1998-07-013817REPS574301998-07-01Mr SPEAKER(Rt Hon. Ian Sinclair) took the chair at 9.30 a.m., and read prayers.Bills5743r5635743Bill presented by Mr Anderson, and read a first time.574309:31:005743Anderson, John, MPMr ANDERSON4K4GwydirNPPrimary Industries and Energy10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.The purpose of this bill is to give wool growers greater involvement in setting the strategic direction of the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation, something they have been seeking for a long time and which I believe they universally will welcome. The amendments contained in the bill will allow wool tax payers greater involvement in the work of the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation and a greater opportunity to express their views on the directions of wool promotion and research and development. The bill arises from recommendations from the wool industry which were considered by an industry-government working party. I believe the thrust of the changes will be welcomed by wool growers.The current legislative framework governing the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation allows wool tax payers (wool growers) only a minimal involvement in the organisation. These restrictions were established by the previous government as a response to the difficulties experienced with the decision making process of the old Australian Wool Corporation and its management of the reserve price scheme.While wool growers have shown strong support for the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation—including through the recent wool tax ballot held in late 1997—these statutory arrangements have left them feeling they are, to some extent, disenfranchised from the process of setting the future directions of their industry. In practice, the extent to which the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation could interact effectively with wool growers has been limited by the existing legislation.In summary, the bill will give the wool growing industry more involvement in the selection of members of the board of the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation, and will ensure there are more wool growers with appropriate expertise on the board. It will open up the annual general meeting of the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation to allow individual wool growers to put their views directly to the organisation that is responsible for spending their wool tax dollars. And it will allow greater flexibility in future ballots to set the level of wool tax.The bill provides that the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation Board be increased from nine to 11 members. This will allow the number of wool grower members on the board to be increased to four, not only reflecting the importance of this skill on the board but also greatly assisting communication on the business of the organisation with growers spread across the country.However, the board will retain the wide range of expertise and the mix of skills and experience necessary for it to efficiently perform its functions, much of which is, of course, well beyond the farm. In addition to their wool production background, the additional grower members will be expected to have broader commercial, processing or other skills and knowledge to contribute to the board. The board will remain an independent and professional body, with appropriate skills, but with better avenues of communication with the industry it serves and, hence, greater accountability to growers.The bill provides that the Chair of the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation will be required to `have had involvement in wool production' as well as relevant board experience, and experience in the other areas of expertise outlined in the act. This will give sufficient scope to appoint a capable and independent chair suited to heading a large, commercially focused organisation.The Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation is a statutory authority, and appointments to the board will continue to be the responsibility of the government. However, through this bill the selection process for board members will be revised, to increase the role of the industry in the process, while ensuring that board members will be selected on the basis of their expertise, not their affiliation to industry groupings.The board selection committee will include a presiding member and another member appointed by the government, the Chair of the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation, and two members nominated by the Wool Council of Australia, in consultation with the Australian Interior Textile and Carpet Wool Council.In relation to the annual general meetings, as you will be aware, Mr Speaker, with your own knowledge and familiarity with the wool industry, at present growers are only allowed to vote on a motion approving the annual report, or if a motion of no confidence is lodged. Frankly, these restrictions are out of date and are a major contributing factor to the low levels of grower participation in the annual general meetings. Last year's turn-out was particularly low, and in that sense I think indicative of the need for these changes. This bill will allow wool tax payers to put motions to the annual general meeting, bringing forward potentially useful ideas for consideration by the board, without mandating the acceptance of these ideas. The board will then be required to explain to the industry any decision it makes regarding such motions.Enhanced consultation with the peak industry councils during development of the corporate plan will allow the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation to draw more fully upon industry expertise and the desires of wool growers, while still maintaining the professional independence of the organisation.This bill will remove unnecessary restrictions on the conduct of the wool tax ballot, which will also contribute to satisfying wool tax payer requests for more involvement in the direction of their industry. There is also increased flexibility in the form that the ballot may take.Other changesThe other amendments provided for in the bill are of an administrative nature. They include clarifying situations where the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation is operating on behalf of the Australian wool industry and the government under implied, rather than express, powers. This recognises the organisation's move towards more commercial practice, such as charging for the provision of services, and the use of the Woolmark brand by licensees. This allows the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation to seek much needed additional funding to supplement the wool tax and the government's research and development support, leveraging funds available for promotion, and allowing the organisation to enhance its interaction with manufacturers and retailers. The calculation of the gross value of production of wool, which is used in calculating the government's contribution to research and development funding, is also to be amended to ensure consistency with legislation governing the other primary industry research and development authorities.ConclusionThe amendments contained in this bill signal a further step towards curtailing unnecessary government involvement—dare I say, intervention and even interference—in the wool industry. However, I would stress that these amendments are not about enhancing grower representation within the industry or jeopardising the high standard of corporate governance already established by the board. They are about giving the Australian Wool Research and Promotion Organisation greater access to the skills and experience that reside within the wool industry, enhancing accountability to wool taxpayers and fostering industry `ownership' of its main service provider. These changes also fit well with the organisation's continuing evolution towards a corporate structure operating along commercial lines.All of us in this House, I know, feel very deeply for the wool producers of this country. Many of them have been losing money now for six or seven or even eight years in a row. I think last year only 10 per cent, according to some of the figures I have seen, of the nation's wool growers received what could be regarded as a respectable return on their investment. There are farm families and relevant communities across this nation that are hurting, and hurting very badly, as a result of the global decline in demand for wool and the resulting very poor returns. All of us extend our concerns to people in that industry and want to see us do what we can in this place to assist, keeping in mind that in the end, regrettably, there is little we can do to lift international prices beyond attempting to adequately fund promotion exercises and so forth in the hope that, in the long term, people will come back to wool in a substantial way.I commend the measures contained in this bill to honourable members, and present the explanatory memorandum.Debate (on motion by Dr Theophanous) adjourned.Bills5745r5765745Bill presented by Mr Moore, and read a first time.574509:40:005745Moore, John, MPMr MOOREEI4RyanLPIndustry, Science and Technology10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.This bill amends the Industry Research and Development Act 1986 and contains provisions to streamline the administration of the research and development tax concession scheme, with the aim of reducing compliance costs for companies. It responds to the need for such measures identified in the government's industry statement Investing for Growth in December 1997.The bill will make the registration process easier for companies that wish to claim the tax deduction. The period for making an application for registration will be increased by four months to a total of 10 months from the end of the year of income for which the company seeks registration. This will be more convenient for companies with normal accounting periods, giving them more time to prepare their applications and shifting the deadline away from busy periods on the calendar.The bill also addresses some rigidities in the process of company registration. The proposed changes will allow the Industry Research and Development Board a limited discretion to consider some late applications for registration and to correct minor errors made by companies in their registration applications. At present, even if there are exceptional circumstances, missing a deadline or getting the company's name wrong in the application can cost a company its access to the research and development tax concession. This bill will give the board more flexibility to treat such cases based on the specific circumstances attaching to each. The discretions being given to the board will, however, be limited in such a way that they will not weaken those provisions of the act designed to prevent retrospective access to the tax concession.In addition, this bill will give the board the flexibility to require different levels of information from different classes of applicant. This will enable the board, for example, to reduce the information requirement and, hence, the compliance cost of the scheme for companies undertaking smaller dollar amounts of research and development. Companies eligible for approval to undertake up to 10 per cent of their research and development activities overseas will also benefit from this bill. The proposed change will make the effective date for any board approval the date on which the application is received. At present, any expenditure a company incurs between the date of application and board approval—which can take some months—is not eligible for a concessional tax deduction. This bill will fix that situation.The bill also contains a raft of minor measures aimed at improving the administra tion of the research and development tax concession scheme consistent with improving its integrity and efficacy. These minor measures include clarification of the board's powers in the areas of exploitation of R&D results and overseas expenditures on R&D; administrative improvements to the registered research agency scheme; and housekeeping matters relating to board appointments, sharing of information and recruitment of consultants.I commend this bill to the House and present the explanatory memorandum.Debate (on motion by Dr Theophanous) adjourned.Bills5746r5645746Bill presented by Mr Vaile, and read a first time.574609:44:005746Vaile, Mark, MPMr VAILESU5LyneNPTransport and Regional Development10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.In July 1996 the government announced that the Civil Aviation Safety Authority, commonly known as CASA, would conduct a complete review of the civil aviation legislation in Australia, with the objectives of harmonising it with international standards of safety regulation and making it shorter, simpler, and easier to use and understand. This was also an election commitment in our government's Soaring into Tomorrow aviation policy statement. The Morris committee Plane Safe report and the Seaview commission of inquiry both supported the need for a review of Australian regulations and standards.The purpose of this bill is to facilitate the findings of the review. It provides for the introduction of a new set of regulations that are harmonised with civil aviation laws internationally.The existing act contains various references to the `civil aviation regulations'. These references will be changed to `the regulations' or `regulations made under this act' or simi lar. In recognition of the fact that the safety regulation of aviation activities should not be based fundamentally on the commercial nature of an activity, it is proposed that the term `commercial' be removed from the act by replacing `domestic commercial flight' with `regulated domestic flight'.The amendments also provide for new powers in relation to the retention and destruction of goods seized by CASA during the course of investigating breaches of the Civil Aviation Act 1988 and regulations. The power to retain seized goods for longer than 60 days and the power to destroy seized goods are vested in courts. CASA must apply to courts for orders to retain or destroy the goods, as the case may be. The former is required to assist in prosecutions for offences against the act or regulations and is needed in cases where difficulties arise when proceedings are delayed.The discretion to destroy dangerous goods seized is proposed because, in practice, it is not always possible to return seized goods to their owner, and the airline or Customs do not want to accept the responsibility for the goods after the matter is finalised. Unless such goods are forfeited to the state under legislation relating to property used in the commission of an offence, CASA is required to store them indefinitely. This storage is expensive and has no purpose other than to ensure that CASA does not unlawfully dispose of goods which it does not own. The amendments proposed will permit a CASA investigator to apply to a court for an order that the goods be destroyed where the owner cannot be located or has refused to take possession of the goods.Clarification of CASA's ability to classify the fees charged by CASA under the civil aviation (fees) regulations as debts due to CASA is also included in the bill. Where regulations made under the act require the payment of a fee, and the fee is not paid by the due date, then the regulations should be able to prescribe a late payment penalty to be added to that fee. Consequently, a provision which enables the making of regulations which prescribe limited late payment penalties to be imposed is also included.The financial impacts of the proposed amendments have been assessed as being low. The regulatory changes which the bill facilitate streamline many CASA requirements of industry and will assist in the manufacture of aircraft in Australia. The bill has no direct budgetary impact. It is envisaged, however, that the regulatory changes which will follow from the bill will reduce the costs borne by CASA in administering the civil aviation regulatory regime.The amendments proposed in this bill will facilitate the long awaited introduction for the Australian aviation industry of a regulatory regime which is not only harmonised with international practice but clear, concise and outcome focused. The government's commitment to deliver this objective has been realised. I commend the bill to the House and table the explanatory memorandum.Debate (on motion by Dr Theophanous) adjourned.Bills5747r5795747Bill presented by Mr Truss, and read a first time.574709:50:005747Truss, Warren, MPMr TRUSSGT4Wide BayNPCustoms and Consumer Affairs10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.The National Measurement Act 1960, `the act', provides the legislative basis for the Australian national measurement system. The objective of this act is to ensure that measurements are made on a consistent basis throughout the nation and are compatible with measurements in other countries.While trade measurement in reticulated water, electricity and gas already falls within the ambit of the act, the act does not provide a detailed measurement control system to enable traders to easily comply with its broad requirements for legal traceability. This bill amends the act to provide mandatory requirements for specified utility meters, as recom mended by the Review of Australia's Standards and Conformance Infrastructure, the Kean report.The Kean committee recognised that the present system of utility measurement was wasteful, inadequate in today's environment and inappropriate to address the privatisation and corporatisation of utility authorities. In recommending an amendment to the National Measurement Act, the Kean committee was aware that a state and territory based solution would not effectively address the transborder nature of the utility sector which includes the national electricity grid and interstate gas pipelines.The proposal contained in this bill has significant benefits for utility meter manufacturing industry, utility companies and consumers. National pattern approval and verification will provide local manufacturers of utility meters with the efficiencies and benefits of scale of a single national market for utility meters.As a consequence of international harmonisation of requirements, the proposal will enhance export opportunities for local manufacturers of utility meters. While the proposal will expose local manufacturers to additional competition from imported meters, it will at the same time safeguard them against unfair competition from substandard imported meters.The proposal contained in this bill will provide direct benefits for utility companies by eliminating multiple, inefficient testing of utility meters for pattern approval purposes that is only partially effective. The associated cost burden will be removed, and the exposure of these companies to risk arising from the purchase of substandard utility meters will be greatly reduced.Consumer confidence in utility metering will be increased because of the independent third party approval and auditing of meters, reducing the present asymmetry of information between utility companies and consumers. This will translate into indirect benefits to utility companies because of fewer consumer complaints and a consequent reduction in transaction costs.The proposal contained in this bill will cause additional costs for utility meter manufacturers, but these will be more than compensated for by the efficiencies and benefits of scale associated with a single national market for utility meters and the increased access to export opportunities. In addition, the proposal has clear benefits for consumers, utility authorities and state and territory regulators. However, it is not possible to quantify these benefits. There will be minor costs to the National Standards Commission associated with coordinating the system.The bill broadens the objects of the act to embrace the verification of utility meters and extends the functions of the National Standards Commission to ensure that utility meters used for trade are verified. The bill introduces a new section 4A that defines the extent to which the amended act will exclude state and territory laws relating to utility meters used for trade. In particular, this section provides for the concurrent operation of state and territory laws relating to the re-verification of utility meters used for trade and the in-field replacement of meters that give inaccurate measurements.The bill requires that utility meters used for trade, not prescribed as exempt in the regulations, must be verified by the National Standards Commission or a verifying authority appointed by the commission for that purpose. One of the requirements for verification is that the pattern—design—of the utility meter has been approved by the commission under the existing pattern approval provisions of the act.Provision is made for the commission to audit the work of verifying authorities to ensure both that the meters conform to their approved pattern and that they have been correctly verified. Enforcement provisions are included to provide the commission with access to evidence in the event that offence provisions of the bill are contravened. These enforcement powers are similar to those of a trade measurement inspector in a state or territory jurisdiction.It is intended that all classes of utility meters will initially be exempted from the application of these new provisions. Follow ing the satisfactory completion of consultations and the expiry of an agreed introductory period, the exemption will be lifted for a particular class of utility meter. Provision is made in the bill for utility meters already being used for trade to remain in use provided that they give accurate measurement.Recommendation 6 of the Kean report, to which this bill relates, has been accepted by both the present government and the previous government. In addition, the proposal is strongly supported by the utility meter manufacturing industry. I commend the bill to the House and present the explanatory memorandum.Debate (on motion by Dr Theophanous) adjourned.Bills5748r5755748Bill presented by Mr Abbott, for Dr Kemp, and read a first time.574809:56:005748Abbott, Tony, MPMr ABBOTTEZ5WarringahLP10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.The important role higher education plays in Australia's social and economic development is the rationale for the government's substantial investment in it and policies designed to ensure that we realise the greatest possible individual and collective benefits. Australia already has a good higher education system, an achievement recognised by surveys of graduates and the large numbers of overseas students choosing to pursue their studies here. But we are working in a rapidly changing environment, and there is always scope for improvement.The government has a number of objectives which flow from this position. It aims to continue to increase access to post-secondary education, including higher education, so that all those who can benefit from it will have access. This means the higher education system must deal with a very diverse student body and offer the choice that meets varied needs. Lifelong learning is already a feature of our education system, as shown by the large numbers of people across the age groups who are participating in education, but we need to ensure a whole of life focus, which means everything from a good foundation in primary school to opportunities for reskilling later in life. These access goals will be enhanced through better teaching, and government policies are providing incentives and assistance to maintain and lift standards.The various provisions of this bill should be seen in the context of the government's pursuit of these goals. The success of the government's higher education policies is evidenced by the unprecedented number of Australians who are able to attend university and the increased level of resources available to universities. Our policies are making this a reality.The government has created an extra 10,000 Commonwealth funded places for undergraduate students in the past two years. In 1998 the Commonwealth will fully fund 361,925 undergraduate student places in universities. This is a record number. No government in Australia's history has provided so many undergraduate places. Not only is this government making more undergraduate places available in 1998; the number of undergraduate places will continue to increase each year to 2000. By the year 2000, the government will be fully funding nearly 366,000 undergraduate places. This compares to less than 352,000 in 1996, the last year funded by a Labor budget.To these figures can be added enrolments in addition to those undergraduate places fully funded by the Commonwealth. To encourage universities to offer these places, the government is offering partial funding of about $2,500 a place. In 1998 the universities offered around 29,000 of these extra places. To this can be further added full fee paying undergraduate places, an innovation of this government, taking the total number of extra places, on top of those fully funded by the Commonwealth, to nearly 30,000.This government has made access a priority, and we have delivered. Australians have never had greater opportunities to enter higher education than they have in 1998. This government has confirmed its commitment to maintain public funding levels for higher education. This year the government will spend around $5.5 billion on higher education. Commonwealth funding for each full-time equivalent student will be more than $11,400, a significant increase on 1996 funding. This level of government spending on each student is also higher than at any point since 1990.The reality is that universities have never had more resources than they have today. The government's policies to diversify the mix between public and private funding for universities means that there will be an estimated $8.5 billion available to Australian universities this year. This policy approach will secure university funding levels into the future. It is a policy that has been, and will continue to be, successful because it is a sensible solution to the needs of our universities and right for today's circumstances.Consistent with this government's commitment to maintaining public funding levels for higher education, the bill provides for a total net increase of $10,990,000 to 1998 funds. This funding provides supplementation for price movements and additional superannuation expenses incurred by institutions. It also includes an increase of $5,824,000 in the 1998 funding limit for special grants, offset by an equivalent underexpenditure in 1997. The bill also legislates funding levels for the years 1999 and 2000. Funding for 1999 is increased from $3,877,383,000 to $3,885,630,000 and the funding limit for 2000 is set at $3,679,500,000.In legislating funds for 1999 and 2000, the bill confirms to higher education institutions the overall funding levels detailed in the Higher Education Funding Report for the 1998-2000 Triennium. The bill also demonstrates this government's support for the continued growth of Australia's education and training export industry. The government is providing $21 million over the next four years for international marketing and other activities to promote our education and training services overseas. The bill amends the Higher Education Funding Act 1988 to provide funding for expenditure on the international promotion of Australian education and training services by Australian Education International. AEI was previously known as the Australian International Education Foundation. The new name reflects new funding arrangements and the new direction set for it by the government. AEI will be more fully integrated with the operations of the Department of Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs, which will enable it to act as an effective link between the offshore promotion of Australian education and training and broader government objectives for foreign affairs and trade.In 1998, AEI will receive $1,016,000. In 1999 this will rise to $2,468,000, and by 2000 AEI will be funded to the extent of $3,883,000. It will have a number of key responsibilities in the areas of marketing, government to government coordination, research, facilitating access to markets, providing information and awareness raising. AEI services are provided through its offshore network including Australian Education Centres in Bangkok, Hanoi, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, New Dehli, Paris, Seoul, Taipai and Tokyo.This measure implements the government's response to the review of the Australian International Education Foundation by maintaining and strengthening a mechanism for promoting Australia's international education and training industry. It demonstrates the government's support for this industry at a time when it is contending with major changes in the overseas environment.Finally, the bill also amends the Higher Education Funding Act 1988 and the Employment, Education and Training Act 1988 to reflect the name change of James Cook University of North Queensland to James Cook University. The matters in this bill continue the government's objectives of fostering a higher education sector that is open, accessible and well funded. I commend the bill to the House and present the explanatory memorandum.Debate (on motion by Dr Theophanous) adjourned. Miscellaneous575010:03:005750Abbott, Tony, MPMr ABBOTTEZ5WarringahLP10—Last night in the adjournment debate I made a couple of churlish comments—ill-advised and heedless comments—about my colleague the New South Wales parliamentarian Max Willis, a man who has always been generous to me. I withdraw them and apologise for letting my tongue run away with me.Delegation Reports5750575010:04:005750Halverson, Robert, MPMr HALVERSON3H4CaseyLP10—by leave—I am pleased to present the report of the Australian Delegation to the 99th Conference of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, Windhoek, Namibia, and bilateral visits to Angola, Zimbabwe and Mozambique between 5 and 23 April 1998.In the recent past, delegations to Africa have had more than their share of problems—the well-known `Out of Africa' delegation immediately springs to mind. Fortunately, this delegation was one of the hardest working, unified and focused delegations that I have had to honour to lead. I commend my fellow delegates—the deputy leader of the delegation, Clyde Holding, Bruce Reid, Senator Sue Knowles, Senator Barney Cooney and Senator Julian McGauran—for their sterling efforts and contributions.As I have indicated, the first part of the delegation's report relates to the 99th IPU Conference held in Windhoek, Namibia, on 5 to 11 April 1998. The IPU is the `United Nations' of the world's parliaments. It provides a unique opportunity for parliamentarians to discuss, debate and present resolutions on global issues. I have led the Australian delegation to several IPU conferences, and we are well known for our commitment to the aims and objectives of the IPU and, more particularly, for the significant contribution that we make to its work.Our contribution to the 99th conference was outstanding. The conference ran for six days. The members of the delegation not only attended every session but also contributed to specific agenda items in the following ways: Mr Holding chaired and presented a report of the Human Rights Committee of Parliamentarians; Mr Reid chaired the drafting committee on foreign debt; Senator Cooney chaired the drafting committee and presented the report on conflict resolution; Senator McGauran participated on the drafting committee on HIV/AIDS; Senator Cooney and Senator Knowles participated in the general debate; Senator Knowles participated in the meetings of women parliamentarians; and I participated in the drafting committee on the emergency item on the situation in Kosovo, which unfortunately is not resolved at this moment, and also chaired and presented the report of the committee on Palestine's admission to the IPU.No other national group at the conference made as significant a contribution to the substantive work of the conference as did our delegation. The number of delegates that Australia sends to the conference is small compared to many other countries, and this makes the impact of our contribution even more gratifying.On behalf of the delegation, I commend to the House the texts of the final resolutions on the prevention of conflicts and the restoration of peace and trust in countries emerging from war; the return of refugees to their countries of origin, the strengthening of democratic processes and the hastening of reconstruction; action to combat HIV/AIDS in view of its devastating human, economic and social impact; foreign debt as a factor limiting the integration of the Third World countries into the processes of globalisation; the situation in Kosovo—measures to ensure a durable and peaceful resolution of the crisis; and the report of the Human Rights Committee of Parliamentarians. These are incorporated as appendices to the delegation's report.Following the IPU conference in Namibia, the delegation undertook three bilateral visits—to Angola, Zimbabwe and Mozambique. In each of these countries, the deleg ation went about its work in a highly professional manner, undertaking a demanding schedule of visits and meetings in sometimes difficult and challenging conditions. Angola and Mozambique are fascinating countries. Angola still has the threat of civil war in its midst, whereas Mozambique is consolidating its peace process. Both countries were Portuguese colonies, and obtained independence with governments committed to Marxist-Leninism. Both have rejected that ideology and are now looking for assistance by way of foreign investment and trade to realise their enormous potential, particularly in the resources sector.Angola and Mozambique both see Australia as playing a welcome and positive role in their progress and development. In Angola this is happening already with BHP Petroleum and Ashton Mining. Similarly, in Mozambique, P&O Australia is investing in the port of Maputo, and this will have a further impact when the Maputo transport corridor for Southern Africa is developed. Indeed, our relations with Mozambique become even more important as Mozambique is now a member of the Commonwealth. Parliamentary democracy in Angola and Mozambique is relatively new, and the Australian parliament can play an increasing role to encourage this process not only through parliamentary visits but also by the exchange of parliamentary staff with expertise in areas such as information technology.In Zimbabwe, the delegation met with the Speaker of the parliament and groups and committees of the parliament itself. The parliament in Zimbabwe has been a feature of the political framework since independence in 1980. It was interesting to observe that the institution is looking at ways in which it may better perform its functions as an independent institution, having particular regard to the scrutiny and accountability of government.The delegation's program in Angola, Zimbabwe and Mozambique included several meetings with representatives of governments. In fact, during the 10 days the delegation met with the President of Angola, the Prime Minister of Angola, six senior minister in three countries, five vice-ministers, the Speak ers of the three parliaments and the members of four parliamentary committees, and also observed the proceedings of the Angolan and Mozambican national assemblies. During many of these meetings, the delegation gained at first-hand an appreciation of the enormous economic potential of the countries in Southern Africa. Australia is well placed to assist these countries to realise this potential through trade and investment.Australia is regarded highly in the region, particularly as a result of the diplomatic positions adopted in the 1970s and 1980s in relation to apartheid and the internal armed conflict in specific countries. Australia is seen as an honest broker. As these countries now move to stabilisation and development, Australia, particularly our commercial sector, is recognised as having the knowledge and expertise that is directly relevant to the challenges being addressed.The delegation's view on this matter is supported by recent trade statistics showing that the value of exports to Southern Africa from 1992 to 1997 increased from $A450 million to $A1.33 billion. This represents a trend growth rate for the south and east African region of 27.5 per cent. The overall growth rate for Africa is 20.1 per cent, and this compares with 13 per cent for Oceania, 8.2 per cent for Asia, 3.8 per cent for Europe and 3.7 per cent for the Americas. These statistics indicate clearly that the potential for further growth is considerable and should be encouraged and enhanced.This in turn raises the question of Australia's diplomatic representation in Southern Africa. In its report, the delegation shares the view expressed by the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade in its 1995 report on Southern Africa that the costs of maintaining overseas posts are significant. However, as a general statement, Australia does not have adequate representation in Africa, and our limited presence sends an unfortunate message to many African nations. The delegation also agrees with the findings of the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade that additional diplomatic representation is desirable. The delegation recommends that the Minister for Foreign Affairs (Mr Downer) review the feasibility of increasing diplomatic representation in the Southern Africa region and, in particular, Angola. If this is not possible, the delegation endorses the view of the joint committee that the minister should explore a number of other options to enhance Australia's diplomatic presence in the area.During its bilateral visit, the delegation also took the opportunity to be briefed on or visit Australian aid projects. Landmines are a scourge on the landscape in Angola and Mozambique. In Angola, the delegation received a briefing on the situation there from the Norwegian People's Aid Project—an organisation with funding from Australia tasked with clearing landmines in that country. Members of the delegation also visited a factory on the outskirts of the Angolan capital that makes artificial limbs for the victims of landmines. The delegation was disappointed to hear that Australian funding for this project will cease, and our report recommends that this decision be reviewed.In Mozambique, the delegation visited the United Nations demining project in Moamba—50 kilometres west of the capital, Maputo. We observed in situ these insidious weapons. I derived considerable satisfaction when skills learned many years ago and long since forgotten re-emerged to enable me to personally detonate charges to rid Mozambique of at least two of the cruellest impediments to its progress and development. I acknowledge the splendid work of Major Peter McIntosh, Australian Army, and the continuing funding assistance that is being provided by the Australian government for this vital project.The delegation's report rightly recognises the contribution of so many people who contribute to the work of members and senators on official duties overseas. To them we thank you for a job well done. However, I would like to conclude my comments with two special commendations. Firstly, to Mr Alan Elliott, a member of the parliament of Zimbabwe who accompanied the delegation during its visit to that country, I know all the members of the delegation appreciated the hospitality, friendship and assistance he extended during our time in Zimbabwe. We were left in no doubt that he is a true friend of our parliament and our country.Secondly, honourable members will be aware that for the last four years Kerry Sibraa has been Australia's High Commissioner in Zimbabwe and Mozambique and accredited as Ambassador to Angola and other countries in Southern Africa. Before this posting, Mr Sibraa was chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade and, as President of the Senate, took a keen interest in the political, social and economic situation in Africa. As High Commissioner and Ambassador in Southern Africa, he maintained this enthusiasm and commitment. In May 1998 he completed a highly successful posting.The delegation was left in no doubt that Kerry Sibraa has done a splendid job representing Australia in this region. We thank him and his wife, Julie, for their efforts during our visit and we wish them well in the future. I commend the report to the House.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Hollis)—Before calling the honourable member for Bendigo, I might just say to the honourable member for Casey and others that the Out of Africa report and delegation that was referred to, and is often referred to in this parliament, was indeed a very hardworking delegation to that part of the world. There were just a few personality differences. There has been another delegation since and many of the members who were on that original delegation were on this delegation, too. That worked very successfully and was very hardworking.10:16:005753Reid, Bruce, MPMr REIDVT4BendigoLP10—by leave—I thank the members of the opposition. I want to support the comments made by the leader of the delegation, the Hon. Bob Halverson, and congratulate him on his excellent leadership on what was a very significant visit to Africa.I wish to comment particularly on the level of Australian involvement in the Inter-Parliamentary Union 99th conference at Windhoek in Namibia. Australia played a much greater role than its population numbers would credit. Australia is very well regarded by all of the nations who participate in the Inter-Parlia mentary Union. As the leader, Mr Halverson, has indicated, there was a high level of commitment by the members of the delegation. I particularly want to mention Mr Clyde Holding, who has had a long-time involvement in the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians, and his ongoing work on that committee.I also wish to mention Mr Halverson's role in Palestine's admission to the IPU. I had the privilege to be chairman of the drafting committee on foreign debt and Senator Cooney was chairman of the drafting committee on conflict resolution. We also had participation on the drafting committee on HIV/AIDS from Senator McGauran and on the drafting committee on the emergency item on the situation in Kosovo by Mr Halverson. Also Senator Cooney and Senator Knowles were involved in a meeting of women parliamentarians.It was particularly good that Australia had such a high involvement. Australia is seen in international terms as being able to broker and bring about satisfactory negotiations, because we do not carry some of the political baggage that some nations may have. We are seen as being independent and able to negotiate and broker some satisfactory resolutions.I want to briefly mention the bilateral visits to Angola, Zimbabwe and Mozambique. The leader of the delegation has already indicated Australia's involvement in the Norwegian Aid Project for the demining process in Angola and Mozambique. I want to pay a particular compliment to one of the most professional young Australian people that I have ever come into contact with. That was Major Peter McIntosh, who was involved in the demining process and in the training of local people in the demining process in Mozambique. Major McIntosh is a member of the Australian Defence Force and a technical adviser. He is training the locals and performing an excellent job. One could only marvel at the wonderful commitment made by a number of young Australian people who are in those countries in Africa.The delegates and my spouse, Jenny Reid, went to the prosthetics factory in Angola. As a trained nurse, Jenny had a great appreciation of what was being undertaken there and the help that that prosthetics factory can be to people who are unfortunate enough to be maimed or injured by mines. One of the most horrifying experiences of your life is to walk through a minefield and then to see people around the streets of Mozambique who have suffered as a result of mines. It is a horrible experience.I also congratulate Tim Clifton, Andrew Lodge and Carlos Paiva at BHP in Angola, who were very generous in their support to us. BHP and Ashton Mining are both active in those areas. There are many opportunities for Australia in Africa and there is a need for Australia to make a greater commitment to its involvement in the southern part of Africa.I commend and support the report. I believe that it is an excellent report and the result of a lot of hard work. We did not have any conflicts, Mr Deputy Speaker. The delegation got on extremely well. There were no personality clashes. I would also like to commend the secretary, Mr Neil Bessell, who performed an excellent job in his role, and also the leader's adviser, Mr Richard Coventry, for their assistance. I also thank Alan Elliott, the MP from Zimbabwe, who is a wonderful advocate of Australia—I look forward to his visit to Australia later this year when we can repay some of his generosity—and the Hon. Kerry Sibraa, who has done a marvellous job as High Commissioner to Zimbabwe and Mozambique, and his wife, Julie. I commend the report to the House.Bills5754r5615754Debate resumed from 25 June, on motion by Dr Kemp:That the bill be now read a second time.10:22:005754Latham, Mark, MPMr LATHAMK26WerriwaALP00—I move:That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:"whilst not declining to give the Bill a second reading, the House condemns the Government: (1) for failing to provide schools with adequate resources to cope with the expected increase of up to 27,000 students a year as a result of the introduction of the Youth Allowance;(2) for presenting distorted and misleading figures on school funding to the Australian people; and(3) for imposing the unfair Enrolment Benchmark Adjustment on government schools".This bill amends the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Act 1996 to give effect to budget measures and to make a range of other changes. Some $40 million is being provided to extend the national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools program until the end of 1999. This program was initially introduced by the federal Labor government in 1994 to support, enhance, and expand Asian language studies in all Australian schools. The languages targeted are Chinese Mandarin, Indonesian, Japanese and Korean. The opposition is pleased to support the extension of this program to the end of the decade and hopefully beyond.The other budget measure dealt with in this bill is the provision of $20 million for the so-called full service schools initiative to help schools cope with the influx of students which will occur with the introduction of the common youth allowance. The measures in this package—$13.5 million for the job pathway program and $6.2 million for the new apprenticeships access program—simply continue programs put in place by the Labor government. The coalition plans to spend around $40 million on this package of youth allowance measures—$100 million short of what a cabinet submission prepared by DEETYA recommended to the government. We have schools around Australia effectively being short-changed by $100 million, not through any fault of their own but through this government's decision to introduce a common youth allowance without also fully resourcing the needs of schools.The opposition has been raising concerns in this area for 12 months. The common youth allowance in itself is not opposed by opposition. There are few, if any, jobs in the new economy for unskilled teenagers, and anyone in those adolescent years wanting to look for work needs a solid skills base with which to find work. But in sending students back to school, in abolishing unemployment benefits, in placing additional pressure on our schooling system, it is incumbent upon the federal government to accept its responsibility. It is incumbent upon the federal government to recognise that 27,000 students coming back into the schools system is a serious resource question and that it requires much more than the $40 million announced by the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) earlier this year. It requires the $140 million recommended by DEETYA in its submission to cabinet last year. Without that additional $100 million, schools will struggle.It is not as if the impact of the 27,000 students coming back into the schools system will be spread evenly. That impact will be concentrated in areas and in schools which have a high concentration of youth unemployment. Areas with a high rate of youth unemployment will obviously have more students coming back into the schools system in their local area. So the impact will be concentrated. For some schools in disadvantaged areas there is huge concern about what is likely to happen at the beginning of the 1999 school year. Schools are genuinely concerned that they have not had the planning, the advice and the resourcing that they need to cope with the concentrated influx of students in regions and districts with high rates of youth unemployment.Beyond that there is a problem in that the students coming back into the system, of course, are students who would, by their choice, rather not be at school. The government wants to give them new skills and the opposition supports that, but we cannot provide the skills that are needed without the resources to make it work in the schools themselves. These are students with special needs—students who by free choice would rather not be at school—who, if not given the at-risk programs, the special attention, the counselling, the mentoring, the intensive classwork, may well disrupt the studies of other students. This government has taken a short-sighted approach that is harming schools, but it is also jeopardising the study potential of existing students—students who are looking to study and work hard at school and who do not want to be disrupted by students who are not being resourced and catered for as a product of the common youth allowance.The government really needs to make some final action to fully resource these programs. Forty million dollars is inadequate, especially when the schools affected will have a concentrated number and a high number of young people coming back onto their enrolment list with special needs. Without those resources, there is the potential for the disruption of existing studies and the normal flow of school activities.The bill also provides for flexibility of funding allocations under the literacy and country areas programs so that the most recent ABS census data can be used for determining relative need. I understand that there is a possibility of moving away from the method of using a needs based formula for distribution of these funds to an outcomes based approach. I hope that full consultations are made with the relevant school interests and organisations before any changes are made.In addition, this bill inserts amounts for capital funding for government and non-government schools for the year 2001: $212 million for the government sector and $73.5 million for non-government schools. I note that the capital funding for non-government schools in Labor's last year, 1996, was $113 million—$40 million more than the coalition intends to provide five years later. I know that this is an issue of major concern to non-government school authorities and the confirmation of a further decline in funding from the Commonwealth is most undesirable.The amounts provided for recurrent and capital expenditure for 1997 and subsequent years are adjusted by this bill for the most recent round of supplementation. This gives rise to a most important point with regard to claims made by the government about expenditure on schooling. On 12 May, the minister for schools claimed that the federal budget provided $153 million extra for schools in one year, a 3.8 per cent increase on the previous year. By 24 May the claim had become an increase for government schools of only $380 million in 1998 compared with 1996. Neither of these figures reveal very much. Neither allows for true year on year comparisons because they are not real. They are not cost adjusted figures presented in all fairness to the Australian people and the schools sector.The second one includes attributed FAGs funding which has had to be recently revised downwards from 24 per cent to 17.6 per cent. This huge drop of 6.4 percentage points raises the question of the validity of all the bodgie calculations done by this government to try to present its policies in a favourable light. The infamous $2.3 billion figure touted for months by Dr Kemp, which included attributed FAGs of 24 per cent, is now exposed as having been inflated by $400 million—$400 million out, even using the minister's double and triple counting methodology.The opposition has been saying for 2½ years that Dr Kemp is in fact a doctorer of the figures. I think there is now a recognition around the schools sector and this Parliament House that Dr Kemp is not to be believed on any use of figures with regard to schools funding or any aspect of education funding from the Commonwealth government.The government is very sensitive about this issue of providing expenditure figures in real terms. Of course it is. I am sure it is to the lasting embarrassment of the bureaucrats that they know that their minister is doctoring the figures. In a sense, it is not surprising that there has been an attempt to conceal the real—that is, the cost adjusted, the inflation adjusted—figures. This is because the forward estimates of detailed school funding obtained in 1996 by the opposition revealed a decline in real Commonwealth funding for government schools of $87.5 million between 1996-97 and 1999-2000.Since then, the government has refused to provide real terms data to allow the people of Australia to see clearly what is happening in terms of school funding. So, for all the promises of the Prime Minister to lift the standard of government and public accountability in Australia, the government will not even reveal the real funding figures, the inflation adjusted funding figures, for Australian schools. For every single parent around the country this is a matter of gross and serious concern. They want to know what the Commonwealth is doing, in cost adjusted terms, for their children through the schools system. The Prime Minister, who promised open and accountable government, has sullied his record in the fundamental area of school funding.The government's excuse, that real funding figures would allow calculation of the estimated school price index, is not credible. It is not credible because, firstly, real terms expenditure details were actually provided in 1996. Secondly, even if a calculation were made about expected movements in the cost of schooling, this would be a national figure which would reveal nothing about increases in teachers' salaries, for example, in any particular state or territory. The government has nothing to hide other than Dr Kemp's deceit. The government has nothing to hide other than Dr Kemp's continual attempts to mislead the Australian people. It should release the real funding figures and we would have a legitimate and fair debate about the Commonwealth contribution to schooling in Australia.This is a government afraid of the truth, afraid of being exposed by the truth. With the subject of schools funding having generated major debate under the Howard government, the electorate is being denied the official information needed to judge the statistics and the evidence for themselves. The school community is simply been denied access to the facts, and in a democracy that is a very bad thing.The government has sought to deflect criticism because of its decision to introduce an enrolment benchmark adjustment. In operation, the EBA has proved to be inequitable and unjustified, earning the government criticism from parents, teachers, state governments and the general community. Indeed, it is a moment rare in the history of Australian schools policy that the government sector and the non-government sector would be united in saying that a certain piece of public policy is bad. That is what is happening with regard to the enrolment benchmark adjustment.Government schools are saying, quite rightly, that it is plain wrong for them to lose Commonwealth funding, even though they are enrolling more students. It is plain wrong for government schools to enrol more students and lose money out of Canberra. The non-government sector is saying that, for a relatively small part of the Commonwealth schools budget, this EBA has reopened the undesirable debate about state aid. It has given the impression in the public debate that the schools funding question is the old issue of government versus non-government schools. The non-government sector knows that that is a bad thing for the quality and fairness of the debate in Australia.Minister Kemp, rare among Australian policy makers, has devised something so bad, so unfair and so undesirable in its impact on schools that both the government sector and the non-government sector are saying, `Abolish it. Do away with it.' The government schools are saying that it is unfair and denies them needed resources. Non-government schools are saying that it is the wrong way to consider the debate about schools funding in this country.In 1997, almost every state and territory increased its enrolments in government schools. Every state except Tasmania was subject to the EBA. In New South Wales, for example, the Commonwealth took $1,525 for each of the 2,839 extra students enrolled in the government school system in that state—far more than the general per capita payment from the Commonwealth of $379 for each primary student and $559 for each secondary student. For New South Wales, each of those extra students became a net cost to the state of between $966 and $1,146. Nationally, the EBA charge imposed by the Commonwealth for each additional student in the government system was $1,400. This means that state governments lost between $842 and $1,022 for each of the additional 8,500 students enrolled in those government schools in 1997.What sort of funding system is it when government schools can enrol more students and lose funding out of Canberra? This is a government that has gone absolutely mad in its determination to reopen the old debate between government and non-government schools. Kemp has no answers in education policy, so he has fallen back to the oldest trick in the political book: divide and rule; try to set the government against the non-government sector. The healthy news is that it has not worked, because government schools have seen through the folly of this approach and non-government schools know—and I pay credit to those non-government school authorities—that this is a bad bit of policy, and they are supporting the Labor Party in its determination to abolish the enrolment benchmark adjustment.Of course, the government does not see sense in this. Senator Ellison, in self-righteous mode, said in a media release on 24 May:Any suggestion that the Government has decreased funding to government schools is wrong.The minister should explain to this House, to his own chamber, the Senate, and to the Australian people how giving government schools less money for more students does not reflect decreased funding. This is a government which will argue that black is white, that day is night. They will argue anything and concoct any set of statements to try to cover up the fact that government schools are worse off out of the enrolment benchmark adjustment.How can the minister say that the government has not decreased funding for government schools when every single education authority around the country is saying that the government has? The fact that most states had more rather than fewer students last year than the year before highlights the flaw in the rationale for the EBA: that, if one or two students leave a school or a class, there is no measurable saving in terms of teacher costs or administrative overheads. The EBA is based on a comparison of average costs, which become meaningless in the practical operation of each school. When the overall level of enrolments is increasing, it becomes even more meaningless.The EBA is nothing more than a crude grab for cash by the coalition government at the expense of young Australians—at the expense of every single school and every single educator in this country. It is one of the first things that a Beazley Labor government can do for the school sector: abolish the enrolment benchmark adjustment.I want to turn to some other issues about school funding in this fairly broad piece of legislation. I have maintained in my 15 months as the shadow minister for education that the old debate on school funding in Australia, resurrected by this government, between government and non-government funding shares is moribund. The real and tangible variations in the standards and the quality of Australian schools do not lie in an arbitrary debate of government versus non-government sectors; the great variations lie within sectors. I have been to government schools in this country that are an absolute credit to those who run them—to the teachers, the parents and the government officials—government schools that one would regard as advanced information technology centres for the next century.I stood in absolute amazement, absolutely gobsmacked, at the Caulfield North Public School in Melbourne watching a nine-year-old student designing software programs in a computer room that was an absolute credit to the fundraising capacity of that school. He was not just playing computer games, he was designing the software package. In this age of possibility, this age of knowledge enhancement, what a wonderful thing that we can have nine-year-olds in government schools that can access the technology needed to develop that sort of skill. It really does open one's eyes to the possibilities of education in an era of unlimited potential in learning technology. But, just the same, I have visited government schools that would be very little different from when I went to school in the 1960s or when my colleague here, the member for Batman (Mr Martin Ferguson), went to school in the 1930s.LS4FERGUSONMr Martin Ferguson—I am still holding my age better than you.K26Latham, Mark, MPMr LATHAM—Did I say the 1930s? I think I meant the 1950s. I visited schools that look no different from the 1950s and 1960s, where the approach is just chalk and talk— schools without the facilities, the technology, the up-to-date learning methods that are reflected in other parts of the country. So the variations are within sectors. So too have I seen in the non-government school sector the fact that some non-government schools are so advanced and a wonderful credit to their teachers and parents. Other non-government schools are really struggling with the cost of vocational education, struggling with the limited capacity of their parents to make a private contribution, struggling on just about every single front.So the variations within the school sector are not so much between government and non-government schools; they are within sectors. And this just makes the point that it really is time to end the old debate. Let us abolish the enrolment benchmark adjustment, and let us abolish any perception that we need to set the funding interests of government schools against those in the non-government sector. I simply want to fund schools on the basis of need. If there is a school that needs extra resources to produce the results that we want for all young Australians, let us find the funding mechanisms that produce that result.Dr Kemp, of course, is engaged in an arbitrary debate about choice. He is not worried so much about need; he thinks that every single parent should have an unlimited choice of schooling. For a lot of parents, the only choice available is their neighbourhood government school, or fee relief if their children go to a non-government school. So many working families in Australia are struggling with the income that they need to pay large non-government school fees. This choice agenda is limited by that simple economic reality. A government that is deregulating the labour market, a government that has run down employment and economic opportunities in Australia's regions, is running down the capacity for parents to exercise choice. If you have not got the money to pay substantial non-government school fees, the choice is limited. It is a matter of parish benevolence in the non-government sector, where there is fee relief, or the choice of a neighbourhood government school. So choice should not be the paramount priority in the way in which we fund schools; it must be on the basis of need. With some of the new technology emerging about the identification of school needs, we can make substantial advances.I believe there is an argument now to set an effective national standard for what we want our schools to achieve. Let us set down the model of the school in Australia that we want for primary and secondary students: the sort of vocational education, the IT, the teacher-student ratio, the sort of capital facilities, and issues of curriculum. Let us set a broad national standard about what we want every single Australian school to achieve and, if there are schools below that standard, whether they are government or non-government, let us find a funding mechanism to bring them up to the appropriate standard. This can be possible. The ERI review is looking at some of the sophisticated ways of measuring school need and the funding response that might come from the Commonwealth. We can learn a lot from that process. But the most important thing is to get better cooperation between federal and state governments.We know as a parliament that for years in Australia we have had this terrible problem of cost shifting in the health system—the states trying to push public hospital costs on to the Medicare and pharmaceutical budget of the Commonwealth government. While governments bicker and squabble about funding, patients lose out. We have now got the cost shifting problem, regrettably, happening in Australian schools. Non-government schools are being used by governments like the Victorian government as a way of shifting costs from the state budget to the Commonwealth government. Because we have the dual funding scheme in Australia whereby the Commonwealth is the primary funder for non-government schools and the states the primary funder for government schools, there is now an active incentive for governments like the Kennett administration to close down government schools and push the cost onto the opening of new non-government schools funded by the federal government.There is the same cost shifting problem in health. While governments bicker and shift their money around and try to minimise their own budgets, students, teachers and parents lose out. We have got to do something about that; we have got to have federal-state agreement about a common funding methodology that can bring every single Australian school up to the desirable national standard. The only way we can get agreement is with leadership from the Commonwealth. But what have we had from this government in Commonwealth-state relations in education? We have had nothing but warfare, nothing but disputation and nothing but confrontation by Minister Kemp.I am a great believer in upping the ante on Commonwealth-state relations. In all areas of Australia they have always been poor. The problem is that what we put on the Commonwealth-state agenda are 20 little items that politicians can find ways of bickering about. What we need is one big concept on the school education agenda that will bring out the best in federal and state politicians and public administrators. That is the concept of funding schools up to an appropriate national standard on the basis of need and forever doing something about a quality funding methodology for all Australian schools—up the ante, show people the big possibilities that come out of the new, sophisticated identification of school need and try to encourage the states, with acceptable funding support from the Commonwealth, to do the right thing and to reach agreement about the better way we need to fund schools in Australia. This is a wonderful opportunity that this government has totally passed over with its approach of confrontation with the states and territories.Finally, I want to mention another important role for the Commonwealth. It is true that the federal government does not run any schools or employ any teachers in Australia, but it has a big funding responsibility and, I believe, a big policy responsibility for the way in which school education is discharged in this country. One of the problems we have got in the government sector is that we have big state departments that are centralised and monolithic and there is not a lot of capacity for ministers to make bold innovation. The New South Wales education department, for in stance, is the biggest in the world. It must be an intimidating thought for a state minister to think, `If I make a 10 per cent change to the system, the consequences might be enormous across a huge number of schools.' I suppose after the experience with Terry Metherell in New South Wales in the late 1980s, nobody is putting their hand up for innovation.With the state government sector, I think there is an argument for the federal government to provide some seed funding, some promotion of innovation, because we live in a world of constant change, economic and social, but we have not had a lot of changes in the way in which schools are structured and curriculum is delivered. We have had so many changes in information technology and the possibilities of a learning society, but most of our schools in the government sector are still fairly well wedded to the comprehensive model that was devised in the 1950s and 1960s. There is a real need for innovation, for pilot schemes, for experiments and for innovation that will address some of the issues that are arising within the school sector in our post-industrial society.One of the big issues is in the middle years of schooling, the problem of 13- to 16-year-olds feeling alienated from the learning process, young adolescents dropping out of school and young people saying that learning is not for them, they just do not like the school learning environment. So the middle school years has become a critical issue especially—as I am told by educators—more for males than females. This problem of alienation is critical. It is a difficult thing for teachers to handle in schools but also more difficult for policy makers because somebody dropping out of school at age 14 is the long-term youth unemployed of the future or is the young person who might turn to street crime or some undesirable social habits. We must keep every single adolescent in this country connected with the learning process. We must do something about the crisis in middle schooling in Australia.One thing we need to acknowledge is that young people learn in a variety of ways. There is no one form of intelligence or learning inclination; there are many forms and ways of learning. So we need to cater school learning opportunities around the needs and the inclinations of every single student so we can make sure that every young Australian can have a positive learning experience through the school process. That might be in the more traditional academic or vocational areas or it might be in the areas of the creative arts, multimedia or the trades, but the positive learning experience is all important in the middle school years. There are some wonderful examples—the Launceston workshop and the Ballajura community school in the northern suburbs of Perth—where innovation according to this approach is taking place. But we need more innovation promoted by the federal government to come with up real answers to the crisis in middle schooling.The very best thing for public policy is that every single young Australian who is successful at school is a young Australian who will not be on drugs when they get to their late teens, is a young Australian who will not be long-term unemployed and is a young Australian who will not need government training assistance in labour market programs, employment, drug prevention and crime prevention initiatives. Most of the problems are happening in the teenage years of 13 to 16, yet most of the government focus in dealing with these issues and the funding initiatives is on the ages 16 to 20. We have to move down the age ladder to the middle school years and make sure that every single young Australian has a positive learning experience and a genuine sense of social belonging, social belonging out of their school and out of their community.So it is a big agenda arising from legislation like this, but an agenda that this government has by and large ignored. This government's main contribution to the school funding debate has been to reopen the divisive question of government versus non-government schools and it has been to ignore substantially the need for innovation and pilot programs in the middle school years. To this government's lasting shame, in its first budget it made education and training the No. 1 target for funding cuts.Education—school education in particular—is the very best investment we can make in Australia's future. A Labor government will be making that investment and ensuring that every single school, whether government or non-government, comes up to an appropriate national standard and that every school can have the same feeling and successes of Caulfield North or the other wonderful government and non-government schools. That will come only from a Labor government giving the right public policy and the right leadership when it comes to school education in Australia.