Monday, 22 October 1984 The PRESIDENT (Senator the Hon. Douglas McClelland) took the chair at 2 p.m., and read prayers. The Clerk —Petitions have been lodged for presentation as follows: To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of certain citizens of Australia respectfully showeth: That we are greatly concerned with the extent to which serious crime including murder, major drug financing and massive tax frauds have penetrated into the highest levels of Australian society as shown by the investigations of various Royal Commissioners and in particular by Mr Frank Costigan Q.C. That we are concerned that the National Crime Authority has too many restrictions and possible lines of veto placed upon it for it to be an effective successor to the Costigan Inquiry and that this will allow major criminals to avoid prosecution. And your petitioners humbly pray that the Federal Government negotiate urgently with the Victorian Government on the reactivation of the Costigan Commission and to extend its term to at least the 31st March, 1985 and also to provide the Costigan Commission with whatever resources it may need to successfully conclude its investigations into organised crime in Australia. Further we believe that the issue of organised crime in Australia is so important that the Parliament should not be dissolved until at least the interim Costigan Report has beem received and fully debated in both Houses of the Parliament. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senators Kilgariff (from 11 citizens), Peter Rae (from 14 citizens) and Watson (from 36 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in the Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned citizens respectfully shows: That the Australian flag symbolises the continuity between Australia's past, its present and its future; the presence of the Union Jack on the flag represents not a subservience to Britain, but a reminder of our inheritance of the fruits of hundreds of years of struggle for individual liberty against the forces of tyranny and oppression; Nonetheless recognises the rights of the Australian people should they wish as a people to change the design of their flag. Your petitioners humbly pray that no change be made to the Australian flag except with the consent of the people in a referendum. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator Collard (from 35 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth: That we the undersigned, having great concern because of the spread of moral pollution in our nation call upon the Government to introduce immediate legislation: 1. To provide strict controls over importation, production, sale, hire or mailing of video-cassettes with the open sale of only G, PG, and M rated video- cassettes; and the total prohibition of the sale of R rated video-cassettes so that R rated films can only be viewed in an adult theatre by persons over 18 years. We totally reject the concept of 'X' rated video-cassettes which would allow the legal sale of hard-core pornographic films for screening in the homes of our nation, which endanger our children. 2. To dramatically improve the Federal Attorney-General's Guidelines for Classification of video tapes/discs which restrict the importation, production, sale or hire, screening in private homes and mailing by Australia Post so as to include the total prohibition of any pornographic, obscene or blasphemous video cassette, or film containing child pornography, bestiality, sodomy, group sex, violent sex acts with women, such as rape and pack rape, sadism and torture, etc . Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that your Honourable House will protect our society, especially women and children from moral pollution and its harmful effects. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senators Peter Baume (from 47 citizens) and Scott (from 21 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully show that: We deplore and oppose the decision of the Federal Government in legislating to allow the importation and distribution of hard-core pornographic video films and material into Australia and the social consequences of this action particularly for our children. We request the Federal Government to re-enact immediately the previous laws which banned the entry into Australia and sale of this hard-core pornographic material, until the Inquiry into the Effects of the current legislation in relation to adults and children has reported to the Parliament. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator Collard (from 26 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of The Senate in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully shows that: We hail as a victory for the not-so-silent majority, the decision of the Hawke Federal Government to now conduct an inquiry into the effects of hard core pornography and violence upon people and especially children. We view with deep concern, and deplore, the decision of the Government to allow the sale of this objectionable material to continue and become even more widespread during the period of the inquiry. We request the Federal Government to immediately enact laws to ban the entry into Australia and the sale of hard-core pornography and violence in video and publication form. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senators MacGibbon (from 59 citizens) and Martin (from 48 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned respectfully showeth: That- 1. We are Australians who support nuclear disarmament. 2. The world is closer to nuclear war than at any time since World War 2. This ultimate catastrophe can and must be avoided by ordinary people raising their voices and taking action against the threat of nuclear destruction. 3. We identify with the massive worldwide movement for a nuclear-free future- for a 'freeze' on all nuclear weapons testing, production and deployment, as an immediate first step towards complete disarmament. 4. Australians are not remote from nuclear danger-we are very much involved and threatened. 