, we've seen a record decline in wages.
That is manifest in the situation of so many workers in Eden-Monaro who are crying out to me—they seriously are. This it is not a rhetorical point. I know this deeply from my personal contact with them. Also I am never left in any doubt about what people think in Eden-Monaro because, being a bellwether seat, it is surveyed to within an inch of its life. ReachTEL polls that have been published in the media have indicated that nearly 60 per cent of my constituents are really angry about cuts to penalty rates. When you get to Queanbeyan the rate goes up to about 79 per cent. So there is no question about the attitude of my community. No wonder! The McKell Institute's study on the impact of penalty rate cuts in rural and regional Australia indicated how heavily that burden would land on them. We have seen, in particular, that the retail and hospitality sectors account for something like 18 per cent of rural and regional workers. So when penalty rates are cut in rural and regional areas it has a particularly severe impact.
We know that the average income earned by workers in retail and hospitality is the lowest of any industry. The compounding effect is that, if you partially abolish penalty rates in retail and hospitality, then rural Australia loses somewhere between $370 million and $691 million per annum, and there is a loss of disposable income of between $174 million and $343 million, as modelled by the McKell Institute. In New South Wales that figure is between $118 million and $220 million. So that loss of disposable income has been enormous. I have seen estimates that just in the Monaro region $16 million is being ripped out of our local economy.
When we were in government and were being hit by the GFC, the advice of Ken Henry and the experts was: we've learnt from previous mistakes in dealing with recessions. What you have to do is go hard, go early, go households, because household income and consumption is somewhere between 50 and 60 per cent of the whole GDP story, the economic story, in this country. When you smash the ability of households to spend, particularly in the retail sector, you are going to do the economy a massive amount of damage. This was highlighted in an open letter written to the government by 78 expert economists. In that letter they spelt out that the penalty rate cuts in those particular industries, where they don't have enterprise bargaining agreements in which these things could be traded off against some other benefit, simply would not create new jobs. It just simply would not. The letter stated:
While it is doubtful that lower penalty rates will result in any measureable increase in total employment in the retail and hospitality industries, there is no doubt that this decision will reduce incomes for some of the most insecure and poorly-paid workers in the economy. Statistical data confirm that the retail and hospitality workforce is disproportionately reliant on women, immigrants, and youth …
Just the other day, when I was at the National Museum here on a Sunday, having lunch with my wife, one of the young workers there who lives across the border, in Queanbeyan, recognised me, singled me out and said: 'Thank you so much for fighting for our penalty rates. It was the only way I was going to be able to stay at university and now I'm really struggling.' This is having a big effect on people in my community, as they raise with me directly.
Those 78 economists highlighted that. That is the expert evidence. In addition, that's been borne out by statistics that have been revealed in just the last couple of weeks. I guess it's a situation of 'I told you so' from these economists, because we had an incredibly weak retail sales result. It was described as 'a shocker'. It was almost the worst for the period of August in 4½ years. We saw a downward revision to July's numbers and a 0.2 per cent fall in expenditure in that sector. That was spread across the country, with sales in every state falling. The biggest declines were a 1.8 per cent slump in the previously booming restaurant and cafe sector and a one per cent drop in household goods sales. It coincided exactly with the introduction of these penalty rate cuts.
When you look at it from the point of view of people's ability to go and spend money on a coffee or a doughnut, or on household goods, and put it in the context of the other major issue of Australia's household-debt-to-income ratio, which hit another record of 194 per cent, with more than two-thirds tied up in home loans, you can see the double-whammy pressure that's hit these people. In my region, of course, it's exacerbated by the fact that we have a highly casualised workforce. If you're working only two or three days a week or a few hours a week, those penalty rates were putting food on the table or a roof over your head. That's just the simple mathematics of it.
In the context of wages growth continuing to flatline at 1.9 per cent, the lowest since the last recession, from 1 July thousands of retail and hospitality workers have lost their penalty rates. If you cut people's take-home pay, they'll reduce their spending on discretionary items, such as household goods and pleasurable things like going out to cafes and restaurants. So a massive hit is being delivered to the economy and a hit is being delivered to workers through an undermining of their ability to represent themselves. It is to undermine the union movement and prevent it from entering into enterprise bargaining agreements with employers where a penalty rate could be traded off in exchange for a benefit which is actually in the interests of the economy. The collective bargaining regime has always been of benefit to the economy. The Hawke-Keating government delivered us an industrial relations regime that has seen great productivity growth and benefit to the economy. Taking that equation out of the economy will only result in further recession and a downward-spiralling economy. That is the simple fact of it. That is what the economists have highlighted.
All of these measures together are not in the interests of the country, not in the interests of the economy and not in the interests of our struggling low- and middle-income workers out there, who are crying out to us to defend them against these savage attacks on their pay and conditions and their safety standards.
Mr PERRETT (Moreton—Opposition Whip) (16:28): I rise to speak on the Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017. Any time you see a title like that the red flag goes up. It takes you back to 2004, when there was a piece of legislation called Work Choices that didn't actually deliver any choices to the workers. Whenever you see an Orwellian title like that—a 'doubleplusgood' sort of title—being trotted out by the Turnbull government, you know to pay attention, because it is going to be something that attacks workers and attacks low- and middle-income groups in Australia.
This bill is another part of the Turnbull government's relentless attack on Australia as seen through its attack on unions. Not only is it an attack on unions; it is an attack on the workers who form unions for protection, the workers who voluntarily joined unions and paid their fees because they believed in unions and the benefits that come from unions. The Turnbull government is attempting to ram this bill through the parliament without proper consultation and scrutiny. Labor wanted this bill to go through the proper committee process, to be thoroughly examined by the Senate Education and Employment Committee. Instead, this Orwellian-titled piece of legislation is being rushed through that process with a reporting date of 10 November, making it almost impossible for stakeholders to prepare detailed submissions and to give any considered, useful or meaningful evidence to the committee. People like Jorgen Gullestrup from the plumbers union, who is in the chamber, would have a lot to contribute if they had time to prepare submissions to the Senate committee. He and the plumbers union were a great help to my campaign to win Moreton for the Labor Party.
This bill increases the governance requirements and the financial reporting and disclosure requirements of worker entitlement funds. The purpose of worker entitlement funds is to ensure that the entitlements owed to workers are protected and to provide services to workers like training, which is crucial in the plumbing, the electrical trades and the construction industries. We know so many deaths are linked to workers not receiving proper training before they go onto the worksite. We also know the benefits of counselling support, and I know that Jorgen has a great role in that side of the industry. There is suicide prevention and the funding of occupational health and safety officers, a role that has saved thousands and thousands of lives over the years.
This bill proposes to prohibit enterprise agreements from allowing contributions to any fund other than a superannuation fund, a registered worker entitlement fund or a registered charity. So forget about things like suicide prevention and the like. It would prohibit enterprise agreements from allowing employee contributions to a union election fund, even though we have so often stated the benefits that come from the political arm of the trade union movement, which is the Australian Labor Party.
This legislation would prohibit the coercion of employers to pay amounts to a specific worker entitlement fund, superannuation fund, training fund, welfare fund or employee insurance fund. I notice the term they use is 'coercion'. Obviously coercion would not be legal in any event, but I am aware that many employers and employees agree on certain superannuation funds and training funds. It would also mean that you would put additional financial management and disclosure obligations on registered organisations, and this Turnbull legislation would introduce new penalties for non-compliance by registered organisations with those financial management, disclosure and reporting requirements.
It is crucial that worker entitlement funds are able to continue to provide safety, training and wellbeing services such as suicide prevention. I can't believe that the government would be attacking that process, not to mention mental health and drug and alcohol counselling. It is an important role of unions to provide these types of services to their worker members, particularly in the construction industry where, sadly, we see higher rates of suicide, health issues and drug and alcohol abuse because of the nature of much of the work.
It would be alarming if the Turnbull government intended to stop unions from providing these services to their members. It would be alarming but not surprising. This Turnbull government has an ideological obsession with attacking unions. Week after week in this House the government produces yet another piece of legislation solely aimed at attacking unions. It has been relentless in this parliament, the 45th Parliament. The Prime Minister really needs to see a counsellor, I think—maybe one of those could be provided from those funds that the unions have contacts with—because he is quite obsessed. We saw the coalition government call a royal commission to further their pursuit of trade unions, and we saw what the results were: nowhere near the results of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse and the number of convictions that have been sent off. It was a completely different approach.
This is an out-of-touch government. It's hard to believe that, at a time when wages are growing at record lows, in some cases even going backwards, and Australian households are facing cost-of-living crunches due to record levels of debt and rising energy costs, at a time when Australian workers are facing financial stress and when even the Reserve Bank Governor—not exactly a well-known leftie—is promoting the benefits of trade union enterprise bargaining, the government, in spite of all of that information, is relentlessly attacking the very organisations that are trying to give ordinary workers a fair go, and that is unions. I should declare that I have been a member of many unions but I've also worked for a union and have done enterprise bargaining. I have sat down with only two or three members in a workplace of 100 people and negotiated. I know what it's like to negotiate from positions of power, and I know what it's like to negotiate from positions where you have only one or two members in a workplace. That is not an experience that many on the government side of the chamber understand. They do not understand what the modern union movement is about.
The government's policy agenda, which has seen the establishment of the ABCC and the Registered Organisations Commission, is shifting the balance of power in a workplace where Australians are already suffering. This is an agenda that saw the Australian public at the double-dissolution election boot out a dozen coalition MPs. There was hardly a ringing endorsement for this agenda at the double-dissolution election. Look at Tasmania—not a single coalition MP, yet we have the Turnbull government trying to roll out its agenda there. In Western Australia quite a few Liberal MPs were booted out. We saw that across the nation, with the Australian people saying, 'We do not agree with this government's double-dissolution agenda.' Yet the Turnbull government seems to be obsessed with attacking unions despite the great role they play in keeping the Australian fabric together. Sadly, the Turnbull government is allowing unscrupulous employers to engage in practices that avoid Fair Work Act obligation, like sham contracts and dodgy labour hire companies. We haven't seen a great investigation of 7-Eleven, the Myer cleaners or some of the other dodgy practices that are taking place around Australia. This is unfair. Sadly, it is entrenching the already increasing inequality in this country.
Labor have moved a second reading amendment to this bill. We have done this to make it abundantly clear to this coalition government that Labor will always stand up for workers. We'll stand up for all Australian workers but in particular the 700,000 workers who are going to see their wages fall in real terms as a result of the penalty rates decision where the Turnbull government was silent and complicit in these cuts. Workers in the retail and hospitality industries—not exactly an overpaid part of the community—have already had their wages cut from 1 July this year. The Turnbull government supported those cuts and has backed the decision to cut penalty rates by its silence and inaction. The Turnbull government has refused to support the private member's bill moved by the Leader of the Opposition that would have prevented those cuts.
When we talk about tackling inequality we can't ignore the fact that this coalition government, under Prime Minister Turnbull, is prepared to allow the real wages of the lowest-paid workers in the country to be cut at the same time as it is delivering a $65 billion bonus to the top end of town. We can't ignore the fact that this government supports cutting penalty rates which, sadly, will disproportionately affect women. We can't ignore the fact that this government supports cutting penalty rates which will see regional communities, the bush, suffering because people in the regions will have less money to spend in their economies.
This Turnbull government is completely out of touch but Labor will not stand by and watch ordinary Australians be treated so unfairly. Labor will not stand by and watch inequality in this country get even worse. Workers in the retail, pharmacy and fast-food industries have already had their take-home pay cut—the penalty rate cuts that took effect from 1 July. The next group of workers to be hit will be those working in the hair and beauty industry. We all know people who work in that industry. Obviously I don't spend a lot of time at the hairdresser's, but I will give a shout out to Pete the barber who runs Franco's at Moorooka. We know the people in that industry are not super well paid. We all get our hair cut somewhere, or most of us; some might even get our nails done and others might get that healthy youthful orange glow through a spray tan—if you go in for that sort of thing, that's up to you; I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that at all, and I'm not mentioning any MPs on the opposite side of the chamber.
What would you notice most about workers in the hair and beauty industry—putting aside Pete? Statistically, they are most likely to be young and female. It is a familiar pattern from the Turnbull government: constantly attacking the vulnerable minorities. They are in their fifth year of government, and I have lost count of the number of times their legislation has adversely targeted a minority group—young people, women and migrants. What heroes they are in this government! All those minority groups have been unfairly targeted in legislation put forward by the Turnbull-Abbott government.
Sadly, this is at a time when, in Australia, inequality is going through the roof. Inequality is at a 75-year high. Young people are being continually attacked by this government's policies, such as: making them wait five weeks before they can access Newstart; putting 22- to 24-year-olds on the lower paid youth allowance, meaning a cut of about $48 per week, which they can't afford; making young students pay up to $100,000 for their degrees; forcing students to take on bigger debt and then making them pay back that debt even sooner; and doing nothing about housing affordability so that many young people have little hope of ever owning a home—or getting NBN connected to it. We have a Prime Minister who just said, 'Why don't you move to an area where there is NBN?' Where's that? New Zealand?