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Hollis)—Is the amendment seconded?LS4FERGUSONMr Martin Ferguson—I second the amendment and reserve my right to speak.10:51:005761Cobb, Michael, MPMr COBBMF4ParkesNP10—I am pleased to be speaking on the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 which is before the parliament today. At the outset I would like to say that, amongst some quite laudable things the honourable member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) said, it is regrettable that he had to rehash some of these myths that somehow the coalition has been cutting money out of education, when we have not. We are actually putting more into education, as I will come to. I was disappointed to see some of the old sectarian ideologies being rehashed about government and non-government school funding. This government stands for choice in schooling. We believe that that is the way to go.I congratulate the government for bringing this bill before the House. In particular I would like to congratulate the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (Dr Kemp), who has done a magnificent job not only in primary and secondary school education but in education overall, including university education. He has a great grasp of the topic and he is putting down some quite revolutionary and visionary shifts which will benefit education in this country.I would also like to pay tribute to the minister's 2IC, the Minister for Schools, Vocational Education and Training (Senator Ellison), who has proved to be a very diligent minister and is doing a great job for the children of Australia. I am particularly pleased that he has been willing to listen to many propositions that have been put to him by constituents from my electorate. In fact, this government has given education virtually the highest priority of all portfolios. I, for one, am pleased to see that. We are putting more money into schools and building better and new schools. I notice in a press release which came out in the last couple of days that the pupil-teacher radio in this country is now 18 to 1, which is close to the lowest ratio in the whole Asia-Pacific region, which includes countries such as Japan, New Zealand and the United States of America.I am particularly pleased that this government is also wiling to pay attention to some of the small detail. In particular, I am thinking of the Isolated Children's Parents Association lobby group, the ICPA, which represents 12,000 students in rural and remote areas. Twelve thousand is a small number out of the total school population of 3.2 million but, in the two years since coming to power, we have increased the correspondence allowance for primary school children from $500 to $1,000, we have increased the allowance for secondary school children by a similar amount, and we have also increased the non-means tested boarding allowance to $2,900.I believe we have to do a great deal more in this area, because the year 12 completion rate for children in remote areas runs at only about 52 per cent compared to the urban rate in this country of 70 per cent or more. In fact, I saw some disturbing figures for male students completing year 12. In remote areas, less than 45 per cent of male students complete year 12. Often that is because parents have very limited means. I know of cases where parents have had to pull their children out of school and send them off to shearing sheds to earn an income so that the family can continue to survive. As we approach the end of the 20th century, that is not a desirable situation. I exhort this government to do even more to resource the education of children in remote areas. I think that is taxpayers' money very well spent indeed.There are a number of elements to this bill. One is the provision of $20 million for the introduction of what is called the full service schools program. That money is to be spent over three years from 1998 to provide additional support to schools to develop innovative programs and services that address the needs of young people returning to school following the introduction of the youth allowance and current students who are at risk of not completing year 12 or making a successful transition from school to training or employment. I think that is a very worthwhile goal indeed.As well, $40.2 million will be provided for the extension of the previous government's national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools strategy. That strategy will take place over two years from 1998 to support the enhancement and expansion of Asian languages and Asian studies provision. I think just about everybody in Australia, with the possible exception of the One Nation Party, would support that. The full service schools program is part of a Commonwealth initiative to provide additional funding for schools. Industry and community groups will have the opportunity to provide education and training for young people as a result of the introduction of the youth allowance.We have other measures in this program. We have provided an additional $13.5 million over the 1998-2000 period for the jobs pathways program and an additional $6.21 million over a similar period for the new apprenticeship access program. These measures are not funded under this act, but they are worth mentioning because I believe they too are excellent measures. The minister is to be congratulated for supporting them.We are putting $40 million into the Asian language area to improve participation and proficiency levels in language learning, particularly in the four targeted Asian languages—Japanese, Chinese Mandarin, Indonesian and Korean—and to introduce and maintain Asia studies content across the curriculum. There is a concentration on these four main languages, which were chosen on the basis of regional economic forecasts made by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. I am pleased to see that there is a practical economic element in the choice of these languages because two-thirds of this country's exports today go into Asia, and that is where jobs for Australians are.I commend the One Nation Party, when they criticise Asia, to think of the harm that they may be doing to Australian exports in this regard. Asia is absolutely critical to us. When the countries to our north go through these particularly stringent and difficult financial times, it is up to us to assist in whatever way we can, not just as good neighbours but as a matter of self-interest, because that is where our exports lie and that is where our jobs are. In 1997, just over 10,000 year 12 students studied one of the targeted languages. I am very pleased to see that figure. I am sure that number will increase with this increased funding and with the focus on Asian languages in the coming years.I also want to mention the literacy in country areas programs whereby we give targeted assistance, on the basis of relative needs, to schools in the more remote areas. I would like to see the government continue that program and perhaps expand it in the future. It is very important for some of the schools in my area of western New South Wales.Retention rates for year 12 students have dropped in recent years, from 77.1 per cent in 1992 to 71.8 per cent in 1997. One of the measures this government is taking, bringing in the youth allowance, which is introduced in a workable form today, will help turn that around. That is commendable indeed. Bringing in the youth allowance has cost us another $212 million over the next four years. It was a very logical move. It replaced five previous payments with one, and reduced 13 different rates of payment to five. So it simplified the whole thing and made it much more logical.The youth allowance removes the disincentive to study, particularly for those under 21 years of age. Previously they could get a greater amount of money by being on the dole than staying and completing their schooling up to year 12. From my electorate's point of view it provides more assistance to young people who need to live away from home to study or to look for work, particularly those in rural areas. That will be of great benefit to people in country areas.I do not agree with every aspect of the youth allowance and I may just mention one. I have a 23-year-old student living in my district who was working in a retail business, in a shop. This student, Rachel Anderson, decided quite properly to better herself. She has taken up a TAFE course for one year in office administration. At the beginning of this year, because she was an independent student and had given up her job—which is a big step—she was receiving $265 a fortnight. Under the youth allowance to come in today that payment will drop to $174 because, even those she is independent, she is living with her mother, who is a widow of limited means. She pays full rent living there. She signed, in effect, a `contract' at the beginning of the year to receive $265 a fortnight. Unfortunately, that is going to drop to $174. If she dropped out and went on the dole, because she is over the age of 21 she would receive a newstart allowance of $321 a fortnight.So while we have done the right thing in improving the incentive to study for the under 21-year-olds, for the over 21-year-olds there is this anomaly. In this instance the students who are already studying should have been `grandfathered', to use that term. That payment should have continued until the end of her course. I have contacted the office of the Minister for Social Security (Senator Newman) and they are looking into it to see what can be done to assist. I raise it here because it is an important anomaly which needs attention.There has been considerable criticism by the opposition that this government is neglecting education. Nothing could be further from the truth. When we came to government in 1996 and brought down our first budget we increased the total Commonwealth budget for schools by $122 million, or 3.6 per cent, lifting the total to $3,500 million in spending. We did this at a time when we were cutting money out of the budget to bring the economy back into balance. We have now moved back into surplus. This shows the priority we have been giving education. In the next budget for 1997-98 we lifted the spending to $4 billion, which was up another $474 million, or 13.5 per cent. So the commitment was even more forthcoming. In the recent budget we brought down in May this year, we lifted the spending again by another $153 million or 3.8 per cent. So in the two years or three budgets that the coalition has been in power we have lifted total Commonwealth funding to schools by $750 million, an increase of 22 per cent. So there is no way whatsoever the opposition can credibly criticise us for reducing funding, as they have done.We have also increased indigenous education funding. It is up to $339.3 million in the coming year, up from the last Labor budget of $282.1 million. But it is not just a matter of money; it is what you do with that money. Perhaps even more importantly, we have established performance targets and we have set reporting requirements for the first time to improve the educational standards of indigenous children. This is an area which has been relatively neglected over the years. For all the so-called problems that we have with the indigenous community, I think we cannot give too much attention to the education of Aboriginal children, to assist them into the work force as productive citizens with dignity in their later lives. I was very pleased to see that a record number of about 5,000 indigenous trainees started up in 1996-97, which was an increase of 600 per cent on the 870 trainees in 1994-95. So the coalition is starting to score some runs in this area for the benefit of Aboriginal people.We have sorted out the means test for Austudy that we inherited from the previous government. They quite rightly brought this in to pick up high income earners who were hiding incomes in trusts and partnerships. But unfortunately the bad structuring of the previous act had the undesirable side-effect of penalising most farming families, even though they were on very low incomes. It took a tremendous amount of work by the coalition to sort that problem out. It has largely been solved, I am pleased to say. As I said earlier, Austudy becomes the youth allowance from today. We have done a number of other things for youth. The Green Corps program provides $41.6 million over three years for young people to partake in paid practical work on community based environmental projects. Even in my electorate, centres like Broken Hill, Dubbo and Parkes have already taken up these programs.University funding is also running at record levels, despite the previous speaker's criticism. In 1998 the government will fully fund a record 361,925 undergraduate places, and $5.4 billion has been provided for universities in this coming year. Also, $450 million will be provided for university research. We have record growth in our education export industry, which is now up 27 per cent since 1995 to 152,000 overseas students, earning $3.4 billion for our economy. That level was running at $2.3 billion back in 1995. Our commitment to tertiary education is great as well.I particularly commend the minister for his literacy program. We are providing $176 million in this coming year, which will continue through to the year 2001. We have established the first national literacy and numeracy plan to help ensure all children develop sound reading, writing and spelling skills and are numerate by the end of primary school. The literacy needs of all children will be assessed by classroom teachers in the first year of their schooling. Those children requiring extra help will be singled out to receive additional literacy support. All children will be progressively assessed against a national literacy standard in years 3 and 5, and that may even be extended at a later date.Our job placement, employment and training program—JPET—funding has been increased greatly. This was the previous government's program, which we have retained and expanded on. We are providing $143 million to help 10,650 young people in the 15- to 21-year-old at risk group. It includes those with family and school problems. We are identifying those people and we are assisting them through programs. In a sense, this is `a stitch in time saves nine' funding, from the taxpayer's point of view.I congratulate particularly Pam Clarke at the Broken Hill Skills Centre, Tracy Tierney at Forbes Employment and Training Services, and Trevor May from Mission Australia at Dubbo for the fine work they will be doing with our young citizens in their time of need in the coming year. I am also working to see if we can get some funding in the Bourke-Brewarrina area through Centacare and for the great work Margaret Flynn has been doing there for those in need in that area as well.We are also funding youth councils. Regional youth councils have been or are about to be set up in centres in my electorate in Dubbo, Cobar, Narromine, Warren, Nyngan, Bourke and Brewarrina. That taps into the talent and ideas of local youth and encourages them to participate in developing solutions for the issues of importance to them in their communities.I also want to commend the government for its vocational pathways program, with $187 million over four years. Seventy per cent of students do not go on to university and these students have been relatively neglected in the past. We are going to assist 20,000 of those in this year and 38,000 students in the Australian Student Traineeship Foundation as well. I also commend the government for what it is doing in relation to the civics program that we are bringing in for year 4 to year 10 students to help them discover democracy and history, and learn about how the democratic system works in this country. I commend the government for what it is doing. (Time expired)11:11:005764Price, Roger, MPMr PRICEQI4ChifleyALP00—I am pleased to speak on the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 and, in particular, to support our shadow minister for education and youth affairs, Mr Latham, who has moved an amendment, namely that:"whilst not declining to give the Bill a second reading, the House condemns the Government:(1) for failing to provide schools with adequate resources to cope with the expected increase of up to 27,000 students a year as a result of the introduction of the Youth Allowance;(2) for presenting distorted and misleading figures on school funding to the Australian people; and (3) for imposing the unfair Enrolment Benchmark Adjustment on government schools".It is interesting that at the same time as I am speaking in this House, there is a media conference being held by a number of youth groups which condemn the federal government's introduction of the youth allowance. Those groups are the Australian Youth Policy and Action Coalition, the National Youth Coalition for Housing, the Australian Council of Social Service, the Australian Catholic Social Welfare Commission and the Welfare Rights Network of Australia. It is really interesting that none of these organisations is welcoming the government's initiative on the youth allowance. You can catch them in one of the Senate committee rooms at this moment, condemning the government for the youth allowance.I do not think that there is a more mendacious minister in the house than the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (Dr Kemp), who is introducing this bill. On the opposition side he is not held in any high esteem, particularly for his mendacity. I think education and employment are too important for us to be scoring points about because, basically, particularly in terms of education, young people are Australia's future. The extent to which we allow young people to realise their full potential is the extent to which we will be enriched in the future.To give you an example of the mendacity of the minister, let me give you one quote of his about youth unemployment and the youth allowance:The government is committed to reducing youth unemployment—no problem with that—and believes that it is important to encourage our young people under 18 to complete their schooling or, if they leave school early, to move on to further training or employment.Actually it is not a system of encouragement at all; it is a system of compulsion. In my own electorate, when the news hit about this so-called government initiative, I think I calculated that about 1,000 young people were going to be forced back into schools.Mr Deputy Speaker, even if you support compulsion, as I presume government members do, wouldn't you think it would be aided or complemented by a system that facilitates re-entry; that there would be some additional resources, some additional approach within the schools to facilitate re-entry? Some states have particular re-entry schools which are specifically designed to cater for students who may have left school for more than six months and want to get back into mainstream schooling. But it is not possible for those students to do so instantly. You cannot be unemployed and then suddenly sign up for schooling and pick up where you left off because, clearly, you have missed out on a lot. What does it do to other students who already may be very motivated to continue with their education if they are confronted with a significant proportion of their class who have been compelled to return to school?The opposition supports the idea—and we talk endlessly about it, I suppose, because we are so passionate about it—of the need for further education or further training. But I am not convinced that compulsion is the answer; and compulsion unaccompanied by any other remedy certainly is not the answer.In reality what is happening is that young people who do not go back into further training or schooling get zero support from unemployment benefits from the government. Benefits are assessed also on their parents' income, and it is a very modest amount of money—$23,000. That income can be brought into the house by one parent or both. I believe that there would be very few people working in my community, which I am proud to represent, who would qualify on that basis. It almost indicates that people have to be on welfare benefits to qualify. I think that is very wrong.I have spoken also about the opportunity I had in chairing the employment, education and training committee. We brought down a unanimous recommendation—all the recommendations, incidentally, were unanimous—where we said that the age of independence should be lowered from 25 to 21 years of age and the Labor government went about lowering the age of independence.What has this government done? It has made a 180-degree turn and reversed the age of independence. How galling it must be for young people aged 16 or older to have to be totally dependent on their parents—how galling. And what does it do for family relationships? We hear the coalition say, `We are in favour of the family. We want to strengthen the family. The family is the cornerstone of Australia.' I accept all those things, and I believe in them too. But then they set about policies that destabilise families—and dramatically destabilise them.I support, in a sense, the rationalisation of the various allowances. I very much oppose the implication and the exclusion of young people who currently enjoy those allowances from having them. But I note that the department—that is, the Department of Social Security—in implementing this new youth allowance has awarded itself nearly $70 million. In other words, a whole range of existing payments are being consolidated into one payment. But to me, by far and away the biggest winner seems to be the Department of Social Security. I think that is particularly unfortunate.I remember at the last election when, in South Australia, Rupert Murdoch said that the rate of unemployment amongst young people was terrible and that the government—meaning the Labor government—ought to do something about it. I suppose that was a statement welcomed by a lot of people; it certainly had a tremendous impact at the time. But I also have to say that, in fact, under this government the rate of unemployment for youth has increased; it has not been lowered at all.Given his earlier statement, I am just waiting for Mr Murdoch, a very powerful and influential media proprietor, to come out and say to the Australian people how bitterly disappointed he is. I am sure that young people are very disappointed about their inability to find jobs, notwithstanding all the coalition rhetoric at the time about how it would decrease the unemployment rate and how it would create jobs for young people if they wanted them.There are some interesting statistics around relating to job creation. Let me just rattle a few off, if you do not mind—and I am not trying to point score here; I am just trying to really present in this speech the facts of the matter. It is like a report card of this mendacious minister.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Nehl)—Order! I realise that `mendacious' is a relatively obscure word, but the meaning is quite clear and the member should be careful.QI4Price, Roger, MPMr PRICE—Mr Deputy Speaker, I am certainly happy to take up that caution, and I will certainly desist and refrain from using that word again in this speech. But this minister exercises no caution when he uses figures, and I want to avoid what is common practice for the minister and just present figures that are incontestable, figures that are on the public record.LS4FERGUSONMr Martin Ferguson—Meaning you won't fiddle them.QI4Price, Roger, MPMr PRICE—I do not believe in the longer term it does anyone any good fiddling them. Whilst the minister may feel good about it, it lowers the reputation of all ministers and all members of this parliament. I think it is a practice to be avoided, as the point I want to make is far too serious.If you compare the last 27 months of Labor and the Howard-Fischer coalition's first 27 months, total jobs growth under Labor was 561,600. Under John Howard it was 231,100. Full-time jobs growth under Labor was 350,300. Under John Howard it was 74,100. Part-time jobs growth—and this is perhaps the best performing area for John Howard—was 211,300 under Labor and 157,000 under John Howard. What was the impact of our government on unemployment in those 27 months? The unemployment rate came down 2.4 per cent. What has happened under John Howard? It has come down certainly—by 0.3 per cent. Let me repeat that: under Labor unemployment came down 2.4 per cent; under John Howard it came down 0.3 per cent.The unemployment rate for youth under Labor was 26.4 per cent, and the unemployment rate under the coalition was 27.9 per cent. I apologise for using an old figure of May 1998, but it has increased under this government. There are fewer people now looking for work—in other words, the discouraged numbers in our community have increased dramatically because the participation rate has not increased under John Howard. These are statistics that I have been using, but underneath every statistic is a human being looking for dignity, wanting work and not being able to find it. It is really disappointing that, when a government introduces a youth allowance which denies young people the ability to get unemployment benefits, this is triumphed as tremendous government policy. In fact, it is going to put serious pressures on that young person or, alternatively, their family.In reading the newspapers today, I could not help noticing in the Telegraph and the Sydney Morning Herald the headlines `Mt Druitt teachers stage walkout' and `Teachers in west walk out'. This has everything to do with something that I have been fighting for for 10 years, and that is the creation of a senior high school in Mount Druitt with junior feeder schools. I have said to the House before that the earlier campaign was unsuccessful because we did not get the model that we wanted and Mount Druitt missed out, but St Mary's senior high was implemented and became the first ever public senior high school in New South Wales. I note that one report says 80 and another report says 100 teachers gathered at the office of Paul Gibson, the present member for Londonderry. Why teachers feel that they need to go to Mr Gibson as some moral authority in the community I do not know.What I can tell the House is this: Mr Gibson has a very firm position on improving student outcomes in my electorate, particularly amongst the five high schools in Mount Druitt. What he says is this: notwithstanding declining school enrolments, we should do nothing about increasing subject choices. We should do nothing about improving vocational educational opportunities in years 11 and 12. What we need to do to combat declining enrolment is to throw more teachers into a declining student population. That is clearly a recipe for failure. Some may be attracted to that proposition if it improves student outcomes, but there is no evidence that that is the case.I cannot in all conscience stand in this parliament and say, `I support in one of those five high schools one year 11 student being taught by one teacher.' I apologise to you; I cannot defend it. I cannot defend that school's concept of providing choice for students in Mount Druitt by directing them to take distance education for one of their subjects—that is, by correspondence. I am appalled that, because of low student numbers and because choices are so limited, this school is encouraging year 11 and 12 students to take a subject, an everyday common subject, by distance education. To me, that points to failure.Last but not least, in the instance that I gave of one on one teaching, someone has to pay for it. The students who are paying for it are the junior students—the years 7 to 10 students. They are being robbed of teaching resources to provide such incredibly low student numbers. It has been claimed that there is a lack of consultation. The minister hired the University of Western Sydney, and they went round all the five schools, spoke to students separately, spoke to teachers separately and spoke to the community. I think I was at three of the five community consultations. Out of that process everyone has recognised that things have to change in Mount Druitt.A working party was set up comprising a principal, four teachers—one of them I understand a representative for the teachers federation—and a community representative. To his credit, Minister John Aquilina allowed that working party to travel to Victoria to see first-hand how a multicampus arrangement—a college arrangement—can work. I congratulate him for it. They came back and developed a particular model on the way forward. That model has been presented to the school principals. That model will go to the wider community, including the teachers. Let me say this: I am very happy to organise a public meeting at the Rooty Hill RSL and invite every parent and every student to come along—teachers can come along if they want to—and we will discuss the merits of this change.The clock is ticking away. We need to have the new structure in for next year. Narimba has already borrowed from the work that was done in Mount Druitt; their college system has got a green light, they are proceeding and it will be implemented in 1999. It is unacceptable to me that having already lost ten years, we should lose another year. We must have this new arrangement in place for 1999.As much as I believe that teachers are a very valuable and important aspect of teaching, and I esteem their role, as a federal member I cannot sell out the interests of my students and their futures on the basis of this walkout. I have been committed for a number of years to senior high schools. I am not going to waver in fighting for the best outcomes for my students; whether they are at high school or at primary school, I am committed to them. I am disappointed, but I understand that the majority of the teachers came from the two high schools that are not involved in this arrangement rather than from the five schools themselves. I commend the amendment moved by the shadow minister. (Time expired)11:31:005768Andrew, Neil, MPMr ANDREWHE4WakefieldLP10—I welcome the opportunity to participate in this debate on the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 and to make a remark or two on some of the comments made by the member for Chifley (Mr Price). I understand that if he is leaving, it would be because he has no choice; I am not critical of that for a moment. He did end on a rather parochial point that it would not be appropriate for me to comment on, however, earlier in his speech, he tried to make a great deal of political mileage out of what he painted as the government's failure to address the vexed and difficult question of youth unemployment. On that point, he knows, as I know, that he was using some statistics rather mischievously within time frames that suited his argument, rather than anyone else's argument, to reinforce what he believed was a valid point about youth unemployment. No-one in this chamber—least of all you, Mr Deputy Speaker Quick, given your experience in education—would for a moment waver in their statement that youth unemployment is the most vexing problem facing every parliamentarian. But it is mischievous and wrong to paint this government as having failed in its obligation to do something about the difficulty of youth unemployment.The government has much to be proud of in the employment area. The government is particularly proud that, in the face of an unprecedented Asian crisis, unemployment has been largely unaffected. We wish it would come down. In fact, to the government's credit, it has come down overall in the two years that it has been in government. It normally would have been expected that the collapse of our major trading partners in Asia would have produced all sorts of repercussions throughout our economy, but we have largely been fireproofed from those repercussions by the difficult, but responsible, decisions that the government has taken.I am disturbed at any figure of youth unemployment, particularly a figure as high as 25, 26 or 27 per cent. But, as we look at the question of the youth allowance and the way in which we encourage young people to be better qualified, let the parliament bear in mind—and the shadow minister at the table, the member for Bonython (Mr Martyn Evans) would be well aware of this—that those areas in South Australia with the lowest unemployment, those with the minimum rates of youth unemployment, are, obviously, those where economic growth is most marked.If you go into the Coonawarra in the south-east of South Australia, if you go into the Barossa Valley, if you go into the Clare Valley, you will find a situation where unemployment, including youth unemployment, figures are below 10 per cent. If you come into the area I represent, not only the Barossa Valley but also the Riverland, you will find unemployment levels coming down because community growth and trade growth is so marked. In the areas I have nominated, as any listener would be aware, the boom in the wine industry has meant that unemployment has come down. The secret to reducing unemploy ment, whether it is youth unemployment or unemployment generally, is, frankly, to find what Australia does better than the rest of the world and get on with doing it.I applaud what the former government did, and they ought to applaud what we have been doing to maintain the trading arrangements that have allowed some of Australia's key industries—such as the dairy, sugar and wine industries—to enjoy such unprecedented export growth. That has been the key to reducing unemployment.I can create jobs, anyone opposite can create jobs, simply by ensuring that—and I use the example mischievously—every grape grower in my electorate goes back to hand harvesting instead of mechanical harvesting or every farmer in my electorate puts his grain into bags instead of using a self-propelled harvester—jobs a plenty, and the nation would be broke inside six months. We need to discover what it is that Australia does well and get on with producing those goods.Much was made by the former speaker of what he saw as the difficulty with the youth allowance. He said, for example, that the youth allowance denies young people the unemployment benefit. So it does, but should I apologise for that? Do I actually want to offer young people an unemployment benefit instead of the youth allowance when the obligation for taking the youth allowance is the obligation to be involved in some form of study, to be improving themselves? All the statistics—not parliamentary statistics, not party oriented statistics—indicate that you are 2½ times less likely to be unemployed as a young person if you have some form of post-secondary education.What has this government done? We have said, `Let's put in place a deliberate incentive to ensure that people get post-secondary education. Let's call it the youth allowance.' The youth allowance is something that you qualify for, providing you are prepared not to leave secondary school and go aimlessly looking for work but to leave secondary school and be involved in some sort of improvement of your qualifications. Do that, and you get support from the government. Do that, and you improve your opportunity of being employed in the long term. Anything else would be irresponsible.When I was a member of the opposition, one of the criticisms I frequently faced as a parliamentarian was that it was more attractive to be on the dole than to be getting Austudy, more attractive to be on the dole than to be improving your outlook and your employability. We have turned that around, and that improvement ought to be welcomed by those opposite, not criticised for some short-term political gain.Much was also made in the debate by the member for Chifley, and by the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) preceding him, of what was seen as this government's inadequacy in the way in which we have gone about funding for schools. Everyone has heard the comment about `lies, damned lies and statistics' and some very convenient statistics were being peddled to make it look as though the government had in some way failed to recognise the obligation it has to support government schools. Let me put on the record the simple fact that federal funding for government schools from all government sources is expected to rise by 13.5 per cent on a per capita basis between the years 1996 and 2000. Let me reinforce that. Education was one of those areas quarantined from budget cuts by this government—a government saddled with the responsibility of paying off a deficit that it did not run up. We deliberately quarantined education and, as I said earlier, we focused additional moneys into government schools.In common, I suspect, with everyone else in this chamber, I have been lobbied by teachers and those representing government schools pleading for what they thought would be a fairer deal for government schools relative to non-government schools. As a parent, I find myself in a very interesting situation. All three of our children have been educated in both government and non-government schools. It was a choice we took—a relatively easy choice to take if you are on a parliamentary salary—but I am staggered at the number of people in Wakefield who choose to educate their children in non-government schools at a great deal of personal cost. As someone with some responsibility for the way the taxpayer's dollar is divvied up, I consider that I have an obligation to ensure that every parent in Australia has a deliberate right to choice, that they can choose whether they want to be in a government school or a non-government school and that they can know that the proportion of their tax that we, the parliament, have collected will be made available to both government and non-government sources on a fair and equitable basis so that they can make that choice without prejudice.A number of the government schools in my electorate have welcomed what we are proposing in this legislation before the House. This proposal brings into place the youth allowance and allows funding to ensure that there are institutions properly funded to help support those young people who will, under this arrangement, choose to improve their education rather than drift aimlessly and hopefully—but ultimately fruitlessly—into the work force. We have a number of government schools across my electorate that have done something about it. Let me take you for a moment to Birdwood High where a TRAC program is running to ensure that we properly prepare young people who are leaving secondary school, or are at the end of their secondary year, for workplace experiences.My office is located in Gawler—adjacent to the principal city in which the parliamentary secretary's office is located. Gawler High School has a similar program, put in place to ensure that young people are prepared when they leave school not only for the work force but also to search out those TAFE opportunities and those other educational opportunities that they should be searching out if, as I said earlier, they are to be that much more employable. I coincidentally happened to get a fax from my office today outlining the Barossa region schools industry links program which is being put into place to assist those in the Barossa to be better educated after their secondary education and consequently that much more employable.I put it to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, that everyone in this House knows that the way to get young people into jobs is, first, to make sure that we have a growing economy and, second, to make sure that they have the qualifications. What we are dealing with this morning is a proposal to ensure that young people have qualifications post secondary school to make them that much more employable. It seems a bit churlish to me, as a member of the government, to sit here and be bucketed by those opposite for a proposal that deliberately encourages young people to be directly involved in some form of post-secondary education and to be better qualified as a result.Since I represent a regional electorate, the other point I would make is that the proposals before the House are also designed to assist those in regional areas. For example, for the first time, students will be able to access rent assistance of up to $74.80 per fortnight which is currently unavailable to young unemployed people. Young people from remote areas will benefit from an extra $17 per fortnight by way of a remote area allowance. Under-18s living away from home—and as you would be aware, Mr Deputy Speaker, and as many on both sides would be aware, that is sometimes unfortunately necessary because of the nature of our urbanised Australia—for study or training purposes will have further gains with their payment boosted to $265.50 per fortnight to bring them in line with 18-year-olds.This proposal basically ensures that young people, as I said earlier, have facilities that encourage them to be better trained. As the member for Parkes (Mr Cobb) mentioned in his contribution to the debate, this proposal allocates $40 million to improve people's Asian communication skills, recognising that the future for young Australian people and for Australian industry will be in Asia as it recovers from its present crisis. It also allocates $20 million to a number of other employment areas to assist those who are planning employment programs on a post-secondary basis for young people leaving school.I am proud as a member of the government to be associated with the introduction of the youth allowance and to recognise that it represents for the first time a deliberate incentive to get better than secondary education. I welcome that, because I, both as a father and an employer, recognise that the young people who are most employable are those who have taken that step of improving their secondary education status. I commend the bill to the House.11:45:005771McClelland, Robert, MPMr McCLELLANDJK6BartonALP00—The previous speaker, the member for Wakefield (Mr Andrew), who makes a genuine contribution to the debates in this House, raised a number of issues in the debate on States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 which are worth responding to. Firstly, he asserted that the government has quarantined school education spending from budget cuts. Clearly, the member has not looked at the graph on page 4-37 of Budget Paper No. 1 . That graph shows that the outlays on school education between now and the year 2000 will actually decline by 1.3 per cent. Indeed, if you look at the make-up of the cake going to public schools—and that can be found on page 4-39 of Budget Paper No. 1 —you will see it quite clearly shows that public or government schools will receive a mere 0.4 per cent increase in their funding in this current financial year whereas non-government schools will receive a 6.4 per cent increase in their funding this financial year.HE4ANDREWMr Andrew—What about state funding?JK6McClelland, Robert, MPMr McCLELLAND—That is true. The state government has a role in funding state schools. But we are talking about the resources available to the education system as a whole, whether they be state schools or non-government schools. There is no doubt that there has been a shift in the priority of funding away from government schools. Government members say, `We have done that because state schools are already funded by state governments.' In other words, they see themselves as having a role in evening up the equation. They say that, to compensate for that state government funding, the federal government should top up what the non-government schools get.HE4ANDREWMr Andrew—And a per capita shift.JK6McClelland, Robert, MPMr McCLELLAND—That comes in on the enrolment benchmark adjustment, which I will talk about shortly. They could be honest and say that they have contributed unequally and inequitably to non-government schools at the cost of what the Commonwealth is providing by way of funds to government schools. On the facts, that is quite clearly the case.The fact of the matter is that, even when you consider that 0.4 per cent funding increase this financial year, if you factor in actual price increases, it reduces from $1.289 billion to $1.193 billion, or actually $90 million less than last financial year—that is, yesterday's financial year.In addition, there will be an influx of some 27,000 16- to 17-year-olds as a result of the introduction of the government's common youth allowance. The previous speaker genuinely spoke of a desire to reduce youth unemployment. The proof of the pudding is in the eating and, regrettably, the figures show that youth unemployment under this government has actually increased, and that is a concerning trend.One wonders, when one looks at the common youth allowance, whether it is actually a means of upskilling young people or whether it is a means of reducing the unemployment figures. Quite clearly, if you take young people off the unemployment queue and bung them back into schools, you are shifting a statistic. You are shifting some 27,000 16- to 17-year-olds off the unemployment figures and on to the student figures. One wonders if there is a hidden or desired agenda on the part of the government in that equation.The reality is that education is an empowerment; it is the means to employment. The honourable member said that a person is 2½ times less likely to be unemployed if they have moved on to higher education. Where are these 27,000 16- and 17-year-olds going to go? Many of them have left school in unfortunate or unsatisfactory circumstances, through lack of motivation, they did not get on with their teachers or the other students or because of domestic difficulties. There are an infinite variety of separate circumstances.Obviously, there will be exceptions, but where, on the whole, will these reluctant students—the students who have left—be going? Will they be going to the schools where the majority of government frontbenchers send their children? Will they be going to the elite private schools which are drilling their pupils to get high tertiary entrance ranking? No, they will not.0V5SLIPPERMr Slipper—Where did you go?JK6McClelland, Robert, MPMr McCLELLAND—They will be going to the poorest of schools. In answer to the honourable member, I went to Connells Point Primary School and Blakehurst High School—both excellent schools. To be frank, I am speaking in this debate with experience of both. I have divided my children between the public sector and the private sector.That is the frustrating dilemma that many parents find themselves in at the moment. In the private sector, the parents are debating the resourcing or evening up of the funds paid by the state government to state government schools. Parents with children at public schools are complaining about the inequity—and it is clearly an inequity on the figures—of the funding of non-government schools by the Commonwealth government.We are having, for the first time since the 1960s, a return to the state aid debate. The government is not talking about lifting the standards of education overall or about upgrading the standards across all of Australia in the interests both of young people and of the nation as a whole. If you took two five-year-olds starting school and said, `What are going to be the career prospects of those two five-year-olds?' obviously there would be a number of variables. There would be health. There would be intelligence. But assume that health and intelligence are about the same, and assume they come from similar socioeconomic backgrounds. You would say that how those kids get on in life will substantially be determined by their education. Education obviously provides knowledge and provides skills. Essentially, education is empowerment of the individual, so there is a fundamental equity consideration.Even social democratic parties around the world concede that there are not the means available to sensibly effect the distribution of wealth in society. I do not think any social democratic party around the world is trying to achieve that. But they are trying to achieve a distribution of equality of opportunity, and it is the opportunity for young people to undertake education that is essential to that. You have seen that in the United States with the Democratic Party and with the election of the Labour Party in Britain: they are both fundamentally and appropriately obsessed with lifting the standard of education across the board in their countries, particularly the public sector. One of the motivating factors—one of the great pushers in those countries—has been the business community in both of those countries, because the business community knows that, in addition to education being an individual empowerment, it is the empowerment of a nation.The member for Wakefield spoke of Australia having survived or having been able to avoid or fireproof itself from the Asian economy. People can have various opinions as to why that is so, but one of the principal reasons is that we have a fundamentally sophisticated population in terms of its skills base. That is the result of our resourcing education over a number of years. Education has been a fundamental reason why this country has survived when our regional competitors are in so much trouble.Do we have the competitive advantage because of our wages and conditions of employment? Clearly, that is not the case. Our wages and conditions of employment are superior to those of our regional competitors. The reason we have that competitive advantage is our national education base. Education empowers all who receive it, and obviously that balances opportunity. Education also, it has got to be said, is fundamental to Australia's prospects internationally.But let us return to the issue of the state aid debate. Unfortunately, in this debate and conflict between the two sectors, we are not talking about increasing resources. The shadow minister spoke today of his observations and, I have got to say, they are my observations. The inequalities and the inequities are not inter-sector but intra-sector. In the private school system you will find some elite private schools and you will find some that are really struggling. Equally, in the public sector you will find the same thing.The main factor in that inequality seems to be where the selection base for those schools is. Obviously, if an elite private school is able to select its pupils—or, more specifically, its parents—from higher income brackets, then the school itself is going to be better resourced. On the other hand, the mainstream Catholic system has a much broader selection base and tends to take on kids from whatever family is in the area, whether it is a kid from a disadvantaged family or indeed whether the child has some kind of disability.Those Catholic schools—I am talking about the mainstream Catholic schools—will tend to enrol all children. They have accepted a responsibility to provide an education to the overall community, but it is the selection base from which they are getting their pupils which determines the level of resources that are or are not available to the school. I have been to some public school functions—for instance, a fundraising night—where they have raised a great deal of money, whereas sometimes when other schools from my area come down here to Canberra I see literally a handful of pupils because neither the school nor the parents can afford to subsidise their trips down here. That inequity is intra-sector.The reality is that the debate is not and should not be public versus private schools. This point has been made very well by a very balanced presentation from Mr John Bednall, the Principal of the Uniting Church's Wesley College in Perth. In terms of the debate, he said:The church cannot afford to be vulnerable to the accusation that is attracting money from the State system by being too eager to seek funding for new schools which deliberately run at low-resource, low-fee in order to attract maximum funding.He is talking about the abandonment by this government of the new schools policy. That was a policy of the former Labor government which said that, before any new school was given the imprimatur to commence, the school had to establish a minimum number—I think 50—and also had to meet other minimum standards. It was a means of ensuring that all schools attained minimum standards.Mr Bednall is cautioning against the fact that these new schools are able to be established at the whim of fringe groups of all descriptions and they are causing the very scarce resources which are being applied to education to be spread even more thinly. They are being drawn from not only, for instance, public schools, but they are also being drawn from the Catholic school system, which is enrolling kids from the broad selection criteria that I have discussed.He has cautioned about that aspect of the policy. He also says:If parents want to assert their rights to choose the school they want for their children, the church schools could not be silent and see the government school lose its viability as an option for choice.He is talking there about the enrolment benchmark adjustment, which is a matter of real concern. The enrolment benchmark adjustment is a situation where the government has said that, every time a student moves from the public sector to the private sector, the state government, so it alleges, gets a windfall gain of about $3,400. That point was made in an interjection by the member for Wakefield.That is a fallacy, as the shadow minister pointed out. Just because a few kids leave from a class to go to a private school does not mean that you can dispense with the employment of that teacher, nor can you take a teacher from the playground, nor can you reduce administrative resources, nor can you reduce sporting facilities and the like. It is a complete fallacy to say that the state government saves $3,400 every time a child moves from the public to the private sector. Each time that occurs, this government grabs $1,700. Last year about $11.5 million was taken out of the public school system, despite there being an enrolment increase in the public school system of about 8,000. That point is made—in a very balanced fashion, if I might say so—by the Australian Parents Council. In the New South Wales Parents Council newsletter of June 1998 they say:APC has regarded the EBA as a flawed policy from the time it was announced in late 1996. . . . The resurgence of the divisive `state aid' debate of the 1960s and arguments about school funding policies such as the EBA, have diverted attention from the main issue—the need for greater public investment in school education by all governments, State and Commonwealth.That sentiment has also been taken up in a balanced fashion by Saint Francis Xavier School at Arncliffe in my area, which is a Catholic school that takes its selection base from the broad area I have previously described. They say as part of their petition:We petition for the major parties of the Parliament of Australia and Parliamentary members to have concern for the capacity of all schools (government and non-government) to meet their challenges and to cooperate legislatively to improve the level of resources available to them, especially in the most needy communities.We have even the parents of private schoolchildren saying we should abolish this EBA. It is the source of an unfortunate debate and conflict. It is a source of division. It goes back to the 1960s and it does not look forward to what Australia needs to enhance the resources to provide a decent education for all Australians. Any fair-minded citizen, no matter whether they are able to afford elite private schools or not, would say that educational equality of opportunity for all children is an imperative for any government to achieve. I quote from a speech of the shadow minister for education, who I think has summed it up in a nutshell. He says:Only when the worst Australian school is good enough to meet strong national standards—measured by the satisfaction of educational need—will it be possible to talk comfortably about the quality and choices available in the Australian schools system.Until that is done, any reference to freedom of choice is a misnomer. So many parents in Australia—70 per cent, I dare say—just do not have that freedom of choice. They have no choice other than to send their children to the state school in their immediate area. If that state school is underresourced, their kids are not going to have opportunity. Whether it is a state school you are talking about or whether it is a poorer private school which has to resource a wide selection base, Labor's policy is to resource schools according to need, to resource schools according to their requirements to provide a decent standard of education in the context of their enrolments. (Time expired)12:05:005774Slipper, Peter, MPMr SLIPPER0V5FisherLP10—Education is one of those matters near and dear to the hearts of those of us who have children, and I can understand the ongoing debate in the Australian community over funding and concerning the relative division of resources between the government sector and the non-government sector, but the government does not apologise for seeking to provide free choice to parents, and the abolition of the new schools policy has in fact given parents an economic as well as a legal choice to select which school their children ought to be sent to.There has been a wide-ranging debate on the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 . I understand, Mr Deputy Speaker, that you and your predecessors in the chair during this debate have been quite tolerant as members have roamed widely across the common youth allowance, enrolment benchmark adjustment and other matters.At the outset, though, I would like to point out that this particular bill gives effect to certain initiatives announced in the 1998-99 budget. Firstly, $20 million will be allocated for the introduction of full-service schools over three years from 1998 to provide additional support to schools to develop innovative programs and services that address the needs of young people returning to school following the introduction of the youth allowance and for current students who are at risk of not completing year 12 or making a successful transition from school to training or employment. There is also $40.2 million for the extension of the national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools strategy over two years from 1998 to support enhanced and expanded Asian languages and Asian studies provision through all school systems in order to improve Australia's capacity and preparedness to interact internationally, particularly with key Asian economies.I would also like to refer to the employment benchmark adjustment arrangements and also to some of the inaccuracies which have been peddled in the chamber by members of the opposition. There has been a