5. We can contribute to the growing global movement for a peaceful world by opposing Australian involvement in activities and strategies likely to lead to a nuclear holocaust. To achieve this, we call on the Australian Government to: Support actively the United Nations' World Disarmament Campaign and to commit itself never to introduce, or allow to be introduced, nuclear weapons into Australia. Undertake not to update or expand existing nuclear related foreign military installations on Australian territory nor permit the establishment of any new ones. Remove all nuclear related military installations since these contribute to the ability to conduct nuclear attacks and are likely targets in case of war. End all port-of-call and landing rights arrangements granted to foreign nuclear forces, including nuclear-armed or nuclear-powered vessels and aircraft. Support the establishment of nuclear-free zones in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, including the banning of all nuclear testing and waste dumping. End the mining and export of Australian uranium. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator Haines (from 653 citizens). Petitions received. Senator JACK EVANS(Western Australia) — I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) notes the Prime Minister, Mr Hawke, statement to a public rally in Melbourne during the 1983 election campaign that his Government would fund environmentally acceptable and economically efficient projects for Tasmania in lieu of the Franklin Dam; (b) notes the commitment by the Minister for Home Affairs and Environment, Mr Cohen, not to fund further power schemes in Tasmania until a joint study on Tasmanian power needs had been completed by the State and Commonwealth governments; (c) expresses concern that $200m of the $277m compensation being provided by the Commonwealth to Tasmania is being provided to subsidise power from the King and Anthony hydro-electric power schemes; (d) notes that King and Anthony hydro-electric schemes fall within areas on the register of the National Estate and should therefore be subject to an inquiry under the Environment Protection (Impact of Proposals) Act; and (e) condemns the Hawke Government's failure to undertake the joint study on power needs and its failure to comply with the provisions of the Environment Protection (Impact of Proposals) Act, both of which contradict the Prime Minister's election promise. Senator TOWNLEY(Tasmania) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) aware that uranium is a relatively common metal and widely distributed around the world; (b) well aware that Australia is not the only source of uranium and a policy of non-supply to the world market will not stop nuclear power stations being constructed and operated; and (c) convinced that more and more countries will move into the nuclear field over the coming decade, is of the opinion that a policy of restricting development of uranium mines within Australia is a policy out of touch with reality, and one which can only damage the economy of Australia at a time when the price of many of our exports is dropping. Senator WATSON(Tasmania) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate is of the opinion that the Australian Labor Party should disclose its taxation policy before the 1 December election. Senator JACK EVANS(Western Australia) — I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) condemns the election promise of the Leader of the Federal Opposition, Mr Peacock, to allow the Franklin Dam to be built; (b) notes that the Franklin Dam would obliterate Tasmania's last wild river and irreparably damage an area already included on the World Heritage List; and (c) condemns the Federal Opposition's total disregard for an area of Australia' s environment that is of outstanding universal significance and their failure to ensure Australia's observance of its international environmental obligations. Senator HARRADINE(Tasmania) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) noting that the annual report for 1983-84 of the Public Service Board tabled in the Senate on Thursday, 18 October 1984, shows that the employment of youth in the Commonwealth Public Service has fallen to an all-time low; and (b) noting also that the youth percentage of permanent staff in the Commonwealth Public Service was 22.6 per cent in 1966 falling to 12.2 per cent in 1974 down to an all-time low of 6.7 per cent in calendar year 1983; calls on the Federal Government to instruct the Public Service Board to desist from its policy of apparent discrimination against youth. Notice of Motion Senator TOWNLEY(Tasmania) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate, aware that the Federal Government's proposed Bill of Rights will give the Federal Government extremely wide powers at the expense of States' rights, is of the opinion that the Federal Government should table the proposed Bill prior to the 1984 election, so that those interested in the protection of their State can examine the implications of the legislation. Senator WALTERS(Tasmania) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate condemns the Federal Government for breaking its promise to the pensioners of Australia that it would increase the pension to 25 per cent of average weekly earnings. Senator CHANEY —My question, which is addressed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate, relates to the statement by the Prime Minister last week that the family home would not be included in a capital gains tax. Does that mean a total exemption for the family home or is there likely to be a limit placed on its value? If a limit is placed on its value does the Minister think that fairness and equity, which I think are the words he used last week, would require any such limit to be indexed against inflation? Senator BUTTON —I have answered a number of questions on this issue and I have informed the Senate on numerous occasions that the Government, as distinct from the Opposition which is apparently about to embark on piecemeal tinkering with the taxation system, is concerned to have a comprehensive review of the taxation system in the interests of fairness and equity in that system. It is something which has been needed for a very long time. If, as a result of a comprehensive review of the taxation system, the tax mix is altered-as a result of recommendations arising from that review-to