As a society we should be nurturing our young people and bringing them on. They are our future. We should be encouraging them to get the best education they can. We should be doing everything we can to help them succeed and not give up in despair, because they'll be looking after us before too long. We should make sure our young people can have the same dream that many Australians enjoy: the dream of one day having a home of their own to raise a family in. I believe in fairness. That's why I joined the Labor Party. It is not fair to cut the take-home pay of low-paid workers, especially when many of those people are young and are women. That is fundamentally unfair and un-Australian.
I know people care about penalty rates, and I know people in my electorate of Moreton care about penalty rates. I hold street stalls every month across my electorate, and I talk to people about that exact issue. We had street stalls in 10 locations. I spoke about penalty rates in Acacia Ridge, Annerley, Fairfield, Moorooka, Rocklea, Runcorn, Salisbury, Sherwood and Sunnybank. Volunteers came out in force, generously giving up their own weekend to support the weekends of others and the take-home pay of our lowest-paid workers. So many signed my petition to protect penalty rates that we ran out of paper at some of the stalls. Southside locals care about penalty rates. Thanks to the Turnbull government, one in six local workers in Moreton have had their pay slashed this year.
Labor will not sit back and do nothing to protect vulnerable workers. We have already presented a private member's bill, the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Take-Home Pay) Bill 2017, which would have stopped the cuts to penalty rates. The Turnbull government, sadly, chose not to support it. And there is more than just the immediate effect of that decision; there is also 2018, 2019 and 2020. Because the Turnbull government did not stand up for our lowest-paid workers who rely on penalty rates to pay their bills, those workers will not get a pay increase for four years. We should not be surprised. The Prime Minister and many others in his government support cuts to penalty rates. How do we know? Because they've told us many times. The Prime Minister even said, way back in 2005, that he believes there should be a free market so that the cost of labour will be as low as possible. How un-Australian and out of touch is that?
In 2014, on ABC Radio, the Prime Minister said it was nuts that cafes and restaurants closed on weekends because penalty rates were so high. The Minister for Employment, Senator Cash, said on Sky News in 2015 that, in many industries in Australia, the seven days of the week are now basically the same day. Senator Cash also said we need to cut penalty rates to be globally competitive. They are not the only ones. Senator James Paterson, the member for Grey, the member for Mallee and the member for Hasluck have all made comments supporting cuts to penalty rates.
Sadly, the Turnbull government support scrapping penalty rates. They do not support low-paid vulnerable workers keeping their take-home pay. Inequality is at a 75-year high, wages growth is at a historic low and underemployment is at a record low. Inequality needs to be tackled, and only Labor will do that.
Mr DICK (Oxley) (16:44): I rise to speak on the Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017. Looking at the speakers list on this bill, despite the minister and the government claiming this is a critical and important issue, the fact is that no government members—not one—have the courage of their convictions to speak on this bill today. No member of the government wants to front up to this parliament and explain to working people right across this country why they are enforcing some of the most regressive working laws that we have seen in this country.
In my opinion, this is part of an ongoing, systematic campaign run by an ideologically extreme government—not a government focused on delivering outcomes, not a government focused on the people we are charged to represent, but a government more focused on political outcomes, on making political amendments to working conditions for men and women of Australia. We know that the bill contains five schedules over 80 pages. So, there is an amount of technical detail in the bill. It will amend the Fair Work Act, the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act, the Fringe Benefits Tax Assessment Act, the Income Tax Assessment Act and the Taxation Administration Act. Disappointingly, as we've heard from speakers on this side of the chamber, the Nick Xenophon Team once again have sold out their principles and sold out workers, in one of Senator Xenophon's last acts before he runs away from this parliament. They've blocked our attempt to have proper legislative scrutiny of this bill. And I've got to ask the question: if there is demonstrated need for this piece of legislation, if there is evidence to be provided, why not have proper process? Why not have proper scrutiny of this legislation?
The minister has rushed this legislation through without any real explanation, imposing a deadline for reporting that does not allow a reasonable period of time for stakeholders to make submissions. That not only shows contempt for the process but also shows contempt for the organisations and representatives that this bill will have an impact on. In my opinion, this bill shows no understanding of what worker entitlement funds do. Worker entitlement funds are established in most cases jointly between unions, employer bodies and employers. They provide services such as training, counselling support and suicide prevention, which I will address in some detail in my speech to the parliament tonight. This bill also makes clear whether funds can invest in safety initiatives or continue to subsidise insurance for accidents, ambulance, portable sick leave and income protection. Even the royal commissioner, Dyson Heydon, said that training funds, for example, provide an important public good. When it comes to legislation, in my short time in this parliament I have come to the conclusion that the government cannot be trusted to introduce legislation without consultation. When that happens, bad legislation is enacted. But, more importantly, bad outcomes occur.
This bill gives the power to the minister to, at the stroke of her pen, deem a fund a workers' entitlement fund under the new legislation. This creates significant uncertainty in the sector. If this bill is passed in its current form it will mean that organisations and charities such as MATES in Construction will see their funding drastically cut. Members who are present in the chamber today need to understand the full consequences of this legislation passing. It will mean that organisations who do outstanding work—like MATES in Construction, which I am a proud supporter of—will see funding drastically cut. And tonight I want to acknowledge Jorgen Gullestrup, who's in the chamber tonight, who is the CEO of MATES in Construction.
I want to explain exactly how this will occur. In the first instance, it will impact the way redundancy trusts are able to donate to charities. Secondly, proposed section 329LD(2) states:
A payment is a training or welfare payment covered by this subsection if:
(a) the payment is made for the sole purpose of providing training or welfare services to either or both of the following:
(i) participants or former participants in any industry in which fund members participate;
(ii) spouses or dependants of such participants or former participants; and
(b) if the services are not provided by the operator of the fund:
(i) the services are provided at market value and on commercial terms …
This will negatively impact on an organisation that provides services free of charge and in a manner that cannot calculate the market value. The government think only in black and white. The government think any legislation they put forward and hang their hat on to go back to their communities, to the Liberal Party branch members or to the Liberal Party preselectors and say, 'This week I got tough on unions,' is somehow good for them, for their own political, personal careers.
But let me be very clear: this is not good for the organisations that do outstanding work in areas like suicide prevention, like MATES in Construction. Not only is it hard to measure the work that MATES in Construction does to prevent suicide but also, since proving a suicide was prevented is incredibly hard, the value of saving a life and of saving that person's family and community from pain and hardship is equally incalculable. From talking to people involved with the industry and people who have benefitted from this training, I know exactly what it means. The suicide rate for construction workers is 71 per cent higher than the rate for other employed men in Australia. Every year 191 construction workers take their own lives—tragically, one every second day. A construction worker is six times more likely to die by suicide than by an accident at work. Around 5,500 construction workers will attempt suicide each year. Of those, around 970 will be permanently disabled after a suicide attempt.
For example, the fund MATES in Construction is a multimodal program, establishing a local care program on construction sites where mates look out for mates. The program has trained more than 120,000 workers, and we know that there is a network of around 10,000 volunteer connection points on sites across Australia. The organisation also provides case management services, being the missing middle link between a worker in crisis and the right level of care. More importantly, the service provides a 24/7 helpline. I'm proud that MATES in Construction was established in my home state of Queensland. It was established in March 2008 in response to a report, commissioned and funded in part by the Building Employees Redundancy Trust, establishing suicide to be a significant problem in the industry.
Research has shown MATES in Construction to have a return on investment, particularly to the Commonwealth government, of $4.60 per dollar invested. Suicide rates in the Queensland construction industry fell by 7.9 per cent over the first five years of the program against an increasing trend amongst Queensland men generally. The risk ratio has decreased continually in Queensland since the introduction of the program, from an almost 100 per cent elevated risk to 'only' a 22 per cent elevated risk. A conservative estimate is that up to 30 lives have been saved so far. Being industry led has allowed MATES in Construction to further develop the mental health agenda for the industry. We know that MATES in Construction has broad industry support and has worked hard at getting a broad funding base. The funding from worker entitlement funds is important to the stability and sustainability of MATES in Construction.
I want to be very clear about the impact of the bill that this government, under Minister Michaelia Cash, is asking this parliament to approve. Putting it very clearly: if the government expects that we, as representatives of this parliament, are going to vote for a bill that will dramatically decrease the funding for MATES in Construction and make it harder for them to operate, they have another think coming. If they think we are going to put up with their continual attacks on the rights of people to be members of unions, they have another think coming. The cynic in me says that the government are in deep, deep trouble. For 21 Newspolls in a row, they have been slipping further and further behind. The government are bereft of ideas and a narrative.
In my time in the parliament, I've noticed a couple of things. First of all, there is no area of union bashing this government won't go. There is no area where this government, when it comes to people on low incomes and fixed incomes, won't try and dismantle safety nets. From speaking to residents involved in the construction sector, and people in hospitality or retail or people working in the service industry, I know what they have seen over the last 12 month—since I've been elected. They've seen a couple of things. They've seen a government not really interested in helping people get ahead. They've seen a government not really focused on wanting people to get ahead. They haven't seen policy development which would allow middle- and low-income earners to come forward and say, 'This is great news for our family. We are better off.'
Time and time again we stand up in this parliament—as I stand up in this parliament just about every day and every week—to ask the government to rethink its strategy around dealing with people on low and fixed incomes. I listened to my friend the member for Moreton, who has been an outstanding advocate in this space for almost 10 years in this parliament, and I want to publicly acknowledge that tonight for the first time. He is a true champion of people who need a hand and who have slipped through the cracks. I know that from witnessing his work during my time as a Brisbane city councillor, and from admiring the work he does as a champion for the south side of Brisbane. In particular, when it comes to people who rely on services from government, he speaks the truth, just as he did when speaking about the mobile offices, the street corners and the consultations that he does week in, week out. What I've learnt from following that fine example is that people expect this government, or any government, no matter its political persuasion, to make sure that, first of all, it is listening to them; and, second, it is shaping and creating a nation where, if you need assistance, that assistance is there for you. That's exactly what MATES in Construction does.
This may be a great headline for Minister Cash to do one of her sound bites, or perhaps to go on to a shock-jock radio program and talk about how he she's tough on unions. I get that. That's the government's narrative. They've run out of ideas and they've run out of puff. When in doubt, attack people on social welfare or people who choose to be members of trade unions. It has consequences. It has impacts. When laws like this are passed, it impacts on people. This law in particular will negatively impact on wonderful organisations like MATES in Construction.
I'll finish on this point. I want someone from the government, now, tonight, before this bill is passed, to get up on their feet and say that what I'm saying is incorrect. I want someone to get up and provide evidence and data and show cause that what I'm saying here in this chamber tonight is somehow inaccurate. If they do, I'll come back into this place and acknowledge that someone has done the time and done the work. If they don't, I'll continue to highlight the fact that, when it comes to workers' rights, workers' protection and workers' entitlements, this government cannot be trusted. For as long as I am the member for Oxley, I will come to this place to serve and make sure that working men and women in my community are looked after.
Ms BRODTMANN (Canberra) (16:59): As we've heard from my colleagues all afternoon, the Fair Work Laws Amendment (Proper Use of Worker Benefits) Bill 2017 was introduced in the House last Thursday. Last Thursday! It's not even a week old. It is a significant bill. It has five schedules. It has 80 pages. It amends five different pieces of legislation. They are: the Fair Work Act 2009, the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009, the Fringe Benefits Tax Assessment Act 1986, the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 and the Tax Administration Act 1953. It has significant implications for employers and unions. When it comes to scrutiny, this government, with the help of the Nick Xenophon Team in the Senate, prevented any attempt to have a thorough Senate employment committee inquiry into this bill. Any attempts were knocked back, even though the ink is barely dry on this bill, even though it's less than a week since the bill's introduction into the House.
Instead, what did the government do? It imposed a reporting date of 10 November. That is in 16 days time—16 days for stakeholders to prepare submissions, for people to get their fingers tapping away on submissions, in response to a bill that has five schedules and a significant impact on five different pieces of legislation, a bill that is 80 pages long. People have 16 days to go through all of those five pieces of legislation and make submissions, Mr Deputy Speaker Buchholz. We have 16 days for stakeholders to present evidence on this bill. It is absolutely outrageous.
The Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee has an impossible time line for reporting on this bill, but that was the government's whole intention in introducing the bill last Thursday and having the debate on it now, with no opportunity for the committee to go into the detail of what is very complex legislation that will have a significant impact on five other pieces of legislation. The government set this ridiculous time line, this ridiculous deadline, because it didn't want any scrutiny of this bill at all. And who can blame the government, when the purpose of the bill is actually brought to light? The government's intention, its purpose with this bill, is to limit unions' legitimate activities and sources of income. We know what the government's attitude to unions is because we've seen it so often. We've seen it year after year: union bashing and no attempt to acknowledge the fundamental role that unions play in our community in protecting workers' rights and fighting for workers' rights. Everything we hear from this government is negative, negative, negative towards unions. It has a pathological hatred of unions—particularly the Abbott government but also the Turnbull government.
As someone who comes from what I have dubbed a working-class matriarchy—my great-grandmother worked her fingers to the bone as a cleaner all her life; my grandmother worked her fingers to the bone, in three jobs, as a cleaner; and my mother, after my dad left, worked her fingers to the bone as a cleaner, ultimately in her 70s—I understand the importance of unions. I understand how those who are disempowered—those who do not have a high level of education, those who have no choice in their life, those who have very little skill in their life—can be completely and utterly exploited. I know because I'm related to people like that. I'm related to women who had no education. I'm related to women who left school at 11, 12, 13, 14 or 15. I'm related to women who were completely disempowered. I'm related to women who were unskilled. I'm related to women who, all their lives, lived in fear of not being able to put food on the table or of having their children taken away by the state because they were poor. They lived in fear because basically they had no choice. They had to put up with their lot. They had to put up with whatever the boss was prepared to pay them. And that is the type of system that this government holds up, a system that was operating in this country in the mid-1900s.
We're still getting it now in the exploitation of those workers, particularly foreign workers, who work for chains and franchises. The Domino's, the Pizza Huts and the 7-Elevens have engaged in absolutely outrageous exploitation of people who are vulnerable, like my great-grandmother, my grandmother and my mother. Those people are quite often here in a precarious position in terms of visas, and so they are vulnerable to being exploited. It is basically a case of: 'Take $10, sleep outside where you work,' or 'Take $10 an hour or less and accept it, cash in hand, or else you'll get deported.' These people live in this horrible, fearful environment all the time that they're here. As I said, my great-grandmother, my grandmother and my mother lived in a fearful state because of that disempowerment, lack of education, lack of skill and lack of choice. This is why I am a very, very strong supporter of unions.
I'm a proud member of a union, and I have been ever since I began my working life. I was a proud president of the RMIT student union for a year, which is where, in many ways, I cut my teeth politically. When I was president of the union, I proudly set up the first Labor club at the oldest workers college in the world. As I said, I am a proud member of the union and have been ever since I started work. I am also a proud former workplace delegate. I'm proud to have negotiated the first enterprise bargaining agreement in the Commonwealth, when I was at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. It was a huge job because we were in the vanguard, there was no template, and so that was a real challenge. I was proudly involved as my union's workplace delegate in negotiating that deal.
I'm proud of what the union movement has achieved for this country. I'm proud of the fact that the union movement achieved an eight-hour day. One of my favourite statues in the country is the eight-hour-day orb, which is located behind the Emily McPherson training centre. It is just over the road from the Victorian Trades Hall, which looks like something straight out of Dickens, with its crazy Victorian bluestone, as only Victoria can do. Right across from it is the orb. I always love to visit it when I'm in Melbourne. The eight-hour-day orb represents eight hours work, eight hours rest and eight hours sleep. This was a huge achievement in terms of decent working conditions for workers.
We tend to forget about this: workers' rights did not fall from the sky. Each and every right that we enjoy today in our workplaces was hard fought for by thousands and thousands and thousands of working men and women over the last 150 or so years. These rights have not fallen from the sky. They have come from struggle, which is why, on this side of the chamber, we are the ones who are defending workers; we always have done and we always will. Defending workers' rights and defending workers' entitlements is part of our DNA. We were born of the union movement, which is why we will fight, and fight any attempt by this government or any other government—the Abbott government was particularly appalling—to denude the unions of their ability to protect the rights of workers: to protect their security, to protect their safety and to protect the conditions for which we have fought long and hard over more than 150 years. We will fight against that. Just think about it: workers' rights did not fall from the sky. They did not come about as a result of the benevolence of some employer. They did not come about as a result of an employer waking up one morning and thinking, 'Do you know what we need? We need to allow our workers to have annual leave for four weeks each year.' This right was hard fought for by the union movement.
What else was hard fought for by the union movement? Safe workplaces. Again, we take that for granted. We take OH&S for granted. But, again, it's been the union movement that has fought long and hard for every Australian worker to be able to go home at the end of their working day, for every Australian worker to be safe in their work environment, for every Australian worker to have an environment where they're protected, physically and emotionally—because it's not just about physical protection; it's also about emotional protection. It's the union movement that fought for that. It's the union movement that fought for paid parental leave, and Labor delivered that. But, again, it's not something that fell from the sky. It's not as though an employer woke up one day and thought, 'Oh, I'd better introduce a paid parental leave scheme.' It was fought for by the union movement. It was fought for by Labor. These rights haven't fallen from the sky.
Sick pay, again, was hard fought for by the union movement, hard fought for by Labor, as well as annual leave. And of course we've got decent pay and conditions—the fundamentals that allow Australians to live with dignity, that allow Australians to contribute in a meaningful way to their community so that they're not the working poor, who we see around the world. You hear of workers, particularly in the US, living in their cars because they can't afford a house. The union movement has delivered decent pay conditions—the union movement that those opposite deride and demonise, day in and day out, and they're doing it with this bill.
This bill was introduced last Thursday—less than a week ago—and you're expecting it to be finalised, all wrapped up with a big bow around it, in 16 days time. That is 16 days for people to make submissions and give evidence. It's appalling. We are talking here about five pieces of legislation that people have to go through, and they've got 16 days to not only read all that but also contemplate it, think about it, consult on it and then get their submission in. The government does not want any scrutiny of this bill. That is absolutely obvious from the time frame the government has given for the preparation of submissions and from the reporting date of 10 November.
This government continue to constantly demonise and deride unions. They constantly demonise and deride workers. Obviously they have no respect for workers, based on the fact they have cut the penalty rates of people right throughout Australia who rely on them. In my community alone, 13,289 Canberrans are getting a pay cut as a result of this government. That's a lot of people, and a lot of them are women because the cuts to penalty rates by this government disproportionately target women. Women currently account for 46.2 per cent of all employees in Australia, and of that number almost half are working part time. Many of them are working in the retail, hospitality and fast-food industries that will be directly affected.
Dr Jim Stanford, Director of the Centre for Future Work at the Australia Institute, said that these are the workers who are already in relatively low-wage jobs, with insecure and irregular schedules. These are the people this government targets—those like my great-grandmother, those like my grandmother, those like my mother—low-income workers who are vulnerable, who are in need of assistance, who are in need of support. But, no, what does this government do? It just kicks them in the teeth. It kicked them in the teeth in 2014, it kicked them in the teeth in 2015, it kicked them in the teeth in 2016 and it's kicking them in the teeth in 2017. It has no respect, no regard, no concern for Australian workers. This bill is just further evidence of that, and it's absolutely appalling.
Ms BUTLER (Griffith) (17:14): There is in this country, unfortunately, a history of corporate collapses, and when a firm goes into liquidation for insolvency then obviously there's a distribution to creditors of any remaining moneys. Secured creditors, usually the banks, get their money first. Employees have priority over other unsecured creditors, but often there is nothing left for the employees because all the money has been used to pay down, often not completely, the debts owed to secured creditors. Having priority over other unsecured creditors doesn't necessarily mean the employees get any of the money owed to them by their employer. Obviously we had what used to be called GEERS, now the Fair Entitlements Guarantee scheme, which has waxed and waned over a long period of time. Probably the first government payment for employee entitlements that should have been paid by an employer was back under the Howard government, but it has been maintained in a bipartisan fashion since then. So there are some public moneys that can be devoted to paying out employee entitlements, but that is just socialising the losses. It just means that, instead of the employer paying the employees' entitlements, the public purse pays for those entitlements in the event that the employer is wound up in insolvency.
Over many years unions, organisations of employees, have looked at ways they could protect employees, their members, in the event of a corporate insolvency leading to redundancy of the workforce. Obviously, in parallel with the creation and establishment of redundancy severance entitlements—which is an entitlement that is of itself a creation of the union movement and union movement advocacy, bargaining and activism—there has been an increasing focus on trying to make sure that people can actually get the benefit of those redundancy and severance entitlements. An entitlement is not much use if you don't get it. They have looked at a range of things, and one of the options is to have the employer make special provision in its own accounts to ensure that it is keeping the money on hand that it would need in the event of redundancy—so, basically, a contingency fund. That is no use in the event of corporate insolvency because that money, like all of the other money that would be on hand for the employer, would be paid out to creditors, according to the Corporations Act provisions, which, as I said, means that the secured creditors—the banks—would get the money first and probably there would not be much left over, if anything, for employees.
Another alternative that unions have looked at is the establishment of worker entitlement funds, for example redundancy funds. In the course of negotiating a collective agreement, using whatever enterprise bargaining provisions exist at the time, one of the provisions that you include in the enterprise bargaining agreement is a provision that says that, each week or each quarter or over whatever period, the employer will make a payment in respect of the employee into a redundancy trust fund. These redundancy trust funds have by and large been set up in a relationship between the relevant industry unions and the relevant industry organisations of employers. So a group of employers might form what is effectively an employers union, and they are recognised in the same way under industrial law; at the same time you have groups of employees that form unions. Those unions and employer associations can then join together to establish a trust fund into which moneys can be paid. So if there is a corporate insolvency, if you're an employee who has been working your whole life for a firm and that firm goes broke, goes belly up, you get redundancy payments out of the trust fund that have been held in trust for you as a member of the fund, because those moneys don't get used to pay off the big banks. They're not part of the pool of funds that can be distributed to the creditors of the employer; these are moneys that have been held in trust for employees.
These are really important funds for two reasons. First, they avoid the socialisation of losses; they avoid having to dip into the pockets of the public to pay for worker entitlements that employers should have been able to pay. Second, much more importantly, people aren't left destitute when the employer they work for goes belly up. Of course, these aren't the only sorts of entitlement funds, but I'd say redundancy trusts are a very important form of entitlement fund.
Another form of entitlement fund is a fund that provides income protection insurance or income protection payments, not necessarily insurance, to workers. Again, often it forms part of enterprise bargaining, where a union, on behalf of its members, and an employer will put into the terms of an enterprise agreement a provision that the employer will make payments into the income protection fund. Then, if something calamitous happens to a union member—or other employees, for that matter, because employees who aren't members of unions can have the benefit of these things as well; you can't discriminate under our present laws—such as being diagnosed with lung cancer and not being able to work, there is a source of income protection through that entitlement fund.
We know all too well that sometimes when you have an illness or injury you're not covered by your ordinary insurer because you've got a pre-existing condition. It happened to my own father when his melanoma metastasised. His insurance didn't cover the year he had off work on chemo, because it was a melanoma he had had before he joined that particular super fund with that particular insurance. So there certainly are times when people don't get income protection through their ordinary insurer. These entitlement funds that can provide an additional source of income protection can be really important.
There is another example. We have redundancy funds, we have income protection funds and there might be portable long service leave funds. If you work in an industry where it is uncommon to work for a decade for the same employer but you might work in the same industry for a decade—perhaps it's the construction industry, where you have a range of contractors and they have a pool of subcontractors and you might move from subcontractor to subcontractor and the subcontractor might move from principal contractor to principal contractor—and, because of the nature of the industry, it is really hard to rack up a decade of working for the same firm. But these guys are working very hard, doing physical jobs, and they deserve their long service leave as much as anyone. So you might see a fund where people agree, again through enterprise bargaining, that there will be payments made into a long service leave fund that will benefit people who have stayed in the same industry but have moved from employer to employer.
These worker entitlement funds are a really sensible response to problems that face working people. It is absolutely true to say that they generate income streams—of course they do. Moneys are put in and they're invested wisely. It is also absolutely true to say that those income streams are usually reinvested back into the industry for the benefit of the industry—and I say 'industry', not just employees. As you can gather from what I have said about the way these funds are ordinarily set up, they usually have unions and employers on their boards and they use their money for the benefit of the industry. It might be training. One of the big issues we face as a society is the collapse of apprenticeships and traineeships. It might be that those funds can be used to promote the idea of getting into an apprenticeship or traineeship. It might be that those funds that are generated from these worker entitlement funds, the additional moneys, can be used for occupational health and safety work, for going in and providing additional support and training of delegates so that they understand occupational health and safety, and training of managers so that they understand. It might be that these funds go to support colleges or vocational education providers that might be set up in a particular industry.