suggestion that, as a government, the coalition has reduced funding for government schools. Mr Deputy Speaker, you would know that that is in fact not the case, because direct Commonwealth funding for government schools for the year 1998 was more than $127 million over the amount of money provided in 1996, the last year of the Keating government.Each of the six states and the territories will be receiving more, not less, funding from the Commonwealth compared with the last year of the Labor government. It ought to be noted that the Australian people do not appreciate the way in which some members in this place seek to fudge the facts and the truth. The Commonwealth government provides funds to government schools through two mechanisms: by means of tied specific purpose payments for recurrent capital and targeted programs and through untied financial assistance grants which states apply to schools. In addition, states provide funds for government schools from within their own revenues. It ought to be recognised that under our constitution education is primarily a state, not Commonwealth, responsibility.Some people have had the audacity to suggest that the Commonwealth is actually cutting $20 million from funding for government schools. This is part of a campaign of deliberate misinformation and should be rejected by all thinking Australians. The Commonwealth government does not apologise for the enrolment benchmark adjustment, which is designed to adjust the funding between the Commonwealth and the states.8K6FITZGIBBONMr Fitzgibbon—You should apologise.0V5Slipper, Peter, MPMr SLIPPER—The member for Hunter will have his opportunity soon. If the member for Hunter were honest, he would support the enrolment benchmark adjustment as being fair and equitable, and appropriate. The EBA is triggered when the proportion of enrolment shifts significantly from the government to the non-government sector. It is not aimed at individual schools or affected by movement in actual numbers of students. The honourable member for Barton (Mr McClelland) during his speech wrongly asserted that for every one child moving from the government sector to the non-government sector there was a loss of government funding. Funding is only affected by shifts in proportion of enrolments in each state and territory. I believe that it is quite reasonable that, if the state is educating a lower proportion of students, funding should indeed follow where the proportions of students are moving.The EBA includes a buffer arrangement to protect states from minor adjustments to the proportion of non-government student enrolments. The federal government's policy is to support the development of free choice between a strong and competitive government school sector and a strong and competitive private school sector.We aim to provide maximum possible choice for parents and students, and through competition and choice that enables parents to vote with their feet and to select which school and system is indeed suitable for the education of their children. In Australia, which is a diverse country, parents have differing values and they have opportunities now to choose which school and which system is right and appropriate for their children.The expansion and maintenance of government schools is the responsibility of state and territory governments and the existence of the enrolment benchmark adjustment will encourage them to uphold this role. It ought to be recognised also that the EBA simply was not imposed from on high; it was developed after consultation with state and territory governments and is being implemented in a way that is fair to all states and territories and which takes into account their individual circumstances.There was also a mention by the honourable member for Barton of the new schools policy. He claimed that its abolition was shifting funding to people whom he referred to as fringe religious groups. Australia is a multicultural and a tolerant society and I do not believe that it is appropriate that the federal government should sit in judgment and determine which groups should be entitled to set up schools to educate children in accordance with their own values.It ought to be noted that enrolments in the non-government sector in 1998 grew by about 20,000 students, the same number as in the last year of operation of the old, discredited new schools policy. If our aim was to abolish the new schools policy with a view to gutting government sector enrolments, then clearly once the new schools policy had gone there would have been a dramatic increase in the numbers of people who were enrolling in private schools.The federal government believes—and we do not apologise for stating—that parents who wish to take on the onerous task of establishing and running a school should be able to do so, with a very key proviso. That proviso is that they meet state and territory registration requirements. We do not support substandard schools, we do not support people who are seeking to set up schools in circumstances which are not appropriate. But, as I said a moment ago, education is primarily a matter of state, not Commonwealth, responsibility and the key trigger for federal funding of schools is whether or not the particular new school meets state and territory registration requirements.It is up to the states to have the benchmark for registration sufficiently high to make sure that only those schools which are of a satisfactory standard are appropriate for funding. I reiterate that Commonwealth funding is only available for a non-government school which has received state or territory registration and operates on a non-profit basis. The states and territories have always been responsible for the registration of non-government schools and it is a matter for them to determine registration requirements. This government refuses absolutely to discriminate against schools on the basis of religion.Some people have also sought to criticise the youth allowance, which will provide for students right across the nation new opportunities and incentives for them to study rather than to leave school. Students will no longer be paid less money than the unemployed. How rational is it for some members opposite to suggest that students should be paid less money than those who are out of work? The new policy will remove the financial disincentives to study. These disincentives existed during the 13 dark years of Labor rule. For the first time students will gain access to rent assistance of up to $74.80 a fortnight. This is a measure that students have been asking for for some 20 years.Much has been claimed about those people who will lose access to the youth allowance or how some people might be worse off. Of the 416,000 students affected by youth allowance, 70,000 will gain from access to rent assistance, 16,600 will gain from the independence criteria changes, 41,200 will gain from the abolition of the $1,000 minimum rate for Austudy, 19,900 will gain from the abolition of the education leavers waiting period and 3,720 will gain from removing maintenance from the personal income test.It is clear, therefore, that this is a fair and reasonable policy, a policy which is forward thinking and which will encourage students to stay at school. The legislation currently before the chamber obviously assists all of this to be brought about. Students and young Australians from rural and regional areas will be big winners. I dare say you, Mr Deputy Speaker Quick, being one of the last surviving—in a political sense—rural or regional Labor members, would know that your own constituents would be very much better off through the introduction of the common youth allowance.The Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (Dr Kemp) ought to be congratulated for this legislation, which is very forward thinking, which is very positive and which encourages young people to stay at school. The honourable member for Wakefield, the Chief Government Whip (Mr Andrew), pointed out that young people who do not complete year 12 or the equivalent are 2½ times more likely than their counterparts to join the ranks of the long-term unemployed. It is vital—and you, Mr Deputy Speaker, as a former teacher would know—that young people in their formative years are not given the easy option to drop out and join the dole queue. It is so easy for kids to leave school. If we give them a financial incentive to do so, then obviously more people will join the dole queue.The statistics speak for themselves. People who leave before year 12 are 2½ times more likely to join the ranks of the long-term unemployed than are those who finish their schooling. So the government does not apologise for introducing policies which will encourage young people to stay at school, to continue their education, because when this happens these people are more likely to gain jobs and less likely to join the ranks of the long-term unemployed.I think it is despicable that the Labor Party during its 13 years in office supported the principle that it is okay to walk out of school and straight on to the dole queue. I do not think any person with any sense of reality could support such an approach. It is regrettable that the Labor Party is seeking to frustrate the attempts by this government to implement policies which will keep young people in education and give them a greater chance of obtaining a job.The honourable member for Barton in his contribution also claimed that the government was statistic shifting. When we look at all of those mickey mouse training programs, training people for jobs that did not exist, members of the Labor Party have an absolute hide and complete audacity to suggest that this government is statistic shifting when they were shuffling people from the dole queue into training programs and then back on to the dole queue.Labor were hiding people in the dole queue. They were the people, particularly when elections approached, who were prepared to do anything to reduce artificially the number of people who showed up in the unemployment statistics. Labor just cannot bring themselves to admit that the measure before the parliament at the present time is a good measure, it is a positive measure and it will be of long-term benefit not only to the nation but also to young Australians.The honourable member for Barton was generous enough and accurate enough to point out that the economic fundamentals of Australia are good. The only reason that the economic fundamentals of Australia are good is that this government accepted the responsibility for fixing the $10.3 billion deficit it inherited even though it did not create the problem. That is why we have brought forward changes with our policies which we believe make the country better able to live within its means and that is why at the next election we will receive the ongoing strong support of the Australian people.This legislation before the chamber provides an extra $20 million for the introduction of full-service schools and $40.2 million for the extension of the national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools strategy. The learning of foreign languages has been one of my personal hobbyhorses. I believe it is unfortunate that in many Australian schools we do not have the opportunity for young Australians from year 1 to learn foreign languages. When those of us who are fortunate enough to travel overseas do so, we so often meet people who are fluent in two, three, four, five or six languages, but we who come from English speaking countries, particularly those like Australia, often speak only one language. Most of us have been, shall we say, embarrassed when out of courtesy and generosity to us people have switched from another common language that they have been using to using English.The $40.2 million being provided for the extension of the national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools strategy is a positive move. It is a good move. It provides extra money for the teaching of Asian languages in Australian schools. I think it is also important not to forget European languages. It is statistically eight times easier for a person whose mother tongue is a European language to learn another European language than to learn an Asian language, except maybe Indonesian, which is somewhat easier than Chinese, Japanese or some of the more complicated languages.I believe that, as we approach the next millennium, it is important to support the aim of this bill which is to provide extra money for Asian language teaching. But I think that it is vital for our students to continue to learn French, German, Spanish and Italian so that people have real choice in language study. The fact that we are situated in the Asia-Pacific region ought not preclude students in Australia continuing to learn a wide diversity of languages. Given the events in the European Union and the new role that Germany, the powerhouse of central Europe, plays in it, I think that German language teaching ought to be encouraged in Australian schools, along with other European and Asian languages. If we are to take up our role as a key trading nation, given all the new opportunities in central and eastern Europe, then it is important to be able to speak the languages.I would like every Australian child to have the opportunity of learning foreign languages from year 1. As in so many other matters, finance is a problem. The government has finite resources, and obviously this applies to all governments in this country. But, in other parts of the world, it is possible for students to learn foreign languages from year 1. I would hope that, as we move towards the next millennium, governments on both sides of the political spectrum will acknowledge the desirability of doing whatever they can to continue to encourage young Australians to learn languages other than English.As I was saying, the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 is positive legislation. It is important reform which has two arms to it. Firstly, there is the provision of $20 million for the introduction of full-service schools over three years from 1998 to provide additional support to schools to help develop innovative programs and services that address the needs of young people returning to school following the introduction of the youth allowance and current students who are at risk of not completing year 12 or making a successful transition from school to training or employment. Secondly, there is the provision of the vital $40.2 million for the extension of the national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools strategy over two years from 1998 to support, enhance and expand Asian languages and Asian studies provision through all school systems in order to improve Australia's capacity and preparedness to interact internationally, particularly with key Asian economies. These are important reforms, they are vital reforms and they are reforms which I believe have the strong support of the Australian community.12:25:005778Fitzgibbon, Joel, MPMr FITZGIBBON8K6HunterALP00—I rise in support of the amendments put forward by the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) to the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 which call upon this House to condemn the Howard government:(1) for failing to provide schools with adequate resources to cope with the expected increase of up to 27,000 students a year as a result of the introduction of the Youth Allowance;(2) for presenting distorted and misleading figures on school funding to the Australian people . . . We see evidence of that every day as the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs, the member for Goldstein (Dr Kemp), approaches that dispatch box and does his very best to distort figures to present false facts to the Australian community. He gives the term `Lies, damn lies and statistics' new meaning each time he approaches that dispatch box. The third amendment moved by the member for Werriwa condemns the Howard government:(3) for imposing the unfair Enrolment Benchmark Adjustment on government schools.I hope I have time to say something about that before my time expires.The member for Wakefield (Mr Andrew) chose to make the debate on the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 in part a debate on youth unemployment. I am pleased that he did, Mr Deputy Speaker. You will recall, as do all of us here, that prior to the last federal election the now Prime Minister (Mr Howard) had a fair bit to say about youth unemployment. He told us it was the most pressing issue facing this country. We certainly all agree with that. But the point is that he travelled the length and breadth of this country promising to fix it, as did the member for Goldstein. What is the result after 2½ years? The result is that youth unemployment in this country is now higher than it was when this government came to office. In particular, youth unemployment in my region is now higher than it was when John Howard and the member for Goldstein came to office.It is very disappointing that, in the last budget, the government ran up the white flag on unemployment. They now tell us that they do not expect unemployment in this country to be any better than it is now—in 12 months time the situation will be the same as it is today. This is the hope they are giving us on unemployment and, in particular, youth unemployment. The Minister for Finance and Administration (Mr Fahey) is sitting at the table. It must be very distressing for him to have to put his name to a budget that gives up on unemployment and youth unemployment.Today is the day the government runs up another flag. But this time it is not a white flag; this time it is a victory flag. Today, 1 July, is the day on which the award simplification provisions of the Workplace Relations Act come into effect. The point to be made is this: those provisions will undermine the award system in this country. They will destroy the protections contained within that system that Australian workers have enjoyed for very many years. But the main point to be made is that it is not trade unionists who should fear 1 July and the award simplification process; it is those who are not members of trade unions, those who rely solely on a strong award system for protection. This means young Australians in low paid jobs. They are the people under threat as a result of the award simplification provisions that come into effect today.Creating jobs in this country needs a whole of government approach. First, we need to get the economy growing so jobs can flow from that. Again, the Minister for Finance and Administration must be very disappointed to see that his rather poor growth projections in the budget are now coming under the scrutiny of the markets, and all the experts and economists are predicting that the growth projection is—modest as it was—too high and growth will be much slower.Second, we need to give young Australians equal access to decent education and training. Third, government should always do all it can to create new jobs. For example, early in 1996 a firm known as Rack Rite Pty Ltd sought to establish a plant in Maitland to manufacture shelving that is used in supermarkets and hypermarkets. The proposal would have created 600 full-time jobs in Maitland and the wider Hunter region. Rack Rite is South Africa's largest private steel user, and it is a significant player in the market. Early this year, unfortunately, Rack Rite announced that it would, at very best, be significantly downscaling its proposal—leading, of course, to a significant loss of job opportunities.The downsizing has occurred as a result of difficulties experienced by the owner of the firm, Mr Melvyn Lahner, in securing a visa. Mr Lahner is, of course, a South African. Concerned that such a significant proposal has been lost to the region, the New South Wales Minister for Regional Development, the Hon. Harry Woods—a former distinguished and well-liked member of this place—instructed the New South Wales Standing Committee on State Development to inquire into the loss of the 600-job proposal.Today, the chairman of that committee, the Hon. Tony Kelly, MLC, released the committee's findings. The committee found, amongst other things, that Mr Lahner's inability to secure a visa was a `major factor' in the loss of this great opportunity in Maitland and the wider Hunter region. The committee recommended:. . . that the Minister for Regional Development—that is, the New South Wales minister—urge the federal Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs to conduct an internal investigation into the processing of Mr Lahner's visa applications to ensure that mechanisms are put in place to prevent the loss of any future investment proposals to New South Wales.The standing committee also commented on the role of the member for Paterson (Mr Bob Baldwin) with respect to this proposal. The standing committee stated in its findings:. . . despite the fact that Mr Lahner requested assistance with his immigration application from the Federal Member for Paterson, Mr Bob Baldwin MP, in April 1997, Mr Baldwin did not bring this matter to the attention of immigration officials until September 1997. Earlier action by Mr Baldwin would have reduced the delay in processing of Mr Lahner's application—10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Quick)—Order! I would remind the honourable member for Hunter that he is straying considerably from the bill, and I would ask him to come back to it as soon as possible.8K6Fitzgibbon, Joel, MPMr FITZGIBBON—I appreciate your comments, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am trying to draw together the implications of this bill for youth unemployment, as raised by the member for Wakefield. The point I am trying to make is that poor representation by the member for Paterson and stuff-ups by the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs have unfortunately led to a significant loss of jobs in the Hunter. The standing committee further stated that it was:. . . surprised to note a report in the Maitland Mercury on 15 January 1998 stating that both immigration officials and the Federal Member for Paterson, Mr Bob Baldwin MP, had asserted they had done as much as they could to entice Mr Lahner's business to Maitland. Mr Baldwin is quoted as saying that when he was made aware of the immigration problems, he "moved on them straight away." A letter from Mr Martin—the former Mayor of Maitland—to the Editor of the Maitland Mercury on 16 January 1998—which happens to be my birthday—also indicates that Mr Baldwin made statements in radio and television interviews on 15 January 1998 that he had no knowledge of immigration problems until September 1997.The committee goes on to say:The statements attributed to Mr Baldwin conflict with evidence provided to the Standing Committee by Mr Martin that Mr Baldwin was informed of the immigration problems in April 1997. The Standing Committee is of the view that if Mr Baldwin had taken a greater interest in Mr Lahner's development proposal in April 1997, Mr Baldwin may have been able to alert high-ranking Australian immigration officials to Mr Lahner's problems sooner than September 1997.The Standing Committee is also of the view that the failure of departmental officers to respond to, or subsequently locate, any of the five letters written to immigration officials in 1996 detailing Mr Lahner's business intentions, was a major contributing factor to the visa processing delays. These failures suggest less than satisfactory departmental administration processes, both in Pretoria and Australia.I appreciate your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, but this is an example of how government failure can lead to significant job opportunity losses in Australia and particularly in regional Australia.I should turn back to education and the common youth allowance. There is another reason why it is very appropriate that we should be debating this bill. Today, 1 July, is not only the day the award simplification process has come into effect; it is also the day that many of the nasties contained within the common youth allowance come into effect. This is the day when some 45,000 young Australians will either lose their unemployment or income support benefits or, at the very best, have them significantly reduced. This is the day when Australia's young people up to 21 years of age will start to lose their benefit as soon as their parents earn around a measly $23,000. I do not have the figure in front of me but it is certainly very low.This sends an extraordinary message to the Australian community. Where is it based? It is based in the same sort of ideology which led this government to entitle their new initiatives for the work for the dole as just that—to put that `work for the dole' term into the title of the bill. It is their attempt to send a message out to some in the community that they are prepared to get tough on `bludgers', as they see them. But these are not bludgers; these are people who have been denied opportunity. These are people who are disadvantaged. These are people in this position as a result of the failures of the education system in days gone by. The response should not be to punish them for it. Nor should it be to punish their parents, who are on low incomes and who are now going to face an additional $87 a week out of the family budget. This is not the way to treat these people.If the government are serious about giving these people some vocational education, let us send them through the TAFE system. Let us restore some of the funding that the Howard government have cut from TAFE and give these people some real vocational training. Let us not send back to school some 27,000, as the member for Werriwa mentioned in his amendment, and expect the school system to cope with them, because it simply cannot.I have talked to teachers and educational professionals right around this country who are absolutely distraught about the prospect of these kids coming back into the school system. The kids are not going to be making a contribution in class. They do not want to be there. In many cases, they have been out of the system for more than two years. What impact is that going to have on the kids in the class who do want to learn and who are interested in what is happening? What sort of disruption is this policy going to cause for them?As the member for Werriwa has pointed out, the government has very generously allocated something like $42 million to schools in this country to deal with this problem. I think the member for Werriwa suggested that that falls short by some $100 million if you are really going to expect the school system to cater for the 27,000 kids re-entering school. But, again, this is the ideologically driven approach. This is the approach of the member for Goldstein. It is the same approach that leads to policies such as the enrolment benchmark adjustment.The Labor Party got over its state aid debate long ago. We are committed to both a strong public system—a government based school system—and a private system. My kids go to a Catholic school—all three of them. I am proud of that. I am a product of the Catholic system myself. It is a good system and a system we need. It costs me more than $1,000 each year to send my kids to that school, and probably more than that if you take into account other costs. I am fortunate that I can afford to pay that more than $1,000, but not all Australians can.In this country we need to ensure that, regardless of your means, you have access to a decent and quality education. But the member for Goldstein's policies—supported by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (Mr Abbott), who has just arrived—are trying to force funding away from those government schools into the private sector. What does that mean? It quite clearly means a decline in educational standards in the government sector. It also means more stress on teachers working within the government sector. But this is the ideological approach.In the regions, in electorates like my own, some state schools rely on a critical mass of students to survive. In some small government schools you need lose only one or two stu dents to render that school unviable. What the member for Goldstein wants to do is encourage this shift from the government sector to the private sector. What that will lead to in electorates like my own is the closure of government schools. In many of these areas it is not easy to access the private sector schools. Some will, but some who are already disadvantaged—and that is why they are in the government schools in the first place—will find it extremely difficult to access those private schools.I recently attended a hook-up of a Sky Channel viewing which was intended to reach all members of the New South Wales Teachers Federation. They had a two-hour stop-work meeting to protest. They are very concerned by this government's approach to schools funding in this country. Likewise, those involved in higher education are concerned about this government's approach to higher education. They are concerned about up-front fees and the implications of those for equity of access to education. They are concerned about HECS differentials. They are concerned that this government is completely driven by the view that the private sector is good and government is bad. I do not agree. A government has a very important role to play. It raises taxes and redistributes that money to ensure that all Australians, regardless of their means, have the opportunity to access decent community services—services required by them. Just as important is the ability to access decent and quality education in this country.As the member for Barton (Mr McClelland) pointed out, that opportunity is everything. This approach by the government will do nothing to bring down youth unemployment. They know that, and that is why already in a budget which projects more than 12 months out they have run up the white flag on unemployment. That is recognition on their part that this particular policy will fail.12:45:005781Mossfield, Frank, MPMr MOSSFIELDMK6GreenwayALP00—We are discussing the States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 . I propose to take a clearly jaundiced New South Wales view of this bill and the government's general ap proach to education as we view it in New South Wales. In doing so, I am supporting the amendment moved by the honourable member for Werriwa (Mr Latham), which states:"whilst not declining to give the Bill a second reading, the House condemns the Government:(1) for failing to provide schools with adequate resources to cope with the expected increase of up to 27,000 students a year as a result of the introduction of the Youth Allowance;(2) for presenting distorted and misleading figures on school funding to the Australian people; and(3) for imposing the unfair Enrolment Benchmark Adjustment on government schools".I am greatly indebted to one of my constituents for some details relating to this particular issue. This particular constituent would be considered to be fairly close to the action as far as education in New South Wales is concerned. The New South Wales minister commissioned a report called Savaged for a surplus . In introducing the report, the minister stated:John Howard, Peter Costello and David Kemp cannot claim to have turned a deficit into a surplus by slashing Commonwealth expenditure and then turn around to claim they have increased funding for education and training. The facts speak for themselves.I certainly support the claims from New South Wales that this year's budget surplus has been built on the backs of students, teachers, parents, schools, TAFE colleges and universities in order to allow the Howard government to offer an electoral tax cut bribe later this year.The New South Wales experience is that education and training funding has been massively cut again this year, and further more damaging cuts are programmed for the next year and the following years. The impact of the 1998-99 federal budget on education, training and jobs is quite awful. The report I have already referred to, Savaged for a surplus, spells that out in graphic detail, and I propose to quote at length from it because that will be the most effective method of exposing the dreadful behaviour of the Howard government. The report states:An analysis of this year's 1998-99 federal budget again finds massive cuts to education and training funding. Students, schools, TAFE colleges and universities have been savaged for the sake of a budget surplus.Claims by the federal government of an extra $2.3 billion for government schools are not substantiated by an analysis of their budget papers.Even schools minister, Senator Ellison, writing to the Australian (4/5/98) acknowledged that halfway through the four-year funding period the increase for government schools was only $127 million—unadjusted for price increases and additional school enrolments.While the federal government and a number of its ministers continue to claim Commonwealth funding for education and training is increasing, the analysis of their own official budget documents shows the contrary to be the case.This year's budget has only a few minor new measures affecting Commonwealth funding of education and training. To the casual observer, it might be considered one where schools, TAFE and other training, higher education and student assistance have been spared from further Commonwealth cuts.Such a view ignores the detail, all of which is available in many tables which I will not include but which are available if challenged. The report further states:This year, savings in real terms from education—schools, TAFE/VET and higher education—total $404m or 4.5%. While an initial examination of the federal budget papers indicates that the total 1998-99 expenditure on schools is expected to grow 0.8% in real terms or $34m compared with 1997-98, the detail reveals programmed savage cuts to government school funding. The small level of total growth is due entirely to the substantial increase in funding for the non-government school sector.Current funding of government schools declines 7.2% in real terms between 1997-98 and 2001-02, a fall of over $101m. Funding for private schools increases by over $154m or 6.8% in real terms during the same period.Cuts in Commonwealth funding for government schools arise from the following:The impact of the enrolment benchmark adjustment (EBA) which is estimated to require government schools to pay $92m to the Commonwealth in 2001-02;Cuts to program funding estimated at $45m in 2001-02;Cost shifting to the states through the common youth allowance (CYA) which is projected to have a net cost of over $168m annually; and Cuts to the capital works program for new schools.Policies of reduced access to student assistance by tighter targeting of the means test for the program are being implemented. Scrutiny of the impact of targeting policies is made difficult because the budget moves student assistance for under 25 year olds from education to social security and combines it with other income support arrangements under the CYA.Between 1997-98 and 2001-02 Commonwealth outlays on education decline slightly in real terms, but significant additional funding flows to the non-government sector. This is achieved by adjusting sector shares.The real impact of Commonwealth school education funding policies is evident in the change in sector shares of Commonwealth expenditure.The EBA reduces Commonwealth grants for government schools where there is a transfer of students from the government to the non-government sector. This occurs despite increasing enrolments in government schools.In the current financial year, government schools were liable to pay almost $17m to the Commonwealth, but concessions and once-off provisions that were applied reduced the payment to $11.9m.Unless the Commonwealth modifies its policy on the EBA, government schools will pay $33.2m in 1998-99.The CYA is projected to have a net cost to the states of over $168m annually for schools by 2001-02 when the Commonwealth will not provide any special assistance.Just to clarify where I am in my presentation so far, I would say that I am certainly a strong supporter of the dual system of education, both the private and the government sector, but I certainly do not think one should be funded at the expense of the other. My own children went to both private and government schools. Of course, as the member for my electorate, I am very concerned with education generally in the electorate, and I want to see both systems thriving.But it does appear in relation to the figures I have quoted so far that government schools are suffering under this current budget. I also want to refer to the common youth allowance, which, once again, I think, will possibly present extreme difficulties to both sectors of education. With it being 1 July, today is the day that the common youth allowance comes into operation. I just want to go back a bit and recap on some of the things I personally have said on the issue of the common youth allowance. I will refer to remarks I made in the debate on the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Youth Allowance) Bill 1997 in November last year. Relating to the common youth allowance, I stated:I am advised that within my electorate of Greenway some 308 children will be forced back into the school system. While this in itself may not seem a large figure, I am sure that, if I went to all the principals in my electorate collectively and said to them, `You have to find places for another 308 children,' they would collapse with fear. As we know, schools are already overcrowded. To take that argument a bit further, it is not only the kids who are affected but also the families. If you add to those 308 children the mothers and fathers who are also affected by this extra pressure, you are looking at close to 1,000 people who are affected directly and indirectly by this legislation within my own electorate of Greenway.Receipt of income support should certainly be tied to a range of alternative activities—not just school education—which help young people to get work and reach their full potential. To abolish unemployment benefits while also slashing education opportunities is the wrong way to reform the welfare state. This is the negative approach of a government more concerned with winding back the role of government than creating new opportunities through the possibilities of education and training.Young adults who are old enough to vote, to go to war, to get married—and many do the latter—and who are looking for work are clearly independent. They should not be forced by the imposition of a parental income, assets and actual means test to rely on their low income families for support. I believe young Australians who are looking for work should be encouraged to take up work opportunities by the restoration of the earnings credits scheme, mirroring the student income bank arrangements.Having made those remarks in November last year, I come now to some immediate effects of the introduction of the common youth allowance—and I would suggest that many people who will be affected by this measure are still not aware of the damage that it will do to disadvantaged groups in our country. I have already received some representations from people in my electorate raising some concerns about how this common youth allowance will affect them personally.I have already raised this issue in debate in the Main Committee, but I would like to repeat two cases. The first relates to a single father—Arthur, I will call him—and his daughter Melissa. Melissa sat for her higher school certificate in 1996, completed her first year Bachelor of Commerce at the University of England in 1997, but was unable to continue her studies this year due to a lack of finance. Melissa is now 19, unemployed, and did receive unemployment benefits—at least up until today—of $170 a fortnight. This young lady's income will now drop to $20 a fortnight due to the parental income assessment under the common youth allowance scheme. She will then have to rely on her father for boarding and lodging. That is one example.The other case related to a mother, being quite concerned, who rang me. Her position was that her son had left school, again in December 1996—and here we are talking about children who have been out of school for a couple of years. Since that time, he had completed a life skills training course at TAFE. He had worked for two months in the timber industry. He had worked for seven months as a tyre fitter on $4.50 an hour. He had had other occasional casual work.This young man is currently unemployed. He turned 18 on 30 June, and his mother had expected that he would then qualify for unemployment benefits and at least have sufficient money to enjoy a social life. But this young man, who is now 18 months out of school, has completed the TAFE course, has worked, is now unemployed, but does not qualify for unemployment benefits under the government's new scheme. The government now expects this low income family to support this particular young man. The combined income for this family is approximately $480 a week, with both parents working—the mother part time—to support four people. Another son is an apprentice and he can only contribute marginally to the family budget.This situation has already caused tension in the family. The mother is worried that her son could leave home, as he previously has done. She is worried that he then would be exposed—as other young people in this situation could be—to falling under bad influences and be subject possibly to petty crime to obtain sufficient money to live. These two examples, I believe, give a clear indication of how this government's policy relating to the common youth allowance will hurt struggling Australians.I now turn back to the report that I have already indicated I am referring to—the report produced by the New South Wales government, relating to the impact of the federal budget on education, training and jobs, entitled Savaged for a surplus:The budget shows that the Commonwealth's funding commitments in literacy largely are a re-packaging of former programs for English as a second language and disadvantaged schools.This budget puts in place the largest single cut in the program of spending cuts for higher education, announced by the former minister, Senator Amanda Vanstone.The implications of the cuts are that they will wipe out all the funding gains made by the higher education sector over the period 1990-91 to 1994-1995. They will return higher education funding to pre 1990-91 levels.For all of the foregoing detailed analysis, it is clear that the policy announcements by the government about education are simply a giant smokescreen. The report from New South Wales blows away the smokescreen and leaves the Howard government starkly exposed to a critical examination that leaves the government with nowhere to hide.The minister, who has daily lectured and hectored the parliament, is now just like the emperor with his new clothes—bereft of credibility and nakedly and strangely opposed to education in general. Despite an enormous PR team and media advisers in plague proportions, the government will be unable to hide from its disgraceful policy effects upon primary schools and secondary education. For our part on this side of the House, we will ensure that, despite our limited resources, we will move to expose the government. I congratulate the New South Wales government, which has provided us and the media with just the right tools to do so.13:02:005784Abbott, Tony, MPMr ABBOTTEZ5WarringahLP10—This States Grants (Primary and Secondary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill 1998 , while you would not know it from listening to the debate, does two things. First, it provides $20 million for the introduction of full service schools over three years from 1998 to help schools support young people returning to school following the introduction of the youth allowance and to assist other at-risk students. The other key element in this bill is the provision of a further $40 million for an extension of the national Asian languages and studies in Australian schools strategy over two years from 1998. That is what this bill actually does.We have seen a series of opposition speakers engage in the kind of mindless head-banging and `we wuz robbed' lamentation which tends to get this parliament a bad name—and which deservedly gets this parliament a bad name. I was disappointed to hear the final speaker for the opposition, the member for Greenway (Mr Mossfield), talk about the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs, the member for Goldstein (Dr Kemp), in such contemptuous terms. The minister is a man who has devoted his life to education. David Kemp spent many years as a full professor in a university system. To suggest for a moment that David Kemp is not deeply committed to the education of everyone is quite wrong. It is utterly implausible and it brings this parliament into disrespect. I am very disappointed that the member for Greenway, a man of justifiably high standing in the community, should, of all members opposite, make this kind of cheap sneer at a minister who is doing his best to improve the Australian education system.There were three basic points raised by the members opposite. The first was that this government had savagely cut funding to schools. That is simply untrue. In the period 1997 to 2000, total direct Commonwealth schools funding will approach $20 billion. The budget papers show that funding for schools is estimated to increase each year until 2000 at an average rate of 3.6 per cent a year. This year, close to $4 billion is specifically earmarked for school spending. In 1996, the last year governed by Labor's budget, just over $3 billion was earmarked for school spending. So on any yardstick, school spending has increased under this government.I am perfectly prepared to admit that this government has cut a number of outlay programs, but we have not cut school education. The government has deliberately and properly insulated school spending from any cuts because we appreciate that a good school education is the foundation of every Australian's life and that so many of the social problems which ravage our country have their roots in an inadequate grounding, and that begins at school. So the last thing this government would do is cut school funding. We have not cut school funding; we will not cut school funding. It is wrong for members opposite to repeat over and over again something which is simply fanciful.In response to the member for Greenway's reference to the New South Wales government report, let me point out that government schools in New South Wales will receive $520 million in direct Commonwealth funding in 1998. In federal Labor's last year, the New South Wales government was allocated $471 million. In other words, we have allocated almost $50 million more in 1998 than was allocated under the Labor government. The member for Greenway should go back and check his figures. I am sure he is simply repeating what he has been told by the New South Wales government, but they are telling fibs. The teachers union is perpetrating myths. I was delighted to see that the Independent Teachers Association came out recently and savagely attacked the New South Wales Teachers Federation for the myths that are being perpetrated by the federation about this government's policy.The second critique was that this government favours private schools over government schools. That is dead wrong. This government favours good schools. This government wants all Australians, whatever school they attend, whatever choice they make, to get the best possible education. There have been no cuts whatsoever to government schools. There have been no specific boosts to private schools. We have done two things. First of all, we have ended Labor's new schools policy, which should have been called the `no new schools policy' because it effectively prevented new private schools from opening. We have ended that, and if people want to choose a non-government education for their children, why shouldn't they be able to? Why does the Labor Party want to drive kids out of perfectly good independent schools and further overload the government system? That is precisely what their policy would do.YU5TANNERMr Tanner—With 20 students?EZ5Abbott, Tony, MPMr ABBOTT—There are many perfectly good schools with 20 students. Are you saying to the teachers and parents at those schools that there is something wrong with those schools? Are you saying that there is something wrong with those teachers or with the education? That is the trap that members opposite have fallen into—in parroting mindlessly, `Private schools are being favoured; government schools are being ripped off.' In mindlessly parroting this line, members opposite are attacking, wittingly or unwittingly, each and every youngster, each and every teacher and each and every parent who is sending their children to new private schools.The enrolment benchmark adjustment has been heavily demonised in this debate. The enrolment benchmark adjustment is a relatively simple mechanism for ensuring that state governments do not cost shift by, in a sense, encouraging people to take off to the private sector. We all know that every student who enters the private sector costs the federal government a great deal of money and saves the state government a great deal of money. The enrolment benchmark adjustment is saying to the state governments that, if they lose students from their schools and the Commonwealth gains them in a sense when they go to independent schools, we will take some of the money back. In 1997 the amount involved was $12 million. In a total school education budget of something like $4 billion, this is the merest drop in the ocean. For members opposite to talk about this enrolment benchmark adjustment as if it is the greatest attack on government schools is quite wrong. Again, members opposite are trying to create a climate of fear, gloom and despair that does not do anyone in this House any good and certainly does not do our country any good.The final basic critique of members opposite is that the youth allowance, which comes into effect today, is again a savage attack on young people. Let us get the youth allowance quite clear in our minds. The youth allowance will affect 416,000 young people. Seventy thousand will gain access to rent assistance; 16,000 will gain from independence criteria; 41,000 will gain from the abolition of the $1,000 minimum rate for Austudy; 20,000 will gain from the abolition of the education leavers waiting period; and nearly 4,000 will gain from removing maintenance from the personal income test. The ALP and members opposite are saying that 153,750 young Australians who will gain from the introduction of the youth allowance today should give the money back. That is effectively what they are saying. They are saying that those 153,000 youngsters should not be getting the money.I concede that there are a few losers under this scheme. Yes, some youngsters on unemployment benefits will lose money because of the application of the parental means test. But why should it be easier for young Australians to get the dole than to go on to education? That is what the opposition's policy implies. That is what the speeches that they have made imply—that it should be more advantageous for young people to be on the dole than in education. That is absolutely the wrong approach. We are saying that the same rules that used to apply to Austudy should apply to unemployment recipients up to the age of 21. In other words, we are asking the House to accept that the rules that the Labor government were happy to apply to Austudy should henceforth apply to unemployed people as well. If it is fair for these rules to apply to students, why is it not fair for the same rules to apply to people who are seeking work?The member for Greenway said that there were two alternatives: welfare through the youth allowance or a life of petty crime. There is another alternative, and it is work. And that is what we want young Australians who are not engaged in the education system to be involved in. We are saying to young Australians that we want them to make a choice between gainful employment on the one hand and useful education and training on the other. That is what our changes are designed to implement; that is what they will do. We should get a little credit from members opposite for those objectives.The sad thing about this debate has been the cloth cap proletarianism of the politics of envy that members opposite so easily lapse into. It is as if every problem in society has one simple solution, that is, the spending of massive amounts of government money. What everyone has to realise is that government does not spend a dollar that it does not get from someone else. The members opposite are saying that certain people should be getting more money for this or for that. That money comes from the general public of Australia—it comes out of their pockets. This government does not believe in robbing Peter to pay Paul. This government believes in trying to ensure that we have a system which is fair to everyone—fair to the taxpayers of Australia as well as to the beneficiaries of various government payment schemes.We all know that when this government came into power we had a $10 billion budget black hole bequeathed to us by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Beazley). We all know that since the election Labor frontbenchers in just about every portfolio have been promising the discontented and rancorous pressure groups of our society that they will rain money on them. That is Labor's policy—to spend money on every single problem, to appease every lobby group, to try to bribe every interest group with yet more cash and to shove cash down the mouths of everyone who is unhappy or discontented in modern society.The shadow minister for education has promised to abolish the various changes that this government has made to the higher education contribution scheme. That alone would cost at least half a billion dollars a year. Where is that money going to come from? The constant griping about alleged cuts to public education at the school level implies massive increased funding on top of the massive amounts that we propose to spend on schools. Where is that money coming from? Has the shadow Treasurer been included? Did anyone opposite prepare speeches with reference to the shadow Treasurer, or has the shadow Treasurer yet again been confined to the netherworld of relevance deprivation syndrome? The simple truth is that we just do not have the money to spend unless we get it from the pockets of ordinary Australians, and this is not a government which is going to buy off one group by penalising another group.We obviously have problems in Australia at the moment, but one of the reasons why the spectre of One Nation is stalking the Australian political landscape is that there has been too much mindless headbanging in this parliament. Not enough credit has been given by either side to the sincerity and the decency of the opposite side. My great disappointment with the contributions of members opposite is that there has been a constant resort to the politics of fear.Listening to members opposite, you would think that this government was a cross between Attila the Hun and Vlad the Impaler, when this government comprises decent, ordinary Australians—in many cases outstanding Australians—who are trying to do the right thing by the Australian people in difficult circumstances. We have had far too much of the politics of fear, yet listening to members opposite one would think that there is virtually no difference, in education policies at least, between the Labor Party and the One Nation Party.We should not be frightened of the future. Australia is a great country. We are not Albania. We are not the kind of wasteland that members opposite constantly seem to suggest. Ministers of the Crown in this government are not a combination of Stalin and Pol Pot. This is a government which is doing the right thing by the Australian education system. It is doing the right thing by the parents of Australian children. It is doing the right thing by the youngsters of Australia. We are building a better future. We are building it on the strengths of our existing government and independent school systems. Question put: That the words proposed to be omitted (Mr Latham's amendment) stand part of the question.13:23:00The House divided. (Mr Deputy Speaker—Mr K.J. Andrews)73Abbott, A. J. Andrew, J. N.Anthony, L. J. Bailey, F. E.Barresi, P. A. Bartlett, K. J.Billson, B. F. Broadbent, R. E.Brough, M. T. Cadman, A. G.Cameron, E. H. Cameron, R. A.Causley, I. R. Charles, R. E.Cobb, M. R. Downer, A. J. G.Draper, P. Elson, K. S.Entsch, W. G. Evans, R. D. C.Fahey, J. J. Forrest, J. A.Gallus, C. A. Gambaro, T.Gash, J. Georgiou, P.Grace, E. J. Halverson, R. G.Hardgrave, G. D. Hawker, D. P. M.Hicks, N. J. *Hockey, J. B.Jeanes, S. B. Jull, D. F.Katter, R. C. Kelly, J. M.Kemp, D. A. Lieberman, L. S.Lloyd, J. E.Marek, P.McArthur, F. S. *McDougall, G. R.Miles, C. G. Moore, J. C.Mutch, S. B. Nairn, G. R.Nehl, G. B. Nelson, B. J.Neville, P. C. Nugent, P. E.Prosser, G. D. Pyne, C. M.Randall, D. J. Reid, N. B.Reith, P. K. Ronaldson, M. J. C.Sharp, J. R. Slipper, P. N. *Smith, W. L. Somlyay, A. M.Southcott, A. J. Sullivan, K. J.Taylor, W. L. Thomson, A. P.Truss, W. E. Tuckey, C. W.Vaile, M. A. J. Vale, D. S.Wakelin, B. H. West, A. G.Williams, D. R. Wooldridge, M. R. L.Worth, P. M.41Adams, D. G. H. Albanese, A.Baldwin, P. J. Bevis, A. R.Brereton, L. J. Brown, R. J.Crean, S. F. Crosio, J. A.Dargavel, S. J. Evans, G. J.Evans, M. J. Ferguson, M. J.Fitzgibbon, J. A. Grace, E. L. *Griffin, A. P. *Hatton, M.Hollis, C. Jones, B. O.Latham, M. W. Lawrence, C. M.Lee, M. J.Macklin, J. L.Martin, S. P. McClelland, R. B.McLeay, L. B. Melham, D.Morris, A. A. Morris, P. F.Mossfield, F. W. O'Connor, G. M.O'Keefe, N. P. Price, L. R.Quick, H. V. Sawford, R. W. *Sercombe, R. C. G. Smith, S. F.Tanner, L. J. Theophanous, A. C.Thomson, K. J. Willis, R.Wilton, G. S.Bishop, B. K. Ellis, A. L.Costello, P. H. McMullan, R. F.Dondas, N. M. Jenkins, H. A.Howard, J. W. Beazley, K. C.McLachlan, I. M. Holding, A. C.Scott, B. C. Ferguson, L. D. T.* denotes tellerQuestion so resolved in the affirmative.Original question resolved in the affirmative.Bill read a second time.Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced.5788Leave granted for third reading to be moved forthwith.Bill (on motion by Mr Fahey) read a third time.Committees57885788578813:28:005788Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEYHQ5MacarthurLPFinance and Administration10—I move:That, in accordance with the provisions of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, it is expedient to carry out the following proposed work which was referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works and on which the committee has duly reported to Parliament: New facilities for the National Museum of Australia and the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies.The National Museum of Australia was established with bipartisan political support by the National Museum of Australia Act 1980 to research Australian history, develop and maintain a national collection of historical material, create exhibitions and programs which explore our heritage and history and make them accessible to more Australians. The museum will combine the best contemporary exhibition techniques, new media technologies and live performances and will offer a range of experiences to appeal to visitors of all kinds. It will include a high definition digital theatre and electronic linkages to make it a world-class museum and distance learning centre serving schools, state museums and other cultural venues nationally and internationally.The institute, which was originally established in 1964, is the largest research centre of its kind for information about cultures and lifestyles of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. To support its research and other functional activities, the institute maintains collections of audiovisual material, books, journals and manuscripts which it holds in trust for indigenous Australians. Co-location of the museum and institute will allow both organisations to take their place among the other national institutions located in Canberra. In addition, the ACT government intends to establish an ACT Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Centre on the site, which will contribute to the creation of a unique cultural precinct in Canberra. Future use of the Yarramundi site is yet to be decided.Subject to parliamentary approval, construction is scheduled to commence in October 1998 and the buildings are scheduled to be ready to open on 1 January 2001 as the Commonwealth's flagship for the centenary of Federation celebrations. The proposal was referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works on 30 October 1997 and the committee tabled its report on 23 June 1998, recommending that the proposal should proceed. However, the committee has raised a number of issues, including some in relation to the competition process and the proposed contractual arrangements. The committee has also requested that it be provided with reports on progress with the project.While a formal international architectural competition was not conducted, as this would have been much more expensive and would have required an additional 12 to 18 months to conduct, international firms were invited to compete. The conditions were also tailored to enable architectural practices of all sizes to compete. The competition was conducted and judged with the benefit of expert advice, including advice from architects recommended by the Royal Australian Institute of Architects who have since commended the conduct of the competition and the selection of the winning design team.The purpose of the competition was not to select an architect on the basis of a fully completed and costed design, but rather to select a design team that would undertake that detailed design development. The selection included consideration of the concept designs provided by the short-listed teams. These concept designs were based on the detailed functional brief which was prepared by a specialist brief writer, including indicative budgets for the project. The development of the completed design from the original concept design is now proceeding as planned.On the basis of expert advice, the government has concluded that the method of project alliancing is the most appropriate delivery strategy for this complex project and the one most likely to achieve the project objectives relating to time, cost and quality. A project alliance involves the creation of a single, integrated high performance team working to achieve common project objectives and pre-agreed commercial outcomes for all parties. The project alliance thus focuses all parties on achieving outstanding project results and not on protecting each party's contractual position. At the same time, there are appropriate protections for the government as client, including reverting to a more traditional contracting approach at any point if necessary.Three separate buildings will be co-located on the site. They will comply with all appropriate planning requirements in industry and environmental standards. Internal planning of the museum will allow for relatively simple future expansion. The design allows for an expansion footprint of about 2,200 square metres, which could provide up to an extra 4,400 square metres of gross floor area over two levels.The government has approved total funding of $151.9 million for the project, comprising $133 million for capital works and $18.9 million for one-off establishment costs. On the basis of professional advice, the government is confident that the project is capable of being delivered on time and within budget. As with any project, there will be appropriate monitoring and reporting on progress but, as requested, the government will in this instance also provide progress reports to the committee. I thank the committee for its support. I commend the motion to the House.Question resolved in the affirmative.Bills5790r5885790Bill presented by Mr Fahey, and read a first time.579013:34:005790Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEYHQ5MacarthurLPFinance and Administration10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.This bill amends various pieces of legislation as a consequence of amendments included in the Superannuation Legislation (Commonwealth Employment) Repeal and Amendment Bill 1998 included in a package of three bills currently before parliament. That package of bills will, among other things, make changes to the administrative arrangements for the Commonwealth's superannuation schemes by abolishing the office of Commissioner for Superannuation. Because the commissioner has statutory responsibility as chairman of the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Authority under the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Act 1973, consequential amendments to that act are required.The Superannuation Legislation (Commonwealth Employment—Saving and Transitional Provisions) Bill 1998, included in this package of bills, also provides that the trustees of the Commonwealth's civilian schemes use the organisation known as Commonwealth Superannuation Administration, or ComSuper, for the provision of administration services for the schemes for a period of three years. This bill includes amendments to the Military and Superannuation Benefit Act 1991 which will require the trustees of the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme to use ComSuper for the provision of administration services for that scheme for the same period.In addition, the package of bills will repeal the Superannuation (Productivity Benefit) Act 1988, which currently provides a minimum level of superannuation in certain circumstances in relation to the Governor-General and members of the scheme provided for by the Judges' Pensions Act 1968. This bill will ensure that the minimum level of superannuation continues to become payable in those circumstances after the repeal of the Productivity Benefit Act.The bill also makes a minor amendment to the Commonwealth Funds Management Limited Act 1991, required as a result of the sale of Commonwealth Funds Management Limited in 1996 and not included in amending legislation at that time. This bill does not involve any additional budget outlays. I commend the bill to the House.