include any element of capital taxes , the next question to be considered would be: What exemptions apply to any capital taxes included in the tax mix? That would be a question which would arise from re- commendations included in the review because here in Australia, as elsewhere, one would anticipate that any such taxes would include a wide range of exemptions. The Prime Minister has indicated in a statement, made, I think, in Perth last week, that the family home would certainly be one of those exemptions if any such recommendation came out of a tax review. He has taken it no further than that. But in the interests of fairness and equity, as I have said, no doubt a wide range of issues would be considered. Senator CHANEY —Mr President, I ask a supplementary question, and preface it by reminding the Leader of the Government that I have asked him a question about an area in which the Prime Minister has already apparently reached the second stage ; namely, his consideration of what exemptions would be given by his Government with respect to a capital gains tax. I ask the Minister: Given that the Prime Minister has, apparently in the interests of clearing the public mind, said that the family home would not be included in a capital gains tax, can he tell us whether that means a total exemption for the family home or only for family homes up to a particular value? That seems to me to be something which the public is entitled to know, to clarify just what the Prime Minister was telling us when he made his statement in Perth. Senator BUTTON —I scarcely regard that as a supplementary question in view of the answer which I gave to the original question. Let me just say that, in terms of exemptions to capital taxes of any kind which may or may not be recommended by a review of the taxation system, that will go with the recommendations. The Prime Minister has specifically mentioned the family home, but he has taken it no further than that. I remind the Senate that of course capital taxes are already in existence in Australia. The problem is that they do not work in relation to tax avoidance. That is why the Opposition, when in government, did very little about them. It was a characteristic of its term in government that it was not prepared to do anything significant about tax avoidance. That has resulted in enormous inequities in the taxation system, particularly to those on pay as you earn income. Senator COLSTON —I ask the Minister for Social Security whether he is aware of this comment attributed to Senator MacGibbon in yesterday's Brisbane Sunday Mail : . . . the Federal Social Security Minister, Senator Grimes, had been 'less than truthful' when he said pensioners would not face door-knocks from . . . 1500 to 2000 Social Security inspectors recruited to investigate pension entitlements. Is the Minister also aware of a claim by Senator MacGibbon that the Department of Social Security 'has seconded 120 inspectors from the Tax Department, who don 't need a warrant to enter a house'? Should Senator MacGibbon's comments be taken seriously by pensioners, or is he irresponsibly playing politics by unnecessarily worrying Australia's senior citizens? Senator GRIMES —Yes, my attention has been drawn to the statement which has been admitted-- Senator Chaney —Mr President, I raise a point of order. The Standing Orders clearly provide that a question should not seek an expression of opinion from a Minister. Since those are the terms in which the question has been asked, I hope the Minister will bear the standing order in mind. I draw it to his attention. The PRESIDENT —Order! The matter is clearly within the Minister's portfolio. I will allow the question. Senator GRIMES —Thank you, Mr President. I am not going to give an opinion, nor am I going to indulge in flights of fantasy with no regard for the truth in the way Senator MacGibbon did. My attention has been drawn to the statement allegedly made by Senator MacGibbon. Let me make just two points to demonstrate how inaccurate that statement is. Senator MacGibbon allegedly talked about 1,500 to 2,000 inspectors from the Department of Social Security. First of all, for the implementation of the assets test about 1,100 employees of the Social Security Department will be employed in the establishment stages. Those employees will process people's claims. Some field officers but mostly clerks and clerical officers will process those claims. Senator MacGibbon said that we had acquired 120 inspectors from the Australian Taxation Office. In fact we will be using about 90 valuers from the Taxation Office and they will be employed in assessing the valuation of properties, et cetera. They will be mostly desk top valuations. As I have said in this place on many occasions, they will not be knocking on people's doors or entering people's homes. They do not need warrants to do so because they will not be doing so under the Social Security Act and under the assets test. One can only assume that Senator MacGibbon makes remarks like this in order to frighten pensioners, as Senator Colston said. Senator MacGibbon is deliberately misstating the facts in order to frighten pensioners, to confuse pensioners and to misrepresent the assets test for his own party political purposes. I understand that people campaign in certain ways. I also understand that the conservatives in this country have traditionally campaigned on the basis of fear, even if that basis is without any regard to the facts, as it is in this case. Senator Chaney —What were you doing during the Lowe by-election? Senator GRIMES —I am sure that Senator Chaney, who obviously approves of Senator MacGibbon's tactics, and Senator MacGibbon will be treated with contempt by the pensioners of this country in the forthcoming election, as they should be. I believe that they will also be treated with contempt by the Press and the media in these circumstances. Senator MESSNER —My question is addressed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate. It concerns the Prime Minister's announcement on what would or would not be included in a capital gains tax and seeks some further information on Mr Hawke's statement that losses incurred on dealings in assets could be offset against gains. Does