So it is absolutely true to say that there are income streams generated from these funds, and isn't it a good thing? It means sustainable revenue sources for institutions and programs that provide a public benefit, but without having to tap the public purse. I think that's a very positive thing. When you hear some of the florid rhetoric we get from the government in relation to the matters that are the subject of the present legislation we are debating, you really do forget the importance of these funds. I think that's partly because they have this almost irrational hatred of the Australian union movement. It's quite hard to understand. I know that, in politics, sometimes you look at the people who back the other side and you think you don't really like them, but we're not just talking here about personalities or individuals. We're talking about an institution in our society. Just as corporations are institutions in our society and unions of employers are institutions in our society, so too unions of employees are institutions within our society.
The fact is that this particular institution, the labour movement, has been getting weaker. People aren't joining like they used to. What's the consequence of that? We have a regulatory structure that privileges bargaining ahead of centralised wage fixing, and I support that. But, for bargaining to work, people have to feel like they have the power to bargain. If bargaining is just a euphemism for the unilateral imposition by employers of, 'This is what it's going to be; take it or leave it,' then that doesn't work for anyone, ultimately. It certainly doesn't work for the employees themselves, because bargaining takes power, we all know that. And we're seeing the erosion of power that has been happening as a consequence of the erosion of union membership, directly translating into very poor wage outcomes for working people. So you see things like public sector employees going four years without a new deal and a new enterprise agreement, and therefore four years without a pay rise. You see things like private sector firms having low rates of unionisation and, therefore, long periods going by without pay rises and without deals. That then flows onto other sectors of the economy, because wages growth overall is quite flat. Then you get what we have now: record low wages growth and stagnant wages. That is a direct consequence of the erosion of unionisation in this country.
I understand some members opposite may not like unions and may see them as too close to the Labor Party. They may not like some of the individuals and some of the personalities in the Australian union movement, but that should not be conflated with seeking to undermine and delegitimise the institution of the union movement in this country. Because, when those wages stay flat, what happens to the economy? It has an impact on household consumption. In other words, it has an impact on GDP growth, and we are seeing that now. What else happens? Low wages growth means an impact on government revenue, and an impact on government revenue means an impact on government spending. Again, this directly affects GDP growth in this country. We need to be really careful when we talk about wages, because wages drive so many other things. I encourage those members opposite: by all means take issue with individual personalities in the union movement and take issue with policies, ideas and programs. But delegitimising and undermining the union movement itself is not just wrong; it's deeply irresponsible for our economy and for our nation.
It's interesting to be debating this particular bill in relation to worker entitlements funds when we've just recently had a change in the law in relation to the duty of directors to prevent insolvent trading. The Productivity Commission recommended that there be a safe-harbour defence for directors to allow them to take more risk and to trade out of trouble, and I support that. I support the proposal of the Productivity Commission for a defence. Of course, the government, not content with doing something that could have bipartisan support, went even further and created an entire exemption from insolvent trading laws, effectively rendering the civil prohibition on insolvent trading useless. The difficulty that I have with what's happening, the reason it's so incongruous, is that, at the same time this government gave a blank cheque to directors to behave in a more risky way that puts firms more at risk of winding up in insolvency, it is simultaneously attacking the worker entitlement funds aimed at protecting the interests of working people. It really is quite revealing of the priorities of the government and of where the government's interests in this matter lie. As I say, I supported the idea of the defence, but I do make the observation that weakening protections against insolvent trading and then attacking workers' entitlements is incongruent, at best.
Ms OWENS ( Parramatta ) ( 17:29 ): It's Wednesday so the government must be attacking unions again. I'm astonished at this approach by this government, at this time of at all times. Between 1997 and 2012 wage growth averaged around 3.6 per cent a year. Since 2012 wage growth has slowed right down to average just 1.9 per cent a year. This is the lowest wage price index data since the data has been collected. Corporate profits are at an all-time high and wage growth is at an all-time low. Wages are more than what a person takes home at the end of their work day; they're also what they spend in the business next door. While I've heard some businesses argue for cuts in the wages of their workers, I have never yet heard a business argue for cuts in the wages of their customers. Yet, when wages fall, that's exactly what happens. When the cost of living rises higher than wages, the spending capacity of people is lower and lower, and we see what we're seeing in our community right now, which is entirely predictable: the slow decline of retail. Retailers are keeping all their fingers crossed and hoping for a great Christmas because they so desperately need it, yet wage growth is at an all-time low.
Under those circumstances, when we need to start finding ways to drive wages up, it is not the time that you start bagging out and trying to destroy the union movement. The union movement is one of the mechanisms that argue for that levelling off between corporate profit and wage growth. The moment wage growth is low and corporate profit is high, usually unions are the ones in the middle starting to argue for a fairer share of the pie. Don't let anyone tell you that wages aren't growing because productivity hasn't grown—because it actually has. Real labour productivity has gone up by 20 per cent in the last 10 years. Yet real wages grew by just six per cent. Over the last four decades, real wages for the top 10 per cent of income earners have grown 72 per cent, but for average earners they have grown only six per cent—an extraordinary moving of wealth from working people and middle-income people up to the higher echelons of our society.
Unions have an extraordinary role to play in this. The IMF—hardly a bastion of progressive or radical thinking—has recently been saying that the impact of declining unionisation is felt across the entire income spectrum. They find not only that the trend reduces the welfare of the lower income worker but that in fact it makes the rich richer. The IMF state, 'The decline in unionisation appears to be a key contributor to the rise of top income shares.' They say that the decline of union power has increased income inequality. Because of the government's ideological—I will use the Prime Minister's way of pronouncing the word; usually he uses 'iddeological' for us and 'eyedeoligical' for them, but I'm going to fold it back on him—obsession and hatred for unions, they are attacking one of the very mechanisms that would help this country address rising inequality and the stagnation of wages. This is an extraordinarily poorly thought-through strategy by the government.
In Parramatta we really need the government to start addressing wage growth decline and cost of living and the way the two issues intersect. In Parramatta, rents have risen much faster than wages. The median house price in Parramatta is now $1.2 million. Median rents are now sitting at well over $400 a week. We've just had a toll put back on the M4, which is going to rip $80 a week from a commuter's pay packet if they drive to the city every day. If you drive your kids to the soccer on Saturday, it's going to take $13 out of your pocket. Honestly, it's extraordinary. In Parramatta 12,300 people, or one in six workers, in the retail, food and accommodation industries are affected by the cuts to penalty rates. Again, that is something that the Turnbull government are more than happy to see happen. They're more than happy to see up to $70 a week ripped out of people's pay packets through these cuts to penalty rates, and they're happy to see that roll across the rest of the workforce as enterprise agreements are renegotiated. They're happy to see wages not just not grow fast enough but actively be cut. In Parramatta we are seeing up to one in six workers losing up to $77 a week in penalty rates, an additional $80 a week for the tolls, rents well over $400 and new Medicare levies coming in for lower-income workers as well.
They are a government that seem intent on driving down wages and, in doing so, driving down the wages of businesses' customers, because that's how main street works—people earn a living and they spend it in a business. The workers in that business who earn a living spend it and the money circulates. Take the money out and business slows down. We can see it already happening.
Ms Husar: Then jobs go.
Ms OWENS: As the member for Lindsay says, then jobs go. Of course they do. That's even fewer people to spend et cetera. This is a cycle that this government seems very happy to turbocharge with the policies it is bringing into this parliament.
This particular bill is an interesting case study. The government went to a double-dissolution election some time ago now because they had such urgency to deal with the union movement under their ideological obsession and hatred. This bill comes, according to the government, from recommendations from the Heydon royal commission, which was quite some time ago. So it sat somewhere on the backburner in spite of this urgency the government had when it went to a double dissolution. It was introduced into the parliament on Thursday last week, 19 October, and we're debating it today. It's not usual for bills to be presented in the parliament on the Thursday and debated the following week. Usually they hang around for a couple of weeks because it's important that stakeholders can actually give some feedback. Even if there isn't an official inquiry, it's important that members of parliament can actually know what they're voting on.
This bill has five schedules, runs to 80 pages and amends five pieces of legislation. It amends the Fair Work Act of 2009, the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009, the Fringe Benefits Tax Assessment Act of 1986, the Income Tax Assessment Act of 1997 and the Taxation Administration Act of 1953. If anyone who is listening to this has never seen what these sorts of amendments look like, they say things like, 'In section 3.6, remove this and replace this.' You can't just read them. They require an incredible amount of effort to work out exactly what is going on. On this side of the House we've had Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday—as most of us work the weekends—Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and here we are debating it today. Actually we started debating it yesterday. So suddenly there is a level of urgency about this that makes it more important than all of the other things sitting on the table for this government—more important than cost of living and more important than doing anything about stopping cuts to penalty rates. The private member's bill on that has been sitting on the table for a long time. We could debate that. There is the rising cost of housing, the extraordinary lack of affordability of housing and the fact that young people are being completely priced out of the market. Unemployment rates for young people have gone through the roof. There are the effects of climate change, for example, on our health and wellbeing and eventually on the economy. That doesn't seem to be a priority.
This seems to be a government that can let the important things slide because the most important thing to it is this ideological obsession with and hatred for the union movement. This is quite absurd. I would love to be able to go through the 10 recommendations from the Heydon royal commission and match them up with what this government says this bill does. I actually care about this. I don't come from the union movement, by the way. I don't. I was a union member for 15 years before I joined the Labor Party because I think you kind of need to be and because I came from an industry that had never been industrialised. We were the original gig economy in the arts. So we needed unions to take care of us when we worked in pubs because it was so easy for workers to be ripped off. The businesses that required artists to do well needed unions to do that as well. Record companies needed their artists to earn an appropriate living for the work they did when they weren't working for them. The whole sector needed this voice to speak for all of us as individuals who were out there doing our gigs. We needed unions. So I've been a member since I was about 15 when I first started working in the sector.
But I've never worked for a union. In fact, my professional work was on the other side. I managed a trade association. I managed an employer association. I have been an employer virtually all my life. So I come from the other side. But this is actually an important matter because, as the rest of the workforce moves towards the gig economy, you can see the loss of full-time work and the increasing use of subcontractors. You can already see it in industries like construction. They're starting to move into what I call the gig economy, where they do this job and that job; they don't get holiday pay and they don't get sick benefits, because they're subcontractors and they don't have any of that. What you start seeing in industries like that, right around the world, is various organisations finding ways to assemble those workers in some form of mutual cooperation.
In Belgium you see SMart, which is a commercial organisation that does the invoicing and collection of payments for artists—about 80,000 of them. It essentially pays artists a regular wage; it does all of the invoicing, collects all their money, averages it out and pays them a regular wage. You can see Broodfonds, which collect groups of 50 sole traders together to insure each other against illness. You get these kinds of ways that people assemble themselves to provide the protections that full-time workers get.
My staff get a lot of these things these enterprise funds provide. My staff get counselling and assistance with difficult clients. They get all sorts of things that these sorts of enterprise funds provide. They get them because they're employed full time in big companies. But, if you're in the gig economy or you're a subcontractor, that's not the case. We would expect, at this time in the history of the change to workplaces, that you would find unions that care about their workers trying to find ways to cushion workers with the kinds of mechanisms they had when they were fully employed. So you find these funds that cover sickness benefits, termination benefits and death benefits. You find these funds like MATES in Construction that assist people in their worst times. Members contribute to them and they are there when a person needs them, because they're injured, suffering from mental illness or whatever it is. You'd expect those things to happen.
I want to have a look at this because I want to see whether these enterprise funds, as they're called, are actually starting to do the kinds of things that we will need our communities to do as the workforce changes. These are forerunners of something that should grow, not be banned. It's actually a forerunner of something that fills an incredibly important role, a role that we've just got used to having because we had full-time work. But remember that full-time work wasn't dignified when it was first invented. When it was first invented at the beginning of the industrial age, it was hell. Six-year-olds did it; they worked 16 hours a day, seven days a week. That was civilised. The entire full-time work was civilised by the union movement. As we move out of full-time work, past casualisation into the gig economy, we are going to need our union movement to civilise that too. That is what these funds actually do. They attempt to replace some of the things, the safety nets, that you take for granted if you're in full-time work. They replace them with these funds for casuals and subcontractors.
It's the beginning of something that should grow. I would like the opportunity in this place to actually have time to look at this bill and see its detail to see whether it genuinely is stopping something incredibly important from happening.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Goodenough ): The question is that the amendment moved by the member for Gorton be agreed to. All of those in favour say aye, to the contrary no. I think the noes have it.
Honourable members: The ayes have it.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: As it is necessary to resolve this question to enable further questions to be considered in relation to this bill, in accordance with standing order 195 the bill will be returned to the House for further consideration.
Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017
Second Reading
Consideration resumed of the motion:
That this bill be now read a second time.
Ms MARINO (Forrest—Chief Government Whip) (17:44): I represent two premier Australian wine regions—the Margaret River and the Geographe wine regions. That's why I am supporting the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017. The bill enables the Australian Grape and Wine Authority to implement all activities under the wine support package, including for cider and international wine tourism. It enables the authority to administer grant programs for wine, including the cellar door grant, and it changes the name of the authority to Wine Australia.