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Andrews)—Minister, are you presenting a copy of the explanatory memorandum?HQ5Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEY—No.Debate (on motion by Mr Tanner) adjourned.Bills5790r4085790Bill returned from the Senate with amendments.Ordered that the amendments be taken into consideration forthwith.Senate's amendments—(1) Clause 2, page 2 (line 2), omit "This Act commences on the 28th", substitute "Subject to subsection (2), this Act commences on the". (2) Clause 2, page 2 (after line 3), add:(2) Items 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 141A, 146A and 146B of Schedule 1 commence on the 28th day after the day on which this Act receives the Royal Assent.(3) Clause 3, page 2 (line 5), omit "Each", substitute "Subject to section 2, each".(4) Schedule 1, page 21 (after line 17), after item 103, insert:103A Paragraphs 193(2)(a), (c), (d) and (e)Omit "another part of the Queen's dominions", substitute "a Commonwealth country".103B At the end of section 193Add:(4) In this section: Commonwealth country means a political entity, or part of a political entity, that is a member of the international organisation known as the Commonwealth of Nations.(5) Schedule 1, page 21 (after line 17), after item 103, insert:103C Subsection 200D(4)Omit "close", substitute "are declared under subsection 176(1)".103D Subsection 200D(5)Omit "close", substitute "are declared under subsection 176(2)".(6) Schedule 1, item 117, page 24 (lines 14 and 15), omit "or such longer time as the Electoral Commissioner, before the end of that period, directs in writing".(7) Schedule 1, item 136, page 32 (lines 25 to 32), omit paragraph (c), substitute:(c) if subparagraph (b)(ii) applies—count each ballot-paper of an excluded candidate to whichever of the first or second ranked candidates is earlier in the order of preference expressed on the ballot-paper.(8) Schedule 1, page 33 (after line 11), after item 136, insert:136A Subsection 274(8)Repeal the subsection.(9) Schedule 1, item 138, page 33 (lines 24 and 25), omit the item, substitute:138 Subsection 274(11)Repeal the subsection.(10) Schedule 1, page 34 (after line 7), after item 141, insert:141A Subsection 287(1) (definition of financial controller )Omit "associated". (11) Schedule 1, page 35 (after line 5), after item 146, insert:146A After subsection 316(3)Insert:(3A) If: (a) an authorised officer has reasonable grounds to believe that a person is capable of producing documents or other things, or giving evidence, relating to whether an entity is, or was at a particular time, an associated entity; and (b) the person is, or has at any time been, the financial controller or an officer of the entity; the authorised officer may, by notice served personally or by post on the person, require the person: (c) to produce, within the period and in the manner specified in the notice, such documents or other things as are specified in the notice; or (d) to appear, at a time and place specified in the notice, before the authorised officer to give evidence, whether orally or in writing, and to produce the documents or other things specified in the notice. The notice must not require the person to produce documents, or to appear, until after the end of the period of 14 days beginning on the day on which the notice was received, and must set out the person's right to request a review under subsection (3B).(3B) A person who is given a notice under subsection (3A) may request that the Electoral Commission review the decision to issue the notice. The request must be: (a) in writing; and (b) given to the Electoral Commission during the period of 14 days beginning on the day on which the notice was received.(3C) The Electoral Commission must: (a) review the decision as soon as practicable after receiving a request under subsection (3B); and (b) affirm, vary or set aside the decision; and (c) notify the person in writing of its decision on the review.(3D) If a person requests a review of a decision, the person is not taken to have refused or failed to comply with the notice to which the review relates at any time before the Electoral Commission has notified the person of its decision on the review.146B Subsections 316(4), (5) and (6)Omit "or (3)", substitute ", (3) or (3A)".(12) Schedule 1, page 37 (after line 28), after item 163, insert:163A Subsection 354(1)After "refer it for trial", insert "to the Federal Court of Australia or".163B Subsection 354(2)After "referred for trial", insert "to the Federal Court of Australia or".163C Subsection 354(3)Repeal the subsection, substitute:(3) The High Court may refer part of a petition in respect of an election or return, being a part that consists of a question or questions of fact, to either of the following courts: (a) the Federal Court of Australia; (b) the Supreme Court of the State or Territory in which the election was held or the return made.(4) Subject to any directions by the High Court, if the High Court refers part of a petition to a court (the other court ) under subsection (3): (a) the other court has jurisdiction to deal with the part of the petition that has been referred; and (b) the other court has, in respect of the petition, the powers and functions of the Court of Disputed Returns, other than the powers referred to in paragraphs 360(1)(v), (vi), (vii) and (viii) and in section 379; and (c) subject to any directions by the High Court, further proceedings in relation to the part of the petition are as directed by the other court.(5) The High Court may have regard to the findings of the other court in dealing with the petition and may in its discretion receive further evidence on questions of fact.(6) The jurisdiction conferred by this section may be exercised by a single Justice or Judge.(13) Schedule 1, page 38 (after line 2), after item 164, insert:164A After section 363Insert:363A Court must make its decision quickly The Court of Disputed Returns must make its decision on a petition as quickly as is reasonable in the circumstances.(14) Schedule 1, page 38 (after line 14), at the end of the Schedule, add: 167 Subparagraph 10(b) of Schedule 3Before "12", insert "11A or".168 Subparagraph 11(b) of Schedule 3Before "12", insert "11A or".169 After paragraph 11 of Schedule 3Insert:11A. This paragraph applies to an envelope if the DRO is satisfied: (a) that the elector who signed the certificate or declaration on the envelope is not enrolled for the Division; and (b) after making enquiry: (i) that the elector was, at the time of voting, entitled to be enrolled for a Subdivision of the Division; and (ii) that, if the Division had not been divided into Subdivisions, the omission of the elector's name from the Roll for the Division would have been due to an error made by an officer, or to a mistake of fact. 11B. Subparagraph 11A(b) does not apply if: (a) more than one election (excluding the election to which the scrutiny relates) has been held since the omission from the Roll; or (b) where there has been a redistribution of the State or Territory that includes the Division since the last election but one before the election to which the scrutiny relates, the omission from the Roll was made before the last such redistribution.170 Paragraph 14 of Schedule 3Omit "paragraph 13", substitute "paragraphs 11B and 13".(15) Schedule 2, page 39 (after line 4), before item 1, insert:1AA Subsection 3(1) (subparagraphs (b)(ii), (iii) and (iv) of the definition of authorized witness )Omit "another part of the Queen's dominions", substitute "a Commonwealth country".1AB Subsection 3(1) (subparagraph (b)(v) of the definition of authorized witness )Repeal the subparagraph, substitute:(v) an Australian citizen.For the purposes of this definition, Commonwealth country means a political entity, or part of a political entity, that is a member of the international organisation known as the Commonwealth of Nations.(16) Schedule 2, page 39 (after line 8), after item 1, insert: 1A Paragraph 4(2)(b)Omit "issue of the writ", substitute "close of the Rolls".(17) Schedule 2, item 11, page 42 (lines 10 and 11), omit "or such longer time as the Electoral Commissioner, before the end of that period, directs in writing".(18) Schedule 2, page 43 (after line 29), after item 19, insert:19A Subsection 73B(4)Omit "close", substitute "are declared under subsection 176(2) of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 ".19B Subsection 73B(5)Omit "close", substitute "are declared under subsection 176(1) of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 ".(19) Schedule 2, page 44 (after line 4), after item 21, insert:21A After section 107Insert:107AA Court must make decision quickly The Court must make its decision on a petition as quickly as is reasonable in the circumstances.(20) Schedule 2, page 47 (after line 3), at the end of the Schedule, add:37 Subparagraph 10(b) of Schedule 4Before "11", insert "10A or".38 After paragraph 10 of Schedule 4Insert:10A. This paragraph applies to an envelope if the DRO is satisfied: (a) that the elector who signed the certificate or declaration on the envelope is not enrolled for the Division; and (b) after making enquiry: (i) that the elector was, at the time of voting, entitled to be enrolled for a Subdivision of the Division; and (ii) that, if the Division had not been divided into Subdivisions, the omission of the elector's name from the Roll for the Division would have been due to an error made by an officer, or to a mistake of fact. 10B. Subparagraph 10A(b) does not apply if: (a) more than one election (excluding the election to which the scrutiny relates) has been held since the omission from the Roll; or (b) where there has been a redistribution of the State or Territory that includes the Division since the last election but one before the election to which the scrutiny relates, the omission from the Roll was made before the last such redistribution.39 Paragraph 13 of Schedule 4Omit "paragraph 12", substitute "paragraphs 10B and 12".13:38:005793Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEYHQ5MacarthurLPFinance and Administration10—I move:That the amendments be agreed to.The amendments that have been returned following debate on this bill in the other place and that have been approved by the Senate relate to some 20 government amendments. Most are of a technical nature. They correct editing errors that were made in the original bill. These amendments refer to such things as the removal of references to exhausted votes in House of Representatives elections. The amendments restore the 24-hour period after which pre-poll voting may commence as a consequence of introducing a 24-hour period between the close and declaration of nominations. They restore the Electoral Commissioner's non-discretion to extend the deadline for the receipt of postal votes received in the mail. They allow, during the period between the issue of the writ and the close of the rolls for a referendum, the removal of electors whose enrolment has been the subject of objection action.The government has also moved amendments to tighten disclosure of donations provisions. This issue was brought to the government's attention by the AEC's report on funding and disclosure in the 1996 federal election. I would add that we have moved swiftly to amend the appropriate legislation because the government believes in the transparency of political donations. We believe that is desirable. Our amendments will ensure that our system is more accountable.The amendments give the Australian Electoral Commission greater power to investigate organisations, trusts, clubs or any other entities which it suspects may be associated entities of a political party. Specifically, they enable an authorised officer to issue a notice to an organisation requiring the production of documents to assist in determining whether the organisation has a financial disclosure obligation as an associated entity.The government amendments also replace the references to Queen's dominions with a reference to the Commonwealth of Nations. They provide that, where subdivisions are proclaimed, a provisional vote cast by an elector who has moved to a different subdivision without notifying the Australian Electoral Commission can still be included in the scrutiny, provided the elector is still living in the division. They allow the High Court, sitting as the Court of Disputed Returns, to remit the whole or part of a petition to the Federal Court. They require the Court of Disputed Returns to make its decision on a petition as quickly as is reasonable in the circumstances.The government amendments generally met with the support of all parties in the Senate. I take this opportunity to thank the parties in the Senate for their cooperation as this bill will be of great benefit to the Australian Electoral Commission in the conduct of federal elections, whenever they may occur in the future. I commend the amendments to the House.13:41:005794Melham, Daryl, MPMr MELHAM4T4BanksALP00—I indicate that the opposition does agree with these particular scheduled amendments that were made by the Senate to the Electoral and Referendum Amendment Bill 1998 . The amendments I particularly want to speak to are amendments Nos 14 and 20, because they are amendments that I really do commend the government for. These amendments mean that the franchise throughout Australia is now a uniform franchise.As a result of scrutineering that I was involved in in the Northern Territory shortly after the last election, it became obvious that in the Northern Territory, because of the joint roll arrangement, electors were being enrolled in subdivisions but some 1,594 electors who had moved within the division from one subdivision to another were not reinstated on the roll. In all other electorates apart from Kalgoorlie, where there were two subdivisions, subdivisions have been abolished. These particular amendments restore the position so that the Electoral Commission can enrol people for those districts and subdivisions but they will not lose their voting entitlement providing they move within a division. As I say, in the last election some 1,594 electors, a lot of whom were Aboriginals, were moving from one area to another in the Northern Territory.I do commend the government on this. This was an area that was subject to a High Court challenge in the case of Snowdon v. Dondas, where the High Court, sitting as the Court of Disputed Returns, on 10 October 1996 unanimously rejected the petition. Whilst it saw that there was a problem in terms of a legal situation, it said there was no legal remedy and it was a matter for the parliament to remedy. I made a submission to the parliamentary committee and—in fairness to the parliamentary committee—there was a unanimous recommendation to fix the situation. The government's response was to unanimously support that recommendation of the parliamentary joint committee. Because there has been a number of electoral bills, the government—to its credit—moved this as a government amendment in the Senate. I do commend the government on this. I think it shows that you can receive cross-party support for amendments aimed at improving the Electoral Act.The thing that came through in the Snowdon v. Dondas case was that, in terms of electoral matters, the court has made it very clear that it is not going to be an interventionist court in laying down principles per se and that the right to vote and the qualifications to vote through elections will be determined by the parliament. As a result of Snowdon's case and McGinty's case, the onus is on the parliament. This is one instance where the parliament has done the right thing, and I believe in giving credit where credit is due.For me, it is particularly pleasing because it has meant that a campaign that I launched as a result of scrutinising in the Northern Territory has reached fruition and many more indigenous Australians in the Northern Territory will be able to vote and have their vote counted when the next election is called. The main thing is the uniformity of the franchise because, until these amendments are proclaimed, the current position, particularly in the Northern Territory, is that people miss out who, if they were living anywhere else, would not.I felt it was important to intervene and give credit to the minister and the Australian Electoral Commission. I think we have one of the best electoral commissions in the world in the Australian Electoral Commission. They are professional. I think we have one of the best voting systems in the world. I agree with compulsory voting. I agree with the full distribution of preferences. It has meant that we have had a stable democracy. It has meant that you need a majority of the votes to get elected in any particular division. I repeat that we on this side support these amendments and I, in particular, support those subdivisional amendments enthusiastically. I commend the amendments to the House.Question resolved in the affirmative.Bills5795r3985795Consideration resumed from 30 June.Senate's amendments—(1) Schedule 1, item 5, page 5 (lines 5 to 7), omit the item.(2) Schedule 3, item 35, page 40 (lines 5 to 7), omit "exceed the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total )", substitute "fall below the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total ), and may not exceed the previous total".(3) Schedule 3, item 35, page 40 (line 17), omit the formula, substitute: Recent index number Base index number100 x + 1 Base index number(4) Schedule 3, item 35, page 44 (lines 9 to 11), omit "exceed the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total )", substitute "fall below the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total ), and may not exceed the previous total".(5) Schedule 3, item 35, page 44 (line 21), omit the formula, substitute: Recent index number Base index number100 x + 1 Base index number(6) Schedule 3, item 75, page 60 (lines 28 to 30), omit "exceed the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total )", substitute "fall below the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total ), and may not exceed the previous total".(7) Schedule 3, item 75, page 61 (line 5), omit the formula, substitute: Recent index number Base index number100 x + 1 Base index number(8) Schedule 3, item 75, page 65 (lines 1 to 3), omit "exceed the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total )", substitute "fall below the total amount of the payments made under the income stream in the immediately preceding year (the previous total ), and may not exceed the previous total".(9) Schedule 3, item 75, page 65 (line 13), omit the formula, substitute: Recent index number Base index number100 x + 1 Base index number(10) Schedule 4, item 1, page 75 (after line 8), after "seasonal work 16A(1)", insert "seasonal work income 16A(1)".(11) Schedule 4, item 2, page 76 (after line 6), after the definition of seasonal work , insert: seasonal work income means gross income from seasonal work less amounts necessarily expended in relation to that seasonal work that the person can demonstrate are allowable deductions for the purposes of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 or the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 , as the case may be.(12) Schedule 4, item 2, page 76 (line 31) to page 77 (line 2), omit all the words after "on the day", substitute "on which the claim was lodged".(13) Schedule 4, item 2, page 77 (line 13), omit all the words after "on the day", substitute "on which the claim was lodged".(14) Schedule 4, item 2, page 77 (line 15), omit the note.(15) Schedule 4, item 2, page 78 (line 3), omit "income", substitute "seasonal work income".(16) Schedule 4, item 2, page 78 (after line 22), after Step 6, insert: Step 6A. If there is a period between one relevant period of seasonal work and another, or between a relevant period of seasonal work and the day on which the claim was lodged, work out the number of weeks in the period (the intervening period ). This is done by dividing the total number of days in the intervening period by 7. Step 6B. If there is more than one intervening period, add together the number of weeks worked out for each intervening period. The result (including any part of a week) is called the person's intervening weeks . Step 6C . Add together the number of seasonal work weeks worked out under Step 6 and the number of intervening weeks (if any) worked out under Step 6B. The result (including any part of a week) is called the person's self-supported weeks .(17) Schedule 4, item 2, page 78 (line 23), omit "seasonal work weeks", substitute "self-supported weeks".(18) Schedule 4, item 2, page 78 (after line 30), at the end of subsection (5), add: Note 3: For seasonal work income see subsection (1).(19) Schedule 4, item 2, page 79 (line 24), omit "income", substitute "seasonal work income".(20) Schedule 4, item 2, page 80 (after line 26), after Step 7, insert: Step 7A. If there is a period between one relevant period of seasonal work and another, or between a relevant period of seasonal work and the day on which the claim was lodged, work out the number of weeks in the period (the intervening period ). This is done by dividing the total number of days in the intervening period by 7. Step 7B. If there is more than one intervening period, add together the number of weeks worked out for each intervening period. The result (including any part of a week) is called the person's intervening weeks . Step 7C. Add together the number of seasonal work weeks worked out under Step 7 and the number of intervening weeks (if any) worked out under Step 7B. The result (including any part of a week) is called the person's self-supported weeks .(21) Schedule 4, item 2, page 80 (line 27), omit "seasonal work weeks", substitute "self-supported weeks".(22) Schedule 4, item 2, page 81 (after line 2), at the end of subsection (6), add: Note 3: For seasonal work income see subsection (1).(23) Schedule 4, item 2, page 82 (line 2), omit "income", substitute "seasonal work income".(24) Schedule 4, item 2, page 82 (after line 30), after Step 8, insert: Step 8A. If there is a period between one relevant period of seasonal work and another, or between a relevant period of seasonal work and the day on which the claim was lodged, work out the number of weeks in the period (the intervening period ). This is done by dividing the total number of days in the intervening period by 7. Step 8B. If there is more than one intervening period, add together the number of weeks worked out for each intervening period. The result (including any part of a week) is called the partner's intervening weeks . Step 8C. Add together the number of seasonal work weeks worked out under Step 8 and the number of intervening weeks (if any) worked out under Step 8B. The result (including any part of a week) is called the partner's self-supported weeks .(25) Schedule 4, item 2, page 83 (line 1), omit "seasonal work weeks", substitute "self-supported weeks".(26) Schedule 4, item 2, page 83 (after line 8), at the end of subsection (7), add: Note 3: For seasonal work income see subsection (1).(27) Schedule 4, item 2, page 83 (line 27) to page 84 (line 21), omit subsections (9) and (10).(28) Schedule 4, page 98 (after line 23), at the end of the Schedule, add:34 ApplicationThe amendments made by this Schedule do not apply in relation to seasonal work engaged in before the commencement of this Schedule.13:47:005797Worth, Trish, MPMs WORTH8V5AdelaideLP10—I move:That the amendments be agreed to.I will briefly explain that the Social Security and Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Budget and Other Measures) Bill 1997 was last before the House on Monday, when we dealt with requests for amendments sought by the Senate. At that time, the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (Mr Ruddock) outlined the history of this bill and I do not intend to go over that ground again today.We are dealing with the amendments made to the bill by the Senate. The government accepts all these amendments, which can be broken into three groups. Amendment No. 1 is consequential to various refinements which we discussed on Monday, those being to the measure granting carer payment to carers of profoundly disabled children.Amendments Nos 2 to 9 were government amendments that clarify the measure reforming the means testing of income streams. The original intention of this measure was always that retired Australians should have access to regular, dependable income so that in their later years they could be as secure as possible. These amendments ensure that, for income streams to qualify for concessional treatment, they must offer a regular, stable income.Finally, amendments Nos 11 to 28 all relate to the seasonal worker preclusion period. Their effect is to allow seasonal workers to be tested on taxable income rather than on gross income, to protect seasonal workers who voluntarily do not claim benefits and to ensure that seasonal workers have reasonable notice that they may be subject to preclusion periods. I commend these amendments to the House.Question resolved in the affirmative.Bills5798r5605798Debate resumed from 25 June, on motion by Mr Miles:That the bill be now read a second time.13:49:005798Thomson, Kelvin, MPMr KELVIN THOMSONUK6WillsALP00—The States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 is a non-controversial bill which is supported by the opposition. It provides the untied Commonwealth financial assistance to the states and territories for 1998-99. Untied assistance, of course, is that which may be spent according to the states' own priorities.The bill authorises payments for the funding agreed to at the 1998 Premiers Conference of $17.1 billion for 1998-99. In doing so, the government has continued the Labor practice of indexing the pool of funds on a real per capita basis—that is, increasing both for inflation and for the increase in population. This is a fair funding formula, as demand for state services such as health, education, infrastructure, et cetera is often driven by both inflation and population.It also authorises that the revenue from the safety net arrangements introduced to make up for the state revenue shortfall arising from last year's High Court decision in the Walter Hammond case, which invalidated state business franchise fees as being uncontroversial, is also authorised—that is, $6.5 billion for 1998-99.The Prime Minister (Mr Howard) likes to pretend that he is a successful federalist. He pretends that the coalition is good at cooperative relations with the states. However, his record would have to be the worst of any government's in history. There have been three Premiers Conferences with John Howard and Peter Costello, and all of them have been disastrous—a quite unparalleled effort.Many would remember the 1996 meeting. Just prior to the meeting, the Treasurer (Mr Costello) announced an enormous new tax burden on the states, around $1.3 billion per annum. This ambushing poisoned the water for the conference, and it was a farce. In the end the Treasurer had to back down on his tax proposal, except in respect of some cars, and instead he cut over $1.5 billion from the funds available to the states over three successive years, thereby cutting much needed services to Australian families. This was the meeting where the states put on the record what they really thought about the Treasurer, and in the end the Premiers refused to meet with the Treasurer, and the Prime Minister had to meet with them alone to finally salvage an outcome.Last year we saw a complete collapse of the COAG process which has remained completely stalled through the whole of this wasted period of office, and finally this year we had an unprecedented result where the Premiers simply walked out and went home. Without question, this government has the worst record in Commonwealth-state relations of any government.Indeed today, 1 July, is the first day of what ought to have been the start of a new five-year Medicare agreement. Due to this government's ongoing incompetence, we do not have an agreement between the governments of this country concerning the delivery of health care to their citizens—again, an unprecedented outcome which smacks of incompetence.One can only wonder what the Prime Minister might have in store for the states next year if he were to win the upcoming election. How would he be able to continue or better a record like the one we have seen in the last two or three years? If we look into the crystal ball of federal-state financial relations, what we might expect to see, if this government is successful in being re-elected, is a Prime Minister explaining to the states that they will face a GST, a goods and services tax, on all of their purchases, without compensation. It would be like 1996 all over again, but it would mean a much larger blow to the finances of the states than that proposed in 1996.Notwithstanding the fact that some of the states suggest they are on board the tax cart, this will mean in turn that the services provided by the states, such as schools, hospital, police and other community services, will all be squeezed still further. Labor's very good record of cooperative reform with the states can be seen now, as it contrasts so starkly with the pathetic performance of the current government.We need to also remember that the GST will not only adversely affect the states but also detrimentally affect the third tier of government—local government. For example, KPMG has estimated that a GST at a rate of 12.5 per cent would increase the costs on local government by over $1 billion. This would mean that everyone would face an increase in their rates bill in the order of 20 per cent—that is, the government is planning to impose a tax upon a tax, which is, of course, what rates are. That also would be unprecedented in Australia.We would also, in all probability, see a GST imposed on other state taxes and charges. Some examples include motor vehicle registration and third party insurance costs. These are examples of the necessities of life which are not subject to wholesale sales tax, and it is Labor's view that they should not be.We have seen quite recently more and more groups coming out and expressing concern about the way in which a goods and services tax would operate. Just in the last week or two we have seen the Australian Catholic Social Welfare Commission, the commission of the Australian Catholic bishops, commenting on the Queensland election outcome:"There is nothing the Government has produced or said to date which convinces the Australian Catholic Social Welfare Commission that a GST is a fair and equitable plank in tax reform."Commenting on the lack of any detailed information from the Government, Mr O'Connor—the spokesman for the Australian Catholic Social Welfare Commission—said, "The so called `tax reform debate' is an indictment on economists, big business and the Federal Government who are fixated in their belief that a GST is the panacea for the complexity and disincentives in the current tax system. These groups are putting self interest ahead of the reality that regressive taxes, like a GST, have a negative impact on the financial position of struggling families and the poor."Mr O'Connor went on to say:"No amount of advertising will alter the simple realities: that a GST is a regressive and unfair tax; that struggling families will be hit the hardest; that the necessity to introduce a package of compensation to vulnerable families is an admission of the unfairness of a GST and goes against the concept of good citizenship because it will treat some Australians as second class citizens worthy of a hand out."We also saw the Australian Catholic Health Care Association expressing some similar concerns as recently as 18 June. They said:. . . media reports that the Howard Government is planning compensation handouts to ease opposition to a GST is a frank admission that the tax is unfair . . . It is already well established that a GST is regressive and bad news for middle and low income families. Now it appears they will need to rely on compensation funding just to keep pace with everyone else, let alone get ahead.They went on to point out:Compensation packages are unreliable, have been proven to not work and usually end up being dismantled over time—and that is quite correct—Why are these packages going to be any different?The Catholic Health Care Association went on to say:Let's not forget, a GST means removing taxes from big business and placing them on household budgets.The Business Council of Australia spokesman, Stan Wallis, gave the game away when he said that we need to reduce the taxation levels on big business. That can only mean that household budgets would be subject to higher taxation levels. The Catholic Health Care Association continue:To use a `handout mentality' to address genuine problems for struggling families is demeaning. The precarious nature of their circumstances deserves to be fully understood by Government and proponents of the GST. They concluded by pointing out that, irrespective of the advertising campaign, the facts are as follows:families need to purchase different goods and services at different times to meet essential needs—a GST on basic food, health, aged care housing and education will hurt many—and I would add to this necessities like electricity, gas, water, child care and many expenses in the education area—families with members who are chronically ill or frail and dependent will be taxed the same as healthy young individuals or prosperous high income Australians—a GST on health, medical, nursing home expenses, hospice, community aged care or nursing care will hurt many . . . The Catholic Health Care Association conclude:If tax reform is to be successful, let's not approach sections of the community in a patronising and demeaning fashion. If it is to be genuinely fair, let's prove that those most in need of help actually benefit in real sustainable terms.The impact of a GST would be unfair. It would reduce taxation on luxury items and assist those who are already well off at the expense of battlers, at the expense of those who are less well off. In particular, it would adversely affect Australians who are retired and for whom it is too late to go back into the work force and earn new money at what might turn out to be lower rates of income tax. So it diminishes the savings of retired people and is regressive for that reason.It is also an unnecessary impost on small business and would turn many small businesses in this country into unpaid tax collectors. At present, the 1.3 million small businesses that are not liable to pay GST would become unpaid tax collectors for this government.Let me also add that it is not the answer in terms of the black economy either. It tends to encourage the avoidance of transactions and to encourage people not to report transactions, so that they can avoid the GST as well as income tax. For those reasons and many others, we will be opposing a GST at the next election. As I indicated at the outset, we are supportive of this bill and will not be opposing it.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—Order! It being 2 p.m., the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 101A. The debate may be resumed at a later hour and the member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.Ministerial Arrangements58005800Howard, John, MPMr HOWARDZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—I inform the House that the Minister for Veterans' Affairs will be absent from question time for the rest of this week. He is today addressing the Victorian annual state congress of the RSL. Tomorrow he will depart for France, where he is officiating in various World War I ceremonies, accompanied by a number of Australian veterans and the opposition spokesman for veterans' affairs. He will also be involved in ministerial meetings with the French government. The Minister for Defence Industry, Science and Personnel, who has been delayed just a few moments returning from Sydney, will answer questions on his behalf. The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade, Mr Tim Fischer, has just returned from Gippsland, where he has been assessing the flood situation.Questions Without Notice580058005800Beazley, Kim, MPMr BEAZLEYPE4BrandALP00—My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister. Is the Deputy Prime Minister aware of the view of his Western Australian counterpart, Deputy Premier Hendy Cowan, that One Nation should be placed last on National Party how-to-vote cards? Is he also aware of Mr Cowan's warning that the National Party should not compromise itself on this issue `for the sake of political expediency'? Deputy Prime Minister, will you show some leadership and wield your authority to ensure that One Nation is put last by the Nationals across this country?5800Fischer, Tim, MPMr TIM FISCHERDG4FarrerNPTrade; Deputy Prime Minister10—I am in constant contact with Hendy Cowan. I met with him twice in the last fortnight—once in Melbourne, once in Darwin—and had further talks with him and noted his further comments.DT4CREANMr Crean—Are you getting on with him?DG4Mr TIM FISCHER—I am getting on with the important tasks of government—the federal government's interface with the Victorian state government on the Gippsland flood recovery arrangements, helping people through a very difficult situation where there has been over 400 to 500 millimetres of rain deluging the area and doing a lot of damage. In regional Australia, we are getting on with the task of helping to rebuild with the $250 million regional telecommunications infrastructure fund, getting jobs and record export figures and helping to further facilitate those export figures. You can try as many angles as you like, but I will answer when I have completed my consultations in my own electorate of Farrer, and that will be at a time further down the track. You have no right to question my approach to standing up to the Hanson agenda. I have been there all along.58015801Billson, Bruce, MPMr BILLSON1K6DunkleyLP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Workplace Relations and Small Business. Minister, the Leader of the Opposition this morning released a policy on industrial relations. What would be the impact of this policy if it were ever to be implemented?5801Reith, Peter, MPMr REITHWI4FlindersLPWorkplace Relations and Small Business10—I thank the member for Dunkley.JK6McCLELLANDMr McClelland—Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order. The question clearly asked for an opinion. The minister has not been asked to give an account of his government's policies.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—He asked, actually, about the effect of industrial relations policies on the whole industrial scene, and that part of the question is certainly in order.Mr Beazley interjecting—WI4Mr REITH—The Leader of the Opposition interjects about small business. In small business in the area of Frankston, in the member's seat, the fact is that this policy, if ever implemented, would be a disaster for jobs. It is anti-small business.Mr Beazley interjecting—WI4Mr REITH—The Leader of the Opposition talks about job security. This policy, which the Labor Party announced this morning, is actually being acted out by the shoppies union in Victoria. It has got a log of claims against 30,000-odd businesses, which would cost 20,000 jobs in Victoria alone. It is claiming triple time for weekend work, and that is endorsed by the Labor Party. Why is it endorsed by the Labor Party? You only have to look at the donations made by the shoppies union to the Labor Party in the last few years to know. In 1996-97, you got $571,000 from the shoppies union. In 1995-96, you got $879,000 from the shoppies union.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order. This would be relevant if it had been a question about whether or not his policies on industrial relations were dominated by having got a concessional price for a penthouse.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition is not now making a point of order.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—No, but I am making a relevant point.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—He can raise one specifically, but not argue the point.WI4Mr REITH—The personal comments of the Leader of the Opposition reveal how sensitive he is. You have been bought off by the shoppies union, and the people who will pay for this are the thousands of people in small business who will lose their jobs as a result. Instead of the personal remarks, why don't you have the guts to stand up and defend your policy? This policy in action, as we are seeing already in Victoria, will add 25 per cent to the cost of small business, and that will mean a lot of people will lose their jobs. This is the Labor Party's policy in action. He talks about Labor's previous policy, but the fact is that, though you are today attacking award simplification, you used to be in favour of it.What incredible hypocrisy. Your only objection to the fact that we have done it is that you were unable to do so. Why were you unable to do so? You have been bought off by the trade unions as usual—in dollars and cents—against the interests of the people who you claim to represent. Not only will they undo award simplification, which is a tremendous benefit to workers; they will also repeal the secondary boycott provisions of the Trade Practices Act which have given this country the lowest level of disputes since 1940. You people, before the last election, said if the coalition was elected there would be an increase in disputes. Since we have been in, we have a record low level of industrial disputes. Labor's policy means not less disputes but more industrial disputes. What will be the consequences of that? More job losses in the Australian community.It is about time the Leader of the Opposition stood up to these trade union bosses, stood up for small business and stood up for the people who need a job. What a fascinating contrast there is between the Australian Labor Party and the Labour Party in the UK. In the UK, Tony Blair came in and he said, `We can't go back to the policies when Labour was last in office. We need a new approach,' and he abandoned the links with the trade union movement. He actually went to a trade union congress and told them that the old days of union bosses dictating policy had to be over. In conclusion, what an irony it is that Mr Beazley's biography is now being written and the foreword is to be signed off by Tony Blair, a leader who has what it takes to deal with the union movement—instead of the subservient policy which you have today released.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—I remind ministers that they should direct their replies through the chair and not across the table.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker—10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition need not intrude into the debate. He will ask a question and not do otherwise.58025802Beazley, Kim, MPMr BEAZLEYPE4BrandALP00—My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. Is the Prime Minister aware of the view of Mr Michael Kroger that he would prefer a Labor government to One Nation? Is the Prime Minister aware that Mr Kroger has said that this is the view of Mr Kennett and the Treasurer and the Victorian Liberals generally? In the light of this, will the Prime Minister categorically rule out ever forming a government with the political support of One Nation?5802Howard, John, MPMr HOWARDZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—I am not aware of those views that have been attributed to Michael Kroger. As I have found in the past, the views attributed to Australian citizens by those who sit opposite are frequently inaccurate. Our position is very clear: the party I lead will never form a government with any party other than the National Party of Australia.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker, I seek leave to table the transcript of Mr Kroger's comments last night.Leave not granted.58025802Hawker, David, MPMr HAWKER8H4WannonLP10—My question is addressed to the Treasurer. Can the Treasurer advise the House what impact recent reforms to the Australian financial system will have for ordinary Australians and for businesses?5802Costello, Peter, MPMr COSTELLOCT4HigginsLPTreasurer10—I thank the honourable member for Wannon for his question, and I acknowledge the work that he has done as chairman of the parliamentary committee in this area. Today, 1 July, Australia has a new system for financial regulation. It is probably the biggest overhaul of Australia's financial regulation system ever. Today two new bodies commenced: the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority—APRA—which, for the first time, will regulate prudential requirements across all deposit taking institutions, including banks and superannuation authorities including, as the states join the system, state based institutions. What that means is that banks will no longer have their own specific regulator. There will be a general regulator which will allow institutions the same kind of regulatory supervision that previously was available only for banks.Today, 1 July, a new corporate and consumer regulator is instituted—the Australian Securities and Investment Commission—which completes the twin peaks doctrine of prudential regulation and consumer regulation. This is the body which will be a one-stop shop for consumers in relation to financial products and a one-stop shop for business in relation to corporate and consumer regulation. I had the privilege of launching both APRA and ASIC in Sydney this morning.In addition to this, the government's reforms include the passing of a company law review bill in relation to meetings and company procedures, the institution of real time gross settlement in the payments system for the Reserve Bank and legislation which has recently been passed to allow credit unions and building societies to issue their own cheques. This is a great improvement, particularly for rural and regional Australia which can have access to credit unions that can now, for the first time in Australian history, issue their own cheques and compete equally in relation to the banks.But it does not stop there. The government's reforms include the corporate law economic reform program, which is going to revolutionise directors' duties, takeovers and fundraising and make it easier for small business to raise funds. That bill will be coming into the parliament next week. Some of the benefits that arise from this state-of-the-art leading edge financial regulation include the fact that we are now getting increased and heightened competition in the financial sector. One of the advantages of increased competition in the financial sector is the fact that, since the government has encouraged competition in the financial sector, the margin on home loans by banks and other financial institutions has fallen two per cent. That is a two per cent benefit for Australian home buyers as a result of competition. I know the Labor Party is opposed to competition and I know it is engaged now in a direct race with Ms Hanson to try to steal backward looking economic agendas. One of the great benefits of competition in the financial sector is that we have got official interest rates down from 10½ per cent as they were under Labor to 6½ per cent with a two per cent cut as a result of extra competition on mortgages. That means for the average family—since this government was elected—a saving of over $3,000 a year on the standard variable home mortgage.I say this to the Labor Party opposite: we know that their backward looking economic policies will, as sure as night follows day, lead to higher interest rates. The Labor Party is the party that gave Australia home mort gage interest rates of 17 per cent. That was the Labor policy on home mortgage interest rates. On this side of the House, we believe in giving young home buyers a go, giving them opportunity, giving them low interest rates and giving them money back in their pockets.58035803McMullan, Bob, MPMr McMULLAN5I4CanberraALP00—My question is to the Prime Minister. Prime Minister, are you aware that the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia yesterday announced plans to prosecute major clothing companies in Australia, alleging the companies have breached award conditions for Australia's most vulnerable and disadvantaged workers—namely, outworkers? Are you aware that the award conditions which have allegedly been breached—which require companies to register the outworkers they are employing—are the very same award conditions which are subject to award stripping? How can you support stripping away from awards provisions which give outworkers vital protection against exploitation?5803Howard, John, MPMr HOWARDZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—Once again, I will investigate the assertions that have been made.ET4BEVISMr Bevis—It's your law.ZD4Mr HOWARD—Seven out of ten, you get the facts wrong—and that is a pretty good reason to investigate. While I am answering that question, can I remind the House that the government very strongly supports the attempts made by different sections of the community to prevent the exploitation and unfair treatment of outworkers within the Australian community. I would also remind the member for Canberra that concern about the treatment of outworkers did not commence on 2 March 1996. I can remember the first occasion I discussed this matter at length was with an officer of the relevant union. That person indicated to me that it was an issue that had been around and of concern to the union and many other people under the governments of both sides of politics in Australia. Any attempt by the member for Canberra to try and persuade the Australian public that, after them being in power for 13 years and having done nothing to stop the problem, somehow or other the problem—5I4McMULLANMr McMullan—I raise a point of order on the question of relevance, Mr Speaker. My question was not about the programs which the government cancelled when they came in to deal with outworkers; it was about the award.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The member knows he asked a long question, and the Prime Minister has every right to respond in kind.ZD4Mr HOWARD—The member for Canberra asked me a question about the exploitation of outworkers. What I am saying to the member for Canberra is that for 13 years of Labor government outworkers were exploited. For 13 years you had an opportunity to do something about it; for 13 years you allowed it to go on. You have no moral authority to thump the table and now say the outrage started on 2 March. You did nothing about it for 13 years and you have no credentials to lecture us on this or, indeed, any other matter.58045804Randall, Don, MPMr RANDALLPK6SwanLP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs. From today, all 18- to 24-year-olds who have been unemployed for six months or more must participate in an additional approved activity in order to receive their full unemployment benefits. Why were these new requirements introduced and how will they help get young people into jobs?5804Kemp, Dr David, MPDr KEMPBT4GoldsteinLPEmployment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs;Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service10—I thank the member for Swan for his question. Today the government puts into place two of the key elements in its comprehensive strategy to address the problem of entrenched youth unemployment. One of these is the youth allowance and the second is the new arrangements for young people on the dole. From today every young person 18 to 24 years of age who passes six months on unemployment benefit will need to do an additional activity in order to continue receiving the unemployment allowance. The base basic principle underlying this measure is, of course, the principle of mutual obligation. The community recognises a strong obligation to young people and the need to support young people on the dole. In return, the community believes it is fair that young people should do something to increase their own employment prospects and put something back into the community.Under the policy which commences today, young people will have the choice of activity to meet their mutual obligation requirements. They will be able to undertake voluntary activity within the community; they will be able to undertake part-time work. The government is investing some $465 million over the next four years to provide other avenues for constructive job experience. One of those is work for the dole; the other one is important literacy and numeracy training for those young people who have come out of the school system without those skills. If young people do not satisfy these requirements, their dole could be reduced. It is an obligation, but it is also an opportunity. It is an opportunity for young people to take charge of their own future and to make a choice to do something that will actually help their employment prospects.What a fundamental change this is from the dole system that Labor favours. Labor favoured a dole system which encouraged young people to go on the dole. Labor's message to young people was that the dole was an alternative lifestyle; the dole was there as an alternative to work and to gaining useful work experience. Labor's message was it was okay to be on the dole. That is not our message. Under the Leader of the Opposition youth unemployment reached 34 per cent—135,000 unemployed teenagers. The Labor Party betrayed a generation of young people. It is up to this government to take hold of the fundamental issues which underlie youth unemployment—the lack of literacy and numeracy skills and the lack of proper opportunities for the 70 per cent who do not go on to university. Today we are putting into place the policies that will completely change the incentive on the dole for young people. Instead of the negative message from the Labor Party, we are putting in place a positive message that gives young people the chance to do something to improve their employment prospects in the future.58055805Lee, Michael, MPMr LEEMG4DobellALP00—My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. Is the Prime Minister aware that the Red Cross says it faces a depletion in its stocks of blood because of changes to awards that will deny employees leave during working hours to donate blood? Does the Prime Minister share this concern of Red Cross? If so, how can you support stripping away from awards a worker's right to one hour's leave to donate blood?5805Reith, Peter, MPMr REITHWI4FlindersLPWorkplace Relations and Small Business10—This is a patently absurd question and it shows that the Labor Party has completely abandoned the many things which they themselves thought were a good idea when they were in office. I take you back—and it is not so long ago—to October 1993. The then minister, who is now your colleague sitting next to you—PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker, on a point of order which goes to relevance: this was a specific question related to a specific award provision related to time off for the donation of blood, which has now been stripped away from the award and the Red Cross has expressed concern about this.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition will not argue the case.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—That is what he should be answering.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The minister is responding to a question with respect to an analysis of award conditions. The question related to the Red Cross and award conditions.WI4Mr REITH—This question is based on the implementation of a policy known as award simplification, which the Labor Party itself supported. The member for Kingsford-Smith, when he was the minister, said this in October 1993:This legislation marks the culmination of the government's break with the past . . .And he went on to say it was specifically in respect of—5T4BRERETONMr Brereton—By negotiation.WI4Mr REITH—Yes, I will come to that point. You specifically said:The amendments are also directed at making awards more streamlined and modern, with detailed prescription about the organisation of work increasingly being a matter for agreements.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker—WI4Mr REITH—Just to finish off before the irrelevant interjections—PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker, on a point of order: the question went straight to the Red Cross's depletion of blood supplies.4G4DOWNERMr Downer—It's a frivolous point of order.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—It is not a frivolous point of order; it is a relevant point of order. You can get away with murder in this place.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition will complete his point of order and not start arguing across the table.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—The point of order goes to relevance. It was a very tight, brief question related to one matter. It did not invite a generalised discussion of awards or past attitudes to them.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition is fully aware that the question was predicated on the change in the award conditions, and the minister is specifically referring to award conditions.WI4Mr REITH—Just to conclude—to perhaps explain the system as it was introduced by Labor to the Leader of the Opposition—the fact of the matter is that you boasted about the number of people who had agreements, in other words, whose agreements were subject to the no disadvantage test to displace the operation of the underlying award.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker—WI4Mr REITH—This really is a frivolous and irrelevant point of order.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition has raised the point of order and, unless he has another one, I have ruled on it: the minister is in order.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—The opening remarks of the question, Mr Speaker, were: are you aware that the Red Cross says it faces a depletion in its stocks of blood because of changes to awards? 10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Leader of the Opposition has raised the point of order on relevance. As long as the minister is responding specifically with respect to the changes in award conditions affecting the specifics, he is in order. He is presently in order. I invite the minister to conclude his reply.WI4Mr REITH—To conclude, the point I make is that in this particular respect we are doing exactly the thing that you yourself said was a good idea. And it is absolutely incredible hypocrisy for you to even put up such a question.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—I call the honourable member for La Trobe.5806MG4LEEMr Lee—Last question, Bob!5806Charles, Bob, MPMr CHARLESOT4LaTrobeLP10—My question without notice is to the Treasurer. And don't you worry about it being my last question. Don't you worry about my being back. The member for La Trobe will be back. You can count on it.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The member will direct his question and not respond to interjections.Opposition members interjecting—10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The members of the opposition will restrain their enthusiasm and allow the member for La Trobe to direct his question.OT4Mr CHARLES—Anyhow, back to the Treasurer. Treasurer, can you please advise the House of the significance of the May retail trade figures? Does the survey support the budget forecast of 3.75 per cent growth for 1997-98?5806Costello, Peter, MPMr COSTELLOCT4HigginsLPTreasurer10—I thank the honourable member for La Trobe for his question and I say, like Douglas MacArthur, `He will return.' The seasonally adjusted retail sales rose by 0.5 per cent in May after rising 0.2 per cent in April. The rise was above market expectations and suggests continuing growth in retail trade in Australia. The outcome is consistent with budget forecasts and reflects largely strong growth in food retailing, clothing and soft goods retailing, and hospitality and services.The trend estimate in relation to retail trade increased in May—its 20th consecutive monthly increase—and that indicates continuing growth in retailing on a sustained basis. Housing approvals, which were also released today, point to healthy continuing economic activity. Although there was a 6.8 per cent fall in May, this followed a 12.1 per cent increase over the previous two months and the trend remains positive. Approvals have risen 8.1 per cent over the year to May. As I said at the time of the release of the March quarter national accounts, which showed exceptionally strong growth in the Australian economy of 4.9 per cent, we were not predicting 4.9 per cent over the course of the year until June 1998 and our budget forecast was 3¾, which would be consistent with the next quarter coming off the record of the March quarter.These figures suggest that retailing is maintaining domestic strength, led principally of course by the low interest rates, which have given savings to average Australians and have come off a low inflation base, and the extent of this government's fiscal rectification of Labor's $10 billion deficit.I make the point, as I have on a number of occasions to this House, that, if this government had not turned around Labor's $10 billion deficit, if we had not got the Australian budget back into the black and if we had not run a proper fiscal policy, we would not have been able to keep inflation low and keep interest rates down for home buyers. Nothing could affect home buyers and small businesses more than Labor's plan to run Australia back into the red and Labor's plan to get Australia back into deficit with unfunded promises and with unfunded tax policies.It is important at a time like this that Australia continues to rectify its budget position, continues to run down and repay Labor debt, and gets the Australian accounts back into a position where we can sustain a low interest rate regime with good spending opportunities, good housing opportunities and good home buying opportunities for young Australians. 58075807Bevis, Arch, MPMr BEVISET4BrisbaneALP00—My question is to the Minister for Defence Industry, Science and Personnel. Minister, in light of the review `Restructuring the Army', which recommended greater reliance be placed on reserve forces, why did you allow the Workplace Relations Act to strip hundreds of awards of their Defence Force training leave provisions, which are needed to enable reservists to participate in ADF training activities? Are you aware that the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry has already rejected an approach to have such leave identified as an award provision in all federal industrial awards? Minister, why has your government asked reservists to spend more time in military training at the same time as it has taken away their award leave provisions that they need in order to do the military training?5807Bishop, Bronwyn, MPMrs BISHOPSE4MackellarLPDefence Industry, Science and Personnel10—Thank you for the question. It is timely that there is a question today regarding the reserves, because today I have literally just come from Sydney where 10,000 reservists and former members of the CMF and reserve are marching, with a great deal of pride, to honour the 50th anniversary of establishment of the reserves. Today, in case you did not know, is Reserve Forces Day. I will be in Brisbane on Sunday when reservists will also march there. The important thing about the reserves is that, yes, there is indeed a reliance on reservists forming an important part of the ADF. There is an important emphasis put by this government on liaising with employers in order that those employers can see the benefit that having a reservist in their employ gives to them.ET4BEVISMr Bevis—Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order. The question was not about reserve day or the anniversary of the formation of the reserves; it was about the government decision to strip leave for reserves out of awards. The minister has not even started to address that point.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The member is expressing an opinion, but the minister is entirely within standing orders in responding to any matter pertaining to the reserves and their terms of service. There is no requirement as long as it is relevant to the question, and the member knows that.SE4Mrs BISHOP—I think the rest of the people in this chamber and the people who watch are getting sick to death of the carping that goes on from the likes of you. The fact of the matter is that the way you treated the defence of this nation was a disgrace. What you left behind and the mess we had to clean up—10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The minister will respond to the question.PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker—10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The minister will respond to the question.SE4Mrs BISHOP—I said yesterday that the Leader of the Opposition forgets his place often, and he is doing it again today.