the Minister envisage that there would be a limit on the time over which losses could be taken into account? For example, would it be fair to assume that only losses incurred during the current financial year would be taken into account? Senator BUTTON —If as a result of a comprehensive review of the taxation system, which is much needed in this country and which the Government has promised, there is a recommendation to the Government about the inclusion of some additional form of capital tax in Australia over and above those capital taxes which already exist, the question of exemptions which would come up with that proposal would also come up for consideration by the Government. Not only would the question of exemptions in relation to matters asked of me by Senator Chaney come up for consideration but also those matters raised by Senator Messner. I make the point again that wherever taxes of this kind apply, as they do in every other Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development country, as I understand it, there are, of course, exemptions provided for and they have to be considered in the context of the overall tax mix in a particular country. In conducting a review the Government will be taking into account a wide range of views expressed by various community bodies. For example, the Business Council of Australia has views on the desirable taxation mix in Australia and what can be done in terms of business taxes. It also has views about so-called capital gains taxes. Of course the Business Council of Australia would advance a view to the Government that there ought to be particular exemptions which, if such a tax was proposed, would relate to business activity. Just as the Business Council of Australia has those views, so does a wide range of other bodies which will have input into the comprehensive review to be conducted by the Government. Those views will have to be taken into account by the Government at the time. Senator MESSNER —Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. In the light of the Minister's reply, am I right in assuming that the Prime Minister's assurances about the exemption of capital losses are therefore not in force and that everything is open until the tax review is actually held and a report is received? Senator BUTTON —I do not know what Senator Messner means by 'being in force'. In the context of the current election, if everything that was said by politicians, and particularly the Opposition, were in force this country would be in for a diabolical time economically. As I indicated earlier in answer to the honourable senator's previous question, if any such tax or increase in such tax were recommended the question of exemptions would have to be considered at the time. The Prime Minister has indicated what matters he would regard as relevant if those circumstances arose. They are matters which, of course, are widely regarded as appropriate exemptions in all other countries. Senator COOK —Has the Leader of the Government in the Senate seen the list of expenditure proposals that the Opposition has promised to implement in the extremely unlikely event of its election to government? Given the economic problems facing this country, now and in the next few years, how would the Opposition's proposals affect the economy? Senator BUTTON —The Opposition's list is endless, and I would not pretend to have seen it all. A wide range of promises has been made by the Opposition. It has promised the world at a time when this country needs a restrained and sensible economic management approach. I do not want to deal will all the peripheral questions raised, but up until this point the Opposition has made unequivocal and quite specific promises which would have the effect of increasing the structural deficit of the Commonwealth by more than $2.5 billion. These promises, to which I will refer in a minute, do not take into account tax charges and, more specifically, they do not take into account the defence policy enunciated by the Leader of that other party, the National Party, over the weekend. It would be very nice to be contesting an election in a Melbourne suburban seat when the National and Liberal Party candidates were vying with each other as to which particular promises would be adhered to by an incoming coalition government, if that unlikely fate was to befall this country. I wish to refer to some of the unequivocal promises made by the Opposition parties. They include the abolition of the assets test, building the Darwin- Alice Springs railway line, repeal of the lump sum superannuation arrangements and abolition of wine tax, depending on whether one adopts Mr Peacock's view or Mr Howard's view. Mr Peacock favours abolition of the wine tax and Mr Howard favours its retention. Give or take $20m or $30m to start with, that is the option that one has-an optional extra depending on whether Mr Howard or Mr Peacock prevails. I suppose it depends on who is the Leader of the Opposition for the next election. Other promises include abolition of excise on new oil, extending the investment allowance to 20 per cent and phased removal of double taxation. Those are just some of the things which add up to $2.5 billion. One can add to this the promises made over the weekend by Mr Sinclair in respect of defence expenditure. One of those promises was to build four nuclear submarines for Australia. The cost of those four nuclear submarines would be $2.6 billion- that is $0.6 billion in excess of the cost proposed for the submarine replacements. What Mr Sinclair does not mention in that proposal is that the recurrent costs of retaining a nuclear submarine are six to seven times the cost of actually building such a submarine. Under that proposal, we would become the first non-nuclear power in the world to have nuclear submarines. The only way to fund these extravagant promises that have been made by the Opposition is to have a massive blowout of the deficit or, alternatively, have massive increases in new taxes. We wait with bated breath to see on which horn of the dilemma the Opposition will impale itself in these matters. What this country needs more than anything else at present is sound, steady, economic leadership which it