I'm very, very proud of our region's winemakers and wineries. They bring great value and vibrancy to the south-west. In fact, Margaret River is about to celebrate its 50th anniversary of commercial fine wine making in the modern era. Margaret River is an international brand, as we all know. The two main wine regions in the south-west, the Margaret River and Geographe wine regions, have very well-deserved reputations for producing top-quality wines. However, the winemakers never stand still. They are continuously striving to produce even finer quality award-winning wines.
The measures in this bill are important to the over 95 cellar doors in the region that sell wine directly to the public. Many of these are small and family businesses that have invested year upon year, often starting from very humble beginnings; mortgaging their houses or properties to start that small business; at times, like so many small business people, not sleeping at night wondering how to pay wages and bills; and investing countless hours themselves in and on their businesses. But their considerable efforts have produced so many benefits for the region.
A division having been called in the House of Representatives—
Sitting suspended from 17:47 to 18:17
Ms MARINO: In terms of exports across Australia in 2016, the wines were worth over $2.2 billion. For the south-west region in 2016, the value of exports was over $42 million, according to Wine Australia. In our export markets—predominantly China and Hong Kong—and around Australia the most popular wines are shiraz, cabernet sauvignon and chardonnay. The benefits of these export dollars flow not just to wine producers but to their regional and small communities, and there are so many local jobs involved. Countless other small and family-owned businesses benefit from the wine industry. Just look at the farm supply companies. Cowaramup Agencies supplies trellising, fencing, winemaking, cleaning and packaging supplies. And there is Landmark in Margaret River and in Busselton as well. We have LP and JA Fryer in Harvey—all the rural traders, delivering similar services to the industry.
And consider some of the other local businesses that supply or support the industry, including fencing contractors, transport companies, mechanics, local tourism operators like Bushtucker River and Wine Tours, accountants, and marketing companies like Jack in the Box—the list is endless. It demonstrates why the wine industry is very important in my electorate. It's important to the regional and state economy as well as our broader Australian economy in terms of export earnings as well as the tourism income and local jobs in communities like mine in the south-west.
The coalition government clearly understands the important contribution this industry makes to the local, state and national economy, as demonstrated by the measures in this bill. Industry came to us and said there were problems with the wine equalisation tax rebate scheme. There were integrity concerns, and they said there was a need to target the benefits back to the original purpose: that of supporting small wine producers in rural and regional areas. These changes were negotiated with wine producers across the nation and, most relevantly for me, in the south-west, Margaret River and the Geographe region, through discussions with Assistant Minister Senator Anne Ruston. They were very robust discussions, with a diverse group of growers who raised a range of issues—and they did it so well. Much of what we see in this bill is as a result of consultations and us genuinely understanding the businesses of the small to medium-sized producers. I want to thank every producer who made time to meet with Senator Anne Ruston and me for their frankness during those discussions. I also want to acknowledge the work of the Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, Kelly O'Dwyer.
This initiative also recognises and supports the value and vibrancy that wine producers bring to regional communities like mine. We largely depend on that vibrancy. I will be looking very closely at how my wine regions are represented in the marketing effort. Wine producers in my electorate will be very focused on how they can leverage and improve their export options, particularly on the back of the three free trade agreements concluded by the coalition government. On the back of the federal funding that I secured there will be an upgrade of the Busselton-Margaret River Regional Airport to international passengers and, importantly for my producers, it will have more freight capacity. This is, as I have repeatedly said, a transformative project—one that is greatly anticipated. We are really looking forward to the upgrade of the airport being completed and services being able to run out of there. I can see a lot of fantastic exports from the south-west moving out through that airport.
This bill is ultimately about increased support for small regional wineries. It's exactly what our small to-medium-sized cellar doors need to offer to attract and retain tourists in this area. It's very, very important. I wholeheartedly commend the bill to the House.
Ms CHESTERS (Bendigo) (18:21): It is good to be standing here and talking about the success of the Australian grape and wine industry. I am sure that, after today, many of us will feel like having a glass of wine, but we've got a few hours to go. There is a lot to be proud of in what the Australian wine industry has achieved. It's important, in speaking to the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017, to say that, whilst Labor supports this bill, it gives us an opportunity to remind the House that it has been a bit of a journey to get here.
The newly named authority, Wine Australia, will be responsible for administering two funds created as part of the wine equalisation rebate reforms. This was first flagged on budget night in 2016, when the government and the Treasurer of the day thought they could pull a swiftie on the wine industry by saying, 'Yes, here is your $50 million as promised, as part of the reform package,' but then put forward a wine equalisation tax measure which had not been fully agreed to and supported by the wine industry and which was not in the spirit in which it had been discussed prior to its announcement on budget night.
The wine industry—including many wineries in my own electorate of Bendigo—and the opposition had serious concerns about the original design of the measure as put forward by the Treasurer on budget night. The original measure was supposed to start on 1 July this year. In May 2016, it was announced that the cap for the wine equalisation tax would be lowered from $500,000 to $290,000 within 12 months. The day after that budget announcement, winemakers said to me: 'Lisa, it's just not fair. That wine is in the barrel. How can you make such a change so rapidly and so quickly? It will put my business, my enterprise, at serious risk.'
Another issue that winemakers raised about the first draft was that it targeted the cap first and not where the real gaming of the wine equalisation tax is going on, and that is in the bulk and unbranded wine. They said that the way the original changes had been proposed in the bill gave a free kick to the bulk and unbranded wine sector—commonly know as the Coles and Safeway branded wine; it could basically continue to game the system. Through the efforts of Wine Australia, our state based organisation and the opposition, we engaged in a constructive way to say, 'Yes, everybody agrees that there needs to be reform with the wine equalisation tax; however, what has been put forward by the government isn't fair.' After consultation and genuine engagement, the measure was changed to be more reflective and more in line with what the industry had previously asked for and which would deliver similar savings to what had been put forward on budget night. It was about restoring integrity to the wine equalisation tax, which has always supposed to have been about supporting small, independent wineries, many of whom are based in many of our electorates in regional Australia, particularly in my electorate of Bendigo.
In the one area of Heathcote alone, there are over 80 wineries and cellar doors. Quite often I use a statistic which makes schoolchildren and teachers laugh, which is that there are more wineries than schools in my electorate! I have 96 schools across the Bendigo electorate and we have over 150 registered cellar doors and wineries, and that's just the beginning of the extent of the wine industry in areas like mine in Central Victoria. They will benefit from this bill that is before us.
This bill has been designed to deliver on the $50 million that has been allocated for the Export and Regional Wine Support Package. This was part of the commitment to the industry because of the wine equalisation tax reforms. Within this $50 million, for those with $20 million of annual turnover up to a $50,000 cap can be claimed for promotional activity. This fund is limited and the money will be allocated on a first-in-best-dressed basis. I have a few concerns about the first-in-best-dressed basis because it does mean that we may not necessarily get the best products with the best kind of promotional material asking for support. The refund will also cover any manner of expenditure, including taxi fares and business cards in dual languages. Again, with $50 million on the table to support our independent and small winemakers, you just wish that the government could have been a little bit more innovative and put a little bit more thought into how they wanted to spend that $50 million. When talking to my local wineries, they have said to me: 'Business cards are something I can cover. Having a business card I can give to someone is something I can cover. But where I really need support is on how to establish those markets.'
When you have an area like Heathcote, which is a big shiraz region with over 80 independent shiraz producers, they are trying to grapple with whether they have their own name for their wines, like Jasper Hill or Mount Camel, or whether they band together as Heathcote shiraz. They acknowledge that they can't produce enough wine independently to justify the expenditure of opening up an export market in China. China is massive. We could never produce enough wine in Australia to feed the Chinese market. So, as we on this side have talked about a lot, we need to stop thinking 'big' and 'bulk' and start thinking 'niche' and 'top price'. That's very much what our small independent winemakers want to get into. They want to get into telling the winemaking story, making their wine the one-off gift or having it go into the top restaurants.
These are small businesses and, like most small businesses, it's almost a 24/7 operation. They spend so much time making the wine, they need support in marketing the wine. So it is a bit disappointing with $50 million on the table that the government hasn't been more innovative on how this can be spent. I know that Wine Australia is very keen for innovation, and Wine Australia will be working to maximise how this funding can support small winemakers. That's why it's just disappointing that the government has gone for a first-in-best-dressed basis, including taxi fares and business cards. Most small businesses say: 'I've got that covered, but what I really need is help establishing the client base, the market base and how I position my product.' Also, if they hit a barrier—and we have a lot of secondary trade barriers with the Chinese market—they need help getting through.
I also have some concerns about the limit for marketing and promotion. There are China, Hong Kong and the United States, and Japan is a really important country to a lot of our winemakers. Korea is an important country, and increasingly the UK and Europe. So it is disappointing that this provision has been limited to these markets, and maybe it calls the China free trade agreement into question—perhaps it isn't quite delivering what the government is claiming it's delivering if our winemakers now need $50 million to help get their product into China. What has gone on here? Apparently it is great on one hand and our winemakers are doing really well, but then on the other hand we have to give them $50 million to help them get their product there. So maybe there is a bit of a disconnect between what the government is claiming and what is actually happening.
The other part of the scheme that is really important, particularly to my area, is the $10 million that will be allocated to wine tourism and cellar door grants. Infrastructure is important. One of the reasons why this particular part is critical to regional Australia, and in particular regional Victoria, is wine tourism. Whilst the core business is the production of wine, what we have seen really flourish across regional Victoria, whether it be the Bellarine-Geelong, whether it be the Yarra Valley, whether it be heading to the Grampians or whether it be around Bendigo and Central Victoria, is wine tourism. People who travel to Bendigo, perhaps to the art gallery, might go via Heathcote and our wineries. Our wine tourism and cellar doors are critical in terms of regional tourism and are a big part of the culture. A lot of wineries talk to me about capital costs, in terms of establishing those doors, making sure they've got decent and up-to-date maps—making sure they have maps and roads signs that can get you there. Believe it or not, in the age of mobile phones and Google Maps, we still need our road signs because a lot of these areas are in black spots. Some of this funding will go towards helping people navigate the good old-fashioned way to get to wineries because we still haven't fixed a lot of the black spot problems in regional Victoria.
Part of the cash grant scheme will allocate money to cellar doors. Again, this is a bit of a top-up. The government tried to move very quickly to reduce the cap, and we knew that would hurt a number of small to medium wineries. I guess, because of the reform going ahead, it was agreed that we would have a grant scheme to help as a bit of a top-up. If some of our small wineries sell more than what the new cap is, it is kind of restricting. It is important that that continue as well as, as I've said, making sure that we have our wine tourism infrastructure established.
Whilst we on this side do support this bill, we are critical of how long it's taken to get here and of the haphazard and messy way we got here. We hear about the government taking a bipartisan issue on the reform of the wine equalisation tax and support for an important industry in so many of our electorates, and then they just mess it up. Everything this government touches, even when we're trying to work together, gets stuffed up. It's one of the unfortunate things with this government that we have to work so hard from opposition, so hard with the industry, to try and get the government to clean up its own messes. I do have to acknowledge, though, that the minister responsible for this did work with us and was open to reform. Unlike what we have seen from some other ministers who dig their feet in and say, 'Labor is wrong and it's all Labor's fault,' at least Senator Anne Ruston did say, 'Let's work with the industry to get this right.' I do want to acknowledge that, unlike some of her colleagues, she did work with us to make sure that we got a package that the industry could work with, that did restore the integrity of the wine equalisation tax and at the same time ensured that we had this fund created to support the growth of our wine industries here in Australia.
The government should stop all this rhetoric about how great their free trade agreements are for the wine industry because, quite frankly, they're not delivering yet, and they're not delivering for some really fundamental reasons. The small independent winemakers are not getting access to the markets that will help deliver benefits. We are supporting clustering—I have used Heathcote as an example—to encourage the export of wine. Whilst they might not be able to send over a plane full of their own wine, if we could gather wineries together we might be able to do some cross-marketing.
There is still a lot of work to do. The wine sector is unhappy with how this government has rolled out this package and this reform. It's been a messy process, and it didn't need to be this hard. Whilst the outcome that we've got to is acceptable, we shouldn't have to work so hard on a proposal that in its original form was bipartisan. As I have said, the Victorian wine industry contributes $7.6 billion to the Victorian state economy and employs over 13,000 people. In the 22 divisions and winery regions that we have, there are over 500 cellar doors and 477 wineries. As I've said, that's a huge chunk of my electorate in Bendigo. We are proud of what our winemakers are achieving, the work they're doing, the innovations they're making and the fact that so many of our wineries are wanting to become ethical, sustainable wine businesses. We should be supporting the work that they do.
It's great to finally have this being debated and going forward. However, it's just so disappointing that the government messed it up, from the very first night that they announced these reforms on budget night to where we are today.