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The minister will ignore interventions and respond to the question.SE4Mrs BISHOP—Very simply, this government is committed to seeing reserves having a very important role to play with the ADF. The question of leave and the question of the value of reservists to employers, which we are promoting, is a question to be negotiated between employers and their employees. Those I saw marching with a great deal of pride today show that this system is working very well. Today, Reserve Forces Day, is a time when we can all celebrate the fact that there are many Australians who give of their time, who give of their energy, to ensure that we can have people who can defend this country.58075807Bartlett, Kerry, MPMr BARTLETT0K6MacquarieLP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs. Can the minister inform the House of the notable initiatives of this government which are coming into force today and in the near future in the social security area? Can the minister contrast this with the actions of the previous Labor government?10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—I point out that the last part of the question is not technically in order because the minister is not responsible for the policies of the previous government.5808Ruddock, Philip, MPMr RUDDOCK0J4BerowraLPImmigration and Multicultural Affairs10—I accept your injunction, Mr Speaker. In fact, I was a severe critic of those policies and would accept no responsibility for them.Mr Beazley interjecting—0J4Mr RUDDOCK—I was shadow minister for social security, as you know. Your colleagues have had some things to say about that from time to time. We have been about introducing a fairer and simpler social security system, one which is better targeted and more consistent and which has significant and improved compliance associated with it. You have already heard from my colleague the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs about the implications of the youth allowance, which comes into operation today. I will not elaborate on that save to say that, of the 560,000 young people affected by it, 153,750 will receive more money and 361,200 will be on the same benefits.PG6MACKLINMs Macklin—How many will lose?0J4Mr RUDDOCK—A very insignificant number by comparison. Overall, Australia benefits significantly by having in place a system which encourages people to upgrade their skills to be able to enter effectively into the work force instead of being encouraged to remain on benefits, as occurred under your government. But I am trying to obey your injunction, Mr Speaker, not to make those comparisons.We also introduced from today the deferred pension bonus plan. That is a very important new initiative. It is one that I took some personal responsibility for encouraging my parties to adopt and is one that ensures that older Australians who choose to work longer will be significantly better off. It gives them a choice, it is voluntary, but it offers them a far more secure retirement. It means that the community as a whole can be better off. Taxpayers will be better off. What it means is that women after age 61 and men after age 65, if they continue to work, will be able to receive a bonus, and if they remain in the work force for five years they will be entitled to a full pension as well as a bonus of $21,250. In the case of a couple, that could be as high as $35,450. It is tax free. It is a very substantial benefit which commences from today, and it is one that I think indicates clearly that we are about addressing issues of ageism, where previously people who had very significant skills and were able to continue in the work force were literally forced out.This is a day when families who have children with disabilities will be considerably better off as well. We have a situation where the domiciliary nursing care benefit will rise by 29 per cent to $75.10 per fortnight. We have a situation where the carer payments will now allow carers to undertake longer absences to study, train and work without losing their benefits. We have a situation where those families with profoundly disabled children will now be able to qualify for a carer payment. We have the provision of influenza injections for pensioners, which is an important related initiative. We have a situation where the families who do not qualify for the child disability allowance but have a child with a less severe disability or a chronic medical condition may be eligible for a health care card to help with the cost of medication and other expenses. That is on top of the very significant record we have in the social security area in relation to the $1 billion family tax initiative, the parenting changes that were introduced from 20 March 1998, the jobs, education and training program, which was extended, and the families that will no longer lose family allowance when their child goes overseas. I could go on and on, but my colleagues would not encourage me to do that.58085808Macklin, Jenny, MPMs MACKLINPG6JagajagaALP00—My question is to the Prime Minister. Prime Minister, what do you say to the Newcastle family which has just been told that their 18-year-old daughter will lose all of her unemployment benefit, her health care card and her public transport concessions due to the introduction of the youth allowance today? How do you explain to this family, where one parent has a chronic illness and the other is earning an ordinary wage, that they have to find an extra $87 a week to support their daughter? How do you explain to their daughter that she now has to pay an extra $39 for her asthma inhaler and full fare on the bus, not to mention the fees that job seekers who are not on social security now will have to pay to get help finding work?10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—This is all hypothetical and I don't—Honourable members interjecting—10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—Just restrain yourselves. The barb of the question, however, is in order. I invite the minister to respond to the consequences of changes that affect a particular individual in the manner identified.5809Howard, John, MPMr HOWARDZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—Mr Speaker—PE4BEAZLEYMr Beazley—Mr Speaker, you ruled out a part of this question as hypothetical. The point of order is that, as I understand it, the example has already been read into Hansard with the appropriate details by the member for the area. There is nothing hypothetical about the example.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—I have asked the Prime Minister to respond to the question, although I still doubt the degree to which facts that are contended are necessarily realistic. The Prime Minister will respond to the question.FI4MORRISMr Allan Morris—Mr Speaker, I take a point of order. I am happy to show you the correspondence privately, because names are involved, to confirm. It is not hypothetical.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The honourable member knows there are a set of contentions which may or may not be accurate. I am suggesting that the Prime Minister respond to the substance of the question. I call the Prime Minister to do so.ZD4Mr HOWARD—I will analyse the details of the case that has been put to me by the member for Jagajaga, as I do with all such cases, and if there is anything I can specifically say about it, I will.I take the opportunity afforded by the honourable member's question to say a few things about the youth allowance. I inform the House that, of the 560,000 young people covered by the youth allowance, payments for 361,200 will remain unchanged, and that is 64 per cent; payments for 153,750 will increase—I repeat: payment for 153,750 will rise—and that is 27½ per cent; and payment for 45,000 will reduce or cut out entirely, which is eight per cent.I remind the House of the philosophy behind the youth allowance. The philosophy is about altering the incentive so that people will choose work and training rather than the dole. We had a very interesting illustration today—and I want every member of the House and those present in the gallery to listen to this very careful reflection by the member for Batman which reveals the philosophy of the Australian Labor Party towards the dole. This is what he had to say in answer to a searching question from Gareth McCray on radio station 2KY. I ask all members to listen very carefully to this. He said:. . . and I say, you know, they—meaning those receiving the unemployment benefits—are entitled to see their mates now and then and it is not a question of trying to keep them at home in front of the TV, you actually want them to be out there mixing with people and being socially oriented so an employer wants to employ them.In other words, the philosophy of the dole is that you provide them with an alternative lifestyle of living on the dole. That is what you are on about. You are on about providing people with an alternative lifestyle of living on the dole, whereas the purpose of our youth allowance is to provide an additional expenditure of $212 million. The youth allowance does not involve saving expenditure. Those who sit opposite would have you believe that the youth allowance is about cutting expenditure. The youth allowance is not about cutting expenditure; the youth allowance is about altering the attitude to the dole in the Australian community.The youth allowance is about saying to young people, `We want you to choose staying at school, going into a job or going into training instead of going onto the dole.' Under the policies of the Labor Party, going on the dole and staying on the dole was a real live option that they actually encouraged, whereas under the philosophy of my party the purpose of the youth allowance is to do the exact opposite. I reject the claims made by those who sit opposite. The youth allowance is about altering those incentives. The youth allowance is about encouraging young people to stay at school, to train or to seek a job in preference to going on the dole.58105810Andrew, Neil, MPMr ANDREWHE4WakefieldLP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Transport and Regional Development. Can the minister inform the House how today's abolition of Labor's avgas tax will benefit regional and remote Australia?5810Vaile, Mark, MPMr VAILESU5LyneNPTransport and Regional Development10—I thank the honourable member for Wakefield for his question. I am sure that there are a lot of aviation operators and consumers in his area who are going to benefit from today's announcement by our government—that is, that the unfair avgas tax has been abolished from today, 1 July. This is the first instalment of our government's commitment to taxation reform in Australia. This was an unfair tax—a tax which levied some $17 million at a rate of about 13c a litre. The people who will benefit the most from the abolition of this tax are the people in the bush, the general aviation operators in rural and remote Australia.YU5TANNERMr Tanner—Their landing charges are going up.SU5Mr VAILE—They have been paying the tax on avgas, but rarely, if ever, using Airservices Australia's services that this tax was going to pay for. That is what the member for Melbourne is interjecting about. It is important to note that the people paying this tax were not necessarily using the services it was going to pay for. So we have abolished this tax and we are going to see a much fairer regime in its place. This means real savings for farmers in the electorate of the member for Wakefield. Abolishing the avgas tax will keep down the cost of using aircraft to spread fertilisers, spray crops and muster stock. It will mean savings of up to $10,000 per plane per year to rural and remote operators of air services. For every GA operator, it is 13c per litre off their annual avgas bill forever. It has been abolished and people should recognise this.This decision has been welcomed by industry. I received a fax—and the Labor Party are good at quoting local constituents—interest ingly, from a company in the electorate of the member for Wakefield. It is from Loxton Engineering Works, which operates light aircraft and sells produce into regional South Australia. The fax said:Minister, we recognise and applaud your work in eliminating the unfair Airservices avgas levy.We operate a light aircraft in our agricultural manufacturing and sales business over much of rural Australia.The fuel levy in the past has forced us to pay for services we did not use.After 1 July 1998 we can select and pay only for the services we require.Our appreciation to you and the Coalition Government.That fax from Loxton Engineering Works in the Riverland is a sign of the understanding in rural and remote Australia of the commitment of the Howard-Fischer government to taxation reform that provides fairness to rural and remote Australia.58105810Campbell, Graeme, MPMr CAMPBELLCF4KalgoorlieIND00—My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister. Deputy Prime Minister, you gave as one reason why you cannot do anything about Canadian pork imports the fact that we have an 8:1 trade surplus in relation to Canada, when in fact we have a $100 million trade deficit. Under these circumstances, don't you think it is unlikely that Canada would curtail its purchase of Australian sugar when it is the best, cleanest and cheapest sugar they can get in the world? Don't you think it is most unlikely that, under those circumstances, they would act against it?5810Fischer, Tim, MPMr TIM FISCHERDG4FarrerNPTrade; Deputy Prime Minister10—I thank the member for Kalgoorlie for his question. He raises the difficulties being faced by the pork industry—and I might add the citrus industry. I say at the outset that the government recognises that there is no such thing as a level playing field and we deal within that parameter to help industry. In fact, taxpayers of Australia have given a $28 million leg-up for both the pork and the citrus industries by giving them help where it is needed, particularly in facilitating their longer term export strategy. The problem is the short-term, and I accept that. What have we done there? We have announced a safe guards measure under article 19, which was not activated by our predecessors but which is being activated on a generic basis with the first reference being specific to the pork industry, and the Treasurer has now signed the reference to allow that to go ahead.To come to the particularity of the question, it is a fact that overall trade is in balance between Australia and Canada, but on agricultural goods we enjoy a surplus with Canada of about 8:1. With regard to the world, I point out that Australian farmers are so efficient that they produce five times more than we can consume in Australia, so the economic keys of hope for our farmers are represented by viably exporting to the world the other four-fifths. The House might like to know the pig meat exports, both wild and farm, from July 1997 to February 1998 country by country—I just happen to have this with me. Some $18 million worth of pork is being exported to Japan. I was at a piggery near Corowa last week seeing containers being loaded with high quality Australian brand-marked pork going to Japan. That is an expanding trade, which I welcome. We export to China, Korea and New Zealand as well. I admire and recognise the efforts by our pork industry to boost their exports. They recognise they need to do more and they need the chance to do so more. Exports to New Zealand were $4 million. Exports to Holland in Europe were $2.4 million. Exports even to the Russian federation were $2.7 million, as that economy comes back into line. Exports to France and Germany totalled over $7 million. My colleague John Anderson, the Prime Minister, John Howard, and I recognise fully that the pork and citrus industries are in a very difficult part of their cycle. We have no magic wands and we have no false solutions for them, but we do have specific targeted help to boost their export efforts, including from the Queensland pork industry, to the world.Finally, it is the sugar industry itself which has voiced concern about what Canada may or may not do. I do not make any specific comment on that, other than to say that at this stage it is in essence hypothetical. We are going about this in a workman-like way so that the action that may or may not be taken based on the commission inquiry will be unchallengeable by Canada or anybody else.58115811Georgiou, Petro, MPMr GEORGIOUHM5KooyongLP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs. I refer the minister to suggestions by some parties that Australia adopt a zero net immigration policy. Can the minister advise the House on the implications for Australia of such a policy being adopted?5811Ruddock, Philip, MPMr RUDDOCK0J4BerowraLPImmigration and Multicultural Affairs10—I thank the honourable member for Kooyong for his question on this matter. His undoubted interest and expertise in this area is well known. I welcome the opportunity to have something to say about the nature and scope of the immigration program and the views that we can move to a situation which is loosely described as `net zero migration'. The first point I would make is that the immigration program we have today is about half the size that it was 10 years ago. It has been very significantly reduced. At the moment there are 68,000 in the immigration program, with 12,000 refugee places. It is a rebalanced program; one which is highly skilled. It is a program that has been—if I can coin the phrase—`de-shammed'. What happened before under our predecessors, particularly in the family reunion area, was that we had considerable scope for abuse which allowed many people to enter Australia who were not in bona fide relationships.Today we have a very tightly administered family reunion program. It is a program in which 70 per cent have an English language capacity before they arrive in Australia and the balance have an opportunity to obtain it under our adult migrant English training programs which are in place. Those programs are in place to meet the needs of those people who require them.Opposition members interjecting—0J4Mr RUDDOCK—I do not wish to invoke the Speaker's injunction, but let me make it very clear that we provided additional support for training in the adult migrant education program—DT4CREANMr Crean—Only in the forward estimates.0J4Mr RUDDOCK—Yes, additional support in the forward estimates. We are running forward an additional $4 million for this year, last year and another two years forward. That is to deal specifically with those who have had difficulty in obtaining entry to those programs because they have come as refugees and are not necessarily able to enter into structured education programs.The point I want to make is that we have significantly addressed the abuse that was in the program. We have significantly addressed the balancing of that program. Those who talk about an alternative of net zero migration need to understand that they are talking about an immigration program of 30,000 people. How do you get to a program of 30,000 people? We heard today that one way you do it—because you do not want to say that you will not welcome refugees—is that you say, `We will provide temporary entry. Wait until you want to go back. But, if your children are born in Australia, they will be Australian.' I do not know how it can be characterised as temporary entry.CF4CAMPBELLMr Campbell—That's not so.0J4Mr RUDDOCK—I was not sure who to believe, Graeme, in relation to that. I heard the honourable member for Oxley make one comment and I heard an alleged spokesman say something else. I suppose if I need an adviser sitting beside me to answer the questions, the adviser ought to be sitting in the chair. But the fact is that the adviser put one view and the member for Oxley put another. I take it that the member for Oxley has a view, and that is that refugee children ought to be Australian. That is the comment that was put. But the fact is that what she is saying is, `We won't count refugees as part of the program.' That is how we can get it down to 30,000.What does she say about the balance? She says 60 per cent will be `close family reunion'. That means 20,000. I have to tell you that `close family reunion'—if you include a wife, a de facto partner or a fiance—numbers 24,000 under the program that we have put down for this year. That is demand driven. If you include their dependent children you have got another 2,000. So there are at least 4,000 people in close family relationships without any of the others such as last remaining relatives, special need relatives and orphaned children—there are a range of them—who would not be able to obtain entry to Australia. She says in relation to the balance that there would be 20 per cent for business migration and 20 per cent for skilled migration. What she is saying in effect is that instead of a skilled migration program of 30,000 which is highly beneficial to Australia, she would have a program of 10,000. What she would effectively be doing is what Mr Campbell once described to me as the `deskilling of Australia'. Something of the order of 30,000 young Australians, highly trained young Australians, leave Australia each year. What she would say in relation to the immigration program is that we should make sure that, essentially, unskilled people dominate it, and that skilled people who are able to obtain work, who are able to generate additional economic activity and who would create jobs for Australians are not able to come.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—I suggest the minister draw his answer to a conclusion.0J4Mr RUDDOCK—I have to tell you that not only do the figures not add up; now that we have got more detailed explanations, the situation is that the views that are being put are quite absurd as well.58125812Crosio, Janice, MPMrs CROSIO7T4ProspectALP00—My question is directed to the Prime Minister. Prime Minister, why do you want to tax Australian families with a hidden GST every time they need a routine household service? How will you compensate them when they have got to pay an extra 10 per cent when the toilet blocks up, when the TV breaks down, when the washing machine blows up and when the car needs a service? Prime Minister, what if those bills come in the same month as the phone bill, the electricity bill, the gas bill, the rates, the car insurance and registration and the household insurance? Isn't your GST going to cost Australian families hundreds of dollars a year just for basic household services?5813Howard, John, MPMr HOWARDZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—This is from somebody who supports a tax system that says when you go into the kitchen you tax detergent and other cleaners. Not feeling as though you should leave it at that, you tax flavoured milk, you tax fruit juice, biscuits, ice-cream, cutlery, the fridge, the dishwasher, the cooker and the microwave. They are all taxed at 12 per cent. Milk—VD4EVANSMr Gareth Evans—Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order on relevance. We all know the Prime Minister is rattled at the moment, but he really ought to understand the difference between goods and services, and the question was about service.4G4DOWNERMr Downer—They've been bored by him; never rattled.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The Deputy Leader is now not making a point of order. If you do not raise your point of order you will not make an intervention across the table. The Prime Minister will remain relevant to the question.ZD4Mr HOWARD—The Minister for Foreign Affairs said people have been bored by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, but never ever rattled. I say to the member for Prospect that her question is all of a piece with the pattern of questions that have been asked by the opposition. I understand the little game that you are playing. The Australian public know that it is a game. The Australian public will make a judgment on our tax policy when it comes out.I lead a coalition that, unlike the Australian Labor Party, has the courage to tackle serious issues. I lead a coalition that does not go around scaring people. I lead a coalition that is willing to take on long-term economic reform and, despite any short-term political criticism and despite any short-term political adversity, I continue—7T4CROSIOMrs Crosio—Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order under standing order 145, as to relevance. My question was very specific, Mr Prime Minister: will you or will you not tax Australian families on ordinary household services?10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The member for Prospect will resume her seat. The Prime Minister is answering the question within the ambit of the question put to him.ZD4Mr HOWARD—I would say to the House that I do not intend to be deterred by short-term political circumstances, or by the scare tactics of the opposition, from pursuing my commitment and the commitment of my government to bring to Australian families and to the Australian community long-overdue taxation reform. We remain committed to reforming the Australian taxation system. You can run the frivolous scare campaign; you can enjoy yourselves in the luxury of asking these questions but, when the policy comes out, the Australian people will say that the coalition stands for fairness, and the Labor Party and One Nation look backward into Australia's past.58135813Cobb, Michael, MPMr COBBMF4ParkesNP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Customs and Consumer Affairs. The minister would be aware of concern amongst the citrus, pork and paper industries about the need to have access to speedy anti-dumping provisions. Can the minister advise the House how soon it will be before Australian industries can use the government's new anti-dumping measures?5813Truss, Warren, MPMr TRUSSGT4Wide BayNPCustoms and Consumer Affairs10—I thank the honourable member for Parkes for his question and I commend him on his keen interest in providing a fair trading environment for primary producers and other industries within his electorate and around Australia. Last week the Senate passed the government's new anti-dumping legislation. As a result, Australian industry will now be protected from unfair dumped or subsidised products in the fastest and fairest way in the world. We have delivered on another government election promise. There will be a commitment—a final decision—in 155 days where there are complaints of dumping or subsidisation of products coming into this country, and there will be interim duties available at day 60.Let us contrast what this government has actually achieved with the position of the Labor Party. The honourable member for Hotham—who is very keen at giving advice on these matters—said, when he was defend ing the system introduced by Labor, that it could not be done any faster. It could not be done any faster when Labor was in government but, when they went into opposition, he accused us of being too slow at bringing this new system into place. It is now in place; this government has acted. But where is the Labor Party now? I was amazed, after all of the advice that the member for Hotham has been given, that his union masters put out a media release yesterday demanding that the government delay the introduction of this legislation. The CFMEU and the Tasmanian AMWU want the legislation delayed. So where does the member for Hotham stand now? Is it too fast or is it too slow?I can assure the citrus growers, the pork growers and the workers in the paper industry that we will not be taking the advice of the trade union movement. We will be implementing this legislation immediately. In fact, the new anti-dumping system is open for business. If there are industries in Australia which believe that their products are being damaged by unfair imports that have been subsidised or dumped, we are ready to hear their case and to deliver appropriate and fair protection for those industries.58145814Lawrence, Carmen, MPDr LAWRENCEXS4FremantleALP00—My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister admit that his new hidden GST is going to make school holidays far more expensive for Australian families? With his GST on footy tickets, food, the program, public transport and a supporters cap, won't a day at the footy cost a family of four around another $10 in tax? Won't an afternoon at the movies and McDonald's—with tickets, popcorn and the rest—cost a family almost another $10? And won't a weekend camping in a national park—with entry fees, camping permit, tent hire and so on—cost around another $20 with the new hidden GST? Prime Minister, while these amounts might not mean much to you on your salary, how can you deny that they will really hurt ordinary families?10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The member for Swan will not be exhibiting signs in the House. Nor will the member for Franklin.5814Howard, John, MPMr HOWARDZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—I thank the honourable member for Fremantle for her question. My reply to the honourable member is that the entire Australian community will be greatly benefited by our tax reform package.58145814Hockey, Joe, MPMr HOCKEYDK6North SydneyLP10—My question is addressed to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Are you aware of intentions by the Israeli government to expand the municipal borders of the disputed boundaries of Jerusalem? What effect will this unilateral decision by the Netanyahu government have on the faltering Middle East peace process, and what is the response of the Australian government to that decision?5814Downer, Alexander, MPMr DOWNER4G4MayoLPForeign Affairs10—I thank the honourable member for North Sydney for his question. The honourable member for North Sydney is one of many members on this side of the House who show a great deal of interest in important international issues. I do not think the honourable member for Kingsford-Smith should nod in agreement because he has not asked a question of me all year—and it is now July.Mr Gareth Evans interjecting—4G4Mr DOWNER—No mock indignation from you. You are the chairman of the tactics committee and you don't ever give him a question. The Australian government is concerned at the recent announcement that the Israeli government has partially approved plans to expand the boundaries of Jerusalem, a move that could see land currently classified as being in the West Bank brought under Jerusalem's direct municipal authority. We have repeatedly expressed the view that unilateral action on the ground by either side only serves to complicate the very difficult negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. The expansion of Jerusalem to take in Jewish settlements in the West Bank would constitute such a unilateral action of concern. The United States, the European Union and the United Nations Secretary-General himself have expressed similar concerns about the potential of such a decision to complicate negotiations.Our policy has been, and remains, that the status of Jerusalem should be negotiated as part of final status negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Again, as I did on my recent visit to the region, I urge all those involved to redouble their efforts to ensure that the Middle East peace process regains the momentum which, frankly, it has lost.ZD4HOWARDMr Howard—Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper .Personal Explanations581515:09:005815Downer, Alexander, MPMr DOWNER4G4MayoLPForeign Affairs10—Mr Speaker, I wish to make a personal explanation.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—Does the honourable member claim to have been misrepresented?4G4Downer, Alexander, MPMr DOWNER—Yes.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—Please proceed.4G4Downer, Alexander, MPMr DOWNER—In a newspaper article today in the Australian , written by Robert Garran, the foreign affairs writer, there was a heading `Habibie to host critic Downer'. The article said that President Habibie was a man whom I said six weeks ago would not be remotely acceptable to the Indonesian opposition. This is a distortion, to say the least, of what I actually said. In an interview on 6PR in Perth I talked about the announcement, the resignation by President Suharto and the proposals that he was putting in place. In my comments I said:And I am not here reflecting on the Vice President—who was then Dr Habibie, which was of course left out of the quote in the Australian —but I just want to make the point that I doubt those opponents of the regime, what we might call the opposition groups in Indonesia, would regard that as a remotely acceptable solution.I went on to make the critical point:See, they do not just want—It is not just the personality, it is the system and I think there is very much a sense now in Indonesia that there has to be reform of the system. That is to be done in a constitutional way.10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—The members standing in the aisles will resume their seats.4I4McLEAYMr Leo McLeay—Mr Speaker, I was about to raise a point of order and draw your atten tion to the plot meeting, but obviously you picked it up.4G4Downer, Alexander, MPMr DOWNER—Of course I did not regard the appointment of Dr Habibie himself as not remotely acceptable; I made the point that it was critically important that there be reform of the system, not just changes of personalities. I think that was very clear from the remarks I made on 6PR.Documents58155815Reith, Peter, MPMr REITHWI4FlindersLPWorkplace Relations and Small Business10—A paper is tabled as listed in the schedule circulated to honourable members. Details of the paper will be recorded in the Votes and Proceedings and Hansard .The schedule read as follows—Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs—National report on schooling in Australia—1996.Bills5815r58815:11:005815Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEYHQ5MacarthurLPFinance and Administration10—I present the explanatory memorandum to the Superannuation Legislation (Commonwealth Employment) Repeal and Amendment (Consequential Amendments) Bill 1998 .QI4PRICEMr Price—Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order. Should not the explanatory memorandum be tabled with the bill, not after the bill?10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—A minister has the capacity to table papers at any time other than in the adjournment.QI4PRICEMr Price—Surely we are owed an explanation.Questions to the Speaker581558155815McClelland, Robert, MPMr McCLELLANDJK6BartonALP00—I have a question for you, Mr Speaker. During question time I observed two members of the government, when the member for Fremantle was asking her question, displaying a sign. My understanding from a ruling in the other place is that, just as it is unparliamentary for a mem ber to utter certain words, it is similarly unparliamentary for a member to display unparliamentary language. Mr Speaker, would you please direct those government members accordingly?5816Mr SPEAKERMr SPEAKER10000PON/A10—You might turn around and ask your colleague to desist from doing exactly the same thing. On whichever side of the House members display words, they are out of order. I identified the member for Swan for having displayed signs and the member for Franklin has just done exactly the same thing. Interjections of any sort are out of order.Matters of Public Importance5816581610000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—I have received a letter from the honourable member for Holt (Mr Gareth Evans) proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:The need for tax reform which is genuinely in the interests of all Australians.I call upon those 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—15:13:005816Evans, Gareth, MPMr GARETH EVANSVD4HoltALP00—In a few days or a few weeks or a few months—the timing, I suppose, depends on whether the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) fears his deputy the Treasurer (Mr Costello) more or the voters more—we will see, as a prelude to the election campaign, the long-delayed release of the coalition's tax package. The centrepiece of that tax package will of course be that very GST which John Howard said three years ago he would `never ever' introduce, which he said two years ago was not on the agenda—vamoose, kaput—and which just 18 months ago the Treasurer was describing as `snake oil'. We are happy to start that debate about that package at any time and wish only that the government had been honest enough to start it months ago by putting its options, its analyses and its ideas on the table for public discussion rather than playing out old political rituals of concealment and grandstanding, of which ordinary Australians are growing increasingly sick and tired.The Labor Party is in favour of tax reform—tax reform which is in the interests of all Australians and which is fair to all Australians. To the extent that the government's package does contain specific proposals or initiatives which are consistent with our thinking and our planning, we will happily embrace them. At the very least we will look at them with a very open mind. That is true, for example, in relation to the issue—the problem—of very high effective marginal tax rates for low and middle income earners, which are caused by the interaction of the social security and taxation systems that we are planning to fix with our own working families tax credit. To the extent that the coalition's tax package happens to contain some serious measures to address tax evasion and tax avoidance—particularly by high wealth and high income individuals through family trusts like Senator Parer's—we will certainly not be critical, rather we will be applauding it. But, given the coalition's absolutely appalling record to date on attacking tax avoidance, we will not be holding our breath.The truth of the matter is that none of these sorts of reforms will be at the heart of the coalition's tax package. That will be the new tax, the new hidden tax—the GST which John Howard said he would never ever introduce. It is a tax unprecedented in Australia—unprecedented in the degree of unfairness it will involve for low and middle income families—and it is absolutely unredeemed by any contribution it can possibly make to the overall health and efficiency of the Australian economy.It is also a tax about which a lot of the government's own backbenchers are getting very cold feet—because of that unfairness. Few have been more publicly honest about it than the member for Eden-Monaro (Mr Nairn). When asked in May by his local paper, the Post Examiner, whether he supported a GST, he said, `I don't know if I support a GST, but I do support a fairer based system.' But, then again, I suppose Gary Nairn's reluctance to support the GST could be because, if it comes in, he will have to charge an extra 20c on top of the $2 that he has been putting out as the requirement for pensioner morning teas.What can we reasonably assume about the shape of the coalition's tax package on the basis of all the leaks and the massaging, and the hints dropped to favourite columnists and reporters that we have been seeing so far? It seems reasonable to assume that what we will see as the central elements in the package are these things: a flat rate GST of up to 12½ per cent; a hidden GST, with the amount of the tax not at all visible to the consumer; a GST which will inevitably rise; a GST with minimal exemptions and exclusions; a GST involving a significant shift in the tax burden, with high income individuals and big business the big winners; a GST which purports to compensate low income earners for its adverse impact upon them and to pay for tax breaks elsewhere, all of which, however little justified, will be emphasised with a huge amount of glitz and fanfare. And we can expect to see a GST plus direct tax-cut package which will probably require a significant raiding of the budget surplus in order to pay for it.The bottling and the packaging of all this will involve the greatest concentration of snake oil seen since the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories was in its heyday. But, for all the glittering packaging and all the breathless commentary that we expect to accompany it, this will remain a snake oil package. However attractive bits of it may look at first sight, the only thing in it that will be certain will be the introduction of a GST. Everything else will be in the `perhaps' or the `maybe' or `if you're lucky' class—in particular, the stability of the rate and the effectiveness and longevity of the compensation package. The GST is the core promise; everything else will be non-core, subject to the circumstances of the time.Why is this a snake oil package? It becomes very clear when you go through each of the elements of it that I have mentioned. It will be, for a start, a flat rate GST—and any flat rate tax is inherently regressive and unfair to lower and middle income earners. An extra $10 a day for a family day at the football or the movies might not be much of a hurt for a doctor, a lawyer, a politician or a Prime Minister, but it sure as hell hurts for a process worker's family or anyone else on a low income.That unfairness is compounded when you realise just how much the new GST will impact on low income budgets—because of course it is the case that lower income people consume a vastly higher proportion of their income than do high income people; it is also true that very low income people consume as much as 40 per cent of their income on food, whereas the ratio for higher income earners is around 10 per cent; it is also true that lower income earners consume, on average, one-third of their income on rent, which is nothing like the case for higher income earners. That is leaving out unavoidable gas, electricity, telephone, postage and public transport costs, and all the rest.Flattening down the present wholesale sales tax rate will be manifestly unfair as well. As we have seen in this place recently, someone buying a new top-of-the-line Mercedes under the new regime will get a $61,000 tax break, whereas a family buying a used Commodore from a caryard will have to pay out a new tax of around $300.The second thing about the tax is that it will be hidden. The Treasurer has confirmed in recent days to this parliament that the GST will be embedded in the price of goods and services—which means nothing more or less than it will not be disclosed on price tags for consumers to see. This makes, of course, complete nonsense of one of the major arguments about the present system, the wholesale sales tax system, which is equally embedded in the price of goods. This not only takes away one of the major arguments of the government against the present system, but of course it will make it easier for the rates to be increased in the future.That is the third thing to say about this package—it will be an inevitably rising GST. The government knows—it confirmed this week through the Attorney-General (Mr Williams)—that no Australian parliament can bind its successor, can stop it changing any law that it makes. You cannot entrench a tax rate at a particular level, and nor can you entrench any particular procedure for example to require the states to be party to any increase in the rate. In any event, the idea that the states could be the guardians of some initial GST rate begs all historical experience. They have never had difficulty agreeing if there is extra revenue involved for them, when it is collected by the Commonwealth and when they can hide behind a collective decision.Just about every country that has had a GST—21 out of the 23 recorded OECD countries, for a start—has seen those rates rise, inevitably rise: in New Zealand, up from 10 to 12½ per cent; in the UK, from 10 to 17½ per cent; in Denmark, from 10 to 25 per cent. Any promise to hold the GST at its initial rate can only be just another non-core promise.It will be a GST with minimum exemptions and zero rating. That has been made clear. The Treasurer has been determined from the outset to keep it that way. He has refused to identify as an exclusion even health and education services. He has not denied in this place that the GST will apply to food, clothing, rent, new houses, local government rates, community services, non-profit community organisations and to scores of other areas where huge annual costs are involved for ordinary families.It will be a GST involving a significant shift in the tax burden. Just as `the higher a GST is, the more unfair it is', so it is the case that, the more it is used to pay for direct tax cuts, the more unfair it necessarily is. Having poor people pay at the checkout counter for income tax cuts for the rich is about as low and unfair as any tax system can descend.At the very least there will be a shift in the tax burden from big business to households. The President of the Business Council—that well-known pauper, Stan Wallis, responsible for the $4 million ad campaign in support of the government on this issue—did not conceal the point when he said, `The GST holds out the prospect of significant reductions in the indirect tax burden currently borne by busi ness.' Since he was not advocating any overall reduction in the tax take, that can only mean that what business does not have to pay households will. There will also be a major shift in the compliance burden to small business: 75,000 collection points will increase to well over one million; average annual costs to small business will be $7,000; there will be 30 times the degree of extra burden for small business as compared with big business in making all this work.The GST package will no doubt involve a pretence at compensation. Every time any government anywhere in the world has gone down this path, it has made such a pretence. The coalition is no exemption, floating a whole variety of ways through direct tax cuts and pension increases and goodness knows what else by which all this will occur. As Francis Sullivan, from the Australian Catholic Health Care Association, very graphically put it:Reports that the Howard Government is planning compensation handouts to ease opposition to a GST is a frank admission that the tax is unfair.Because it is so unfair in its impact, it needs all these measures to begin to compensate people for the extra costs involved. The big question is whether that compensation, once granted, will stay effective over time. In New Zealand, when the GST rate increased from 10 per cent to 12½ per cent, there was no new compensation package. The government subsequently made a whole series of large cuts to social security benefits, introducing user pays charges, changing and flattening the tax rates in a way that has made it there, as seen in so many other countries, horrendously unfair.It is a tax package which will depend on the budget surplus in order for it to be fully delivered. That has become clear too from what is on the record. The government will no doubt be hanging on this Christmas tree of a GST a whole range of baubles, bangles, beads and diversions in order to take people's attention away from its basic impact—so many that the whole tree is in danger of falling over. There is every likelihood, as a result, that in order for this package to be paid for there will have to be some raid on the budget surpluses which are now projected. If they are relying on the surpluses to deliver that, then Australian taxpayers and the Australian community may once again have another think coming when it comes to the enjoyment of these so-called baubles, bangles and beads. Given the present condition of the Australian economy, the outlook in Asia, the predictions of every economist in the business as to what will happen in the future, you would be a very brave person indeed to imagine that these surpluses will survive at their present rate and be capable of generating the kinds of direct tax cuts the government is undoubtedly going to be promising.Finally, there is the point that there is no redeeming economic justification for all of this. It is an important element in everything the government has been saying that it is somehow the responsible economic thing to be doing to be introducing this; that, whatever people's personal concerns might be about the impact of a GST upon them, they really ought to subordinate those personal concerns in the larger national economic interest and reform a tax system that, as the government claims, is hopelessly out of date. The truth of the matter is that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the Australian tax system, nothing to make it fundamentally out of kilter with tax systems prevailing elsewhere and no reason at all for anyone to feel guilty about opposing a GST on its merits.Let me say why. There is no relationship anywhere in the world between the presence or absence of a GST and the basic health of the economy. The United States is the healthiest economy in the world and it has no GST or anything like it. We hear from the Treasurer about Swaziland and Botswana. When do we hear about the United States? Secondly, a GST is no help at all when it comes to job creation in the services sector, where most of our hope must be for rapid future employment growth. Whatever case may be said to exist for introducing a new tax on services at a time of economic prosperity—there are many reasons why you should not, but if that case can be made—you would have to say that now is the worst possible time to be creating new discouragements to job creation.It is also the worst possible time to be creating a new inflationary tax, with anxiety growing about the price impact of the depreciation of the Australian dollar. Professor Warren, Mr Howard's favourite economist, estimated last year that a 10 per cent GST with a comprehensive base would add 5.6 per cent to the CPI. What a time to be going down that particular path! Again, taking these economic arguments one by one, a GST would on the evidence of Treasury secretary, Ted Evans, not do anything to improve national saving—probably our basic biggest structural economic problem. Again, on the evidence of the Treasurer's own former adviser and now deputy head of his taxation task force, a GST will not have any beneficial effect on our trade. Again, there is no credible basis on which you can say that a GST would ensure better taxation of the black economy. Whatever you pick up going out is going to be well and truly outweighed by new kinds of transactions coming into the black economy, as the Canadian experience among many others amply demonstrates. To add to the mindlessness of it all, the OECD is one among many analysts now pointing to the difficulty of relying on collecting a tax in the future in an environment of exploding electronic commerce. We are having this argument at a very time when this particular kind of taxation is rapidly heading into obsolescence.The Labor Party is an active and willing participant in the tax debate. We are in favour of tax reform. We are wholly in favour of tax reform measures that are genuinely beneficial to Australia and to the great mass of ordinary Australians who are willing to contribute their fair share. (Time expired)15:28:005819Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEYHQ5MacarthurLPFinance and Administration10—During the course of the last 15 minutes I have looked at the terms of the matter of public importance. I have done it time and time again. It has been submitted by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition (Mr Gareth Evans) and it reads:The need for tax reform which is genuinely in the interests of all Australians. The only argument in those 15 minutes that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition put up was that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with our tax system. That is the one point that he has made in 15 minutes that made any sense. The rest was simply a stroll down memory lane. It was called `what if'. He may as well have spent 15 minutes talking about what he is going to do if it rains on Saturday, because that is all the relevance that was in the remarks that he gave in this debate.He takes up the time of the House by suggesting that there is a need for tax reform which is in the interests of all Australians, and he makes one fundamental point; and that one fundamental point is that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the tax system. That clearly indicates just how bereft of ideas the Labor Party are on this issue, how they want to continue to bury their head in the sand on this issue, as they did for 13 years when their union mates would not let them make any move on one or two occasions during those 13 years, particularly in 1985, when the Deputy Leader of the Opposition was one of the few people on the then government ranks who were prepared to look at a broad based indirect tax. Unfortunately, the political masters of the Labor Party said, `It is not on. Forget it. Bury it.'It would be abundantly clear to all Australians, particularly those who watched television in the last few weeks, that there are some fundamental problems with the tax system. It is not serving this community, it is not serving the Australian people; it is simply moving to a point where it will break down hopelessly, where all of those incentives that Australians should have the right to expect in their daily lives will be stripped from them. It is fast moving to the point where it will simply collapse. With that in mind, the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) has advanced the need for fundamental tax reform in a very sensible, very logical and very proper manner. He has set up the options and the principles, having asked for options that blended with the principles.It is appropriate for us to examine the principles under which the government is currently working on fundamental tax reform. The first principle is that there should be no increase in the overall tax burden. I want to contrast what this government will do with what the previous Labor government did when it increased the overall tax burden. When the union mates in 1985 knocked over the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, the current Leader of the Opposition (Mr Beazley) and the then Treasurer, when they said that there was no way that they could proceed to a broad based indirect tax, the then Labor government said, `But we need more money.'So what did we see? Firstly, we saw some changes to the tax system with fringe benefits tax introduced. Secondly, we saw a capital gains tax introduced which brought in additional revenue. We saw a $6 million advertising campaign, promotional campaign, to explain to the Australian people those new taxes which Labor introduced because they could not make fundamental change at that time. We have seen how badly those taxes, let alone the myriad other taxes that are in the present system, have served the Australian community in recent years. We know that Labor stands for new taxes, increased taxes.In 1993, the year which shall ever be held in the halls of shame of the Labor Party for lying when they made promises to the Australian people, they said there would be no new taxes, no increase in taxes. But we know that the moment they got into government in 1993 the promises that they made about no new taxes, no increases in taxes and cuts in taxes—which they said they would entrench in l-a-w, law—changed directly, changed in backflip fashion, to there being increases in the wholesale sales tax. We saw the rate of 10 per cent increase up to 12 per cent, the rate of 20 per cent increase up to 22 per cent and the rate of 40 per cent increase up to 42 per cent. And those seven taxes, which are not understood by the Australian people and which apply to almost every item on the supermarket shelf, were dealt with, played with, again.We then saw the Labor government decide that the time was right to strike the people of western Sydney, and the fuel excise was increased. The cost of petrol, the cost of moving, the cost of getting to your job through those roads of western Sydney and the outer suburbs of the other capital cities of Australia and the cost of moving vehicles in the country areas of Australia were increased by way of excise taxes. The exact opposite of what was promised occurred.When we say there will be no increase in the overall tax burden, let me assure the House that that is the way in which we are undertaking this reform. That is the way in which we are asking the task force to provide us with options. We believe that it is up to governments to trim their own cloth, to live within their means, to not spend what they have not got and to not turn simply to the Australian people whenever they see that there is a demand or need—usually from a squeaky minority group, which Labor always gave in to. You cannot just find the money. When Labor could not find the money they brought in new taxes. They were not prepared to live within their means, and that is why we got ourselves into the unholy mess of debt and deficit which this government has addressed and fixed up.The second principle under which the options are being prepared for government is that any new taxation system should involve major reductions in personal income tax, with special regard to the taxation treatment of families. Many new initiatives come in today, 1 July, that will benefit the Australian people, not the least of which are some benefits for ordinary families through savings. There are some tax deductions for savings for ordinary families, whether it be in their superannuation or in any other particular investment they might have.We have also delivered $1 billion to families. We recognise that they are special people in the Australian community. We recognise the role that they play in making this the country that it is. Rest assured that we recognise also that people on ordinary average weekly earnings will by about 2000 or 2001 have to pay tax at the highest rate. By 2000 or 2001 they will have to pay every second dollar to the Commissioner of Taxation. That is Labor's system. That is the system we inherited. That is the system they had 13 years to fix up. They say they represent ordinary working Australians, but they sent them to work on the basis that they would pay every second dollar they earned to a government which squandered the money when they got it and which got the Australian community in debt and deficit during those 13 years.Those people deserve some reduction in the rate of tax they pay. Those people who are not at the highest levels of income, those who would not be responsible for paying the highest level of tax, also need some relief. I assure you that the government will address the rate at which tax is paid. The government will have special regard to the taxation treatment of families. This government believe in families, and since getting here 2½ years ago all we have done has been about supporting families and recognising the contribution they make to the Australian community.The third principle is that consideration should be given to a broad based indirect tax to replace some or all of the existing indirect taxes. We now have this absolute stupidity where you do not pay tax on caviar. That is one of the things on the supermarket shelf that you can get through the cash register without paying any additional tax. That is the way in which Labor's tax system works. You do not pay tax on caviar, you do not pay tax on antique items, you do not pay tax on fine art works, you do not pay tax on Lear jets, but you pay tax on the bulk of things that the average family uses day in and day out—but you do not know what the tax is. Let me tell you: the hidden tax that Labor—VD4EVANSMr Gareth Evans—Are you going to hide it? You're going to hide the GST.HQ5Fahey, John, MPMr FAHEY—Let there be no mistake about it—as the Deputy Leader of the Opposition interjects—Labor's current hidden tax is as high as 42 per cent. You have a 42 per cent hidden tax on most items in the supermarket store at the present time, and you have the hide to come in here and talk about hidden taxes. You talk about hidden taxes and you have seven different rates of taxes that no-one knows about.This diminishing area in indirect taxes needs attention, and we really ought to have a look at when it came in. It came in in the 1930s. It came in at a time when everything that was prepared, manufactured and produced in this country was for domestic consumption. We did not have the exports in manufactured goods. We did not send those things overseas. We did not create wealth for our nation. The wealth creation in those days came out of the rural sector almost entirely. Today we have these same hidden taxes—up to 42 per cent; Labor's hidden taxes—being placed on all that we are manufacturing. Is it any wonder we have difficulty in competing with our trade partners when it comes to exporting our manufactured items? The current system of indirect taxes is discriminatory and unfair. We need a broader base that will enable us to provide other benefits for the Australian community in the way of their tax system.The fourth principle is that there should be appropriate compensation for those deserving of special consideration. We have always recognised those deserving of special consideration. This is the government—the Howard-Fischer government—that enshrined in legislation those increases for those on pensions. For the first time in this nation's history this government has said to those on the age pension, `You will get indexation; it is legislated.' It was left up to the whim of the previous government. If they felt like it or not at any given time, they had the options to be able to crib, to renege and not to recognise those who are less fortunate than us who require that particular support when they get to those retirement years. Rest assured that not only those who are on that fixed income through the social welfare system but also those who are on a fixed income as self-funded retirees will be recognised in any tax that is brought in. The compensation will be there. It will be fair. It will recognise what it will mean in the way of additional costs to those people and, rest assured, it will be covered in the package that is brought forward.The last principle is that we need reform of the Commonwealth-state financial relations. Of course we do. Perhaps no-one knows that better than I. I used to come down here with my begging bowl as the Premier of the state of New South Wales. On one occasion, much to my surprise, the then Prime Minister gave me everything that I asked for. It was a bit frustrating. I had to tear up the press releases that were prepared in advance because all was given on that occasion. I suffered the following year and we certainly got cut out the next year. It is a ridiculous system where in the states you do not know from one year to the next where you are going. We saw the High Court decision in respect of business franchise fees recently which simply said—what perhaps most of us always knew—that the states do not have the right to levy those taxes the Commonwealth now collects. The states play politics. They suggest we are not giving all that is there. We have to address these areas. They have uncertain taxes. They cannot do long-term planning to provide for the needs of people within the states and territories, and that particular aspect of reform cannot be ignored. It will not be in what the government will bring forward.This government has addressed the current tax system on the basis of a genuine need for reform and a need for genuine reform. We have not buried our heads in the sand. We do not go around saying what I think will become an immortal quote from the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the tax system. If there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the tax system, how do Labor—should they ever be given the mandate by the Australian people—propose to play with the system in the future? I think we know. They will play with it by some sort of manipulation of the current indirect tax called the wholesale sales tax. We are seeing here a phoney debate. There is no sincerity on the part of this opposition. This government will reform. (Time expired)15:43:005822Crosio, Janice, MPMrs CROSIO7T4ProspectALP00—At the outset I remind the Minister for Finance and Administration (Mr Fahey) that the subject of the matter of public importance is:The need for tax reform which is genuinely in the interests of all Australians.And I would like to emphasise for the Minister for Finance and Administration the words `all Australians'. Tax reform is not just for the mates of the Liberal Party. Tax reform is not just for those peak bodies and organisations representing the top end of town—those groups with enough money to burn on expensive pro-GST advertising campaigns that mouth the government's own hidden tax agenda. Tax reform is not just for the Stan Wallises of this world.If we are to fix the inadequacies that currently exist in the Australian taxation system, for genuine tax reform to take place Australians must be confident that they are being offered a package that treats them all equally—whatever their means, whatever their background. Tax reform must deliver security and opportunity to the average Australian. That is what Labor is about, and that is what we see as being the incontestable end result of any reform of the Australian taxation system. A tax reform package that introduces a `tax mix switch'—swapping a progressive taxation system for a regressive one—is against the interests of all Australians. A tax reform package that introduces an inherently unfair goods and services tax is quite blatantly against the interests of all Australians.Yet these are the two objectives that we know this Howard government will be aiming for when it unveils its new tax reform policy in the coming weeks. Tax reform for the Howard government is not about meeting the economic and taxation needs of Australians into the 21st century but about putting together a package that wins it enough votes to cling to office.This Howard government is keeping Australians in the dark until the very last moment and then attempting to blind them with enough bells and whistles that would make a dead cat seem a fresh and exciting prospect. If the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) and the Treasurer (Mr Costello) of this country were interested in delivering genuine tax reform, we would have been debating in this chamber the intricacies of those proposals over these past months. Instead, what do we see? We have seen a ridiculous and cynical charade of a discussion by the Prime Minister and Treasurer as both gentlemen have withheld the details of their policy from the public.The public want to know. What the Australian people have been given are a few glimps es of the broad brushstrokes of their intentions; a few flashes of skin but not too much, just like a pair of tired, old strippers. But, hide it or not, we have seen and heard enough to know what is up their sleeves, and so have the majority of average Australians.The Liberal Party equates tax reform with a GST. Prime Minister John Howard has said as much himself. In March last year the Prime Minister said on Radio 5DN:When you talk about aggregate tax reform, you are really talking about whether or not we are going to have a GST.The Liberal Party is obsessed with the same ideas it had on taxation in the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s. It wants to go back to a tax that was emphatically and energetically rejected by the Australian people in the 1993 election. This government wants to go back to a tax