has had in the past 18 months with results that are demonstrable to the Australian people, if not to the lacklustre Opposition that sits in this Senate. That is what Australia needs in the next few years and that is what it will get from a Labor Government. It would not have any hope of getting that from this collection of desperates and irresponsibles who constitute Her Majesty's hopefully loyal Opposition. Senator CHANEY —My question is addressed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate and follows the supposed answer he has just given. I remind the Leader of the Government of his plea that we should debate these important matters in a more intelligent fashion than we have in the past. Referring to Mr Keating's list, I ask him whether he can answer a couple of questions about three of the larger items appearing on that list to make up a fake figure of $2.5 billion. I ask him about the figure of $157m for the construction of a parallel runway for Sydney's Kingsford-Smith Airport. On what basis was that figure arrived at and has any off-set been allowed for the Government's own plans for improving the airport facilities for the city of Sydney and for the State of New South Wales? With respect to the item of $300m for the repeal of the new taxation arrangements for lump sum superannuation, in what year would it be anticipated that that would rise to a cost of $300m, given that the Government's May statement said that there would be a saving of $70m if the Government's original proposal had been implemented, and that was for a higher rate of tax? In what year is the Government suggesting that a cost of $400m would be incurred for the phased removal of double taxation, given that the Opposition has made it quite clear that any removal of double taxation would have to be carefully phased in bearing in mind budgetary circumstances at the time? Senator BUTTON —Everything in the Opposition's proposal has to be carefully phased; I agree with that. But one section of the community that will not be fazed by it is the Australian electorate. As I have said, and it has been the subject of some comment from Senator Chaney, over the next few years governments in this country will have difficulty with the Budget process, with Budget deficits. The point I was seeking to make in my answer to the question is that the difficulties incurred by the present Opposition if it were, unhappily for this country, elected to government would be enormous by comparison. Senator Chaney asked me for specifics. He asked a question about the dual runway at Sydney Airport, said to cost $157m. I did not refer to that specifically as being included in the $2.5 billion. Senator Chaney —Of course it is; it is here on the list. Senator BUTTON —No, I beg your pardon. I answered a question which specifically excluded that. In relation to the other two questions, I will give Senator Chaney an answer in terms of the precise figures. I think I can probably do that now in relation to the repeal on lump sum tax commitments, but I cannot do it for the last matter. I will obtain an answer for him and give it to him as soon as possible. Senator CHANEY —Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. I thank the Leader of the Government for that attempt at an answer, but in the interests of clarifying the dishonesty in the release by his colleague the Treasurer, I ask him to tell us, in the further information he will provide, what is to be the net cost in 1985-86 of the item relating to the parallel runway if the Government's own plans proceed as hoped and, if it has alternative proposals, what will be the off-setting of that cost? I ask for the net cost of the new taxation arrangements for lump sum superannuation in 1985-86, and for the net cost of some phased removal of double taxation in 1985-86 given that no particular target date has been provided by the Opposition. Senator BUTTON —I will provide those answers, but let me say that the point I was seeking to make in answering Senator Chaney's original question is quite clear. If one is to have responsible economic management in this country over the next few years, in the context of an election one cannot make promises to build nuclear submarines for $2.6m billion and then, once in office, say: 'We will never deliver on that. That was just a stunt for the purposes of the election'. In respect of any of these matters one cannot say: 'We undertake to the Australian people to do all that, but it will not happen in the next year, or the year after, or the year after that'. Those are the matters which are of fundamental concern and relate to the economic management of this country to which I referred. Senator COLEMAN —My question is directed to the Minister for Veterans' Affairs and follows closely on a question asked of Senator Grimes earlier. I remind the Minister of forecasts of doom, gloom, confusion and hostility by the Federal Opposition regarding the assets test. I understand that the Minister has already had assets test forms mailed to most service pensioners. I ask what the reaction to date has been to those forms. Senator GIETZELT —On Monday and Tuesday of last week the Department of Veterans' Affairs sent out one of two separate forms to all persons who are in receipt of a service pension. The total number was something in excess of 200,000. As a result, we are now in a position to make some assessment of the responses of those who received the forms. I know that many people who have broadcast alarm and concern about the assets test forms will be disappointed by what has been a very clear response by service pensioners. I have to advise that the general reaction among service pensioners as at today's date is one of considerable relief by those who have received the principal form. The Department's hotline telephone, it is true, did last week run hot. Over 9,000 calls were received, but those calls were generally about whether the Department required the applicants, the beneficiaries, to send the form back. When they were told that that was not so, their relief was pretty pronounced. They expressed surprise that the forms were much simpler than media publicity had led them to believe. Many of them asked the officers taking the