Mr GOSLING (Solomon) (18:36): I rise to speak on the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017. It's great to be able to make a contribution on this important subject for our economy. The wine industry is large and getting larger, and it is in all parts of the country. Some listening may think that there'd be no wineries up in Darwin, in the Top End of Australia, but the Northern Territory does, in fact, have mango wine. There is a mango winery, the Red Centre Farm—where mangoes are grown, harvested, pulped, frozen and then sent down to the great state of South Australia—where they're turned into all sorts of fantastic wine products: Mango Moonshine, Mango Mist and Mango Magic. Some listening may have heard of the silly season up in the Top End when the build-up comes, such as we are experiencing at the moment, where there's a bit of mango madness, and I can't vouch for the Mango Magic wine myself, but I know the moonshine is not a bad drop for a mango wine.
All around our country there are wine-growing areas that everyone in this place should be very proud of. On this side, as those that have spoken before me have articulated, we're supporting the Australian Grape and Wine Authority amendment bill. As we've heard, that's going to allow the newly named Wine Australia to administer two funds created as part of the wine equalisation tax, or WET, rebate reforms. One part of that is the Export and Regional Wine Support Package, $50 million; the other is the Wine Tourism and Cellar Door Grant program, $10 million.
It's not a bad package, but, as the member for Bendigo said, it's a shame we had to come on the route that we did to get here. Australia's wine industry is such a vibrant component of regional Australia. We just heard some figures about its input into the Victorian economy of $7.6 billion. I grew up in the Yarra Valley of Victoria. When I was growing up, there were two wineries in our part of the world: Miller's winery and the Fergusson winery. There was a lot of dairy country, but over time many of those dairy properties have become wineries, and the beautiful Yarra Valley, with its cool climate, is making fantastic chardonnays, sparkling wines and pinot noirs. As I said, there were two wineries around Yarra Glen when I was growing up, but I reckon there are probably about 40 now.
I've been very lucky throughout my life to have lived in other wine-growing areas. I just want to tip my hat to them and the fine winemakers who are plying their trade making world-class wines. When I was in the Army, at one time I was posted to Singleton, in the Hunter Valley, which, as you know well, Madam Deputy Speaker Claydon, makes incredible semillons, which is widely considered the iconic wine of the region. The beautiful Hunter Valley produces outstanding shiraz, cab savs, verdelhos and chardonnays. They are also innovating with a variety of new styles. The member for Hunter is a great advocate for wineries in that part of the world and, I understand, a great advocate of the Pokolbin Pride weekend that happened recently, which you, Madam Deputy Speaker, might be frequenting in our beautiful Hunter Valley wine region, listening to Midnight Oil. Midnight Oil were recently up in Darwin as well. It was one of the best concerts I've ever been to, I must say.
The Clare Valley in South Australia cannot be forgotten either, it being one of our oldest wine-making regions. It is well-renowned for riesling. I had the opportunity recently to try a riesling made by one of our own members of parliament: Farrell Wines. For the record, Don Farrell and his winery make a fantastic riesling. The Clare Valley has an amazing story over a long period of time, as far as wine-making goes. It is a story of migration, it is a story of Australia in many ways. They make excellent wines. The exports from those wine-growing areas will really benefit from this legislation, in that funding has been made available for marketing to export markets in China and the States in particular. That's obviously a very good thing for those wineries. We support the bill for those reasons.
I was recently on a parliamentary delegation to Beijing and Shanghai with a number of our colleagues, including the Speaker of the House of Representatives. There's certainly a great interest there in our wines. Looking at the growing number of Chinese entering the middle classes, in particular in places like Hong Kong and Macau, we see that they are having a bit of a crack at wine, and they want the best. They're increasingly wanting to get their hands on some Australian wines, so marketing support really benefits those wineries that are sending their wines overseas.
It is a bit of a shame, however, for some of the smaller wineries, which, with these reforms, are now getting less of a rebate and also aren't benefitting from the marketing assistance, because they're not exporting. For those smaller wineries servicing our domestic market, we need to be aware of the challenges they have with their businesses and we need to be looking for ways in which we can assist them. There is our Red Centre winery at Ti Tree, on the highway, growing mangos that go down to South Australia—I'll put them in that basket as well. We really need to make sure that we maintain the clean, green image that we are renowned for all around the world. We need to value it and protect it because therein lies the credibility and uniqueness of our brands. This reform of the wine equalisation tax rebate is long overdue.
The system had been open to rorting by some of those bulk and unbranded operators, and it's important to recall that the government did plan, back in the day, to pocket $300 million from the first reform proposal it put forward. However, following significant industry backlash and expressions of concern from Labor, the government did back down and went back to the drawing board. The government still plans to be $160 million better off as a result of these reforms and the implementation of this industry support package. There is, possibly, little case for this; those who are doing the right should not be made to pay for the crimes of others.
As I said, the system was a little bit open to rorting and there was some creative entity structuring. However, I don't want to dwell on that too much because, as the member for Bendigo said, Minister Senator Anne Ruston has done a pretty reasonable job talking to the industry and coming up with a package that, more or less, suits their needs and that they're happy with. Understandably, they're not as happy as they could have been, and it has been a bit of a messy process, but we on this side of the House look forward to working with all stakeholders to ensure that the $60 million that we are approving today through the passage of this bill is money well spent.
Finally, I want to reflect on the people who are working in this industry around our country. There are some fantastic wineries in Margaret River. The army kept sending me from wine area to wine area. When I was in Perth I managed to get down there. I'll never forget the Xanadu winery in Margaret River, but I do forget most of my trip to Cape Clairault Wines in the same area! There were outstanding wines and very professional people working at the cutting edge of innovation. Winemaking is not a backyard operation. There are some great backyard operators having a crack at making good Australian wine, but, usually, it is very much a professional undertaking that requires high levels of education, skill, perseverance and tenacity, and Australian winemakers all around our country can be very proud of the job they're doing.
Debating this bill today, I have been proud to just reflect on their work making great produce for our country. I stress again the need for us to maintain the clean, green food bowl image that we have and to make sure that it is real. It is incredibly important that we protect that brand. It will ensure the sustainability—with the support of these measures—of our industry into the future.
Ms MADELEINE KING (Brand) (18:48): I thank the member for Solomon for his fine contribution. As always, he is a great contributor to the debates in the House. I rise to speak on the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017. This bill will enable the Australian Grape and Wine Authority to implement all the program activities under the wine support package. It will also enable the authority to administer grants for wine, including the cellar door grant. It will change the name of the authority from the Australian Grape and Wine Authority to the much catchier Wine Australia. The newly named Wine Australia will administer two funds which have been created as part of the wine equalisation tax rebate reforms.
I'd like to take some time to reflect on the journey of these reforms, and what a tortured path it has been. I thank the member for Hunter for reminding those opposite of the history of this reform for the wine sector. Yesterday he took us through the jagged path of reform for the sector that he has personally witnessed as the able member for Hunter since 1996. I know he is very proud of the wine producers in the Hunter, and so he should be. They produce some beautiful wines.
Many if not all of us here will remember the introduction of the GST, the goods and services tax. The 29 per cent wine equalisation tax came to be as the Howard government acknowledged that taxes on wine would have fallen significantly, creating an economic distortion, and would have been socially irresponsible. With a mind to helping out cellar door sales of small vineyards and promoting more activity and growth of small and family owned vineyards and wineries, the Labor Party in opposition moved amendments that would provide for a cellar door exemption from this wine equalisation tax. The always courageous Mr Costello, the Treasurer of the day, rejected our suggested reforms. As the legislation went through the other place, Labor kept up its efforts on behalf of the industry and Mr 'All tip, no iceberg' eventually conceded it was a good idea for small wine producers and such an exemption would in fact help at the cellar door.
But, always up for letting poor policy decisions get in the way of a good idea, the Liberal government, instead of introducing an exemption, in a rotten deal with the Democrats to introduce the GST, which in the process destroyed the Democrats, brought in a rebate and so developed a situation where loopholes in the wine equalisation tax and the rebate processes allowed bulk wine traders to exploit the market and take advantage of the $500,000 rebate, which has sometimes been claimed several times for the same wine. Ultimately what we have seen with this arrangement is bulk producers gaming the system and getting the rebate when it was never intended they receive it. But that is what happens with bad policy and poor implementation—unscrupulous rorters game the system. We all agreed reform was needed.
Let's fast forward a bit to the 2016 budget. What a gem that was! Without warning, the government announced reform of this system. There was no consultation with industry and no consultation with stakeholders. There was just the announcement of, 'By the way, we'll take $300 million out of the industry and pocket that.' It's just like what the government are hoping to do to students in this country. Let's hope the other place can put a stop to that. This government has upped the fees students pay to attend universities by 7.5 per cent. You might think those funds will go to helping improve the student experience, such as through improving infrastructure, funding teaching and learning development, more lecturers themselves or assisting the programs at universities. But, no—they are just hitting up students for cash and pocketing these fees to fix their budget mess, just like they've tried to do with the wine industry.
So the wine industry, quite rightly, opposed the changes. Ultimately, there was a backdown. Common sense prevailed and the government changed tack on the tax rebate cap. The industry group Wines of Western Australia were opposed to the original budget proposals and came out strongly against them. They've been quite generous in their assessment of the backflip. A representative from Wines of Western Australia said: 'I don't call it a backdown. I call it doing the process properly.' That's an industry group having to congratulate this government for getting the process of legislative development right.
You've got to remember this is their constituency. You might reasonably think most vineyard owners or winery owners are probably Liberal voters. Take the seat of Forrest in the south-west of Western Australia. It covers a magnificent part of the world. It's a pretty sturdy Liberal seat. Some figures recently showed it was in some trouble, but I'm sure it's not for the Chief Government Whip. This is their constituency, so you might assume that a Liberal government would consult with their own constituency when they were going to bring in some changes that would affect their constituency's bottom lines, lives and industry. They rail on about small, family owned businesses in this place, saying they're the only ones that seem to understand them. Yet, in this attack—well, I don't think it was an attack; it was negligence—on the wine industry, they've strolled on in and made an announcement without any consultation with these small, family owned businesses that most likely have voted for them for a long time. Maybe they'll reconsider their position after this exercise.
Mr Brian Mitchell: They certainly should.
Ms MADELEINE KING: They certainly should—I agree with the member for Lyons on that point.
We agree these reforms are necessary to ensure the long-term viability of the Australian wine industry and improve the integrity of the rebate itself, which, in its previous form, was damaging the sustainability of wine production across Australia. As I've said, the old WET producer rebate created an unfair and uneven incentive for businesses to create a structure that maximised rebate claims. Reforming the rebate better targets the areas for which the policy was initially intended. It was to benefit smaller wine producers, who are making significant commitments and investments to the industry around rural and regional Australia.
As I was saying before, through this legislation Wine Australia is going to administer two funds. The Export and Regional Wine Support Package will have $50 million allocated to it. That will aim to help transform the Australian grape and wine industry through wine tourism and wine exports. Three grant programs will be offered under this package—wine export grants, international wine tourism state grants and international wine tourism competitive grants. We've heard that the object of the wine export grants is to reduce exporting transaction costs for wine exporters and so increase export opportunities to China, Macau, Hong Kong and the US from Australia. The objective of the international wine tourism state grants is to support state wine associations, such as Wines of WA, to work with wine tourism stakeholders to build international wine tourism within the state. In that regard I very much look forward to working with the Hon. Paul Papalia, the member for Warnbro, which is in my seat of Brand, who is the new state Minister for Tourism.
The objective of the international wine tourism competitive grants is to support stakeholders in plans to grow the number of tourists visiting and spending time in the Australian region for the purposes of international wine tourism. It allows entities with an annual turnover of less than $20 million to claim 50 per cent of their promotional activities, up to a cap of $50,000. The fund is limited and money will be allocated on a first-in-best-dressed basis—not exactly the fairest means of distributing funding, especially when funding is limited. There doesn't seem to be a competitive process; it's who gets in the door first. And limiting the markets this promotional grant will go to seems to be a little short-sighted as well. There has been a solid trajectory in growth in Australian wine exports internationally from the nineties until now, and I think our export capacity, particularly into Asia as tastes change, is still to be fully realised, especially in the sense that wine makes up only around five per cent of Australia's agricultural exports.
I might reflect on the WA wine industry. Whilst in Western Australia we produce only around five per cent of Australia's wine by volume, Western Australia produces nearly one-quarter of the nation's premium and super premium wines. That's a fact Western Australian members in this place are very proud of. With our exports generally, we do have a way to go. There's much to celebrate: in 2015 bottled wine exports to China increased by 45 per cent, which demonstrates the power of that emerging Asian market and the demand for the high-quality wine that Australia offers. But still nearly half of our bottled wine exports go to Europe and nearly a third to North America, so even with the massive 45 per cent increase in exports to China there's a lot of opportunity in that market.