that leaves low and middle income earners worse off while the fat cats of this country scratch their bellies and congratulate each other on how well they will do under the system. It wants to go back to a tax that is an unfair anachronism—a hangover from European economic thinking of the sixties and seventies—and hardly the sort of thinking to lead Australia and Australians into the next millennium.A GST is quite simply not tax reform that is in the interests of all Australians. Firstly, it is an unjust tax. Consider the fact that for the past few months we have had government members—including the Prime Minister and the Treasurer—wandering around talking about introducing a GST with compensation payments for the elderly, for home buyers and for people on lower incomes. Compensation is an explicit admission that a GST is unjust.It is a tax that leaves people worse off; therefore they must be compensated for what effect it has on their lives. No compensation package is going to cover all Australians from the damage a GST will do to them. Secondly, a GST does not create jobs. Under a GST, in order for small businesses to remain competitive with big businesses, they will have to haemorrhage thousands of jobs. The service sector—areas like tourism where job growth has been at its strongest over the past de cade—will be nobbled by a tax that directly inhibits employment growth.Professor Neil Warren—a key adviser to the coalition on the GST during the early 1990s—has made the GST's dead or negative affect on job growth absolutely clear. He stated:It's a mistake to say that it—meaning a GST—is going to cure our foreign debt and create thousands of jobs. It's just not going to do that.Thirdly, as we all also know, a GST is virtually guaranteed to increase within a few years of its introduction. By looking around the world at other countries that have experienced a GST or its equivalent, we can see that within five to 10 years the rate of tax increases to sometimes double the level at which it was originally set.You cannot cap a GST. We know it and the government knows it, but they do not want to tell the Australian people. John Hewson—the man who made the mould for a GST in this country—is someone else who also knows it. He has said that a GST set below 15 per cent will invariably rise to that level. So much for the Treasurer's guarded little hints about a 10 per cent GST.All of these aspects of a GST combine to make it a reform that is quite obviously not in the interests of all Australians. To add insult to injury, the Prime Minister and the Treasurer of this country have engaged in a level of duplicity and treachery on the GST that would leave Benedict Arnold or Tokyo Rose red-faced. Prime Minister John Howard said in May 1995:There's no way a GST will ever be a part of our policy. Never, ever. It's dead; it was killed by the voters in the last election.Treasurer Peter Costello said in May 1996:In our election in 1996, we indicated we wouldn't introduce a GST. Ah, that finishes the matter. We won't.Do you remember that quote? Prime Minister John Howard was at it again in January 1997 and still as adamant as ever. He said:People get the idea that it's the economic elixir of Australia.That is, a GST. He continued:I don't think people should make the mistake of imagining that a dramatic change to the tax system is going, of itself, to transform the economy.Both gentlemen have at various times condemned the GST to the dustbin of history. They have pilloried it and pointed out its faults for all and sundry to see. Yet now they are back to sell us this loathsome tax once again. Their deceit is only eclipsed by their gall. A GST delivers neither security nor opportunity. A GST's calling cards are crippling inequality, red tape and higher and more burdensome costs on families.Labor's tax plans are, however, about reforming the system in the interests of all Australian families—families who, like many living in my electorate, presently have their backs to the wall. Labor's tax credit for working families will deliver tangible tax cuts to low and middle income working families by introducing a tax credit for those who work, or want to work, but who face debilitating tax bills and the loss of support payments.Labor's tax credit system rewards work, where the current system can penalise families who increase their earnings. It will be a new tax payment which introduces a direct work incentive into the Australian tax and social security systems which has not existed before. Labor's tax credit for working families works in unison with the present social security system to deliver strongly on our objective of bringing security and opportunity to families who have been robbed of such certainties over the last few years under this Howard government.Labor's tax reforms are about giving Australians a choice between a regressive, out-of-date and unfair package with a GST as its centrepiece and a tax package that neither penalises nor adds extra burdens for ordinary working families. Labor welcomes tax reform. We have never shied away from the idea of reforming the tax system or debating what methods could be used to achieve this objective. Labor agrees that there is an argument for tax reform that genuinely meets the interests of all Australians. However, Labor does not, and will never, agree to a GST as the solution to our tax problems.Rather than supporting the interests of Australians, a GST will undermine them. A tax system that undermines the interests of Australians will leave us a diminished, weakened and divided nation as we enter the next century. It is a recipe for disaster and it will be soundly rejected once and for all by the Australian people at the next election—an election that will be called when this Prime Minister can find the courage. I say to him, and to the whole of his government, that if we want to talk about reform and we want to talk about how good the GST is for the country and for all Australians come into the parliament with the package. Let us debate the package. Do not keep it hidden away behind closed doors—let us see what the package is all about. And, more importantly, let us see an honest government stand up and deliver to the Australian people what they are going to take to the next election so that we have the opportunity to debate some merits of their tax package. (Time expired)15:53:005825Tuckey, Wilson, MPMr TUCKEYSJ4O'ConnorLP10—One can only grin when a member of the 1993 government says, `It is your responsibility to tell us before the election what you propose to do, when in fact in 1993 we, as a government, did just that in promising l-a-w tax cuts and then turned around after the election and broke that promise.' What did they do to the poor people of Australia? They put the highest level of their tax increases on consumer goods—on leaded petrol—and they said they did that for environmental reasons. But did they send any of the revenue over to the environment? No, sir. Not one penny!The reality is that the Labor Party should be struck down by lightning every time they stand in this place and pontificate on the issue of honesty in tax policy. They have no credibility, and for people who were here and who placed that particular burden upon the Australian people it is arrant hypocrisy. What is more, when they took that choice, where did they apply the greatest burden? On fuel, the lifeblood of transport. If and when Australia shrinks to the size of Singapore, I will have no difficulty with taxing fuel, but I thought it was the dumbest possible policy that any government could pursue. The reality is that over the life of the previous Labor government the tax on fuel rose from 6c a litre to 36c a litre.Australia is a country with a small population and large resources. Its living standards exceed those of most other nations throughout the world. No-one disputes the fact that, to maintain those living standards in the environment of a highly competitive world, a nation must achieve high exports and be able to meet vigorous import competition. In that environment it would seem patently silly to have a tax system that imposed itself constantly and consistently onto the cost of production of the goods we export or that we produce to consume at home. That is a fundamental issue.The issue of how much tax a government raises is one for this House. The issue of the incidence of the fall of tax on Australians is an issue for this House. But, in terms of this debate, it is said that our reference to paying compensation, if in our view there is a change in the incidence of taxation, is an admission that it will occur. That must stand in front of the fact that, quite clearly, when we in this parliament put up the price of leaded petrol it fell on those who were still buying old-fashioned cars. When that happened the reality was that no compensation was paid by the Labor government.We accept the fact that we have got to give industry a go. I was concerned that the member for Prospect (Mrs Crosio) wanted to talk about Stan Wallis as though he would be the only beneficiary of his industries being made more efficient. I thought it might have been an incentive for his industry to go out and get more orders and employ more people and, yes, make a profit on their efforts. The reality is that we know why our businesses are in Indonesia: they can produce goods cheaper and under Labor's tariff policy export them back to Australia.Let me give an example of how our present tax system works in the production of that icon of Australian manufacturing, a Holden Commodore. A Holden Commodore, in the Australian context, starts its life in an iron ore mine and a coal mine. The iron ore mine employers pay payroll tax. They pay very substantial quantities of wholesale sales tax, although they are exempt from some. They pay a component of fuel tax up to 100 per cent. And, of course, they pay 100 per cent of fuel tax to have the fuel delivered to the extremities of the mine site. They pay payroll tax, as I have said, and they pay financial institutions duty on very large sums of money.But that is not the end of the story, because having paid those taxes their cost accountants then say, `This is a cost of doing business. We need a profit margin on that.' So they put it on those taxes and they disappear into the system. But then, of course, that iron ore and coal has to be freighted away from those mine sites either by rail or road, where fuel tax is paid and wholesale sales taxes are imposed. If it just happens to be by road, which is quite significant, and the means of transport happens to be a now well-recognised vehicle, a B-double, which is a sort of dual trailer unit, I got advice from the Road Transport Forum the other day which confirms my own experience in this industry that the effect of indirect taxes—fuel taxes, wholesale sales tax and these other taxes—on the operation of that truck is $1,750 a week. As these goods, yet to be made into anything, move down the road on a truck, we have got to add $1,750 per week for a 30-tonne load. Of course it is built into the freight charge, and of course a profit margin is attached to it.Then we get to the smelting process. BHP pays payroll tax, pays sales tax, pays financial institutions duty and pays WST. By this stage, not only do its cost accountants build that into the price of their manufactured item, which is a bit of steel—a long way from a Holden—but it is going to put a profit margin on its taxes and all the taxes and profit margins on taxes paid by those who have got that product to their front door. Then, of course, we have the transport task again and another $1,750, because we are going to get to the component manufacturers. Then we are going to see them add their taxes into that cost and add another profit margin.After that we get to the transport task yet again, because we are going to have a vehicle manufacturer and assembler who pays payroll tax, fuel tax and all those taxes I have mentioned, adds it into the price of the car and adds a profit margin to its taxes and all those taxes that were paid before. At that stage, as we roll it out the door, we actually put 22.5 per cent of real, honest, visible tax on that particular vehicle and send it off to the vehicle retailer, who pays fuel tax, who pays payroll tax, who pays financial institutions duties and who pays sales tax.All of that is added into the cost of the car. I take you back to the vehicle manufacturer in Geelong, who produces a beautiful car today. I am sure the Holden Commodore or our locally manufactured Fords can be admired. But we say, `We can't export them, they are too dear.' The message for the Labor Party is: who have we blamed in the past? We have blamed the workers. We have said they are inefficient and lazy. It is not the workers. We are putting about $1,000 per vehicle of hidden tax costs into that construction process and telling the workers of Geelong and Elizabeth to go out and compete in the world, to go out and compete with the Europeans, who have not had that process applying to their manufactured goods for 30 years.Might I say, in response to the member for Holt (Mr Gareth Evans), that on the introduction of that tax, right up to the oil shock, all those countries had rates of growth about six per cent and inflation at about four per cent. That is a matter of record. You do not have to dispute it. Go to the Parliamentary Library, as I did, and get it.The realities are that we are asking our people to operate in a highly competitive world environment, where a lot of other difficulties like wages and so on are there for us, and we want to add an additional burden. We know that a VAT or GST, call it what you like, does not have that effect. That is beyond dispute. You charge your customer, you bank the money and you are able to use any tax collected to pay the tax that you pay to your suppliers. Within the confines of your business, there is no tax imposition on the cost of doing business. That is so necessary if we are to put ourselves on the same footing as others. We just cannot tax our workers with their jobs by a tax system that has the effect I have just identified. I could go on and say how it is costing us jobs in the financial sector. (Time expired)16:03:005827Campbell, Graeme, MPMr CAMPBELLCF4KalgoorlieIND00—There is no-one in this House who doubts the need for tax reform. That tax reform clearly has to be equitable. The government puts forward the view that we have to broaden the tax base, and we do have to broaden the tax base, but there are other ways you can do it without the imposition of a GST. If you get more people working, that would certainly broaden the tax base. You could make large foreign companies pay tax. That too would broaden the tax base. These are issues which the government could easily attack.The GST, the goods and services tax, is called just this because this government was toying with it at the time when the government in Canada was completely routed through the introduction of this sort of tax and when this tax was very unpopular in Britain. There it is called a VAT, a value added tax. So it thought, `We will be clever, we will change the name.' A GST is not necessarily the same as a VAT, because you do not have this payment claiming process as you do with a VAT. It could be a one-off decision or it could be put at a lower level which is not claimed back. Now the government is talking about changing the name of the GST because the GST is unpopular. This sort of window-dressing is not going to fool the Australian people.The reality is that throughout the world, wherever the GST type tax has been introduced, it has always risen. There are two exceptions to that, I might add, where it has been introduced only recently. Inevitably it will rise. That is the history throughout the world. The undisputed history throughout the world is that, where you get the introduction of a GST, the total government tax take increases. Does anyone seriously think Australia is going to be different? Of course it is not. The total government tax take will increase if you add a GST to the tax system.The member for O'Connor (Mr Tuckey) was preaching the importance of exports and the export dollar. It was somewhat reminiscent of the time when I used to preach this message too. But, when you actually apply some intellectual rigour to it, you understand that any import replacement dollar has exactly the same effect on the economy as an export dollar, and in additional ways it is often more beneficial. The truth is that our current account deficit is out of control and growing, and 87 per cent of our current account deficit is now for the importation of manufactured goods, much of which we used to manufacture in Australia. It is now historic fact that Keating was responsible for deskilling this country and probably put the final nails in the coffin of our manufacturing industry. Without a return to a manufacturing industry, there are no jobs for our children and there is no end to the GST, and that is not fully appreciated by either political party.The member for O'Connor is extremely naive if he thinks that the introduction of additional tax is going to stimulate the manufacturing industry. It will not. I am amused to hear the Business Council of Australia calling for a GST. It is obviously trying to coordinate its program with the government. It is lending a lot of its money to TV advertising preaching the benefits of the GST. Perhaps if the Business Council of Australia and all its members stopped bringing up all these tax dodges they would be paying more tax, which would broaden the tax base and make the introduction of additional revenue less necessary. I think the Business Council of Australia and its members should seriously consider their ethics in this matter.I want to talk today about a tax that has the potential to equitably reduce the burden of taxation across the board. Australia First has said to the government, `Put all the cards on the table and let us see the figures in respect of the debit tax compared with the GST.' A debit tax postulates that if you tax every withdrawal from every financial institution, including credit cards, at 0.33 cents in the dollar, you raise enough money to entirely replace income tax plus another $50-odd billion that you can do with as you would.Clearly it is a tax that is very easy to collect. It is collected by the banks at the end of the day and all the government does is put the software insertion into their computer system and at the end of the day they can transfer that money electronically to the government. Banks are not going to cheat because it is not their money and you simply write into legislation that they lose their bank licence if they do. I certainly would not trust banks, but in a situation like this they certainly would not cheat.When I mentioned this to Prime Minister (Mr Howard), he said, `Oh, it has been tried in Sri Lanka. It didn't work there.' It has never been tried in Sri Lanka. That is now accepted as fact. He was simply wrong. What he was talking about was a turnover tax, which is much more akin to his GST. I spoke to the Treasurer (Mr Costello) and he said, `No, foreign companies would avoid it.' Heavens, his own taxation department is telling us that those companies avoid the present tax regime. We say it is much harder to avoid this tax. I asked the Treasurer, `How will they avoid it?' He said, `They will draw the money out of the banks in Australia and move it overseas.' Bingo, the minute they draw it out of the bank in Australia, they pay the tax.In any case, neither the government nor the opposition sees anything wrong in deeming pensioners. If you know that your system is being rorted, you can say to these people, `We will deem you.' I guarantee that will soon bring them back into line. But I do not think business is that stupid and I do not think business would flee Australia for a safe haven in the Cook Islands, whose tax regime is two per cent, to escape this tax. The simplicity of it is enormous and is open for all to see. It is a tax which would be highly visible. We could publish the figures every month as to how much tax the government was collecting. I think people should understand how much tax they pay. This tax would encourage people to save because it is a tax only on withdrawals.Let us have the debate. What is the government frightened of? Bring in your arguments against it. The arguments I have seen so far have been fatuous. One of the members of this House was circulating a paper prepared by the Parliamentary Library. It was palpable nonsense. Anyone who understands the tax could discredit those criticisms very easily. Let the government bring in a full-blown debate on the virtues of these two taxes. We say this tax will restore incentive to Australian people. It will be an enormous incentive. You could take out of the equation taxation on overtime. No other tax is going to do this. We believe it should be discussed.There are opponents to this tax. Let us see who they are. Primarily, the government does not like it because it would not be in a position to offer largesse; it would not be able to give you a tax break—there will be no tax breaks to give. Big business does not like it because they do not pay tax now and they could not avoid this one. That is why they do not like it. The bureaucracy would not like it because there certainly would not be the need for the massive taxation bureaucracy, not that I am suggesting you would sack them all. There would be no need to; you could relocate a lot of them into useful things such as tracking down rorts in some other areas. I believe there would still be a case for excise duties and properly applied tariffs. Those people could be involved in that sort of monitoring.We currently spend about $6 billion minimising our tax. If we had a debits tax, the people in the taxation industry would have to go and do something useful. I have talked to a lot of people in the tax industry and they say they would look forward to that. The competent ones say, `Yes, I look forward to doing what I was trained to do, what I spent my time at university learning, how to make businesses more efficient.' I do not think there needs to be a great concern there.Why won't the government put the cards on the table and simply let people come forward with their criticisms? There are people around who know enough about this to be able to refute them. At the end of the day, if it is on the table, the Australian people can decide. This tax is elegant. It was not possible probably until the last 10 years with the advent of advanced computers and computer software, but it is available now.People ask where this tax is used. I can give an example. It is used in a limited way by our states. They use the so-called BAD tax, which is a debit tax you pay the state every time you cash a cheque. The problem with that system is that it applies only to cheques and there is a cap on it. I think in New South Wales and Queensland you pay a maximum of $400 and in Western Australia it is $470. In a sense, that makes it regressive, but if it applied to all transactions, be they cheques or other financial transactions, you would broaden the base enormously.No-one seriously complains about the BAD tax. It is a very simple situation. I have had situations in my own state where, if the government was to increase the BAD tax and reduce some of the other very selective taxes, people would be much happier. This tax must be considered. Let us put the cards on the table and have a thorough, open and honest debate on taxation, for the benefit of all Australians.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. J.A. Crosio)—The discussion is concluded.Miscellaneous582910000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. J.A. Crosio)—The Speaker has been advised that the Deputy Speaker has fixed Thursday, 2 July 1998, at 9.40 a.m., as the time for the next meeting of the Main Committee, unless an alternative day or hour is fixed.Bills5829Messages received from the Governor-General reported informing the House of assent to the following bills: Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 1998-99 Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 1998-99 Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill 1998-99 Customs Tariff Amendment Bill (No. 1) 1998 Health Care (Appropriation) Bill 1998 Excise Tariff Amendment Bill (No. 1) 1998 Income Tax (Untainting Tax) Bill 1998 Passenger Movement Charge Amendment Bill 1998 Social Security and Veterans' Affairs Legislation Amendment (Pension Bonus Scheme) Bill 1998 Telecommunications (Carrier Licence Charges) Amendment Bill 1998 Veterans' Entitlements Amendment (Male Total Average Weekly Earnings Benchmark) Bill 1998 Financial Sector Reform (Consequential Amendments) Bill 1998 Crimes Amendment (Enforcement of Fines) Bill 1998 Fisheries Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 1) 1998 Miscellaneous5829Motion (by Mr Slipper)—by leave—agreed to:That the following orders of the day, committee and delegation reports, be referred to the Main Committee for debate:Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade—Report on seminar on the Asian currency crisis and its effect on Australia—Motion to take note of paper: Resumption of debate;Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs—Motions to take note of paper: Resumption of debate—Report on aspects of family services; Report on copyright, music and small business—Report on retention of Census data;Joint Standing Committee on Treaties—Interim report on multilateral agreement on investment—Motion to take note of paper: Resumption of debate;Standing Committee on Procedure—Review of the House of Representatives committee system—Motion to take note of paper: Resumption of debate;Standing Committee on Primary Industries, Resources and Rural and Regional Affairs—Report on international agricultural trade reform—Motion to take note of paper: Resumption of debate.Bills5829r5605829Debate resumed.16:16:005829Evans, Richard, MPMr RICHARD EVANS3V5CowanLP10—I am pleased to join this debate to discuss the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 as it relates to states grants and more generally to tax reform. The bill is routine annual legislation that has two main purposes: to give effect to the Commonwealth general revenue assistance to the states and territories for 1998-99 and to extend the operation of section 90 safety net arrangements to protect state and territory revenues in 1998-99.The bill provides for the payment to the state and territories of general revenue assistance, estimated at $17.1 billion in 1998-99. Financial assistance grants, estimated to total $16.9 billion, comprise the major part of this assistance. The states and territories will benefit from real per capita growth in financial assistance grants in 1998-99 with these grants being distributed in accordance with the equalisation per capita relativities recommended by the Commonwealth Grants Commission.In addition, states and territories will receive an estimated $217.2 million in competition payments to the states and territories in 1998-99. These payments and the per capita element of the real per capita growth in financial assistance grants are conditional on states and territories meeting the terms of the national competition agreement. The National Competition Council will shortly be reporting on state and territory progress in competition policy reforms.The bill also provides for state and territories making fiscal contribution payments totalling some $313.4 million to the Commonwealth in 1998-99 and this will be the third and final instalment of these contributions which was agreed to at the 1996 Premiers Conference. The achievement by the Commonwealth of a responsible surplus in 1998-99 is central to Australia's economic interest, particularly in light of financial instability in Asia. The state fiscal contributions will make an important contribution to that surplus.After allowing for fiscal contribution payments, total payments to the states will increase by $957 million, or 3.1 per cent, in 1998-99. A state's fiscal contribution can be paid by way of deductions from general revenue assistance, direct payments to the Commonwealth or a reduction in funding provided under a specific purpose grant. As in the previous two years, the bill provides for all or part of a state's 1998-99 fiscal contributions, including any unpaid amounts, to be deducted from general revenue assistance payments to that state.The bill provides for payments to states in 1998-99 under the safety net arrangements requested by the states to protect their revenues following the High Court decision on 5 August 1997 on the constitutional validity of state business franchise fees. It is estimated that revenue replacement payments to the states will be around $6.5 billion in 1998-99. Revenue collections under the safety net agreements were provided for in separate legislation in 1997-98 which do not require annual amendments.I stand before you today as a fairly proud Western Australian. I am not only proud to be a hardworking representative for the seat of Cowan but also proud to be representing the state of Western Australia. I might tell the House and those who are listening at the moment some facts about Western Australia. Western Australia has 1.8 million Australians—less than 10 per cent of the Australian population—yet it supplies almost 11 per cent of the PAYE tax collected. Western Australia has over 25 per cent of the national export income, totalling some $27 billion out of a national total of $79 billion.Western Australia is the biggest producer of oil and gas in the nation. Western Australia is also the biggest producer and exporter of wheat in the nation. It is the biggest producer of gold in the nation, with some 78 per cent of the total, about $3.5 billion. Western Australia is also the biggest producer of nickel in the nation, about $1.25 billion. We are the biggest exporter of crayfish and abalone.Western Australia has the biggest diamond mine in the world, covering some 38 million carats or about 38 per cent of the world's total. Western Australia is also the biggest exporter of alumina powder in the world. It is also the biggest producer of cobalt in the world with the advent of the Anaconda mine near Leonora. It is the biggest producer of iron ore in the world, producing some $3.4 billion. It is the biggest producer of lupins in the world. It has the biggest solar salt operation in the Southern Hemisphere, accounting for over one-third of the world production.Western Australia had growth at the end of 1997 of some 7.9 per cent against the national average of 3.7 per cent. By further comparison, the US was at 3.7 per cent, the UK was at 3.2 per cent, Germany was at 2.3 per cent, Japan was at 0.9 per cent and the OECD average was at three per cent for the very same period when Western Australia had growth at 7.9 per cent.We have 25 per cent of the national road network and one-third of the national land mass, yet we receive only 11 per cent of national road funding and in 1995-96 we received only 8.5 per cent. We do not have a direct flight to Canberra from Western Australia. We have limited defence facilities in Western Australia, in particular for our offshore gas fields and oilfields. With these points on states grants issues in mind, it is important to note that Western Australia feels a bit aggrieved about the process of states grants. That is why the Howard government, our government, is searching for tax reform. It must be pointed out that other speakers have spoken on different parts of the states grants bill in the debate on the matter of public importance today.The Prime Minister (Mr Howard) set out five criteria to be followed in the tax reform process. All the discussions and debate around the country at the moment seem to focus on only one aspect. The Prime Minister talks about five components; so, too, do the rest of the government frontbench. The first component is fairness. Australians should be treated fairly when it comes to tax reform. The second component is a reduction in income tax. A lot of people are talking about income tax. No-one is actually talking about an agreement to a reduction in income tax, yet the coalition government wants this to happen.The third component is a broad based indirect tax. There are some problems associated with such a tax. We are considering a broad based indirect tax but there have been no announcements yet. The fourth component is states and Commonwealth grants and funding. The fifth component is no increase in tax collection. There are five components, yet everyone seems to be talking about only one. Today we should also be considering the way our states are funded. This is one of the key components of the need for tax reform.It is interesting to note that in 1901 the states created the Commonwealth of Australia—the Federation. However, since that time, the powers vested in the states at the time of Federation have been pared back through High Court and Commonwealth parliament acts. This has had a great impact on the taxing powers of the states, culminating in the 1997 franchise decision by the High Court virtually prescribing that the major revenue raising powers be vested in the Commonwealth.It must be said that I do not necessarily oppose the many decisions over the last 97 years to reduce some of the powers of the states. However, I strongly support a review of the funding processes to the states. Funding allows the states to provide the services that the community demands. In Cowan, for instance, many projects are needed in the community—new primary schools, bus services and extra police for law and order control—yet the state government claims they have limited funds to provide these services. For the people of Cowan to receive the services they want in the community, we must have tax reform, in particular, tax reform in relation to state and Commonwealth funding.In short, the Commonwealth raises the funds and the states have the responsibility to provide community services. The problem comes when demands from the community far outweigh the funds available. Under the current arrangements, the Commonwealth accounts for around 80 per cent of the revenue raised, yet that only accounts for around 57 per cent of the total expenditure of all governments. This is why the government wants tax reform and wants to get the balance right. This particular imbalance is commonly called a `vertical fiscal imbalance'. Even before the 1997 High Court decision, Australia had the highest vertical fiscal imbalance of any comparable federation. Surely this is a direct indicator for tax reform within our country.The Prime Minister has assured us that tax reform will include reform to solve some of these issues. It is interesting to note that, since the imbalance has become even more acute, the state governments have moved more heavily towards social and financial taxes like FID taxes, as mentioned by the member for Kalgoorlie (Mr Campbell), and gambling taxes, which are a concern of many in this place. It seems that a lot of states rely on the gambling dollar to raise funds for services. The employment restricting payroll tax is an unfair tax on the nation and has an impact on employment. The states rely more and more on this tax.In 1978-79 the Commonwealth returned some 34 per cent to the states, yet by 1988 this proportion was down to 24 per cent. It is planned to reduce the amount to 20 per cent soon, therefore confirming an urgent need for tax reform in our country. Because of the reduced funding, the states are required to raise their own inefficient and in some cases unfair taxes. The problem is compounded when the states receive their grants from the Commonwealth. These grants are usually tied, therefore reducing flexibility for the states in providing for the community. For instance, in the early 1990s some 25 per cent of the grants provided were tied. Now the amount is almost 50 per cent. That is surely another confirmation as to why the Prime Minister wants tax reform in this important area.Given the complex nature of vertical fiscal imbalance, it becomes very important for the states to obtain some revenue raising powers; powers that can best reflect the needs of the states and the obligation that they have to their communities. The difficulties associated with interstate trade prevent states from applying their own indirect tax system, although constitutionally the states do have the power to apply an income tax. However, this is really not the preferred option. What this country really needs is tax reform. We need to debate these issues. We need something more than a broad based indirect tax.It seems that only two groups are speaking against tax reform in this debate. Many groups seem to be in favour of tax reform. In fact, I recently surveyed my electorate of Cowan. Some 94 per cent of residents indicated that they welcome tax reform. Major associations in the community have identified tax reform as being an urgent need. As I said, there are two groups within the country that do not want tax reform. The first group is the One Nation Party. The One Nation Party does not want tax reform. Their policy is to solve the economic problems within our country by printing more money. The other group—honourable members would be familiar with this group—is the Australian Labor Party. Honourable members may have heard the member for Prospect (Mrs Crosio) speaking earlier and saying that the Labor Party is in favour of tax reform and against a GST or broad based indirect tax. There was no mention in her speech of state or Commonwealth funding issues or the need for tax reform. She did say that the Labor Party was committed to tax reform.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. J.A. Crosio)—As Deputy Speaker, I remind the member for Cowan that he is certainly straying from the bill before the House. I am sure he will come back to the context of the bill we are debating.3V5Evans, Richard, MPMr RICHARD EVANS—I am talking about states grants, Madam Deputy Speaker. The point is that there is a need for tax reform in this particular area but no-one seems to be talking about it.The Labor Party have not mentioned, in any of their discussions regarding tax reform, the relationship between state and Commonwealth funding. The Labor Party do not seem to want to end vertical fiscal imbalance. There has been no mention in debates so far on tax reform about vertical fiscal imbalance. In fact, I think I have heard some members on the other side supporting the idea of abolishing the states.I would like to put a question to all the Western Australian Labor members in this place—and there are three of them—and I would extend it to all the Labor Party candidates who are standing for Western Australian seats. Do they want a better deal for Western Australia? Do they think that vertical fiscal imbalance between state and Commonwealth funding is hurting Western Australian communities? If so, do they support tax reform in this vital area? The obvious answer for any Western Australian who is supportive of Western Australian issues is yes, they should support tax reform and, in particular, state and Commonwealth funding issues. Yet I imagine that most of their responses would be no. They would say no because they are told to say no.We should never forget the Labor Party when they were in power. They had a chance to do tax reform, and they applied some tax reform around 1985. They brought in the capital gains tax, the fringe benefits tax, and they tried a few other things but they were not successful. They tried tax reform but they were not able to apply it to the benefit of the nation. They also gave us, during that period, 11 per cent unemployment. They took interest rates in Australia to over 20 per cent—in particular business interest rates—in the late 1980s. I can recall them being 23 per cent on my own accounts. They also increased foreign debt during that period. In fact, government debt increased from $16 billion to $93 billion.In their last five years of government, the Labor Party had budget deficits which totalled over $70 billion. In the last year of their administration they told us—as they went to the election in 1996—that they were in fact in surplus. We found out after there was a change of government that we were over $10.4 billion in deficit. In 1993 they promised us they would not increase taxes, yet they did. They promised us l-a-w, law, tax cuts, yet they never delivered. They said they would not want an indirect tax, yet their own indirect tax—the wholesale sales tax—increased from 10 per cent to 12 per cent, from 20 per cent to 22 per cent, and from 30 per cent to 32 per cent. This is after they went to the election in 1993 promising not to put up taxes. They promised, yet they never delivered. They did put up taxes. They did it secretly through the back door in hidden taxes. Labor, when they were in charge of the national accounts, were a disaster. They were a disaster in Western Australia, they were a disaster in South Australia, they were a disaster in Victoria and they are now a disaster in New South Wales. Who knows what will happen in Queensland? Nationally, for 13 years, the Labor Party in government were a disaster. They ruined our accounts, they sent us into debt, they ruined our credit, they ruined small businesses during the late 1980s and early 1990s with their policies and they ruined the hope of many Australians. The previous speaker, the member for Wills (Mr Kelvin Thomson), said that we do not need tax reform and that we cannot apply compensation packages because they are unreliable and they do not work. By implication, he must think that the current system is working. The current system in Australia allows a family with three children on $20,000 to earn more cash in hand than a family earning $30,000. That cannot be fair. It cannot be acceptable, yet this is the tax system the Labor Party want us to have. What do they say about their own government, their own tax reform and how they approach these issues?10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—I am sure the member for Cowan is going to bring us back to the bill—the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 . I could not find any of the context of your debate in the bill, but I am sure you will enlighten me as you go along in your debate.3V5Evans, Richard, MPMr RICHARD EVANS—The previous speaker spoke about a GST for his entire speech. I am only responding to what he said. What do the Labor Party say about their tax reform period of 13 years? Did they have a tax reform regime? The Deputy Leader of the Opposition (Mr Gareth Evans) said, `We are a good government and we are not going to apologise.' He said that in 1996. The member for Batman (Mr Martin Ferguson) said in 1996, `The Australian people are a pretty forgiving population. They basically threw us out on 2 March not on the basis that we were a bad government but basically related to an "It's time" factor.'10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—Again, I will ask the member for Cowan to please come back to the bill before the House.3V5Evans, Richard, MPMr RICHARD EVANS—I commend this bill to the House. There is an urgent need for tax reform within our country—tax reform which will help the states with their state grant funding and tax reform which will only ever happen under a coalition administration.16:35:005834Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRISHI4ShortlandALP00—This has been a wide-ranging debate covering a wide range of issues that relate to the strict provisions of the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 and matters that flow from that. Might I first repeat the words of the Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet) to the Prime Minister (Mr Miles):The bill will amend the States Grants (General Purposes) Act 1994.He then describes the existing act. He continues:The bill extends for a further 12 months the provisions of the act relating to the payment of financial assistance grants and state and territory entitlements to payments under the safety net arrangements.He goes on to specify the various amounts being made and gives some background. This debate is of a wide-ranging nature. It has had implications for the government's economic and fiscal policies. The previous speaker, the member for Cowan (Mr Richard Evans) made beautiful reference—albeit in passing—to vertical fiscal imbalance. I would that he had gone on to explain in a bit more detail and to translate the words `vertical fiscal imbalance'. Maybe it is one of the positions of the Kama Sutra , I do not know, but I am sure that in the minds of members the public it may as well be. What he is really talking about is the expenditure burden on states and the unequal access they have to revenue to meet those expenditure outlays. It goes to the relationship between federal government and state governments on revenue, shares of revenue and responsibilities for expenditure and provision of services.From what the member for Cowan said, you would think the Australian Labor Party was opposed to tax reform. That is completely untrue. He knows it to be untrue, as does the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) and every one of his ministers, right down through the ranks of the government. The ALP is totally in support of reform, but let us define reform. The government's version of reform is shifting the tax burden from business, high income earners, family trusts and offshore tax havens—shifting what little they pay—back down to low income families, middle income families and small business. We are totally in support of tax reform, but let us put it on the table and define it.Just under 12 months ago this Prime Minister invited Australia to accompany him on a great adventure into tax reform. But it really is blindman's buff. Whatever the adventure is that he is pursuing, he has his eyes masked. No-one can be told about what the adventure is. No-one can be told about what the provisions of the tax proposal are—SE4BISHOPMrs Bishop—What has this got to do with the bill?10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. J.A. Crosio)—I reminded the member for Cowan and I remind the member for Shortland that we are debating the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 . I believe we should confine the debate to the bill before the House.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—Madam Deputy Speaker, I am responding to the matters raised by previous speakers and within the ambit of the provisions of the bill which go to federal-state financial relations, expenditure and methods of collecting revenue.Mrs Bishop interjecting—HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—Yes, I am listening very well. I think on this side of the House we are entitled to respond to those accusations that have been made and which have been allowed by the chair to proceed.SE4BISHOPMrs Bishop—Madam Deputy Speaker, I raise a point of order. The point that needs to be made is that you were pulling up the previous government member for allegedly straying from the subject of the bill in discussing tax reform. Now you have the opposition spokesman doing exactly the same thing and you only pulled him up in response to my interjection.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—No—SE4BISHOPMrs Bishop—I am glad you did that. I withdraw that. But I do not think that you can allow the argument to go that, simply because the argument was put forward from the government side, your ruling can be ignored and he can go on his merry way. You have to be even-handed in this matter.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—I can assure the minister that I am even-handed. I allowed the honourable member for Cowan to go at least 15 minutes into the debate before I actually brought him back to the bill before the House. I say to the honourable member for Shortland, as I said to the honourable member for Cowan, that we do have a specific bill before the House, without going into extraneous matters. The honourable member for Shortland had informed me in the chair, and the minister at the table, that he was responding to the member for Cowan. I would ask him just to speak to the response and then to bring into detail the bill before the House.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—In doing that, I would be the only speaker in this debate to have done so. I will do my best, but I am bound to respond to those matters raised by the previous speaker, which I have taken detailed notes of.Mrs Bishop interjecting—HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—Were the minister in the chair, I would love to follow her direction. But she is not in the chair. To say that we are opposed to tax reform is false. What I have said is that we totally support tax reform, but if the government has a version of tax reform—as I hear the Prime Minister and other members enunciating—let us have the definition of it. I think that is a fair response. The member for Cowan said they are in favour of a fair tax. We are all in favour of a fair tax. But please define what you mean by `a fair tax'. He says he is from Western Australia and they do not get a fair share of taxation revenue. He referred to vertical fiscal imbalance. Each state argues that case about vertical fiscal imbalance.However, I do have to agree with the member for Cowan when he opposes gambling. I have raised in this House on a number of occasions the social devastation that is occurring in our community because of the pressure upon states to raise money from soft sources, the major soft source being the expansion of gambling activities and the collection of tax from gambling. People are invited into gambling establishments to part them from their money, not to give them something. If you give them some grog, put an automatic teller machine beside them and, not too far away, a poker machine they will be parted from their money and they are being parted from their money. There can be no more important social matter in this country than the damage being wrought upon Australian families and children, dependants, arising from the failure of this federal government and state governments to develop a fair set of arrangements for sharing the revenues available and for sharing the expenditure and provision of services available. There can be no more important matter, either financially or socially.The honourable member made much play of what he purported our government's legacy was for this government. I want to remind this chamber of the legacy that I, as a member of a government, inherited from former Treasurer Howard, now Prime Minister Howard. That was the trifecta of double digit inflation, running at 12 per cent; double digit employment, close to 11 per cent; and the highest cash interest rates since the Great Depression. The first negative growth in 30 years was the achievement of Treasurer Howard. And what was the deficit we received? The deficit expressed in today's dollars was in excess of $25 billion—not $10 billion in today's money but 2.5 times that. The budget papers of 1982-83 estimated there would be a budget deficit of $4.6 billion. In today's terms, it was $25 billion.Who can forget, from the 1977 election campaign, that tremendous advertisement in the Sydney Morning Herald. It was a quarter of a page—I cannot show newspapers in the House but I can describe it. It was that big and that wide. In the right-hand column was a fist full of $5 bills. It said, `Labor will not give you tax cuts; Liberals will give you tax cuts.' What happened to that source of revenue and tax cuts? It was given away. That was, I think, on 25 November 1997 in the Sydney Morning Herald. Come January 1978 there was the introduction of new charges for health services. The media then said, `Give with the right and take away with the left.'Minister, it is no good complaining that this is outside the ambit of the debate because it is absolutely at the core of the debate: the collection of revenues from tax, the forgoing of revenue by giving tax cuts and then the collection of new revenues from other service charges. It goes to the very core of state grants.The sum of $800 million is being stripped from public hospitals and the provision of services. That is what this bill is about. It is about federal-state financial relationships and the passing on to state governments of a share of the revenues from taxes gathered by federal government. In my electorate of Shortland, just south of Newcastle, what do my constituents and I see? The closing of the Belmont CES office and the denial of services, the closure of the Belmont Medicare office, and longer queues at the public hospitals, because the public hospital share of funding is being cut.SE4BISHOPMrs Bishop—Madam Deputy Speaker, I raise a point of order. While sitting at this table, I recalled that the member for Cowan, while speaking on this debate, was interrupted by you on at least three occasions because you thought he was straying outside the ambit of the bill. By any stretch of the imagination, the material that the member is now going into is quite clearly outside the ambit of the bill, and I am wondering why you are not interrupting him as you did the previous speaker.QI4PRICEMr Price—Madam Deputy Speaker, I raise a point of order. I must object to the last remark. That is a reflection on the chair, and I think the minister ought to withdraw that remark.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—It is a reflection on the chair if the chair takes offence at it. Nevertheless, I thank the hon ourable member for Chifley and assure the minister that I have drawn to the notice of the honourable member for Shortland that he is to come to the contents of the bill. I again will remind the minister at the table that I allowed the member for Cowan to go for 15 minutes in debate on the bill. It was in the last five minutes that I reminded him on at least three occasions to come back to the contents of the bill.I again tell the honourable member for Shortland to come back to the contents of the bill. If the minister had been listening, she would have heard reference to the fact of the state grants interfering with hospitals; that is what I understood the member for Shortland to have said. But I will remind the member for Shortland that the bill before the House for debate is the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill. I would ask all speakers to keep to the bill, notwithstanding the debate that has occurred in the past.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—Madam Deputy Speaker, with great respect to you and to the minister—and I have spoken with you and the minister on many, many occasions—I am nonplussed as to why both you and the minister are exhibiting these attitudes. The States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill is as broad a bill as can be brought into this parliament for debate. If you go back through the Hansard , you will find it is probably the broadest of bills. If each of you would like me to come down quietly afterwards and have a private talk with you and explain it to you, I will do it. But just let me read—10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—I can assure the honourable member for Shortland that it will not be necessary because you will be able to tell us all about the bill before the House.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—I am trying to do that, but both of you do not seem anxious to listen to me. But, with all due respect to the chair, the parliamentary secretary's speech reads:The states and territories were able to allocate the funds provided by the Commonwealth under this act according to their own budgetary priorities. Is there anything broader than that—`according to their own budgetary priorities'? That covers the whole range of services they are providing. If the government do not want me to speak about the funds being provided by this government via this legislation for hospitals and health services and education—which also was being discussed more specifically earlier—let them get up on their hind legs and say that they do not want to talk about it.But I am going to talk about it because the next matter I come to is the Medicare agreement. Part of the funding is provided through this legislation, and part is provided through the Medicare agreement in the bill discussed the other day. These are part—SE4BISHOPMrs Bishop—I just want some consistency, Peter. That is all.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—Minister, knowing you as I do, far be it from me not to want to be consistent in discussions in this chamber when you are present; I would not want to be otherwise. But let us come back to the general picture about federal-state financial relations.I have referred to gambling. I feel very, very strongly about this issue. It is at the core of family destruction that is occurring in this country—and it starts here in this chamber. Don't let us pussyfoot around the place and try to push it off to somewhere else. That problem starts here and will only be solved here. It is because the states are being starved of funds or overloaded with responsibilities that they turn to alcohol and poker machines and automatic teller machines—a prescription for disaster, suicide, destruction.Some people have the temerity to lecture us about young people—`Aren't they terrible, the way they stand around in clubs with a cigarette in one hand, poker machine handle in the other, a glass of beer in front of them and the automatic teller machine not too far away, and maybe they've got some money from somebody else.' I do not want to recount an experience I heard one night in the club of how one young woman was getting money to play the poker machines. That problem starts here; it does not start outside of here. So I want to repeat that and hammer that view across to members.But then let us look at the broader area of collection of revenues. One of the major sources of general purposes revenue that go to the states in untied grants is excise on fuel. This government is budgeting this year to collect $11,043 million in excise from refined petroleum products; $67 million from crude oil excise, mainly from LPG; and $960 million from resource rent tax. The current excise on fuel—unleaded petrol and diesel—is 34.697c per litre, of which a lousy 4.97c per litre is spent on road construction and maintenance; that is one seventh.Whether or not the government or you, Madam Deputy Speaker, want to talk about it—and, Madam Deputy Speaker, you may want to talk about it—my constituents certainly want to talk about it. They know that when they buy petrol they are paying 35c to the Treasury, and they know that about one-seventh of that is spent on improving their roads. That is a matter of concern and sharing of access to revenue and responsibility for carrying out construction and maintenance of roads. That relationship between state and federal government goes to the heart of this question of vertical fiscal imbalance—who has their hand on the till, who gets the opportunity to spend it and who has the responsibility of providing the service. But we cannot talk about that and at the same time be muzzled from discussing the alternate means of revenue.The reality is that, every day in this parliament, ministers and members of the government talk about a goods and services tax. What is it? Essentially, it is a tax whereby, every time money changes hands, the government takes a slice. So, if you buy a bottle of water, you pay tax. If you turn the light switch on, you pay tax. If you buy bread, you pay tax. You will pay tax on everything, every good and service. But the disastrous thing about that is that it is unfair. A much higher proportion of total expenditure of total income of a middle to low income family would be spent on paying tax. So you shift the tax burden down the line onto those people, and you have the business people at the top.I find it utterly obscene that you have big business led by Stan Wallis, the Chair of the Business Council of Australia—and I am referring to Australia's top 100 corporations; not the little business people but the real business people—SE4BISHOPMrs Bishop—So small business isn't real.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—Small business is real. They are the real people in this country, but they are being asked to pick up the burden of collecting tax. More than a million of them—QI4PRICEMr Price—A total of 1.3 million.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—They are being asked to do that to make it easier for big business, for Stan Wallis and his mates, for the top 100 business corporations in this country. They employ the highest paid executives in this country and they earn more in one year than most working people in this chamber earn in a lifetime. A person on $30,000 a year over 30 years earns $900,000. Stan Wallis and his mates earn between $1,500,000 to $2,500,000 per year. Where is the equity in that?These people are saying to my constituents, those working and those out of work, `You ought to be paying more tax. It will be good for you, believe me.' We should be saying to Stan Wallis and his mates, `Let's close down family trusts so that you pay your fair share of personal income tax.' These top executives have available to them all the rorts, lurks and means of passing their income offshore and evading personal income tax—the euphemism is minimising; the reality is evading. They have availed themselves of family trusts to evade tax. We have 19 ministers in this government—Minister, you are not one, are you?