hotline calls what the fuss was about in respect of the assets test. Many callers are continuing to avail themselves of the hotline service to clarify points of detail. These have mostly been cases of people who have received the full form on the basis of information available to the Department previously and who are near or above the threshold levels. At this stage there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that pensioners are finding the forms unduly taxing or confusing. Despite the unscrupulous campaign waged by the Opposition both inside and outside the Parliament, and by some Opposition candidates standing for election, service pensioners at least have shown that they have very little to complain about. The response received indicates that there has been an exaggeration of this issue in the public mind as a result of the campaign waged by the Opposition and there is considerable relief that the overwhelming majority of pensioners will not be affected by the assets test. Senator HAINES —My question is directed to the Minister representing the Minister for Health. For the Minister's information I preface my question by referring him to a letter dated 1 June 1984 from the Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, to the Hon. Doug Everingham, which stated, inter alia: You probably know that a major review of the Medical Benefits Schedule is getting under way, in which several forms of alternative medicine will be examined, and it would seem an appropriate opportunity for orthomolecular medicine to be reviewed in this context. In this way orthomolecular medicine would be studied not only as a discipline in its own right, but also in comparison with accepted areas of medical science. Can the Minister say what stage this review has reached; what forms of alternative medicine are being examined; and whether orthomolecular medicine has been included in the review? Further, if the review is not yet finished, can the Minister say when it is likely to be completed? Senator GRIMES —The Medical Benefits Review Advisory Committee has been sitting and is sitting now. It is meeting with relevant organisations, having received some 250 submissions from various organisations throughout Australia. The Committee expects to bring down an interim report in February and to consider the extension of the benefits to certain paramedical services about that time and thereafter. Certainly the matter of orthomolecular medicine will be included in the investigations of the Committee. I expect that matter to be mentioned in the interim report in February. However, I will seek further information from the Minister for Health so that Senator Haines can be more clearly informed on the matter. Senator COATES —I ask the Leader of the Government in the Senate whether he has noticed reports of the amazing scenes in Hobart on Friday when the current Leader of the Federal Opposition gave the current Premier, Mr Gray, the nod for the Gordon below Franklin Dam, despite its non-construction being the subject of an agreement between the State and Commonwealth governments. Has Mr Gray let the Government know that he has thoughts of reneging on this solemn deal? If so, has Mr Gray acknowledged that he would be obliged to repay to the Commonwealth the many millions of dollars which the State Government has already received from the Commonwealth as compensation and which has already been used for many very worthwhile projects on the west coast and elsewhere in Tasmania, not to mention the loss of the other parts of the compensation arrangements yet to be called upon? Further, from where would Mr Gray get this money? Senator BUTTON —I used the word 'desperates' earlier in relation to some politicians who happened to be here. If I might, I extend the description to Mr Gray. Senator Coates asked me about, in his words, 'amazing scenes' in Hobart when the Leader of the Federal Opposition and Mr Gray met last week. Those two meeting in itself is an amazing scene. I am sure that there will be considerable amazement by the Tasmanian people and, indeed, by people throughout Australia who have been concerned to follow the issue of the building of the Franklin Dam and the decision made by this Government that that dam should not be built. Mr Gray has had a long series of discussions with the Federal Government about the dam and the compensation, so called, which should be paid to Tasmania in respect of the non-building of that dam. He expressed himself as being satisfied with the outcome of those discussions. He then went back to Tasmania and made a good fellow of himself about the agreement which he had reached with the Federal Government. In respect of the proposed building of the dam, there is still an ongoing process of consultation as to whether Tasmania's electricity needs in the future will require any other form of Commonwealth assistance for building or providing for alternative sources of electrical energy. I would have thought those discussions would be prejudiced by Mr Gray's conduct in the course of the last few days. It is not a very suitable environment in which to conduct discussions when there seems to be no unanimity of view about the compensation which has been provided by the Commonwealth Government to the Tasmanian Government over this issue. The conduct of the Tasmanian Premier in this matter is quite extraordinary. It will be noted throughout Australia. I am sure that the close affinity which the Federal Leader of the Opposition has assumed with Mr Gray on this issue will also be noted throughout Australia in the course of the forthcoming election campaign. Senator TOWNLEY —I refer the Leader of the Government in the Senate to the Prime Minister's expression of interest in the suggestion of a summit to discuss the whole question of taxation reform, a suggestion which I believe was put to him by a radio announcer in Perth. I ask: Is the Government seriously considering such a summit? Senator BUTTON —The suggestion was put to the Prime Minister and he said that the idea may have some merit and would be considered by the Government. However, one thing is clear. A comprehensive review of the taxation system has been required for many years and was not an issue dealt