I want to reflect for a few minutes of my remaining time on the great local wine industry in my state. Off the back of the wine industry we get to benefit from a fantastic tourism industry that's enjoyed by both domestic and international visitors. I know the member for Lyons, who is sitting here this evening, is a fan of wines from the Margaret River region, as is the Deputy Speaker in the chair, the member for Newcastle.
Mr Brian Mitchell: I was just wondering if you could get me a box of Evans & Tate.
Ms MADELEINE KING: Yes, Evans & Tate; it's a good brew—wine.
The tourism hotspots of the Swan Valley and Margaret River are beacons in the domestic wine industry and popular places for visitors from everywhere. Margaret River is a treasured destination of mine with an amazing expanse of natural wonders, caves, forests and amazing beaches—with some pretty dangerous surf that will certainly wake you up in the morning if you had an overindulgent wine tour the day before. There are a wide range of activities: surfing, mountain bike trails, hiking, the various national parks, the Munda Biddi Trail, the Bibbulmun Track, vineyards and wines of course, and, I might add, breweries as well.
You haven't tasted wine, I don't think, until you've had some Margaret River wines from the cellar door. I'm going to talk about a couple of my favourites—I have mentioned them here before but I can't help myself. Rosily Vineyard is a great little family owned vineyard where they hand-pick their grapes every harvest season. Another excellent vineyard in the region, some find it hard to get to but I assure you it's not, is Ashbrook Estate. It's another family owned vineyard that's been there for a long time, operated by the Devitt family. They've been running it for over 40 years. Similar to Rosily, all the grapes are harvested by hand from their own vines on their own property, and all the wine is made on the estate, all in their own vats and with their own equipment and bottling. It is acknowledged as one of the highest performing and brilliant little vineyards in the country. It's 2016 semillon and 2016 verdelho won silver in the International Wine Challenge 2017. I congratulate the Devitt family for their combined efforts in the work they are doing.
Of course there is the great Cullen Wines on Caves Road that many are familiar with, built by Dr Kevin Cullen and Diana Madeline Cullen, both remarkable Western Australians who have contributed greatly to their state. I have mentioned before how Mrs Cullen was the first person to import merlot and cabernet franc cuttings to Western Australia. She was part of the first trial of vine growing in Wilyabrup in 1966 and established the Cullen vineyard in 1971. She is rightly acknowledged as an important pioneer of the industry.
The Cullens established their remarkable vineyard and the Margaret River wine industry on the back of their own research and on the advice of Dr John Gladstones, who in the 1960s first identified the potential of Margaret River to become one of the world's greatest wine regions. This is a perfect example of science and research being applied to create a whole new industry. Without the research and the science undertaken by Dr Gladstones and the enthusiasm of the Cullens for that research and acceptance of the science in it, we might not have the Margaret River wine region that we do today. Today, Cullen Wines prospers and, among other great wines, it produces the iconic Diana Madeline bordeaux blend that is highly sought after around the world.
In my electorate of Brand I have a few vineyards. Peel Estate vineyard is a favourite. It's down on the southern end of Baldivis, on the way to Mandurah. Peel Estate was started in the same year I was born. Although you might think I'm younger than I am, that means their first vines were planted in 1973. The winery has added varieties as the years have progressed and the Australian palate has changed. I went down to Peel Estate recently and in the upcoming spring and summer they will be having a great many events. They have jazz music under the trees, and you can see a lovely bush sunset from the Peel Estate vineyards. When I was at the cellar door recently, I was informed that Peel Estate have the oldest zinfandel vines in Western Australia, having planted them in 1976. That makes the vineyard at Peel Estate, in Karnup, towards the end of Baldivis, amongst the oldest in Australia to have zinfandel wines.
Small, often family-run, businesses like these are adapting and changing to meet the demands of consumers. The wine equalisation tax needed changing. Government support needs to adapt but it should not do so to the detriment of the industry. We came close to that but ultimately the bill has been much reformed, so we are supporting the $60 million in grants programs today and look forward to working with stakeholders to ensure that this money is well spent in the future.
Ms McGOWAN (Indi) (19:04): I'm very pleased to rise here this evening to support the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017, which will make amendments to the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Act 2013. In support of this legislation, I want to address three points. I want to highlight the importance of wine and tourism industries in my electorate and in other members' electorates. I want to acknowledge the role of Brown Brothers as a clear example of what it means to be a successful regionally based business. I also want to recognise the opportunity for my region in becoming the Australian home of prosecco and the role the Australian government can play in this opportunity.
We've covered well in this debate the amendments and how important they are, and how they will allow the Australian Grape and Wine Authority to facilitate and administer programs for cider and in relation to international wine tourism, to administer grant programs in relation to wine and to formally change the name of the authority. So it's an important piece of legislation, particularly for my electorate of Indi—and I'm absolutely delighted to acknowledge two of my constituents here tonight; I reckon you understand the wine industry and how important it is. For those of you in the chamber who don't know Indi, which is in north-east Victoria, viticulture and tourism are two of our biggest industries. Of the 21 official wine regions in Victoria, six are in my electorate. We're well endowed with beautiful country and glorious wine.
In addition to producing high-quality wine, these vineyards provide high-quality vineyard dining, behind-the-scenes tours and cellar door experiences, and they're a major attracter—in the Murray Valley, the Mitta Valley, the King Valley, the Ovens Valley and then further down south in Broken Valley and around the Upper Goulburn area. We have beautiful fertile soil, mountains and hills, and these fantastic businesses that produce beautiful wine and glorious places to have lunch, but also tourism. Central to the whole wine industry—its agriculture and manufacturing—is that the food and wine, cider and beer visitors spend an estimated $142 million in my electorate. That's tourism.
Central to this whole success story are Brown Brothers. I think many of you would know and appreciate Brown Brothers wine. Brown Brothers are located in Milawa, which is just to the east of Wangaratta, in the King Valley. They're a third- and fourth-generation regional business, which is fantastic. Founded in 1889, Brown Brothers employ 320 people, of whom 200 are located regionally. They've developed a terrific export market that turns over $110 million. They are hugely important for my region.
Brown Brothers cover the full spectrum of what it means to be a successful regionally based business. They've got a base. Their agricultural product starts in the vineyards. They move to manufacturing through their winemaking, their bottling and their packaging. They do research. They market their product and then they trade domestically and internationally, resulting in frontline and executive staff across a really broad range of disciplines. So, it is fantastic working with Brown Brothers, because you've always got a good career path. One of their key tourism and marketing initiatives is their cellar door, not only at their home in Milawa, which is really important, but also at their Devil's Corner and Tamar Ridge wineries in north-east of Tasmania—and I have to acknowledge the member for Lyons, Brian Mitchell, and his electorate—and the Innocent Bystander brand in the Yarra Valley, in the electorate of the member for Casey, Tony Smith. In total, they draw more than 400,000 visitors to their cellar doors. That's 400,000 people visiting our regions. To quote Ross Brown, every bottle of wine exported is equivalent to an Australian postcard inviting visitors to come to regional Australia.
So, it's a terrific industry for us. While Brown Brothers are a very clear example of how the Australian wine industry drives tourism, creates regional employment and generates sales of lifestyle products in Australia and overseas, they don't do it in isolation. I want to share some of the thoughts of Ross Brown, executive director of Brown Brothers. A couple of weeks ago he appeared at an inquiry of one of the committees I'm part of, into regional development. The committee came and heard evidence in Wodonga, and Ross gave evidence. He said:
It's very interesting to think about why the tourist goes to an area. I've spent a lot of time on tourism bodies over the years, and I've coined a one-liner called 'co-opetition'. The concept of bringing people to a region is not about coming to Brown Brothers to buy wine. Twenty years ago, that occurred. People would come to Milawa to buy wine. They go to Dan Murphy's now. Consequently, the offer has to be a regional offer. That means the whole of the region has to be cooperating collectively. When they get into the region, the co-opetition is to build a bigger pie. If you've got a bigger pie and a bit more to go around, we'll be absolutely relentless in making sure we get—
that's Brown Brothers—
the biggest share of that pie. But if the pie is small, nobody gets very much. Collectively we have to create a destination for tourists by bringing the best opportunities of all the tourist aspects together, and that means people make a choice where they'll go. They don't go to a region for a single property or a single occasion. They really want a very large generous offer of lots of things coming together, such as the cycling—
to which I would add scenery, wine, food—
We're seeing in north-east Victoria that this is changing the whole demographic of the visitors to this region.
I know fashions come and go in the wine industry. If you're not aware of it, the eighties was a time of people drinking red wine; the nineties was a chardonnay era; and for the last 20 years it's been sauvignon blanc, mostly from New Zealand, which, sadly, has meant that 40 per cent of the white wine consumed in Australia at the moment comes from New Zealand. But I'm told—you heard it here first, members of parliament—that the next wine fashion is prosecco. Prosecco is a wine grape variety that came from Italy 20 years ago to the King Valley. Since then the King Valley has become the home of prosecco in Australia. The prosecco market is booming domestically and internationally, and it's supported by millions of dollars of production and marketing investment by Australian wine producers and grape-growers. Currently the Australian prosecco market in total is $60 million, and the King Valley has about $25 million of that production. There's an opportunity for the category to grow to $400 million in the foreseeable future. We believe the King Valley could have $200 million of that—certainly growing our pie. Over the last 12 months the Australian crush of prosecco grapes increased by 78 per cent. It has tripled since 2015. Similarly, Australian prosecco exports by value grew 77 per cent in the last year and have quadrupled in the last three years. So, truly, we're onto something. While only six per cent of the sparkling wine drunk in Australia is prosecco, evidence from the United Kingdom tells us that this is set to change. Historically, sparkling wine in the United Kingdom has been dominated by French, but it's now dominated by the Italians. Fifty-six per cent of all sparkling wine drunk in the UK is prosecco.
So, where does that get us? It is an opportunity and a gap. Mr Ross Brown has told the regional development committee:
Therein lies the opportunity and the problem, because the growers in the King Valley are totally focused on getting grapes in the ground and getting production, which they're also very good at. But at the end of the day, the success will be about marketing and taking this wine to market. Therefore, there's going to be a financial gap between opportunity and capability because the producers in the King Valley have done it very tough. They are short of capital and all that capital's going into production. In the future there needs to be the capacity to invest in the marketing.
There are all sorts of opportunities that Brown Brothers and others are addressing. I want to talk a little about how growers of prosecco are working together in my community, individual small businesses, and have developed the concept of the Prosecco Road, which is actually King Valley Road. It's gorgeous. So we have Brown Brothers in Milawa, the Dal Zotto and Pizzini families in Whitfield, All Saints in Rutherglen, Chrismont in Cheshunt and Sam Miranda in Oxley. They've all joined together to get this Prosecco Road idea going.
But there is a real fear that the use of the name 'prosecco' could be compromised by commercial demands of the Italians. They don't want us to use the name 'prosecco'. They think it's theirs. So over this last week, collectively, the wine-growers of north-east Victoria have been in parliament, talking across the political divide and lobbying to ensure that free trade negotiations don't, in the immediate sense, act as a threat to export arrangements to China and Asia broadly or in the mid-term limit the potential of adding $500 million to the Australian wine industry, and in the long term address the risk of huge loss and industry disruption that will be felt by many of our regional communities.
In summary, it is a fantastic change that has happened here with the WET, this investment and the amendment tonight. But what has worked so well is that industry has worked with government. We've had the minister, Senator Ruston, doing a fantastic job in bringing everybody to the table, getting all the negotiations happening and working with Treasury and Finance. That has been really good. Now we've got a huge opportunity to grow a particular type of wine in our regions. Again, I'm calling on the government to provide that same sort of leadership to help us do the trade negotiations, manage the WTO and the geographic indicator problem that has been presented and get the investment in the region so that we can do the marketing that we need to do. If we get all that lined up then we get regional development, we get jobs, we get value-adding like the cycle paths and summer tourism to the mountains and we get a fantastic tourist, agricultural and manufacturing package that is sustainable in the long term. We have got a superb opportunity here.
I would like to acknowledge the leaders of the wine industry in my community and say what great respect I have for your vision, for your really hard work, for working together as a team, for understanding the politics, coming to Canberra and for being ahead of the issue. I thank my community very, very much for that work. It gives me great pleasure to give this talk in parliament, because I think we are ideally placed now to do the work that needs to be done. We've got the leadership, with the government onside. We've got the leadership in industry. We've got the vision. We know that we've got the product that is going to give us economic opportunities. I know from other members of parliament that we like prosecco ! It's a lovely drink and we want to drink more of it.
In closing, I say to the government: the key to ensuring the negotiations that my industry want to do, with optimal results for our wine industry, is strong leadership and a commitment from the government to genuinely engage with industry. We know it is something that the government can do, and Anne Ruston in particular has demonstrated that it can do it really well. I thank her for her work and her staff for their work with the wine equalisation tax and with the amendment. I look forward to working with the government; but, in particular, I look forward to the networking job of bringing my industry together with government and working on opening up trade opportunities.
Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker Coulton, for your interest. There is an invitation for you to come to north-east Victoria. I don't think you've been there recently, and we would love to show you around and introduce you to King Valley and the beautiful cool-climate wines that are growing there. We'll put you on a pushbike and let you do a bit of adventure holidaying. Thank you very much, and I appreciate the opportunity to make this contribution.
Mr KEOGH (Burt) (19:17): Western Australians are spoilt for choice when it comes to wineries. We have hundreds of wineries throughout the state, across six distinct wine regions, including the world-famous Margaret River region and the Swan Valley to Perth's north-east. I am fortunate that my electorate of Burt is surrounded by wineries, including Jadran Wines, Raeburn Orchards, Rocksgate Estate Winery, Millbrook Winery and Fairbrossen Winery. I look forward to one day when the Armadale Hills and surrounds are known as the 'Swan Valley of the south'.
Western Australian winemakers are a highly decorated bunch—that's an intended pun—who are known in particular for creating some of Australia's greatest cabernets and chardonnays. It took some time for Australian wine writers to acknowledge that cabernet and chardonnay grown out of WA's premier wine region of Margaret River were some of the best in the land, but these wines have now achieved unparalleled ratings from the world's most influential wine sources.
This bill will enable the newly named wine authority, Wine Australia, to administer grant programs, including the Wine Tourism and Cellar Door Grant program. This sounds great, and as a lover of wine I think it's fantastic that we are debating the Australian Grape and Wine Authority Amendment (Wine Australia) Bill 2017, which will support Australian winemakers. However, I had a look at the make-up of the Wine Australia board, and I noticed that only South Australia, New South Wales and Victoria seem to be represented. I absolutely support this program but do hold serious concerns that Western Australian winemakers are going to have a hard time getting recognised by a supposedly national body that, like so many others, is essentially run by the eastern states. The cellar door grant program represents $50 million of taxpayer money. I would be doing the Western Australian wine industry a great disservice if I did not to raise my concerns early in the piece in this regard.
The Export and Regional Wine Support Package will allow entities with an annual turnover below $20 million to claim 50 per cent of their promotional activities, up to a cap of $50,000. The object of this grant is to reduce the transaction costs of exporting for wine exporters and, in doing so, to increase opportunities to grow exports from Australia to China, Hong Kong, Macau and the United States. The pool of money this will be drawn from is limited to $1 million but is non-competitive and can be used to claim on all manner of export related costs, including travel to any of those countries or areas; providing free samples; the cost of trade fairs, seminars and in-store promotions; and marketing and advertising. Strangely, however, this funding is going to be provided on a first come, first served basis. So we will wait to see the efficacy of the distribution.
I think it is important that we support our wine industries, particularly that of Western Australia in its export markets and a capacity to grow the market it can sell into. I know there are many Western Australian wines already being served on the tables of restaurants and available through the bottle shops and liquor stores in many parts of the globe. In fact, I make it a key point whenever I travel not only internationally but even when I am here in Canberra or other states—if I can, depending on the wine list—to make sure that I and, of course, those that are with me get the great opportunity to sample some of Western Australia's finest wines.
Both of these initiatives were introduced to assist the wine industry transition to reforms of the wine equalisation tax, including a reduction in the annual rebate from $500,000 to $350,000 from July next year. While I am supportive of the bill, I am conscious of the impact that the wine equalisation tax will have on Western Australian winemakers. Reform to the WET rebate was long overdue. The system was being rorted by big chains and unbranded operators in creative entity structures. When I looked into the history of this, I found, like many other issues I find myself speaking on in this place, the GST was again at its core.
When the GST was first introduced, there was a great deal of angst amongst the winemaking community about the impact of the 10 per cent on their products and the consequences of that. The glimmer of consolation was that pulling a cork out of a wine bottle might hopefully be a lot cheaper, as GST would also see the abolition of a raft of other taxes. As part of the GST, former Prime Minister Howard introduced a 29 per cent wine equalisation tax to account and to offset the overall reduction in the amount of tax paid on wine. The then Labor opposition proposed a cellar-door exemption from the WET in order to boost the cellar door sales of smaller producers. While this specific amendment proposed by Labor was not adopted, the then government eventually did propose and pass something very similar to it. The Howard government's exemption, though, ended up being used and abused by larger bulk operators.
Unfortunately, the Turnbull government attempted to turn reform of the WET into a revenue grab at the expense of our wine producers. The government planned to pocket $300 million from the first reform proposal it put forward. Following significant industry backlash and expressions of concerns from Labor, the government backed down and went back to the drawing board—as with so many other pieces of legislation it has brought forward of late. However, the government still plans to be $160 million better off as a result of the reforms that it is putting forward here, and the implementation of this industry support package.
In Western Australia, last year, close to 400 wine producers participated in a survey seeking to measure the economic and social consequences of the proposed wine equalisation tax reforms. Wines of Western Australia chairman Redmond Sweeney said that, while there were some positives to come from the reforms, Western Australian producers would be disproportionately impacted by the lowering of the cap. Western Australia has the highest proportion of small to medium sized wineries in Australia. Those are the ones that will suffer the most should the cap be lowered.
What's worse is that the grant schemes that are meant to be helping out all of these smaller operators are being administered by an east coast run body that has seemingly no Western Australian representation, despite Western Australia being an absolutely critical part of the Australian wine industry and, in many respects, leading the charge in the varieties in which we excel. In reality, these grants will do very little to offset the impact of the government's larger agenda. Of course, we support the grant schemes. I think we should be doing what we can to support these businesses. They are critical not just to employing many people across regional Western Australia directly but also to making sure we have a vibrant tourism industry throughout the south-west of Western Australia which provides even more jobs to the young people in that area.
But we know that this is really a savings measure for the government, and it's at the expense of the small businesses that it says it likes to champion. More should be done. Margaret River winemaker Vanya Cullen has said that, while parts of the reform were needed to clean up certain parts of the industry, the blanket approach of lowering rebates presents a danger in outweighing the benefits of the reform in toto. Many winemakers in WA are dependent on rebates to compete with larger producers.
To say that this is about savings would be disingenuous on the part of the government. It has just handed big business a huge corporate tax cut and it intends to provide that to even bigger businesses and, of course, the banks. I support reform in this area, I support the overall package and I support the grants in particular that will support the small- to medium-sized enterprise in the wine industry in Western Australia. But I think the critical point that needs to be made here is that the reforms in themselves are just not enough.
Now that I've addressed the detail of the reform package that we're dealing with here, I'd like to say a few more things about the wine industry. The wine industry is not just about those who like to have a tipple on a Friday night over dinner. It is bigger than I think most people realise and it is one of our leading brand ambassadors for the Australian export industry. There are not many products that come branded in a way that so clearly and precisely demonstrates not only that they are an Australian product but the region within Australia from which they come. They, therefore, provide not just the opportunity to market Australia and Australia's produce but also the opportunity to market tourism. It's not just about tourism to the wineries and the cellar doors, which these grant programs will hopefully continue to support. Of course, every time someone in a classy restaurant in London, New York or anywhere else in the world picks up a bottle of, say, Vasse Felix and sees that it is from the Margaret River region, they are immediately transported to seeing the opportunity to visit Margaret River, to find out more about Margaret River and to find out more about Western Australia. I am sure the same can be said for the Clare Valley, for McLaren Vale and for many different wine regions around Australia. I think this is a crucially important aspect of our wine industry, because it is a brand leader for Australia across the world. It is one of those sectors that value-add.
I come from a state which exports a lot of dirt—often referred to as iron ore—and has precious minerals as well. But, at the end of the day, the wine industry is a truly value-added industry. It is a shining light for what Australia can do. That is evidenced by the way in which Australian wines are referred to through international wine sources that acknowledge the impeccable standards of the wines we produce. We have some unique factors that come into play, because we have been able to take grape varietals out of many different parts of Europe and transport them to Australia, where we have soil types that match but different weather climates. Then we have the same weather climates that go with different soil types. From the varietals we have inherited from our European heritage we have been able to create unique Australian flavours—the full-bodied flavours that have put our wines so prominently on the world stage. That has allowed us to talk not only about our wines but also about the foods that match with them, which we can export as well. It's important that we remember that.
I mentioned this before and I'll come back to it in closing. It's not just about the people employed in making the wine in the wine industry, who are very skilled at what they do. Of course, there are also the hundreds and thousands of people that come into our country to help with picking the grapes in small vineyards, where it's not in any way economical to do that mechanically. It's the money they bring in, the tourism dollar—they earn money and then redistribute it throughout our economy by consuming our goods and services. It's the way in which many Western Australians, from Perth, from my electorate and around, will travel down south, as we call it—some have referred it as 'Douth'—to visit the Margaret River region, to visit the wineries, to have lunch and share meals and have fun, to experience the great wine and even some of the beers on offer in the south-west region of Western Australia—as I'm sure they do in other parts of Australia—and to spend that tourism dollar, which is so vital for keeping our regional communities alive. These are the things that should not be overlooked. It's why we need to continually support our wine industry, because it is a huge brand ambassador for our nation around the world. It's why I support this grants program. I do have reservations about the make-up of the board. I say to the minister: make sure you get some Western Australians on it pronto. We'll all feel more comfortable if you do.
Debate interrupted.
Federation Chamber adjourned at 19:30
QUESTIONS IN WRITING
Modified Monash Model
(Question No. 821)
Ms Sharkie asked the Minister for Health, in writing, on 14 September 2017:
In respect of the Modified Monash Model (MMM), a geographical classification system used to address the maldistribution of medical services across Australia: (1) Will the Minister advise if any locations have been identified for review of their classification under the model and, if so, whether any of these reviews resulted in a change to a classification?
(2) Are there are any plans for a review of practice classifications under the MMM and if so,
(a) when is such a review expected to occur, and
(b) when would the results be released?
(3) Will he detail the process for a medical practice to appeal their classification under the MMM?
(4) Will he advise if the Rural Classification Technical Working Group (RCTWG) still assesses classifications under the MMM and if so, what is the most appropriate way for medical practices to contact the RCTWG?
Mr Hunt: The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:
(1) The Modified Monash Model (MMM) is based on research developed by Professor John Humphreys et al. in a paper entitled Who should receive recruitment and retention incentives? Improved targeting of rural doctors using medical workforce data1and was modified through stakeholder consultations including the Independent Review of Australian Government Health Workforce Programs – (Mason Review) 2 and the RCTWG.
Following the introduction of the MMM in 2015, the RCTWG was reconvened in February 2016 to consider whether the parameters and usage of the MMM were meeting the needs of rural communities. This included whether the current buffer zones around large cities accurately reflected the functional service areas of those cities. Consideration was also given to a number of towns where the MMM classification was disputed, including Tamborine Mountain, outside the Gold Coast Qld; Roebourne, north-east WA; Cloncurry, north Qld; Robertson, near Wollongong NSW; Two Wells, near Adelaide SA; Montville and Mapleton, near the Sunshine Coast Qld; Gumeracha, near Adelaide SA; Murwillumbah, near Gold Coast-Tweed Heads Qld.
As a result of discussions, the RCTWG supported the existing structure of the MMM. The discussion did lead to two towns in the Modified Monash category 6 (MM6), Cloncurry Qld and Roebourne WA, having incentive payments increased under the General Practice Rural Incentives Program to levels equivalent to Modified Monash category 7 in recognition of their individual difficulties in attracting doctors to the area. Note that both towns maintain their classification of MM6.
(2) (a-b) The MMM will be updated in 2018, after the Australian Bureau of Statistics update town boundaries and remoteness classifications to reflect changes in demographics as demonstrated through the 2016 Census. The updated MMM will be presented to the Distribution Working Group (DWG) for approval, at which time consideration will also be given to areas in which there is dispute about the current classification.
(3) It is not possible for a medical practice to appeal the location classification under the MMM. The MMM will continue to be based on objective data sources and well-defined parameters in order to determine appropriate classifications.
Programs making use of the MMM are able to establish their own processes to allow for discretion in consideration of factors other than an area's MMM classification as part of their eligibility requirements.
(4) The RCTWG held its last meeting in February 2016. The Australian Government has now established the DWG to address the maldistribution of the health workforce in Australia. One of the core responsibilities will be to consider mechanisms to encourage an equitable distribution of the health workforce. This includes the review and update of the MMM. The DWG has yet to specify the mechanism by which it will seek advice from the community.
1 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/221752917_Who_should_receive_recruitment_and_retention_
incentives_Improved_targeting_of_rural_doctors_using_medical_workforce_data
2 https://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/D26858F4B68834EACA257BF0001A8DDC/$File/
Review%20of%20Health%20Workforce%20programs.pdf