—who have family trusts.10000DEPUTY SPEAKERMadam DEPUTY SPEAKER—Order! You will address the minister at the table through the chair.HI4Morris, Peter, MPMr PETER MORRIS—I am sorry. I apologise to the minister because I have a great deal of respect for her. The reality is that 19 ministers in this government have family trusts. My constituents do not have family trusts. That is what I am railing about. I do not have much longer in this parliament to represent my people, but it is unfair, and a goods and services tax is going to hurt them.I have a great deal of regard for the small business people in my electorate. I have worked very closely with them. In fact, I came from a small business before I came here. I know what it is like. I have been there and have done that. I understand their language, and I understand the burdens and trials that they face. But a GST is a recipe for disaster for small business that will increase bankruptcies. There is nothing in it for small business, so said Ray Regan, the President of the National Tax and Accountants Association, on 9 January this year. He ought to know.Thank you very much for the support I have received from both the minister and yourself, Madam Deputy Speaker, in the course of the debate. There are some other matters that I would have liked to have covered in more detail, but thank you to both of you. I can only say that a GST is about making life more difficult and more unfair for families on middle to low incomes and for small business. It will reduce the number of jobs, not increase jobs, and it will increase heavily the burden upon small business in my electorate.16:55:005838Price, Roger, MPMr PRICEQI4ChifleyALP00—We are discussing the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 , and this is the mechanism by which the federal government transfers its revenues to the states. I particularly want to devote a major portion of my time to a proposal whereby in New South Wales $10 million is going to be docked from their state grants. It is interesting that the conservatives have always touted how much they believe in state rights; that when they get into government Commonwealth-state relations will be much better, will work more smoothly and will be more effective. I think it is fair to say that the Howard government probably has the worst record of any federal government in Commonwealth-state relations, notwithstanding the fact that a majority of the states have conservative premiers. In fact, until the recent Queensland election, all but one of them were conservative state premiers. Notwithstanding this fact, this government has the worst record of any federal government.The three Premiers Conferences have been a disaster. There is certainly a lack of goodwill and cooperation with the states. The COAG agreements have collapsed. At the last Premiers Conference in an unprecedented way we saw a walkout by all the Premiers—not just the Labor Premier but all the Premiers and Chief Ministers. That concerned the Medicare agreements; the fact that they could not renegotiate a new satisfactory Medicare agreement. Those agreements were supposed to commence from today. That is the record of this government. It is quite surprising given all the rhetoric that goes on about it.I said that I wanted to devote my time to one particular matter, and it is an important matter in my state and it concerns the rice industry. The rice industry is almost 99 per cent in New South Wales and within New South Wales almost wholly in the electorate of the Leader of the National Party, the Deputy Prime Minister and member for Farrer (Mr Tim Fischer). As a result of competition policy, there has been an examination of the monopoly of the marketing arrangements of the rice industry. The rice cooperative has sole responsibility for marketing the nation's rice both domestically and internationally. In 1995-96, as part of the competition policy, a team was established to look at this industry. It included four public servants and a representative of the rice industry.What did this report find? It found—and this is disputed by the industry—that there was a net cost to the Australian people in this monopoly arrangement, or single desk marketing arrangement, of some $5 million. It also found that the nation as a whole benefited in 1996 by $35 million to $50 million and, by the year 2000, will benefit by $70 million to $75 million. You might say, `How could that be so?' How many speeches have we heard about the fact that different representatives of the coal industry get slaughtered when they travel to overseas countries trying to renegotiate contracts? One of them sells out for a lower price and then the rest have to follow. This report—not my words—shows that Australia as a nation benefited by $35 million to $50 million in the prices that we got in 1996 and that the net benefit to be received in the year 2000 is estimated to grow to $70 million to $75 million.What is the government doing about it? I will tell you what the government is doing via the chairman of the competition council. Because the Premier of the New South Wales government said, `We think this is a great industry. We think this industry is doing a good job. We can't see any reason why we should change the current arrangements,' the chairman of the competition council has written to the Premier saying, `We disagree with you. If you do not deregulate this industry, we will have to recommend that your state's grants be reduced by $10 million.'You might ask: what are the National Party members doing about it? What have they said in the House about this situation? I congratulate the National Party member for Page (Mr Causley), who has certainly spoken in this House about the rice industry. The trouble is that was almost 12 months ago and he did not mention this current predicament. No other National Party member of this House has got up and spoken out against this ridiculous situation that the competition council is putting the rice industry through.Let me tell you a little bit about the rice industry. I have got to be critical of the New South Wales Minister for Agriculture—and I make no apology for saying that he is a good friend of mine—who has claimed that there are 2,000 rice farmers in the industry. I have to tell him he is wrong. I have got one bit of evidence that suggests there are 2,130 farms and another that says that there are 2,200. And what effect do they have on direct jobs in the rice industry? Those 2,000-odd farms are responsible for 8,000 direct jobs in the rice industry. But the story is even better than that: for every direct job, there are six indirect jobs. I think that totals up to 50,000 people, directly or indirectly, in this industry.What do the National Party members say about it? What are they doing about it? Absolutely nothing. The honour for the last speech given in this House by the National Party on the rice industry goes to the member for Page, who is not currently in the House. When he spoke about the rice industry, he did not say anything about the National Competition Council.The rice industry is one of Australia's real success stories in agricultural production. The history of agricultural production in this country is that we tend to export bulk, undifferentiated, lowest price product. What has the rice co-op done in their marketing effort? Overwhelmingly, They sell brands into markets. Over 80 per cent of their product is exported. Isn't that a wonderful story? They spend a long time developing markets. Indeed, they were saying that you have got to spend probably 10 years in some of these Asian countries before that market opens up. We all know the wonderful success story of our rice farmers exporting to Japan.I have got some old figures that show that over $600 million worth of rice was exported in 1994. This is a wonderful success story. Why is it that the coalition government is so hell-bent on trying to change what is an obvious success? I want to give credit to our shadow minister for primary industries, the honourable member for Burke (Mr O'Keefe), for a question he asked in parliament on 23 June of the Deputy Prime Minister. Given that the overwhelming majority of the industry is located in the electorate of the Deputy Prime Minister, wouldn't you think he would have plenty to say when he was asked the question? The question was:My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister. I ask him: are you aware that your government, through the National Competition Council, is threatening to penalise the New South Wales government $10 million per annum—through states grants—because the Labor Premier, Bob Carr, and his agriculture minister, Richard Amery, have decided to back the New South Wales rice growers by keeping the current marketing arrangements in place? Deputy Prime Minister, who is responsible for this competition policy madness in your government? How will you explain to rice growers in your electorate what your government has done to them?I have read very carefully the reply of the Deputy Prime Minister. I would have thought that we would have had a spirited defence of the industry—a clear statement that he was not going to cop this ridiculous attitude of the National Competition Council. Perhaps I was too optimistic. Perhaps I had too much faith in him. Perhaps the rice growers have too much faith in him.Even if he could not say that, you would have thought that he would have given an undertaking to really sock it to the Treasurer (Mr Costello), who has responsibility for this council. But he did not. Apart from some flattering things that he said about the rice industry—which I am happy to acknowledge—I certainly cannot understand the last paragraph of his reply. The Deputy Prime Minister says:I do not want to see any $10 million dockage take place, but that, of course, is contingent upon some reasonable steps agreed to by stakeholders 12 months ago being advanced. They have not been advanced until 1 May. Steps are being taken to see whether they can be advanced, most notably between now and 30 June so the $10 million dockage does not take place. If the $10 million dockage takes place, it rests on the shoulders of the New South Wales state government and its underwhelming performance on the matter. It is not our decision. It is part of a package of arrangements which it has failed to comply with. I will stick up for the efficient and effective structure of the Australian rice industry.I have just outlined to the House that the very committee that was set up to examine the rice industry concluded that there was a net cost—disputed by the industry, I agree—to consumers of some $5 million, but there was a net benefit of $35 million to all of Australia under these present arrangements. I cannot understand what the Deputy Prime Minister is talking about. The industry has been examined, the report has been presented and is favourable. And what does the National Competition Council want to do? It wants to penalise the New South Wales government. The New South Wales government position has been quite clear: if it ain't broke, don't fix it.This is an industry that we should be very proud of. It is an industry that is exporting its pants off. It is an industry that is growing. It is an industry that is adding value. Why would we want to interfere with it? But if the Commonwealth does take up the threatened recommendation of the National Competition Council and reduces grants to the New South Wales government by $10 million, then we have no choice. We cannot afford to cut funding to hospitals, schools or policing to take up this shortfall. It is up to the Commonwealth. The Deputy Prime Minister and the National Party have to put up or shut up. Today they have shut up. They have not said one word about the National Competition Council and its threats by way of letter to the New South Wales Premier.I can understand that maybe the Deputy Prime Minister does not want to say anything too aggressive about the National Competition Council. You would think the honourable member for Parkes (Mr Cobb) would say something—but we all know he is jumping ship before it crashes—or perhaps the honourable member for Riverina (Mr Hicks), the National Party member for New South Wales, but he is jumping ship. Perhaps John Sharp—at one stage reputed to be the Leader of the National Party—could speak up, but he is jumping ship. Perhaps the National Party member who spoke about the rice industry 12 months ago, the honourable member for Page, should come into the House and speak up on behalf of the Leader of the National Party about the madness associated with the position of the Chairman of the National Competition Council.What is the point of having these studies if they show that Australia is benefiting by the many millions of dollars—that I have already outlined—under this single desk marketing operation? Admittedly it is a monopoly, but why would you want to go away from it if, as I have said, the nation as a whole benefited in 1996 by $35 million to $50 million and, by the year 2000, will benefit by $70 million to $75 million?I understand the honourable member for Richmond (Mr Anthony), the Deputy Whip, will be contesting a seat in our state in the next election on behalf of the National Party. And I think the Deputy Speaker, Mr Nehl, and the Deputy Leader of the National Party, the Minister for Primary Industries and Energy (Mr Anderson), are recontesting their seats. We have not heard a peep out of him about the rice industry. I have no shame in speaking up on behalf of the rice industry. I thought the question that the shadow minister put to the Deputy Prime Minister was a fair question—surprise, surprise, it was not answered—and I have had great difficulty in trying to fathom exactly what the answer was supposed to mean.I say to the coalition: please stand up for this very efficient industry. It might be centred 99 per cent in New South Wales, but it is a great export earner for Australia. It is a great showcase of what we need to do in agriculture in terms of selling branded products and in value adding. The Rice Growers Cooperative of New South Wales took over the Leeton cannery. It was closed down and the cannery was stripped out. So what are the rice co-op doing? They have rebuilt it and are setting it up to manufacture rice products similar to the instant noodles that you can buy. Some will be for the domestic market no doubt and some we will export.Isn't this the sort of initiative that we want to encourage in agriculture? But no, the National Party is being bloody-minded about it. They are allowing the Chairman of the National Competition Council to threaten the Premier of New South Wales in this letter. If the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (Mr Ruddock), who is at the table, requires me to table this threatening letter from Graeme Samuel, the President of the National Competition Council, dated 11 June, I am more than happy to do so.The silence from the National Party has been absolutely staggering. There are 50,000 jobs directly or indirectly involved in this industry. Why wouldn't we want to be maximising the opportunities? Why would we want to fix something that is not broken? (Time expired)17:15:005841Latham, Mark, MPMr LATHAMK26WerriwaALP00—I want to raise two propositions regarding the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 . The first is the restructuring that is needed in the Commonwealth and state responsibilities for post-secondary education in Australia. The second is to put the case for improved national investments in education for both Commonwealth purposes and Commonwealth grants to the states.It is now acknowledged among policy makers that education policy needs to move much closer to the structures and funding of a learning society, that is, a society in which all citizens engage in lifelong learning. The most logical response in an era of uncertainty and insecurity is for people to develop new skills—not just to the age of 18 or 21 as has been traditional in the 1970s and 1980s in Australia, but throughout life. If we live in an era of permanent change, then people skilling themselves and preparing for change through a lifetime is the only logical response. That places a great responsibility on policy reform, because most of the education institutions in Australia have been structured around the old economy and old social structures from the 1960s and 1970s.We have seen the incremental growth of various educational institutions in Australia. Comprehensive schooling emerged in the 1960s; universities have moved from elite structures to mass education and now a movement to almost universal education. Along the way TAFE and vocational education have emerged to provide important services for workplace skilling. Adult and community education has emerged. So we have seen within the traditional stovepipe or silo of government structure the incremental emergence of these educational institutions.But there has never been a fully comprehensive approach to how the institutions relate to each other—how we build the institutions and funding base for lifelong learning. One of the good things about Labor policy for the next election is that we are going to conduct that sort of review. We will have Australia's first ever comprehensive review of how we build the Commonwealth and state structures needed for lifelong learning. We see the pressures and the border disputes in the education system all the time. TAFE is being pulled at from both sides—in its relationship with universities on one side and its growing involvement in schools on the other. We find the challenges of adult and community education are not receiving the attention they need, particularly from this government. Universities, as I mentioned earlier, are going through a range of challenges, not only in moving towards universal provision but also in meeting the challenges of the globalisation of the higher education sector. These are all big issues and Labor will embark on the sort of review that is needed to address them.I mount this argument in post-secondary education: over the next decade in Australia we need to have the Commonwealth government taking all the funding and legislative responsibilities for post-secondary education. For the universities this means funding and legislation. For TAFE it means the full system moving over in a national way onto national funding responsibilities. It means national responsibility for adult and community education, ending the confusion about the resources in that sector. It means Commonwealth responsibility for vocational education.I would maintain that only by the Commonwealth taking these responsibilities for post-secondary education will we have the policy direction and effectiveness needed in the education system to build the structures of lifelong learning. I place this on a 10-year horizon. There is a lot of commonsense in making this point. How archaic that university legislation is still determined by the states in Australia even though the states provide little of the funding that makes our universities perform. How archaic and confusing that the TAFE system has different arrangements for its recurrent and capital funding. There is an argument that we can take, in a profile system, the TAFE institutes—80 in Australia—one by one and move them onto the federal budget. There is also a good argument that, in building the structures of lifelong learning, the Commonwealth should take responsibility for adult and community education and the great work of that sector, which is now expanding into the universities of the third age. This is a 10-year agenda, but only Labor talks about the institutional structures needed for a learning society. All we get from the coalition is the running down of national investment in education and very little to improve institutional design and policy reform.The second point I want to make is about the value of education and how we need improved national investments in this area. It is not just a matter of getting the institutional structure right for lifelong learning; it is also a matter of resourcing it so that every single Australian can engage in the reskilling and knowledge enhancement needed in their economic and social lives that allow them to deal with insecurity. If we do not give people new skills, they will always take insecurity and uncertainty more as a threat than as an opportunity in their lives. If they are threatened by the process of change, then every two-bit populist in town will try to exploit their fears and play on the worst side of human nature. We have seen that most recently in the Queensland election result. Education has a special place on the public policy agenda with regard to not only Commonwealth responsibilities but also Commonwealth grants to the states and territories.In Australia we have traditionally undervalued the importance of education. This nation has had an ethos of wealth generation that normally associates economic activity with things that come out of the ground—agriculture and mining and property development in the postwar housing and property boom. Now we need to move the Australian economic base away from old industries to the new information base for the next century. In a world of permanent change, the only answer to insecurity lies in preparation for change—people preparing themselves for new types of work, being prepared to handle new flows of information and knowledge—thus empowering them to act in new ways with new skills ensuring that people are able to regard the change process more as an opportunity than as a threat.This is more the case as we shift from industrial to knowledge based economic activity. Given the growing importance of information, innovation and creativity, and the declining importance of muscle power and repetitive tasks in the production process, knowledge and education matter more than ever. To change the Australian ethos—to think that we can now get so much more of our national wealth out of our minds, out of our ingenuity, out of our creativity, than necessarily out of the ground—is one of the great leadership tasks for national government. But I worry about this proposition: education tends to be somewhat punished in the political arena because it invests in the future. During this time of insecurity and these political themes of uncertainty, we have demands in the political system for immediate answers, for governments and parties to give the appearance of having an immediate answer for every single social problem. The truth is that the only lasting answer to insecurity lies in preparing people for the change process. Education should not be punished because it invests in the future—because it invests in the future capacity of citizens to prepare themselves for change, economic and social.We live in a world of permanent change with far fewer economic boundaries and limits on the flow of information, and the worst thing we can possibly do in the political system is meet the short-term demand for answers at the expense of the long-term investments the nation needs to make in education and knowledge enhancement. I would argue that there is no point in trying to con people that change can be halted or, with even greater deception, that change can be reversed. There are no answers in the siren song of nostalgia; no answers in the hope of turning back the hands of time to some golden era from the 1950s and 1960s. The only real political direction and purpose that Australia can take requires the development of policies and programs that help prepare people for the inevitability of change. The only lasting answer to this time of insecurity lies in improved national investments in education, research and training.This government, of course, with its promotion of downwards envy, its very narrow political agenda, has been in the business of punishing education budgets, not because they are without answers but because they invest in the future. This is a government that has tried to give the appearance of pandering to the so-called Howard battler constituency—it is now the Hanson battler constituency, of course—and saying to people, `We are trying to give the appearance of having immediate answers,' and one of the things that suffered in that process is the national investment in education. This government is the first in our history to actively wind back the scale of national funding for education. That is reflected not just in Commonwealth purpose activities, but also in Commonwealth grants to the states and the general purpose grants that we find in this particular piece of legislation.The important thing now for policy makers who believe in lifelong learning and who advocate a learning society is to argue and put the case for education as a public good that is available to all and where one person's use does not restrict someone else's access to the education service. I want to present three arguments why education can be argued within this framework; why we should acknowledge the power of education as an essential investment in the nation's future.The first of those is this concern about economic sovereignty and economic growth. In the global economy, nations have been stripped down essentially to the skills and insights of their people. We now have a new economic environment where huge amounts of financial capital can move seamlessly across national boundaries. We have a new economy where even whole industries can relocate from one political jurisdiction to another. The only lasting answer, in terms of economic sovereignty, is to recognise that the nation's greatest asset does not lie in the ground and it does not lie in any other form of economic activity except for the skills and insights of the nation's people. Australia's best way of attracting investment into the future lies in the development of a highly skilled work force and population.The best way of combating global capital is to empower a nation's citizens to be skilled and proficient so they can draw a premium off international markets on the basis of their knowledge based skills. Of course, this argument is being supported by some new economic theories. The new growth theorists are saying that economic growth and a nation's prospects are very closely linked to technological progress. The old Left in politics always argued that to get more economic growth you need to spend more. The new Right argued in their economics that for improved growth and national performance you need to save more. But the new growth theorists call on policy makers to address a nation's third deficit: not the deficit in spending or the deficit in saving on government budgets, but in R&D and knowledge enhancement.This is the greatest folly of all: the Howard government's budget cuts to education, research and training. Australia's R&D performance is being pushed well below the 1.5 per cent level of GDP. Compare that to Japan: three per cent investments; Germany, 2.8; and the United States, with 2.7 per cent of their gross domestic product going into R&D. The Howard government is pushing our rates down to less than half those of our competitor economies in the Western world. The new growth theorists and the whole argument about economic sovereignty point to the need for improved national investments in education, research and training.The second argument about the role of education as a public good concerns this question of social participation. We now live very much in an information rich society where citizens are bombarded with new sources of information throughout their daily activities. From the moment we wake up in the morning and turn on the radio and get the latest news, to when we might log out of a home computer or the Internet at night, we are very much an information rich society. Participation in our society now requires a higher level of information skills. It requires that we have the personal capacity to process information, to understand it, to use new forms of information for personal and social advantage. Beyond that we are all better off as citizens in dealing with information skilled people in our daily lives, whether in the workplace or socially, or in our consumer transactions. We are all better off dealing with people who can cope well with this overload of information. If we deal with highly skilled people, we are all better off in our own daily lives.So too this question of participation relates to the new economy. There are now so few unskilled forms of work. I was in South Australia last month visiting some of the excellent TAFE facilities and had to marvel at the stories I was receiving from TAFE directors about the skill base that is coming out of their institutions. I was told by one TAFE director at Noarlunga, in the electorate of Kingston, how he often gets parents coming to say, `Look, my son has been unemployed. I want him to do a TAFE course. He is going to be a motor mechanic. He just needs to get a bit of grease on his hands and get his head under the bonnet and he'll be a motor mechanic and he'll get off the dole queue.' The TAFE director has to turn around and say to those parents, `Has he got electronics skills, electronics training? Does he know how to use a computer?' They shake their head with amazement. The idea that motor mechanics now need computer technology and electronic training and skills is very much different from the way the old economy operated, but that is what they need to be effective in that industry. Lift the bonnet now on any advanced car and you will find that the argument is true and that what the TAFE director was saying is absolutely accurate.I was in the electorate of Makin at one of the TAFE institutes talking about overseas students, and the director told me of the course they run for stable hands from Singapore. Stable hand work in the horse racing industry is now a skilled position. They are taking overseas students from the horse racing industry in Singapore. So, whether you are a motor mechanic or a stable hand, the skill base and the skill horizon is lifting, and there are so few unskilled jobs available. To participate in the new economy requires a high level of skills. No longer is it sufficient to have the school leaving certificate, as it might have been in the 1960s. The skill base has lifted to where people basically need a post-secondary qualification if they are to be employable in the new economy. So, in terms of social participation, education needs to be seen as a public good available to all and where one person's use does not restrict the use of another citizen.I move to the third argument about the fairness and decency of our society. We do not want the old inequities of class and income transferred to a new divide between the information rich and the information poor. Education is very much the dividing line in the new economy. The new economy rewards highly skilled citizens and punishes and seemingly leaves behind those citizens without skills. We now live in an economic environment where the more you learn, the more you earn. It is an economic environment where skills are the basis not only of social participation but also of economic capacity. There is a big task here to build the public good features of education.I think the task for social democrats is even more important. Our side of politics was always based on the idea out of the Industrial Revolution that big bosses would exploit labour along the production line. Now, of course, we have some types of workers, knowledge workers, earning more on global markets than some of the owners of business in the non-traded sector. So why wouldn't social democrats want to have more of those knowledge workers, who draw a high level of income out of the production process and turn that income into spending, which helps employment levels in their local and regional economies?This applies also to the social democratic ideal about progressive values. I would argue that the best answer to Hansonism in Australia lies in the power of knowledge, the power of reason and the power of rationality. In the end, the Hanson movement, this nostalgic call for Australia to go back to the 1950s, relies on the politics of fear and the politics of ignorance. I noticed a survey recently coming out of the United States of connected citizens, that is, those people who are frequent users of electronic information delivery. This is what the survey said about the information rich:They are knowledgeable, tolerant, civic minded and radically committed to change, profoundly optimistic about the future. They are convinced that technology is a force for good and that our free market economy functions as a powerful engine of progress. They are highly participatory in society and view our existing political system positively. Their political values draw heavily from humanism and social tolerance. They are the first generation to truly embrace diversity as a healthy, positive aspect of American life. Paradise at last. Paradise for every single social democrat who believes in the mixed economy.MG4LEEMr Lee—I bet they use their library.K26Latham, Mark, MPMr LATHAM—They use their library, as the member for Dobell points out, they use the Internet, they use information delivery in an electronic format and they believe in the power of knowledge and reason. For social democrats understanding those values, we have here an insight into the best answer against the forces of reaction and the forces of political nostalgia.Our system and our society need a highly skilled population. We need it for economic benefit and we also need it for social cohesiveness. The more people learn, the more they earn. Also, the more they learn, the greater their tendency to be knowledgeable, tolerant, civic minded and radically committed to change, with support for the market economy and the values of humanism and social tolerance.For all these reasons, education stands as a magnificent investment, a public good that should be supported much more substantially than it has been by this government. The great folly of this government, as will be recorded in history, is that it started out wanting to pander to downwards envy, the worst instincts in Australian politics, and it got trumped by Hanson. It deserves to go out the back door at the next election and allow an administration to come in that actually believes in the value of education and in doing good things, not only for the economic strength but also the basic fairness and cohesiveness of our society.17:35:005846Miles, Chris, MPMr MILESBI4BraddonLP10—in reply—I want to come back to the topic which we are debating here and go back over a few points in regard to the States Grants (General Purposes) Amendment Bill 1998 . This bill has two main purposes. The first is to give effect to the Commonwealth general revenue assistance to the states and territories for 1998-99, and the second is to extend the operation of section 90 safety net arrangements to protect state and territory revenues in 1998-99.In regard to general revenue assistance, this bill provides for the payments to the states and territories of general revenue assistance estimated at about $17.1 billion in 1998-99. The major component of this assistance is some $16.9 billion, which will take the form of untied financial grants to the states and territories. These grants will be distributed in accordance with the equalisation per capita relativities recommended by the Commonwealth Grants Commission in its 1998 update report. As in recent years, the states and territories will benefit from real per capita growth in financial assistance grants in 1998-99.In addition, under this bill states and territories will receive an estimated $217.2 million in competition payments in 1998-99. These payments and the per capita element of the real per capita growth in financial assistance grants are conditional on states and territories meeting the terms of agreement to implement the national competition policy and related reforms.This agreement is designed to improve the competitiveness and growth prospects of the economy with consequent benefits to consumers. The National Competition Council will shortly be reporting to the government on state and territory progress in competition policy reforms. The bill also provides for states and territories to make fiscal contribution payments totalling some $313.3 million to the Commonwealth in 1998-99. This will be the third and final instalment of these contributions, which were agreed at the 1996 Premiers Conference. The achievement by the Commonwealth of responsible surplus in 1998-99 is central to Australia's economic interests. Particularly in light of the financial stability in Asia, these state fiscal contributions will make an important contribution to that surplus. After allowing for fiscal contribution payments, total Commonwealth payments to the states will increase by $957 million or 3.1 per cent in 1998-99.The bill also contains technical amendments to various definitions in the act to reflect the commencement of the Australian health care agreements. The bill provides for payments to the states in 1998-99 under the safety net arrangements requested by the states to protect their revenues following the High Court's decision on 5 August 1997 on the constitutional validity of state business franchise fees. Under these arrangements the Commonwealth collects customs excise and sales tax revenue from petroleum, alcohol and tobacco products in lieu of the former state business franchise fees on these products. This revenue, less a small amount for administration costs, is then passed onto the states and territories on the basis of shares agreed by the states and territories. It is estimated that the revenue replacement payments to the states will be about $6.5 billion in 1998-99.I now want to make a few comments about some of the input into this debate, which was reasonably wide ranging. The opposition spokesman, the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham), said that the Commonwealth government was `punishing education budgets'. That is a total untruth. In the previous debate in the House I listened to some of the figures given by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (Mr Abbott), and he was saying very clearly, and it is the case, that this government has actually increased funding in education. The opposition is running around with a total lie on this issue.The member for Werriwa was saying that we had cut education spending. What is being said by the opposition is totally incorrect. We have actually increased funding for education over and above what the Labor Party put in. That is very clear. It is on the record. We, as a government, are underpinning education. That is the reality of it. I just say to the member for Werriwa that he has obviously forgotten what we are doing in regard to literacy and numeracy. We know that the Labor Party do not care about that. They never have done or they would have done something about it.Also, about 200,000 new apprenticeships are being put into place by this government. It is a massive change in what was occurring in that training sector under the previous government. I want to totally refute what the member for Werriwa was saying in regard to cutting education funding. That is just not true. Out there, as a government, we are fully supportive of both the government sector and the private sector, and we continue to strongly fund both those sectors. All of us here know that the future of our young people and of this country are very much dependent on their knowledge, their skills and the level of education that they have.I was talking to a person within my own community recently about how great the changes occurring in schools are, particularly in regard to literacy and numeracy, and how the teachers are applying themselves to make sure the kids do come up to scratch in that area. That is a great initiative by this government.The member for Shortland (Mr Peter Morris) was talking about fuel excise and saying how terrible it was that such a small amount of fuel excise was going back to road funding. That triggered something in my memory in regard to the history of this. I just want to put that on the record also, because the genesis of the decline in the amount of fuel funding going back to roads was actually under the Labor administration from 1983 through to 1996. For example, in the period from 1983-84 to 1995-96, Labor increased excise on petrol from 7c per litre to the current level of approximately 34c per litre for unleaded petrol and 36c per litre for leaded petrol. Yet the member for Shortland was saying how outrageous was this amount of excise that was placed on petrol and that there was not very much going back. Well, it was under the previous Labor government that the whole decline in this area started to occur.YU5TANNERMr Tanner—You cut road funding.BI4Miles, Chris, MPMr MILES—He was talking about the fuel excise. The Labor Party put fuel excise up from 7c per litre to 34c per litre. In 1983-84, when Labor came in, it was 7c per litre. When they went out it was 34c per litre for unleaded and 36c for leaded petrol. Let us do a comparison of the amount of funding which was going back to road funding. It is interesting that in the last period under the former federal coalition government, the 1982-83 period, federal road funding represented 67 per cent of federal fuel excise revenue collections. Guess what it had fallen to by 1995-96: eight per cent under Labor. For a member of the opposition to be whingeing about that issue is really very hypocritical. I just want to put on the record that in regard to this area what was being said was quite outrageous.I was also listening to the member for Chifley (Mr Price) and he was talking quite a bit about the rice industry and competition payments. First of all we have to remember that this agreement was signed off under the previous Commonwealth Labor government in 1995. That is the first thing: the competition payment process was agreed to by the Labor Party. Now we have members coming in here complaining and whingeing about it. The fact is that they were members of the government. In fact, the member for Chifley was a member of the government that signed off on it. I wonder where he was at that stage—was he arguing the case then or not?The 1995 review into the rice industry found that the domestic monopoly arrangements impose greater costs than benefits and it recommended repeal by 31 January 1999. That review was done in 1995. The New South Wales government in June last year committed to the effective reform of the domestic rice industry, but has failed to do so. Is the member for Chifley really in here criticising the New South Wales government? That is what appears to be the case: that he is really criticising the New South Wales government, which has failed to do anything. So for him to come in here and try to put the blame on the National Party is, quite frankly, a bit rich.Moreover, it is worth noting that the government has not reduced national competition payments to New South Wales. But the member for Chifley was implying that they had. I think he was talking about a figure of $10 million, but in actual fact that is not the case. The agreement to implement the national competition policy related reforms was agreed to in 1995, as I have said, and that was under the Labor government. That agreement contained the conditions that the states and territories needed to satisfy to receive their competition payments and that included reform of industries where competition is restricted and the costs of the restrictions outweigh the benefits, as is the case in the rice industry.Obviously, we have had a wide-ranging debate in regard to this issue. I summarised basically the content of the bill, but I did want to refute some of the points which have been made in here during the debate.Question resolved in the affirmative.Bill read a second time.Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced.5848Leave granted for third reading to be moved forthwith.Motion (by Mr Miles) proposed:That the bill be now read a third time.17:48:005848Price, Roger, MPMr PRICEQI4ChifleyALP00—The Parliamentary Secretary [Cabinet] to the Prime Minister (Mr Miles) did have a few comments to make and I need to refute them. Yes, I certainly had plenty to say about competition policy in the economics committee at the time and up-front to the minister at the time, Mr Gear, but I think it is a perversion of the speech I gave to suggest that I was criticising the New South Wales government. In fact, the rice growers support the decisions of the New South Wales government. The study has shown that the overwhelming public benefit rests in keeping the current arrangements. I made particular mention of the fact that Australia benefits to the tune of $35 million to $50 million each year out of the current arrangements and in the year 2000 it will benefit to the tune of $70 million.Even though the cost of rice to the consumer has fallen, not increased, under this regulated system, the committee set up under competition policy found, at worse—and it is disputed—the net cost was $5 million. So you have got this overwhelming public benefit and this small cost that the committee has identified, but your government is insistent—if the recommendation does go to the Treasurer (Mr Costello) and he accepts the recommendation—on applying a $10 million penalty.My whole speech was devoted to the fact that yes, we do need processes involved in competition policy, but where it is determined that the overwhelming public benefit rests in a current arrangement, as it does with the rice industry, then I think logic ought to prevail and the government should—if the National Party will not, then perhaps the parliamentary secretary will—come out with a statement in support of the excellent work being done by the industry and dissociate themselves from Mr Samuel, the President of the National Competition Council.I offered to table the letter from the President of the Competition Council, Mr Samuel, to the Premier. I asked the minister at the table, the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (Mr Ruddock), if he wanted me to table it. In fact, I would have been happy for it to be incorporated in Hansard if that was what he wanted, but I am afraid he was silent. So I think the parliamentary secretary, whom I have general regard for, was taking some cheap shots. Let us put politics aside, just think of the 2,000 rice farmers, the 8,000 direct jobs in the rice industry and the 42,000 indirect jobs that are there.I think it is worthwhile having a debate. I have committed in the parliamentary secretary's eyes the great sin of raising this issue in the parliament. Not one coalition member and not one National Party member has raised this issue at all and the majority of rice growers live in the electorate of the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Tim Fischer). I am just staggered by their silence.You can ridicule my ideas—the facts are pretty hard to ridicule—but let us have a debate about the rice farmers, their contribution and the impact of the actions of the President of the National Competition Council. I think it is very serious. I am perhaps being parochial because 99 per cent of the industry is located in my state, but I am very proud of what the rice industry has accomplished, where it has come from and what it is doing—value adding, exporting, having branded products and growing specific rice for specific markets. It is a terrific story. I do not know why, under the guise of competition policy, the government wants to maniacally deregulate when it has got the evidence of the public benefit to Australia.Question resolved in the affirmative.Bill read a third time.Bills5849r5705849Bill presented by Mr Williams, and read a first time.584917:53:005849Williams, Daryl, MPMr WILLIAMS7V5TangneyLPAttorney-General10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.The purpose of this bill is to amend the Criminal Code Act 1995 to insert offences relating to slavery and sexual servitude. The importance of this bill is perhaps best demonstrated by the fact that its provisions will be inserted in chapter 9 of the code, which is the chapter that deals with crimes against humanity.The Minister for Justice (Senator Vanstone) has pursued this initiative with our state and territory counterparts through the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General, and I am pleased that it has the support of all Australian jurisdictions.Slavery OffencesAt present, the law in Australia on slavery and the slave trade is governed by four 19th century imperial acts which employ archaic language and relate to outdated circumstances and institutions that have either changed or long since fallen into disuse.In 1990 the Australian Law Reform Commission released report No. 48, Criminal Admiralty Jurisdiction and Prize, in which it recommended that the 19th century imperial acts be replaced with modern and concise Australian statutory offences. Modern Australian slavery offences will ensure that Australia's international obligations are properly fulfilled and that the elements of the offences and the penalties that apply are clear. The slavery offences in the bill prohibit both engaging in the slave trade and possessing a slave.The definitions of `slavery' and `slave trade' are based on the definitions of those terms in the 1926 International Convention to Suppress the Slave Trade and Slavery and its 1953 protocol, and the 1956 Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the Slave Trade and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery, which are the two key international agreements on slavery and the slave trade.However, the bill definitions will be expanded in two important respects. First, in relation to the slave trade offence, the definition of that term will include `. . . exercising control or direction over or providing finance for the trade'. This will ensure that those who lie at the heart of the trade—the organisers, managers and financiers—will be caught by this offence. Secondly, the bill definition of slavery has been expanded to make it clear that slavery can also arise from a debt or contract. Of course, it is not sufficient for the debt or contract to be exploitative or oppressive to qualify. Rather, it must be such as to result in a condition that confers a right of ownership over the person before the definition is satisfied.It is important to make the point that, although this bill contains separate offences to address the conduct I shortly will refer to as sexual servitude, the slavery offences may also apply if the control over the sex worker is so far reaching that it effectively amounts to a right of ownership over him or her.The maximum term of imprisonment for the slavery offences is 20 years. In view of the heinousness of the crime involved, that penalty is more than justified. Since the new slavery offences will be replacing the old imperial acts, the bill contains provisions for their repeal.Sexual Servitude OffencesIn addition to the modern slavery offences, the bill also includes a range of model offences to deter the impact on Australia of a growing and highly lucrative international trade in people for the purposes of sexual exploitation.Essentially the trade involves recruiting persons from one country and relocating them to another to work as prostitutes in servile or slave like conditions for little, if any, reward. Young women are the primary target of this insidious trade but, tragically, children are also falling victim to it in increasing numbers.Over recent years the world has seen a disturbing increase in this appalling activity. There are few countries today that are not in some way affected by the trade and, sadly, the indications are that Australia is becoming an important destination for its victims.Australia has obligations under a wide range of international instruments to prohibit servitude and the trafficking in persons for the purposes of sexual exploitation. These include the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women 1979, the Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948.Intelligence from Australian and overseas sources confirms that the problem is a significant one for Australia. In August last year the AFP reported that, in the previous 18 months, it had received information of 14 possible cases in this country. The NCA also reported that it is aware of eight possible cases over the period from December 1992 to November 1996. The NCA cases involved 25 women, one of whom was allegedly a 13-year-old girl brought to this country from Thailand to work as a prostitute to repay her father's debt.We must not wait for what is already a significant problem to become so firmly entrenched that it proves to be too difficult to rectify in the future. The stakes are too high. Australians are rightly proud of their record on human rights, and what is involved here are serious violations of fundamental human rights.Our intelligence is that the recruits come mainly from South-East Asia. The poorer regions of the world are fertile ground for potential victims desperate to escape poverty and unemployment. In many cases recruits are aware that they will be employed as sex workers but they are usually unaware of the conditions under which they will be required to work. In other cases recruits are deceived into believing that they will be engaged in other work, only to be forced into prostitution when they arrive in Australia.What do they find when they arrive in this country? The reports I have received paint an ugly picture. For example, once in Australia recruits are often placed under heavy security and their movements strictly controlled. Those who are fortunate enough to live off the brothel premises frequently find that they are driven by guards to and from work and are not free to go elsewhere. Others can live and work almost entirely at the brothel.The recruits are rarely allowed time off work and have little or no control over how many clients they service a day. Many are not free to reject a client or to determine the conditions under which they service them. Unsafe sexual practices are regularly imposed on them and, as a consequence, they live under the constant fear of contracting HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. Their passports and other travel documents are frequently taken away from them and transgressions are often met with intimidation, violence and threats to harm them or their families or to report them to the immigration authorities.There are various pay arrangements between the sex workers and the organisers but in most cases the recruits are placed under a debt to the sponsors, allegedly for the costs of the airfares and arranging false travel documents and for ongoing expenses, such as accommodation and board. The sex workers are frequently required to fully repay the debt before they can retain their earnings. In many cases the recruits are not informed of this until after they arrive in Australia. As a precautionary measure, the sex workers' earnings are often not paid to them but directly to the sponsor or parlour owner.The debt is usually far in excess of the sponsor's actual expenses and is often unilaterally increased in response to some transgression on the part of the sex worker. In some cases sex workers have complained that their debt is in the region of $40,000 to $50,000 and in others that they would have to service up to 500 clients before they could discharge their debt. In many cases recruits receive little or nothing for their work by the time they are detected by the authorities and deported back home. In August last year the AFP reported that there are numerous syndicates and individuals engaged in sex trafficking into Australia and many have been operating in this country for many years. The organisers use sophisticated methods and appear to have links with international crime syndicates and major drug traffickers. Large untaxed profits are made by the organisers and large sums of money are transferred by them overseas. Investigations show that the gross cash flow to organisers of the trade could be in the region of $1 million per week, much of which is transferred overseas.Advice to Senator Vanstone is that current Commonwealth, state and territory laws have not proved effective to discourage the growth of this activity in Australia. There are a number of reasons for this. First, sex trafficking to Australia is part of a large and increasing international trade so although existing laws may address some aspects of the domestic activity, they do not address the core of the problem—the international conduct.Secondly, the primary focus of relevant prostitution and migration offences is on the persons subjected to trafficking, such as the illegal immigrants or the sex workers, and not on the traffickers. Thirdly, although existing state and territory laws, such as assault and false imprisonment, may apply to the offenders directly involved, the organisers and recruiters are less vulnerable to prosecution because their involvement is remote from the exploitative prostitution.If we are to discourage this activity in Australia, we need offences that are specific to the problem and address both the international and domestic aspects of the trade. Most importantly, we need offences that target the traffickers who recruit, organise and profit from those engaged in prostitution in slave-like conditions.Last year, the Minister for Justice, Senator Vanstone, asked the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General to consider a legislative response to the problem of sexual servitude in Australia. In April this year, it approved the release of a discussion paper that broadly endorsed a strategy to enact a package of Commonwealth, state and territory offences directed at the whole trade and not just aspects of it. The sexual servitude offences in this bill are the Commonwealth's part of that package of uniform laws and are based on the model offences recommended in the discussion paper released by the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General in April.The bill will create offences of:1) causing a person to enter into or remain in sexual servitude in Australia;2) procuring a person to enter into sexual servitude in Australia by deceiving the person about the nature or other aspects of the engagement;3) engaging in any trade in persons for sexual servitude in Australia; and4) exercising control or direction over or providing finance for conduct involving the procuring of persons and engaging in the trade in persons for sexual servitude.The maximum term of imprisonment for these offences is seven years. However, the bill restricts the application of these offences to conduct which occurs entirely or partly outside Australia and the sexual services are to some extent provided or to be provided in Australia.The corresponding state and territory offences will operate where the conduct occurs wholly within Australia. The `causing' offence in proposed subclause 30.4(2) is intended to catch those who are both directly and indirectly involved in bringing about a person's entry into, or continued participation in, sexual servitude. It is an important provision in targeting the organisers of the trade. Although the concept of causation in the criminal law is complex, it is a notion which is familiar to the courts. The connection must be sufficiently strong to justify attributing criminal responsibility to the conduct (Royall v. the Queen (1991) 172 CLR 378).The procuring offence in proposed paragraph 30.4(3)(a) will only apply if the defendant deceives the recruit about the nature or other aspects of the engagement. It is intended to catch defendants who, for example, tell a recruit that she or he will be employed as a waiter when in fact she or he is employed as a prostitute in servile conditions. It will also apply in cases where the recruit is deceived about the debt repayment arrangements and then finds herself or himself in a condition of sexual servitude.The next two offences in proposed paragraphs 30.4(3)(b) and (c) are perhaps the most important in the armoury because they are directed at the principals involved in the trade—the organisers, managers and financiers. These offences are similar to the `slave trade' offence in that they prohibit engaging in the trade in persons for sexual servitude and exercising control or direction over or providing finance for procuring persons and engaging in the trade in persons for sexual servitude. The central element of these offences is the element of `sexual servitude'. That term is defined as the condition of a person who provides sexual services and who, because of the use of force or threats is not free (a) to cease providing sexual services within a reasonable time or on reasonable terms; (b) to decline to provide sexual services to a particular person or persons; or (c) to leave the place or area where the person provides sexual services.There are a few points I would like to make about this definition. First, sexual servitude can only apply where the services are provided in a commercial context. However, it is not limited to prostitution but can apply to sex work generally, such as pornography. Secondly, sexual servitude can only arise if one of the three matters I have mentioned has been brought about by the use of force or threats. Further, whether a person is not free in respect of those matters will be determined on the facts of each case and in the context of the mischief the legislation is directed against.The fact that a person may suffer a penalty under the terms of a typical employment contract or is threatened with the loss of her or his job, would not of itself amount to being `not free'. It is only if the force or threats effectively deny the person her or his freedom whether to perform the work that sexual servitude can be made out.A `reasonable time' and `reasonable terms' for ceasing to provide sexual services are treated similarly. It will only be if the terms for terminating the employment are so unrea sonable as to create a condition of servitude that the conduct will be caught. In borderline cases, where there is doubt about whether the terms are unreasonable in that sense, it is expected that the courts will resolve the matter in favour of the defendant.The difference between slavery and sexual servitude in the bill is essentially one of degree. To establish slavery it must be shown that the accused exercises a power of ownership over the victim. Sexual servitude falls short of ownership but the domination over the victim is such as to effectively deny her or his freedom in some fundamental respects. For the sexual servitude offences in the bill, criminal liability will only arise if the victim's freedom is denied in respect of one of the three matters listed in the definition.I would like to make some final points about the bill. Both the slavery and sexual servitude offences can be committed by non-nationals as well as Australian citizens and residents. In the case of the slavery offences, they can be committed by both nationals and non-nationals, whether they act wholly inside or outside Australia or partly inside and outside Australia. For sexual servitude, the offences may be committed by both nationals and non-nationals who act wholly outside Australia or partly outside and partly inside Australia.The international nature of the trade in persons and the inherently evil nature of that trade satisfy me that the offences should have this application. However, to ensure that Australia's international relations are not adversely affected in cases where extraterritorial jurisdiction is invoked, the bill contains a standard provision that my written consent must be obtained before a non-national can be prosecuted for a slavery or sexual servitude offence, if the relevant conduct occurs wholly or partly outside Australia. The bill also includes a double jeopardy provision which provides that a person cannot be prosecuted for a slavery or sexual servitude offence in respect of conduct for which he or she has already been convicted or acquitted in another country for offences against the law of that country. Finally, since the offences in the bill are all indictable, the provisions of the Proceeds of Crime Act 1987 will apply. That act allows a court to order the confiscation and forfeiture of property used in, or in connection with, the commission of a relevant offence as well as any profits derived therefrom.As I have said, this bill is part of a package of Commonwealth, state and territory legislation directed at both the international and domestic aspects of the trade, with the main focus on those who recruit, organise and profit from this insidious trade. By enacting this legislation, we will be sending a firm message to the organisers and recruiters that Australia must not be a destination for their trade. We will also give encouragement to the rest of the world to do the same. Australia can be justly proud if it shows leadership to other countries affected by this inhumane trade.I commend the bill to the House and present the explanatory memorandum to the bill.Debate (on motion by Mr Tanner) adjourned.Bills5853r5875853Bill presented by Mr Williams, and read a first time.585318:09:005853Williams, Daryl, MPMr WILLIAMS7V5TangneyLPAttorney-General10—I move:That the bill be now read a second time.This bill continues the `statute stocktake' foreshadowed in the government's law and justice policy, and started with the Statute Law Revision Act 1996. The government recognises that the parliament, as the primary law-maker, must bear a direct responsibility for maintenance and repair of Commonwealth statute law. The past 25 years have seen a dramatic increase in the volume, complexity and reach of Commonwealth law. Legislation impacts much more directly and significantly on all aspects of daily life. Whether it is family law, social security assistance, business regulation, environmental laws or taxation, the federal parliament affects our actions in business, socially, industrially and personally. Indeed, today the expectation is that when a new issue arises within a Commonwealth head of power, like native title, the parliament will step in to pass legislation to cover the field and reduce uncertainty.Perhaps not surprisingly, there are now over 1,300 Commonwealth acts on the statute book. But we cannot just pass more and more legislation without re-examining our existing laws on a regular and ongoing basis to assess their suitability and continuing necessity. In 1997 I wrote to portfolio ministers asking them, as the first stage of the statute stocktake, to identify legislation which was no longer required and could therefore be repealed. The stocktake has revealed many redundant acts still on the statute book. This bill will repeal 95 principal or stand-alone acts that are still on the statute book despite having no further operation. This will reduce the total number of substantive acts on the statute book by over seven per cent.The bill also includes provisions to make consequential amendments, and transitional and saving provisions relating to the repeals. The consequential amendments will remove references to the repealed acts and ensure that other acts can continue to operate properly despite those repeals. The transitional and saving provisions will ensure that the repeals do not have any adverse effects on existing rights. This bill repeals redundant laws as recommended by the Small Business Deregulation Task Force. It is also a further important contribution to the government's policy of reviewing and repairing the statute book.Although of itself an important exercise, this is but the first stage of the stocktake process. Ministers and their departments have also been asked to identify legislation for repair. Further work will continue to be undertaken to give effect to this ongoing commitment to clean up our laws. The repair of legislation is politically a low profile task which does not attract much attention from the media. Some might see it as a thankless task. It requires hard work, dedication and commitment. The coalition is doing what Labor failed to do in government.The winners, however, are all Australians. Whether it is small business taking out a franchise, a public company developing a major infrastructure proposal, an Aboriginal receiving Abstudy assistance to go to university or a family qualifying for the savings rebate, we all benefit from clearer, more accessible law. The bill, and further changes we have initiated, reflects our commitment to reducing the volume of legislation, minimising the complexity of Commonwealth law and ensuring that new legislation takes into account the impact on our citizens. The bill is expected to have no financial impact on the Commonwealth. I present the explanatory memorandum to the bill.Debate (on motion by Mr Tanner) adjourned.Bills5854r5515854Motion (by Mr Reith) proposed:That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent order of the day No. 28 private member's business for the second reading of the Adelaide Airport Curfew Bill 1998 being called on forthwith and the bill proceeding through all stages without delay.18:13:005854Zammit, Paul, MPMr ZAMMITZK6LoweIND00—I do not propose to oppose the suspension of standing orders to allow the member for Hindmarsh (Mrs Gallus) to bring her bill on. By agreement I will be speaking for about 10 or so minutes on the issue of aircraft noise and aircraft emissions. Hopefully, that will allow the member to take her bill through all stages.The issue of aircraft noise and emissions will affect more and more people all around Australia; and, more specifically, with the huge increase being predicted in tourism, it particularly will affect Australian airports. In that context, I must say how disturbed and disappointed I am that the government has chosen to give priority to this bill, the Adelaide Airport Curfew Bill, by bringing it forward, when the Adelaide airport is very small when compared with Sydney airport and the effects of aircraft noise and emissions on the people of Sydney—the one million people of Sydney—have been well documented and brought to the attention of everyone in the government. I have been concerned for my constituents in the electorate of Lowe for a period of two years, during which time I have been trying desperately to get the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) to honour his `categorical assurances', as stated by him repeatedly to the electorate of Lowe prior to the election on 2 March 1996.My efforts to bring my bill before the parliament have been frustrated by the actions of the government. I know that some people may say, `If you were part of the government, it might have been different.' But the point I would make is that, when I was part of the government, I tried for two whole years to get the Prime Minister to see reason and to honour his `categorical assurances', as he put it, to the electorate of Lowe prior to the last election. But nothing has happened. So I have no choice. Whilst it was the Prime Minister and not me who made those promises, I have had to take responsibility for them because I am a man of integrity.In speaking about my Sydney Airports Bill, which I put before this parliament for its first reading a little over two months ago, I would just like to put on the record that