with by the Opposition in its seven years in government. It is still doomed to its course of tinkering with the Australian taxation system instead of conducting a review which would lead to a fairer, more equitable and more efficient system in terms of business. Instead of doing any of those things, for a long period the Opposition merely rested on its oars on the issues both of tax reform and, more particularly, tax avoidance. This Government is concerned to consult, as it has done in its 18 months in office, in respect of all areas of economic activity. It is concerned to consult , in relation to a review of the taxation system, with a wide range of community organisations and business organisations in order that it can provide a fair and comprehensive result which is acceptable to the Australian people. Let me make it quite clear to Senator Townley that, following the comprehensive review of the taxation system, we will have another election in two or three years time and if we do not provide-- Senator Mason —What do you mean by 'two'? Senator BUTTON —I mean two or three years after the completion of the comprehensive review of the taxation system, if that is not clear. In the course of that review we will consult with a wide range of bodies. Of course, if we do not produce a comprehensive, fair and equitable taxation system, we will rightly be judged in the following election. Senator CROWLEY —My question is to the Minister for Social Security. I had a recent inquiry from a constituent concerning the fact that the Department of Social Security in South Australia would not take verification of his identity from an interstate office of that Department, which happened to be Queensland, or accept the identification accepted by the Queensland office for the further payment of unemployment benefit. The South Australian office would, however, accept school records or gaol records. Will the Minister comment on whether this is an aberration of his Department's practice or whether such matters of identification are standard practice throughout the Department? Senator GRIMES —I was informed by Senator Crowley and others that there was a difficulty in that the Department in one State-I believe that State is South Australia-did not accept the verification of identity which had been provided and was accepted by the Department in another State, which State I believe was Queensland. The matter of identification is difficult enough, as Senator Crowley and I am sure all other honourable senators know. Governments of all persuasions have been wrestling with the difficulty of providing satisfactory standard identification procedures. Therefore, I am certainly disconcerted to find that the standards required in one State are not accepted within the same Department in another State. I have drawn this matter to the attention of the relevant officers in the Department. I have not yet had a reply as to just how this situation arose, but I assure the honourable senator that I will get a reply very soon or will want to know why not. I hope this matter can be resolved with ease. We need standard procedures and procedures which clients and departmental officers can understand and accept. Senator JESSOP —My question relates to the Prime Minister's announcement of an exemption of family homes from a capital gains tax, following the wild cat thrown among-- The PRESIDENT —Order! To whom is this question addressed? Senator JESSOP —It is to the Leader of the Government-I was leading up to that- who was guilty of throwing the wild cat among the pigeons last week. Can the Minister provide any information concerning how the Government might define the family home? I use this example: Would the exemption include homes not currently occupied, such as the homes of aged people in nursing homes, or would it be restricted to homes permanently occupied by those resident owners? Senator BUTTON —If there arises from any comprehensive review of the Australian taxation system a proposal for inclusion of these matters on the agenda of any comprehensive review by the Business Council of Australia, the Australian Council of Social Service, the Australian Council of Trade Unions and a wide variety of other bodies concerned about taxation reform in Australia and, as a result of the review, recommendations include additions to the present capital taxes structure which exists in Australia, there will no doubt be recommendations about exemptions. In respect of the exemption of the family home , no doubt there will be recommendations as to what extent that exemption would go. Of course, in considering that I have no doubt that people participating in that review will have regard to the situation which pertains in other countries which have capital taxes of this kind and which include a wide range of exemptions in respect of those capital taxes. Senator HEARN —I ask the Minister representing the Minister for Aviation: Given this Government's commitment to equal opportunity, can the Minister outline what effect this policy has had on female representation in the many traditionally male dominated occupations within the Department of Aviation? Senator GIETZELT —Senator Hearn was kind enough in my absence last week to indicate to my office that she required some information about equal opportunity for females in the Department of Aviation. My colleague the Minister for Aviation, Mr Beazley, has provided me with the following information: There are 34 qualified female air traffic controllers at government airports throughout Australia; five years ago there were only two. There are now more than 40 female qualified flight service officers compared with none in 1978. There are 55 female trainees in these areas as well as women apprentices in radio, electrical and other trades. The Minister also has advised me there are now two women in the Senior Executive Service, one a divisional head. I think that proves conclusively that there has been a very great improvement in equal opportunities provided in the Department of Aviation, particularly since we came to office. Senator KILGARIFF —I direct a question to the Minister representing the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, although perhaps it should be to