I have received a tremendous degree of support for it from various groups, and I want to put their names on the record. The first is Save our Skies, which is a community group representing the residents of the Sydney's inner west. It is a very well organised and a very committed group of people. That group states:Thumbs up for Zammit Airport Plan . . . The group also states:Mr Zammit's Airports Bill is what Sydney residents need and deserve. It is one of the few rational and fair proposals concerning Sydney Airport's noise problems to surface in a long time. SOS—that is, Save our Skies—fully supports the Zammit bill.Also, a letter from the North-West Residents Airport Group, NWRAG, states:Dear Mr Zammit—this letter is to express the support of the North West Residents Airport Group for your initiative in Parliament yesterday in putting forward the Sydney Airports Bill 1998. Additionally, I have a press release issued by the Eastern Coalition of Airports Groups, ECAG, which formally represents the councils of Waverley, Willara, Randwick and Botany. That press release states:Eastern Suburbs supports Zammit's Private Member's Bill to establish the Sydney Airports Commission.So I want to put on the record in this parliament the dismay of the people of Sydney at being treated so shabbily by the government and by the Prime Minister in not allowing this bill to come forward for debate. What does the government have to hide? What does it have to say about what has been said by these community groups, who believe that my bill will go a long way to solving some of the problems that they have experienced over a long period of time?To any of the member of the government who feels comfort in the fact that they might be part of the government and that may well be protected by the government in the event that the coalition were to win the next election, I would just say that they need look no further than me in the seat of Lowe. I feel that the people of the Lowe electorate and I have been treated in a very shabby way by the Prime Minister.I also want to put on the parliamentary record that only yesterday the Prime Minister got up in this parliament and said—and I do not have the actual quote, so I will paraphrase him—something along the lines of the people of Lowe being some of the greatest winners in regard to the matter of aircraft noise. Let me just remind the Prime Minister of the promises he made, and I will reiterate them. This is what he said in a press release on 8 February 1996:I want to state categorically that those who have not been affected by disruptive and loud aircraft noise in the past in the seat of Lowe will not be affected in the future . . .That is a broken promise. The Prime Minister then went on to say:I wish in particular to state that upon reopening the east-west runway, there will be no new flight paths over Ashfield, Burwood, Concord, Concord West, Homebush, Mortlake, North Strathfield Road, Strathfield, Strathfield South or Strathfield West . . . That has been broken. The Prime Minister goes on to say that, additionally, the coalition's policy will result in `a dramatic reduction in flights over the electorate of Lowe with consequent benefits to the health and lifestyle of the affected residents'—and that has been broken as well. There is one further item from that press release I would put on the record, and that is where the Prime Minister said:I denounce the scaremongering tactics employed by the ALP who are relying more and more on half-truths and lies to bolster their tenuous position.For that to be said by the Prime Minister is interesting because a lot of people have used the same words about the Prime Minister's `categorical assurances', as he put it, to my electorate prior to 2 March 1996.I am very concerned about the health and welfare of aircraft noise affected people. I have been trying to raise in, and point out to, this parliament the dangers involved with aircraft emissions and their effects on people's health.I raised the issue of pollution over Sydney in regard to aircraft emissions. The minister said that there is nothing to worry about; that it is no more than two or three per cent. I think that either the minister did not know what he was talking about or he was ill-advised by the people who have the technical knowledge about this matter. The reason that I say that he must have been misled by those advising him is that the two to three per cent pollution that he refers to is two to three per cent if the pollution were to be spread over the whole of Australia. In other words, that is a play on figures that has given the minister little credit. The pollution over residents from planes overflying Sydney airport is a hell of a lot more than two to three per cent. The difficulty is that neither the minister nor the government is able to quantify that figure. I think that is a great shame because the people of Sydney want to know exactly how bad the situation is with regard to their effects. The other thing that is very important is that the minister very conveniently forgot to mention that the percentages that he quoted—the two to three per cent—are very much out of date. The figure that was being quoted is some eight or 10 years old. In fact, jet fuel use in Australia has increased dramatically over the past 10 years. The latest figure I have is in the vicinity of 84 per cent. Additionally, the minister needs to be reminded that there has been no measurement of carcinogens or toxins emitted by aviation, and he must answer why that has not occurred.The Minister for Transport and Regional Development (Mr Vaile) received from me questions on notice asked on 24 March 1998. I raised the matter in the parliament with the Speaker, and I must say how concerned I am that, more than two months after that date—getting on for three months—the minister has not responded to matters that I believe are extremely important. The questions refer to the Sydney Airport Community Forum and the cost to the Commonwealth. That figure has not been provided. I asked about the SACF terms of reference and constitution, how its members were chosen—which I think is extremely important—whether the Commonwealth provides funds to the monitoring committee, including certain individuals on that committee whom I mentioned in my question on notice, and how regularly the IMC meets with the minister and his advisers or employees of Airservices Australia. Just as important, I asked at whose expense this occurred. Who was involved in the selection processes for the advertising agency to promote the new LTOP and what sum did they charge? These are very important figures that need to be provided to this parliament and to the people of Sydney who are the taxpayers.This issue was brought to a head in an article, that I referred to in the House, by Robert Wainwright, the transport writer for the Sydney Morning Herald. In that article he states:The Prime Minister has admitted for the first time that his government cannot meet its aircraft noise sharing promises and wants to back away from targets set in the long-term operating plan, LTOP, for Sydney airport.The LTOP targets are 17 per cent to the north and north-west, 15 per cent to the west, 13 per cent to the east and 55 per cent over water to the south. When I first saw these figures I asked the minister's advisers—in fact, I asked the former minister—how these figures were arrived at. Were these figures plucked out of the air, or has there been any modelling done? The answer was, `We don't know.'Let us talk about the fairness or otherwise of these figures—13 per cent to the east and 17 per cent to the north and north-west. The important thing to recognise is that on the third runway, only the smaller planes take off to the north and bank to the right and go over the eastern suburbs. Yet somebody decided that they are only going to put 13 per cent of the movements over the third runway. Why should they put 17 per cent of the movements on the main north-south runway taking off to the north and north-west, overflying inner western Sydney when the take-offs to the north—(Time expired)Debate (on motion by Mr Andrew) adjourned.Adjournment5857Motion (by Mr Truss) proposed:That the House do now adjourn.585718:29:005857Latham, Mark, MPMr LATHAMK26WerriwaALP00—There is a story in Australian politics from early this century about George Reid. George Reid was a leader of one of the conservative parties who in one of the campaigns wanted to run an aggressive fear campaign against the Labor Party under the banner of the socialist tiger. Apparently George Reid sent his private secretary out to research as much as he could about socialism. The irony was that the secretary was convinced of the virtue of socialism and joined the Labor Party as a result.I rather fancy that history has repeated itself with the member for Warringah (Mr Abbott) and David Oldfield. The member for Warringah takes a keen interest in my writings, and I was very interested to see a document appear in my office not too long ago entitled `Office management: Objectives of Tony Abbott's office'. Under the heading `David—Private Secretary'—I think this is David Oldfield—it reads as follows:To read everything that emerges from the department . . . and to advise me, in writing, once a week or more frequently, if necessary, of what's happening in the department, and what issues have political potential.It is my guess that the member for Warringah has sent David Oldfield out to research One Nation, perhaps in some sort of attempt to sully their reputation in Australian politics. But, just like George Reid's private secretary, Oldfield was converted to One Nation and signed up as the chief political adviser to the member for Oxley (Ms Hanson).The member for Warringah, in an adjournment debate earlier in the week, said he was admitting to a mistake. It is true that in politics, as in all parts of life, we all make mistakes. But of this magnitude? Of the magnitude involved in this particular error of judgment, this basic error of character judgment? It has been reported in the Australian press that the member for Warringah knew before he employed him that Mr Oldfield had a dislike of Asians.SD4CADMANMr Cadman—He was deceived.K26Latham, Mark, MPMr LATHAM—It has been reported, and I have not heard any personal explanation from the member for Warringah saying that that is untrue. At the end of the adjournment, if not before, he will make some contribution to this debate. I call on the member for Warringah to give the House an explanation of whether or not he knew of Mr Oldfield's dislike of Asians before he came in to his employment as a private secretary.I believe that the judgments of the member for Warringah need to be seriously considered. He is not a backbencher; he is a member of the executive government who has made a monumental error that brings into doubt his capacity to serve as a parliamentary secretary. While he wrote a reference for David Oldfield, saying that Oldfield was an absolutely wonderful person and a wonderful staffer, he is now trying to paint Oldfield as a brother of Satan. One can only wonder, when the member for Warringah, the parliamentary secretary, goes to, say, Green Corps graduation ceremonies, whether or not the graduates could believe him when he makes comments about the value of Green Corps, government policy and their prospects in life. Can they really believe someone who one day portrays David Oldfield, his right-hand man, as a wonderful human being and the next day portrays him as a brother of Satan?The member for Warringah has a lot of explaining to do. I know he is now playing catch-up politics, attacking David Oldfield and One Nation, but I think it really is like that old story where George Reid sent his private secretary out to research the socialist tiger. The member for Warringah sent David Oldfield out to research the One Nation tiger and he was converted to the cause.I think we need an explanation about these matters. It is not sufficient to say, `We all make mistakes, and one has been made.' I cannot think of a bigger mistake in Australian political staffing arrangements as this. This is a monumental error that cannot be dismissed as something that happened by chance or something that happened as any form of accident. The member for Mitchell (Mr Cadman) interjected earlier that he was misled, but I would have thought, on the basis of this office manual which names David Oldfield as the right-hand man in political potential and political advice, that the member for Warringah needs to take some responsibility.In a certain sense I can admire his hide, I can admire his gumption, in jumping up in the parliament and attacking David Oldfield and One Nation. Some people would think that discretion in this area would be the better part of valour, that silence would be somewhat golden, that it would be better to forget the episode than to bring attention to the errors of judgment that have been made by the member for Warringah. I bring into doubt his capacity to serve as a parliamentary secretary and for young Australians to believe anything he has got to say about Green Corps or any other aspect of public administration. Maybe a backbencher could get away with this, but not someone in the executive ministry. A frontbencher, given the dimension of this error—an earthquake error in Australian politics—would normally do the right thing and dive on his sword.585818:34:005858Vale, Danna, MPMrs VALEVK6HughesLP10—I rise tonight to draw the attention of the House to an innovative and successful way of dealing with the serious problem of abuse of illicit drugs by our young people and the associated criminal activity which causes so much trauma and distress to all Australians. I acknowledge the contribution of Mr Ross Goodridge, Barrister-at-Law, from Edmund Barton Chambers in Sydney, who brought this important program to my attention so that I might share it with the House.Each of the Australian states have established heavy penalties for traffickers in all illicit drugs, heavy penalties for users of `hard' drugs—with some variations—and heavy penalties for cannabis users. Not everybody is content with the current balance of Australian drug laws. There is much public comment calling for decriminalisation, reducing the penalties or increasing the penalties for drug related activities. The jurisdictions have questioned their own laws through many inquiries and reports.The Australian Institute of Criminology, in their statistic release report of 2 September 1997, revealed that in the 10 years from 1983 to 1993 the prison population increased 55.6 per cent and the expenditure on criminal justice in those years increased by $2,484 million. Notwithstanding the vast increase in expenditure, human resources and commitment, drugs continue to be an ever increasing social and criminal problem in the Australian community.In the United States, the Office of Justice, under the control of the Attorney-General of the United States of America, has trialled a number of law enforcement assistance administration programs. The federal US Attorney-General was authorised to make grants to the states, state courts, local courts, units of local government and Indian tribal governments for the establishment of drug courts which operate in the evening. In 1989, funds were offered to United States jurisdictions to undertake trials which adhered to 10 key components. The trials were extraordinarily successful and the number of drug court programs increased from two in 1989 to 385 in 1998.Drug courts have now been implemented or planned in 48 states of America, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico, two federal districts and the county of Yorkshire in the United Kingdom. In a nutshell, the figures support a cost saving in judicial time that means that one judge does the work of seven. The reoffend rates are down from 85 per cent to as low as 15 per cent in some cases, there is a cost saving per arrestee of approximately $18,000, there is a real improvement in the level of crime and drugs in society and there is a significant decrease in suicide and health costs.By way of example, the Denver drug court was established in 1994 in the state of Colorado. The court was designed to handle all felony drug arrests in the city and the county of Denver. Due to overwhelming numbers of cases filed and insufficient resources the program was modified in 1997 to manage 75 per cent of drug arrests. It handles approximately 40 per cent of the entire criminal district court docket. At the core of the drug court team is only one full-time judge and one magistrate. The Denver drug court is what might be called a post-conviction model, assessing convicted offenders and classifying their substance abuse problems in a standardised fashion. Most individuals arrested for a drug offence in the city or the county of Denver are assessed within 24 hours. The pre-trial case manager follows the individual's progress until conviction. Most offenders are then required to complete a more rigorous program that includes, but is not limited to, substance abuse treatment, random urinalysis, community service and employment and vocational training.The program consists of three phases and, based on their criminal risk to the community, offenders are diverted into one of three tracks. Track 1 is restricted to offenders with minimal or no criminal history, while offenders with a more lengthy record but who are more appropriate for community supervisions are diverted into track 2. Lower risk offenders in track 1 are supervised by probation, while high risk offenders in track 2 can be placed on intensive supervision placements in community correction centres to further enhance surveillance of their behaviour. Track 3 offenders are usually sentenced to the department of correction. Offenders are then required to participate in one of five levels of treatment. Today, over 7,000 cases have been processed through the Denver drug court.In a nutshell, the figures show that the cost saving of one judge in judicial time is equal to the work of seven. This is most significant when one considers the judicial costs of drug offences in this country and the costs to the community. There is also a significant reduction in suicides and youth depression. I would ask that the government direct its attention to investigating this very important initiative in the United States because of its highly successful track record.585918:39:005859Ferguson, Martin, MPMr MARTIN FERGUSONLS4BatmanALP00—I rise tonight to talk about dental health for low income Australians—an issue of particular importance to my seat of Batman. The heartless decision of the Howard government to abolish the Commonwealth dental health program is now beginning to be felt by the people whom I represent in the electorate of Batman in the same way as their decision on youth allowance will begin to rear its ugly head across Australia in the months to come. It is a major issue for low income workers, migrants and social security beneficiaries.Darebin Community Health—which starts today as a result of the amalgamation of the Northcote Community Health Centre and the East Preston Community Health Centre—reports that there has been a significant drop in the use of their dental health service because the poor cannot afford the new payments introduced by the Howard government. Even though the centre is prepared to allow local people to stagger payments for the dental bill or even to negotiate non-payment, the use of the centre has dropped dramatically since the changes introduced by the Howard government.The centre reported this week that people without the capacity to pay do not want to come to the centre. The Darebin centre people tell me that the local people in Darebin in need of dental health care are embarrassed because they cannot afford to pay as a result of the government's decision—the government's choice—to actually abolish the dental health care scheme for needy people in Australia. That is despite the fact that the centre is prepared to bend over backwards to help such people, but they are embarrassed about having to possibly negotiate a special fee schedule.Dr Han Tran, who leads the wonderful dental team at the centre, says she is seeing a 25 per cent failure to attend appointments because people feel they cannot afford the new dental fees. Before the changes to the scheme, the rate of failure to attend appointments used to be as low as five to 10 per cent. Now they only come in when they have an extreme emergency, Dr Tran says, and that is not good enough for ongoing dental health care practices. For the people of Darebin, dental health care is now a luxury. That is what it is: a luxury, because of government decisions under the Howard government.I believe Dr Tran's comments reflect the comments in a recent paper on dental health for low income Australians which was released by the Brotherhood of St Laurence. This was made available to all members of the federal parliament this week. In order to get the first-hand knowledge of the dental health experiences of people living on low incomes, the Brotherhood organised five small group discussions and two individual interviews with a total of 36 people. Most of the people interviewed came from inner Melbourne suburbs—the types of people who live in my electorate of Batman. The electorate of Batman has 15 per cent unemployment, with the seventh highest unemployment in Australia, the electorate with the highest unemployment being the seat of Richmond at 19 per cent. Here is a comment on the fees introduced after the Commonwealth scheme was abolished by the Victorian government. It says:I'm a supporting parent, I have two children. Until now because of the free dental service scheme I've been able to keep their teeth looking absolutely wonderful. But with this paying system, unless they're really in pain it's going to be difficult to take them in. Last year I went myself because I suffer from gum problems as well, and I was always seen at the Royal Melbourne (Dental) Hospital over something like eleven years . . . Since that's (free treatment) stopped I'd only go in when I was in severe pain and because of that I've lost two front teeth. You can always find some money for the kids (dental health) but when it comes to yourself, you just don't bother looking.The Commonwealth dental health program was introduced in 1994 by the Labor government. It was a program which we in the Labor Party were particularly proud of because it targeted those most in need. It targeted the very people we representatives of the Labor Party are here to help. It was targeted to the very people whom governments should exist to help.The Prime Minister (Mr Howard) might have mouthed a lot of rhetoric about the battlers in the last election. What I have spoken about tonight is an example of how the Prime Minister has walked away from his responsibility to really look after the battlers. No wonder he is on the nose out there in ordinary Australia. They have had a gutful of the Prime Minister who walks away from his responsibilities and says to needy Australians that dental care is a luxury. In so far as he is concerned, people in need with children who cannot afford dental care can go to hell. That is what the message is. The report this week by the Brotherhood of St Laurence is of experiences since this Prime Minister abolished the dental health care scheme. The Prime Minister is to be condemned, the Howard government is to be condemned, because they have withdrawn from their responsibility to provide a decent health care scheme for needy Australians. (Time expired)586018:44:005860McArthur, Stewart, MPMr McARTHURVH4CorangamiteLP10—I would like to continue the remarks the honourable member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) made in this House last night about the role of this parliament in running up-front vigorous debate on behalf of the Australian people. All too often this parliament has come into disrepute because of the way in which the debate is conducted—the vigorous nature of the debate in the parliament, both on the frontbench and here on the backbench. I commend the member for Werriwa for raising the fundamental issue that democracy is safe here in the parliament because there is a vigorous contest of philosophies and points of view across the chamber.CF4CAMPBELLMr Campbell—What a lot of nonsense!VH4McArthur, Stewart, MPMr McARTHUR—It is all right for you, Mr Independent, but that is the reality. People can publicly contest the views of others on the public record here in the parliament in the Westminster tradition. At the local, state and federal levels the Westminster tradition is upheld in this form of public debate. People make their statements and put their points of view on the public record, which is available for all to see. A tremendous amount of intellectual and philosophical thought goes into the debates that take place in this House, from both the government and the opposition sides. The arguments presented by members of the government have the weight of the Public Service behind them. Likewise, members of the opposition give a considerable amount of thought to their points of view.Sir Winston Churchill said, `Democracy is a poor form of government but all other forms of government are worse.' We have suffered some adverse public comment in recent times about the conduct of the parliament. I commend this institution—as I do to many of the schools and other groups that I visit around Australia—as the philosophical views of the world change: the emergence of Thatcherism in the UK; the movement to the right of politics around the world; the movement away from the long-held Labor tradition of the ALP that `the government knows best'; the emergence of so-called rational economics (I would hate to see what irrational economics means); and a general movement around the world to more competitive economies in the capitalist system. Even China, India and the emerging nations of Asia have adopted a competitive capitalist system with a democratic background to enhance their living standards.All members of this House have joined the parliament to put their views on how they see Australia in the future and how they would develop a better Australia. As I say to many people in Corangamite, people come here with goodwill and a genuine desire to make a better Australia. While they might have views different from those held by members opposite, everyone in this place, in my view, has a very genuine and long-thought-out position to try to make Australia a better place. We may have different interpretations of how we might do that.The committee system in this parliament focuses the mind and ensures that people develop policy positions that are compatible with the conditions and economic arrangements in Australia. There is an emerging consensus on a number of policy matters because there is an exposure of the facts of the argument to the standing committees of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Because of that, the parliament can bring forward better and more enlightened policies.Social welfare programs depend on the generation of wealth by the Australian people. It is only through the generation of wealth that we can sustain the social welfare programs. Australia's future is dependent on the deliberations of this parliament. My 12-year-old daughter, Sarah, is in the gallery. She is hopeful that the deliberations of this place will be sensible and considered and will not take place at the point of a gun, as in some other parts of the world.I do agree with the member for Werriwa: this is a place for the debate of ideas. I hope the younger generation—in my case, my young daughter Sarah—will be all the better in 20 to 25 years time because we have considered important matters and debated them strongly in this parliament to bring about a better Australia through our hard-fought Westminster system. (Time expired)10000SPEAKERMr SPEAKER—We welcome Sarah McArthur to the parliament. I am sure she will follow in her father's footsteps in due course.586118:50:005861Campbell, Graeme, MPMr CAMPBELLCF4KalgoorlieIND00—I was going to talk tonight about industry policy, which is very important to Australia and without which there would be no jobs for the future and no end to the current account deficit, but following the speech from the member for Corangamite (Mr McArthur) I feel constrained to talk about the parliament itself. It is quite clear that he does not understand what has happened in Australia. I did not hear what the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) said, so I must excuse him on this occasion, although I suspect he was pretty suspect, too.The reality is that this parliament does not argue ideas. To say that there is any intellectual capacity in this parliament today is nonsense. The arguments are decided in the party room. There is very little debate in this parliament. One of the library staff told me that she had been reading the Hansard from 1924, when a very small proportion of people had tertiary qualifications. Now only 14 per cent of people do not have tertiary qualifications. But she believed that the standard of debate had dropped. If you go back and look at the old Hansards you will see that that is quite true. Why is this so? It is because the people of Australia know this parliament no longer represents them. Members coming into this House no longer represent people; they represent political parties, which in turn represent pressure groups. This problem occurred very much under the Labor Party. We have gone down the American road of executive government without the checks and balances that exist in the American system. We have a Westminster system that we have abandoned.One of the great checks and balances of the Westminster system is question time, which can work only if questions are genuinely seeking information. Nobody seriously believes that questions in this House genuinely seek information. Questions put up by the government are 100 per cent dorothy dixers. Questions put up by the opposition are simply to get at the government. They are not written by members. I have seen times in this House when prepared questions have run out. Members sit mute because they are not quick enough to think of a question of their own. Everyone knows that; that is a simple fact. This parliament does not represent people any more. Until this parliament starts to represent people, we are going to fall into disrepute. We are in a situation now where we have standards and obligations imposed on us that are far more demanding than those placed on the Public Service. It is clear: we are perceived by our own masters in the executive to be less trustworthy than public servants. This is an appalling situation. It is brought about because executive government, whether it is Labor or Liberal, wants to diminish the power of this parliament. They do not want parliamentary government. They do not want the voice of the people heard. They want that executive power and the privilege that goes with it. They are, of course, abetted by a Public Service that thinks it knows better than the elected representatives. That is the great problem here: the people of Australia know this parliament no longer represents them.Until you get the situation where members of parliament are not dragooned by their parties, where they come to this parliament and vote on their conscience, where they vote on the intellectual strength of arguments and on their own commitment, you cannot start to return any integrity to this parliament.I also say this: one of the policies of Australia First is to introduce citizen initiated referenda. All this would do is give the people of this country the power which the parliament has, or the parliament is supposed to have. The truth is that I, as a member of this parliament, have no more power than anyone in the gallery to institute a referendum article. It depends on executive government. It was in the first draft of the constitution. It was taken out because the pollies thought they knew best. I trust the people and I believe the people of Australia should have that power to call a referendum. It is not an easy thing if you are talking about a federal referendum. It would require 200 signatures from across Australia. If you had the ability to go out and get that—K26LATHAMMr Latham—Two hundred?CF4Campbell, Graeme, MPMr CAMPBELL—Sorry, 200,000 signatures across Australia. If you had the ability to go out and get that, you could then have the right to write the question and have it asked in conjunction with the next election. The cost is minimal. The truth is that it would be used very sparingly, very rarely and decreasingly as the parliament, the courts and the bureaucracy realised that people had real power.But it is a joke when people come into this parliament and seriously suggest that ideas are discussed in this parliament. The truth is that the people of Australia know—and this is the reason for the rise of Hansonism in this country—that there is no difference on the major issues between the Liberal Party or the Labor Party. There is simply no difference on all of the major issues. They have a consensus. The member for Corangamite (Mr McArthur) was talking about the need for consensus. That is exactly what you do not need in this place. Where there is consensus the people are powerless.Talk about a democracy is a joke. What you have in Australia is an elected dictatorship because the one day the people in this country have any power is election day. After that, the people know—and every member of parliament knows—that members are much more responsive to the people who preselect them than they are to the people they purportedly represent.586318:55:005863Andrews, Kevin, MPMr ANDREWSHK5MenziesLP10—One of the more enjoyable duties of a member of parliament each year is to present Australian flags to a variety of organisations and people. Some of those people are young Australians travelling overseas as exchange students to places ranging from Bolivia to Belgium, from Poland to Peru, and all parts of the world in between. I have a particular reason to mention this tonight because last December and January my then 16-year-old daughter, Emily, who was at secondary school in Melbourne and who with other members of the family is in the gallery tonight, travelled overseas to Italy, in particular to Milan, where she attended school at the Schola Europa, and with 19 other classmates stayed with a host family for a period of almost two months.It was a great experience for her, as it is for many of the other exchange students that I see each year and have an opportunity to talk to about their experiences, not just in terms of language development but in terms of cultural experience overall. For a number of weeks we have in return from Italy a young student staying with us, Mirko Maiocchi, who is also in the gallery tonight. He is enjoying something of Australia and visiting the national capital this week.I mention this because a great experience of the world in which we live is this ability for people to travel, particularly young people. In fact, one of my dreams would be that we could send all young Australians overseas for a period of time in order to experience something of the world. But it also reflects something about the great multicultural diversity that Australia has become in the last 50 years. In my electorate, for example, there are many people who have come to Australia in the past five decades from all parts of the world, but in particular from Italy, especially the Veneto region; from Greece in more recent years; from Hong Kong and Taiwan; and even a large number of people who have emigrated here from South Africa.The Australia that we have today is a tribute to these people and it also reflects a central factor in the development of Australia over the past 50 years. I note that in 1944 in this place, or the old place as it then was, Arthur Calwell, the then Minister for Immigration, told the parliament:if Australians have learnt one lesson from the Pacific War now moving to a successful conclusion, it is surely that we cannot continue to hold our island continent for ourselves and our descendants unless we greatly increase our numbers.At that stage, Australia's population was just seven million and Calwell stressed the need for what became the great postwar immigration program. He said:Our first requirement is additional population. We need it for reasons of defence and for the fullest expansion of our economy.I suspect those two reasons are just as valid today as they were when he spoke in 1944. That view was shared by both sides of politics at the time. For example, speaking in 1950, Prime Minister Menzies said:. . . if everyone understood that migration was vital to our existence . . . then we should regard every migrant as our friend.There has been mention in recent weeks and months of migration. It is a subject of some topical debate. I recall that, according to projections of the population by birthplace, if current immigration trends continue the percentage of the population of Australia born overseas will actually decline over the next few decades and be only 16 per cent by the year 2041. Nonetheless, we do have great diversity in this country, brought about by people bringing their great gifts from many other parts of the world.The thing about population is that, of course, the population birthrate in this country is decreasing. When our population numbered just seven million in 1947 there were 182,000 births that year in Australia. It is interesting that now our population is 18 million, yet there are only 250,000 births a year. If we are to continue to expand, then migration is very much part of that growth.I note that the Australian demographer Peter McDonald, surveying populations of the world, said that most Western industrialised countries will have a population of perhaps a fifth or a sixth of what they have today if current trends continue. That, of course, is a recipe for stagnation. It is a recipe for a diminution of growth rather than real growth and it would end up in a greatly less beneficial system than we have at the present time. (Time expired)586419:00:005864Nelson, Dr Brendan, MPDr NELSONRW5BradfieldLP10—I think the electors of Werriwa would say that they do not give a stuff; the electors of Bradfield would be more inclined to say that they do not give a damn. I refer to the constant toing-and-froing over whether the member for Warringah (Mr Abbott) has given Mr Oldfield a reference and the nature of it. On Monday night in the adjournment debate I spoke about the need for Australia to have strategic vision. One of the reasons we are in trouble is because we have failed to enunciate in clear terms what it is that we are trying to achieve as a nation, what sort of country we want to become and what values and princi ples it will be based on. I also have said on several occasions in the House and publicly in newspapers that what we have failed to do in relation to the One Nation phenomenon is to explain why changes have occurred in our country. Today I received a letter from Dr Douglas Long, who is the Executive Director of the Centre for Leadership Studies. I would like to refer to some points that have been made in his letter. He says:In his book Flatland: A Romance in Multiple Dimensions Edwin Abbott described a society that existed in only two dimensions. Flatlanders were either point people or line people. . . . The residents of Flatland deprived themselves of spectrums of differences, shades of variations in meanings, and recognition of the inherent changeability in life itself. `What is will always be' is the creed of the culture of Flatland.Few issues summon the Flatlanders to battle more than such sensitive areas as race, multiculturalism, immigration and the nature of nationhood, regardless of world orders. High levels of ego involvement often produce the `either you're for me or you're against me' tendency. Flags, quotas, language, redistribution, land titles and `who belongs' versus `who are the newcomers?' stir hearts and raise tempers as honest folks shout at each other from opposing redoubts entrenched in bipolar camps. And, when life becomes too complex, we often find comfort in the simple answers—we try to return to Flatland.A lot of the current debate has centred around culture and what it means to be an Australian, who qualifies and who does not. . . . culture is not static and the detectable patterns within cultures are not religious scripts that lock us into choices against our wills. . . . If it's time for a change then from what and, most importantly, to what? And if this is accepted then even more important is the notion that getting rid of what you don't want is not the same as getting what you do.He goes on to say:One Nation represents those people who are not happy with the complex world they are faced with, those who feel that the global village, fast paced consumerism, lack of respect from young people, decline in the numbers attending church and so on are responsible for the troubles they face. They believe that if we can just get back to how things used to be everything will work out. These people believe that their way is the only way, and failure to follow this path will only lead to destruction.He goes on to say:Those people opposed to One Nation believe that . . . there is no future in trying to return to the past. They see the policies of One Nation as naive, racist, simplistic and not capable of dealing with the complexities of today.That is not to say either opinion is good or bad, right or wrong, as each has a legitimate view. Suppressing or repressing views which we may personally find to be repugnant doesn't mean they go away—it's a bit like dealing with boils. Until you deal with the root cause of `why' it is impossible to obtain a cure. In Australia's case this has become the boil on our backside and we cannot sit comfortably and focus on our future until it is gone.This is so right. We as a parliament, and I believe as a government and those who profess to lead, need to explain to Australians why we run an immigration program at all; why, despite significant domestic problems and hardship, we send money to the poorest people in the world; why we are even engaged in a debate about trade and why that is important to the next generation. Dr Long says:The main focus of the established parties appears to be to get rid of One Nation, whilst the main focus of One Nation is to get rid of what they perceive as the favouring of Aborigines over white Australians, Asian immigration and so on. But is this the same as getting what Australia wants? If there was a clear indication of where Australia was changing to, what it was trying to get, then would One Nation's rise have been so prominent? The application of deep values thinking was used to develop the framework for the unification of South Africa.I believe that this is the kind of thinking that we in the parliament and those who are privileged to represent the people of Australia need to start to apply to the emergence of One Nation. (Time expired)586519:05:005865Abbott, Tony, MPMr ABBOTTEZ5WarringahLP10—As the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) well knows, politics sometimes makes for odd bedfellows, and even the best of us get saddled with our own personal Judas. I do not judge the Labor Party by Mal Colston. Years ago it would have been quite improper to judge the Nationalist Party by T.J. Leahy, and the member for Werriwa should not judge me by David Oldfield.Today the member for Oxley (Ms Hanson) released her party's immigration policy. The first question that she faced at the subsequent press conference was the use of a tax haven by One Nation Ltd's part-owner and national director, David Ettridge. She refused to take any questions on this subject, but these are the questions which One Nation's supporters across Australian want her to answer. How can the party which claims to be against tax avoidance and which claims to be against get-rich-quick scams by white shoe brigade spivs have as its national director someone who does not pay his tax and uses tax havens?It was also noteworthy in today's press conference that David Oldfield chose to keep a low profile. The puppet master might have withdrawn behind the curtains, but he is clearly still pulling the strings, as more and more One Nation members are realising. People are getting the message that Pauline Hanson is being used by the two Davids and that David Oldfield is using Pauline Hanson as his personal Trojan horse to enter the Senate.More and more One Nation members are getting the message. Peter Archer, their former regional director in New South Wales, said that Oldfield is in it for power, Ettridge is in it for money and Hanson is in it for ego. What is happening is that people are understanding that Oldfield, Ettridge and Hanson are engaged in a strange menage a trois. But where is it leading the nation? What type of people are running One Nation? Today we had Mr Ettridge talking to the Australian. The newspaper stated:Mr Ettridge said membership numbers and details were kept secret from One Nation members."It's nobody's business but ours," he said.It also reported:"We don't want branches getting into the data base because it is not important for them to have it. It is quite important that they shouldn't have it," he said . . . Mr Ettridge said branch office holders had to sign a "pledge of loyalty" and an undated letter of resignation, which had been used to get rid of six members.You have to ask yourself what kind of paranoid, halfway to Waco, Texas, world—what kind of weird existence—do the leadership of One Nation actually have. Yesterday, David Ettridge told the Australian Financial Review :I did not receive any money from World Vision. World Vision was contracted with Global Communications. I am an overseas principal of Global Communications, which is owned by Mr Ross Boland who is an expatriate living in Vanuatu.It is typical of David Ettridge and David Oldfield that they will use a half-truth to conceal a big lie. World Vision did in fact pay David Ettridge's company, Global Communications, but today made clear to my office that all the cheques went to PO Box 775 in Manly. World Vision did not send cheques to Vanuatu and World Vision did not know they were in some way or form paying Ross Boland. This is typical of the web of deceit woven by David Ettridge and David Oldfield.The big question is: what is going to happen to the $500,000 in taxpayers' money that they are entitled to after the Queensland election? The registered agent of the One Nation party is presumably David Ettridge, and there is nothing at all to stop David Ettridge using this money to travel to Vanuatu, presumably to visit Ross Boland, to collect the cheques which he reckons went to a one-roomed house in a village without any electricity.This is not a time to mince words. I say in this parliament that Oldfield and Ettridge are chronic and habitual liars, and I again call on the ASC to investigate whether David Ettridge has used the incorporation of a company in Vanuatu as a device to get around Australian bankruptcy law.Question resolved in the affirmative.19:11:005866House adjourned at 7.11 p.m.Notices5866The following notices were given:Mr Somlyay to move:That, in accordance with section 5 of the Parliament Act 1974, the House approves the following proposals for works in the Parliamentary Zone which was presented to the House on 22 June 1998, namely:(a) introduction of parking restrictions at East Block carpark; (b) introduction of parking restrictions at West Block western carpark access road;(c) construction of an international flag display on the Lake Burley Griffin foreshore;(d) construction of pedestrian and cycle access, Commonwealth Avenue Bridge and Kings Avenue Bridge approaches;(e) demolition of old Parliament House Annex;(f) refurbishment of old Parliament House Library external works; and(g) revised proposal to undertake minor roadworks in front of old Parliament House.Mr Reith to move:(1) That, if the House is not sitting when any committee consisting of Members of the House and Senators has completed a report of an inquiry, the committee may send the report to the Speaker, or, in the absence or unavailability of the Speaker, to the Deputy Speaker. Upon receipt of the report by the Speaker or Deputy Speaker:(a) the publication of the report is authorised by this resolution; and(b) the Speaker or Deputy Speaker, as the case may be, is authorised to give directions for the printing and circulation of the report.(2) That the foregoing provisions of this resolution, so far as they are inconsistent with the standing and sessional orders, have effect notwithstanding anything contained in the standing and sessional orders.(3) That a message be sent to the Senate acquainting it of this resolution.Mr Reith to move:(1) That, if the House is not sitting when a committee appointed pursuant to Standing Order 28B has completed a report of an inquiry, the committee may send the report to the Speaker, or, in the absence or unavailability of the Speaker, to the Deputy Speaker. Upon receipt of the report by the Speaker or Deputy Speaker:(a) the publication of the report is authorised by this resolution; and(b) the Speaker or Deputy Speaker, as the case may be, is authorised to give directions for the printing and circulation of the report.(2) That the foregoing provisions of this resolution, so far as they are inconsistent with the standing and sessional orders, have effect notwithstanding anything contained in the standing and sessional orders.Mr Costello to present a bill for an act to amend the Corporations Law and the Austral ian Securities and Investments Commission Act 1989, and for related purposes.Mr Anderson to present a bill for an act to amend or repeal various Acts administered by the Department of Primary Industries and Energy, and for related purposes.Mr Miles to present a bill for an act relating to the conduct of, and the disclosure of information by, life companies, life brokers and life insurance advisers, and for related purposes.Mr Katter to move:That this House resolves that (a) a review be undertaken of the Competition Reform Policy Act 1995 to decide upon ways and means by which the newsagency, pharmacy, taxi, dairy and sugar industries, inter alia, as well as inland and regional local government bodies, be excluded from the ambit of the Act and (b) the Government be given the power, at its discretion, to designate any other industry or parts of industries or government services to be similarly excluded from the ambit of the Competition Reform Policy Act.Documents5867The following papers were deemed to have been presented on 1 July 1998:Aged Care Act—Determinations 1998 Nos. ACA 1, ACA 2.Australian Postal Corporation Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 183.Carriage of Goods by Sea Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 174.Corporations Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 Nos. 184, 185, 186.Income Tax Assessment Act 1936—RHQ company determination 1998 No. 6.Insurance Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 189.Insurance Acquisitions and Takeovers Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 194.Insurance (Agents and Brokers) Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 190.Insurance Contracts Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 195.Live-stock Transactions Levy Act and National Residue Survey (Sheep, Lambs and Goats Transactions) Levy Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 181.National Residue Survey (Excise) Levy Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 182.Nuclear Non-Proliferation (Safeguards) Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 173.Primary Industries Levies and Charges Act, Horticultural Export Charge Act and Horticultural Levy Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 156.Public Service Act—Determinations 1998 Nos. LES 27, LES 28.Reserve Bank Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 188.Retirement Savings Accounts Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 Nos. 176, 178, 192.States Grants (Petroleum Products) Act—Amendment of schemes 1998 No. 1.Student and Youth Assistance Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 179.Superannuation Contributions Tax (Assessment and Collection) Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 196.Superannuation Contributions Tax (Members of Constitutionally Protected Superannuation Funds) Assessment and Collection Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 197.Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 Nos. 175, 177, 193.Superannuation (Productivity Benefit) Act—Declarations—Statutory Rules 1998 Nos. 168, 169, 170, 171, 172.Taxation Administration Act—Determinations 1998 Nos. TD 98/13, TD 98/14, TD 98/15, TD 98/16.Veterans' Entitlements Act—Instruments 1998 Nos. 7, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51.Workplace Relations Act—Regulations—Statutory Rules 1998 No. 187.Answers to Questions in Writing5868The following answers to questions were circulated:5868(Question No. 2728)27285868Thomson, Kelvin, MPMr Kelvin ThomsonUK6WillsALP00 asked the Minister for Transport and Regional Development, upon notice, on 10 March 1998:Is it a fact that aircraft are departing Essendon Airport at 3 a.m.; if so, (a) what is being done to prevent nearby residents from being disturbed by the departures, (b) what safety precautions apply to control and monitor air traffic movements and runway use at the time and (c) will curfew restrictions not be relaxed and permission not extended to a wider range of aircraft to use the facilities than at present.5868Vaile, Mark, MPMr VaileSU5LyneNPTransport and Regional Development10—The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:Yes.(a) Noise abatement procedures apply between the hours of 11pm and 6am for departing aircraft as follows:A preferred runway system is specified to minimise tracking over built-up areas ie first preference to the north on runway 35, second preference to the west on Runway 26, third preference to the south on Runway 17 and the least preferred is to the east on Runway 08. Departing aircraft are requested to maintain runway centerline heading until above 1,500 feet. Aircraft meeting the following criteria may depart Essendon between 11pm and 6am:(i) Propeller driven aircraft of a maximum take-off weight exceeding 9,000 kg, the noise emissions of which do not exceed 90 EPNdB on take-off when measured in accordance with the methodology of Chapter 3, Part II, Volume I of ICAO Annex 16: or(ii) Propeller driven aircraft of a maximum take-off weight not exceeding 9,000 kg, that comply with the standards in respect of noise expressed in Chapter 6 or 10, part II, Volume I of ICAO Annex 16.(b) Outside the hours of the Essendon control tower operations, (11pm to 6am) aircraft departing and arriving at Essendon are subject to air traffic control from the Melbourne (Tullamarine) terminal area radar controllers. Procedures relating to aircraft operating requirements outside Essendon Control Tower operating hours are published in pilot documentation.(c) The current restrictions on aircraft at Essendon Airport during the curfew period are derived from the Port Phillip Airport and Airspace Study. These restrictions will not be amended or relaxed from the current position.5868(Question No. 2887)28875868Tanner, Lindsay, MPMr TannerYU5MelbourneALP00 asked the Minister for Transport and Regional Development, upon notice, on 8 April 1998:(1) Has his attention been drawn to complaints against Airservices Australia made by Mr Peter Nally of Stafford Heights, Qld, regarding refusal of airways clearance on 6 September 1997.(2) Did Airservices Australia advise Mr Nally in a letter dated 17 September 1997 that clearance was refused because several IFR RPT aircraft were taxiing for or departing runway 19.(3) Did Airservices Australia respond, in a letter dated 28 January 1998 from Mr Peter Evans, to a subsequent query for details of the aircraft referred to in part (2) by stating that all its radar and audio tape information of this kind was stored for only 14 days.(4) Did the letter referred to in part (3) refer to a letter to Mr Nally dated 1 October 1997; if so, is it a fact that Mr Nally has twice requested copies of this letter, which he claims not to have received, but that Airservices Australia has failed to provide a copy.(5) Will he instruct Airservices Australia (a) either to provide a copy of the letter or acknowledge that it does not exist and (b) retain radar and audio tape information relevant to a complaint until the complaint is fully resolved.5868Vaile, Mark, MPMr VaileSU5LyneNPTransport and Regional Development10—The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:(1) Yes. I, and my Department on my behalf, have responded to correspondence on the issue from Ms Gambaro MP, the Member for Petrie on behalf of Mr Nally, and directly from Mr Nally.(2) Yes.(3) Yes. (4) Yes. Airservices has advised me that a further copy of the letter has been sent to Mr Nally.(5) (a) Airservices has provided me with a copy of the letter of 1 October 1997 to Mr Nally and advised that a further copy has also been provided to Mr Nally. I have also provided Mr Nally with a copy of the letter.(b) Airservices Australia has been asked to retain radar and audio tape information relevant to a complaint until the complaint is fully resolved, and have sought assurances that staff who deal with complaints are adequately trained on the authority's obligations under relevant laws.5869(Question No. 2912)29125869McClelland, Robert, MPMr McClellandJK6BartonALP00 asked the Minister for Transport and Regional Development, upon notice, on 8 April 1998:(1) Will he introduce a system of operation for Sydney (Kingsford-Smith) Airport whereby a pilot's selection of a preferred runway can be overridden by instructions from air traffic controllers; if so, has he discussed the matter with representatives of airline pilots; if not, why not; if so, what was their reaction.(2) Would the variation in procedure referred to in part (1) shift responsibility for airline accidents from the pilot in charge of an aircraft to Airservices Australia through the actions of their servants and agents, the air traffic controllers.5869Vaile, Mark, MPMr VaileSU5LyneNPTransport and Regional Development10—The answer to the honourable member's questions is as follows:(1) No.(2) Not relevant.5869(Question No. 2943)29435869McClelland, Robert, MPMr McClellandJK6BartonALP00 asked the Minister for Transport and Regional Development, upon notice, on 12 May 1998:Was the mode of operation known as `Mode 2' considered in the preparation of the Long Term Operating Plan for Sydney (Kingsford-Smith) Airport; if so, was the mode included in the plan; if not, why not.5869Vaile, Mark, MPMr VaileSU5LyneNPTransport and Regional Development10—The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:Yes, `Mode 2' was considered in the preparation of the Long Term Operating Plan for Sydney (Kingsford-Smith) Airport. It was not recommended for inclusion in the Plan due to the requirement for departing aircraft from runway 16R to overfly Cronulla so as to ensure adequate separation from aircraft arriving on runway 34R and the requirement for all arriving aircraft to overfly Kurnell village.5869(Question No. 2981)29815869Jones, Barry, MPMr Barry JonesKH4LalorALP00 asked the Minister for Trade, upon notice, on 13 May 1998:(1) What was the total value of Australia's exports in (a) 1994-95, (b) 1995-96, (c) 1996-97 and (d) 1997-98 to the date of answering this question.(2) What percentage by value of Australia's exports was exported by ship in (a) 1994-95, (b) 1995-96, (c) 1996-97 and (d) 1997-98 to the date of answering this question.5869Fischer, Tim, MPMr Tim FischerDG4FarrerNPTrade; Deputy Prime Minister10—The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:(1) The total value of Australia's goods and services exports was $87.5 billion in 1994-95 ($67.1 billion for goods and $20.4 billion for services), $99.0 billion in 1995-96 ($76.1 billion for goods and $22.9 billion for services), $105.3 billion in 1996-97 ($80.9 billion for goods and $24.4 billion for services) and $85.1 billion from July 1997 to March 1998 ($65.7 billion for goods and $19.4 billion for services).(2) The percentage of Australia's goods and services exports transported by ship was 60.6 per cent 1994-95, 60.6 per cent in 1995-96, 60.6 per cent in 1996-97 and 61.3 per cent from July 1997 to March 1998. With specific regard to goods exports, the proportion carried by sea as a proportion of total goods exported was 79.1 per cent in 1994-95, 78.9 per cent in 1995-96, 80.9 per cent in 1996-97 and 80.4 per cent from July 1997 to March 1998.5869(Question No. 3021)30215869Ellis, Annette, MPMs Ellis5K6NamadgiALP00 asked the Prime Minister, upon notice, on 1 June 1998:Further to the answer to question No. 2633 (Hansard , 13 May 1998, page 3213), (a) what was the total cost to the Commonwealth of his 1997 Christmas function held at Kirribilli House and (b) how many people attended the function.5869Howard, John, MPMr HowardZD4BennelongLPPrime Minister10—The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:(a) As previously advised in my response to question No. 2633, I have been informed by my Department that the cost of my Christmas function was consistent with the cost of those held by my Labor predecessors.(b) Approximately 80 people attended the function.5870(Question No. 3023)30235870Ellis, Annette, MPMs Ellis5K6NamadgiALP00 asked the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, upon notice, on 1 June 1998:(1) What levels of Commonwealth funding were provided to Tuggeranong Link for the provision of migrant welfare workers in (a) 1993-94, (b) 1994-95, (c) 1995-96, (d) 1996-97 and (e) 1997-98.(2) Does the Commonwealth require non-profit community organisations to contribute to the funding of migrant welfare workers.(3) How many migrant welfare workers are employed with Commonwealth funding in the electoral divisions of (a) Namadgi, (b) Canberra, (c) Fraser, (d) Bennelong and (e) Berowra.(4) What is the tenure of migrant welfare workers employed in the electoral divisions of (a) Namadgi, (b) Canberra, (c) Fraser, (d) Bennelong and (e) Berowra.5870Ruddock, Philip, MPMr Ruddock0J4BerowraLPImmigration and Multicultural Affairs10—The answer to the honourable member's question is as follows:(1) The levels of funding provided to Tuggeranong Link, previously known as Tuggeranong Link of Community Houses and Centres Inc, for the provision of migrant welfare workers are as follows:(a) 1993-94None.(b) 1994-95The Tuggeranong Link of Community Houses and Centres Inc was awarded funding for a 3-year period for a Grant-in-Aid (GIA) worker. Funding for the first year was $44,352.(c) 1995-96GIA funding allocated for the second year was $44,973.(d) 1996-97GIA funding allocated for the third year was $47,596.(e) 1997-98Tuggeranong Link did not lodge an application for worker-based funding under the Community Settlement Services (CSS) Scheme.(2) Funded organisations are required to sign a Service or Funding Agreement with the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs before the commencement of funding. The Agreement is a legal document, which sets out the conditions for funding and imposes formal obligations upon both parties. This Agreement, signed by the organisation and authorised Departmental officers, stipulates that the organisation is required to contribute from its own resources to the facilities and services necessary to conduct the function of the worker.(3) A migrant welfare worker is a person who is employed to perform duties which may include service delivery on an individual, group or community basis, case responsibility for clients, co-ordination of a service, supervision and counselling. The number of such workers employed with my Department's funding in the specified electoral divisions are as follows:(a) NamadgiA full-time generalist worker located at Woden Community Services Inc services the areas of Woden, Tuggeranong and southern ACT, which includes the electoral division of Namadgi.(b) CanberraThere are 5 full-time equivalent worker positions distributed as follows:. 1 generalist worker position at Woden Community Service Inc (job shared by two people);. 0.5 Croatian community welfare worker based at the Croatian Community Welfare Centre in Civic;. 1 humanitarian/early intervention settlement worker based at the Migrant Resource Centre (MRC) in Civic;. 1 humanitarian settlement worker based at the MRC, Civic, servicing the division of Canberra and the Queanbeyan district;. 1 community project officer based at the at the MRC, Civic; and. 0.5 generalist worker based at the MRC in Civic.(c) FraserThere are 1.5 full-time equivalent worker positions at the Belconnen Community Service Inc: 1 generalist and 0.5 Vietnamese community welfare worker.(d) BennelongThere are 2 full-time equivalent worker positions distributed as follows:. 1 generalist welfare worker based at the Christian Community Aid Service Inc, Eastwood, servicing the Ryde Local Government Area.. 1 Armenian community welfare worker based at the Dioceses of the Armenian Church of Australia & New Zealand Ltd, Chatswood, servicing Northern Sydney and the Fairfield Local Government Areas. (e) BerowraThere are 1.5 full-time equivalent worker positions distributed as follows:. a part-time Chinese community welfare worker based at the Cherrybrook Chinese Community Association Inc, Cherrybrook, servicing the Hornsby Local Government Area.. 1 generalist welfare worker based at North Sydney Community Service Ltd, Crows Nest, servicing the Hornsby and Kuring-gai areas.(4) Organisations were awarded funding in 1997-98 for 12 months for worker-based positions under the CSS Scheme. They have now been offered an extension of funding for a further 12 months to 30 September 1999.Tenure of workers is a matter between the organisation and the worker. As a condition of funding under the current CSS Scheme Service Agreement, the Department requires that the funded organisation is the legal employer and, as such, is responsible for negotiating conditions of service with the worker, taking account of any relevant industrial conditions. This requirement is included in the Service Agreement in Section 3.3 (e):`only employ the Worker in accordance with the appropriate award applying to the position for which he or she has been employed to fill.'