Senator Button as it appears the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Mr Clyde Holding, has been silenced . I ask: Does the Prime Minister's statement in Perth on Friday represent the Government's final position on uniform national legislation on Aboriginal land rights? In particular, is the rejection of a mining veto on Aboriginal land a firm and unequivocal commitment which will not be changed should the Government be returned at the coming election? Senator RYAN —As Senator Kilgariff's question suggests, the Prime Minister, in conjunction with the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and the Premier of Western Australia, issued a Press statement in Perth on 19 October. That statement makes it perfectly clear that Aboriginal people, while not exercising an absolute veto over mining or exploration on Aboriginal land, will have the right to argue their case in an independent judicial tribunal. That position is consistent with statements that the Minister has made, which the Prime Minister has made previously and which I have made and with Labor Party policy that Aboriginal people should be able to exercise control in relation to mining operations on Aboriginal land. It is a position consistent with the fundamental principle that minerals are vested in the Crown and that ultimate decisions as to their exploitation or otherwise should rest with the elected Government. The proposed tribunal will provide the Government with an independent assessment and recommendations in the event that Aboriginals object to exploration or mining on Aboriginal land and it will also ensure that disputes arising between mining interests and Aboriginal interests as to the terms and conditions under which mining operations take place can be effectively and properly resolved. As to the question of overriding Federal legislation, the Prime Minister reconfirmed the Commonwealth Government's commitment to its constitutional responsibilities in the field of Aboriginal affairs. He pointed out that those States which had or were working towards legislation which would be compatible with Commonwealth aims had no cause for concern about Federal legislation on this subject. Federal legislation would be prepared on the basis of full and continuing consultation between the Commonwealth, the States, Aboriginal organisations, the mining industry, primary industry and other relevant organisations. Of course what is not clear in this land rights debate is the means by which the Opposition, particularly the Liberal Party, will resolve the very obvious differences which exist between the Federal Liberal Party and its State branches . On the one hand the shadow Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Mr Porter, claims that the Liberal Party has a policy supporting Aboriginal land rights but, on the other hand, we have public statements from Mr Hassell in Western Australia, Mr Greiner in New South Wales and Mr Kennett in Victoria resolutely opposing any form of land rights. So perhaps Senator Chaney, on behalf of the Opposition, could indicate in clear and unequivocal terms whether the Liberal Party at the Federal and State levels supports the concept of Aboriginal land rights and whether, in the unlikely and hypothetical event that the Opposition were returned to government, it would introduce legislation providing for Aboriginal land rights in Western Australia, New South Wales and Victoria, despite the stated opposition of the Liberal Party branches in those States. Senator Chaney —Mr President, under the Standing Orders I ask the Minister to table the paper from which she quoted, and can I say to her that we have a published Aboriginal affairs policy which she should read. The PRESIDENT —Will the Minister table the paper from which she quoted? Senator RYAN —Yes, Mr President. Senator McINTOSH —I direct my question to the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs. What is the Government's reaction to the report on AM this morning concerning documents released by the New Zealand Government dealing with the Soviet build-up in the Pacific? Is not the release of documents being made by the New Zealand defence establishment in an attempt to undermine the Lange Government's anti-nuclear position? Do not such statements serve only to heighten tension in this area of the world and further isolate Vietnam from the Association of South East Asian Nations and Australasia as well as give an overstated view of the extent of the Soviet build-up in the Pacific? Senator GARETH EVANS —The Government is aware of the AM report today concerning documents released by the New Zealand Government dealing with the Soviet build- up in the Pacific. We have not yet seen the documents and therefore cannot comment on their substance at this stage. Nor is the Government in a position to comment, even it it wanted to, on either the original source of the documents or the motivation for their release. I can say on behalf of the Minister for Foreign Affairs that the Government remains concerned at the Soviet build-up in the Pacific and its implications for stability in the Asia-Pacific region. Access to Vietnamese military facilities in Cam Ranh Bay and Da Nang has helped the Soviet Union to deploy and maintain military forces in the South East Asian, east Asian and Indian Ocean areas. It is the case that unless Vietnam can be brought into a normal relationship with the Asia-Pacific region and the rest of the world community, Vietnam's reliance on the Soviet Union may well continue to grow and provide the Soviet Union with further opportunities to expand its influence. Of course that consideration gives added weight and force to the Government's initiatives in this respect. Senator CHANEY —My question is addressed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate and follows his answer to Senator Messner's supplementary question. Senator Grimes —How many questions are you going to ask? Senator CHANEY —I thank Government senators for their help. I note the refusal of the Leader of the Government to provide any further details of the exemptions announced by the Prime Minister in Perth last week. I refer to the words of the Leader of the Government in this place a few minutes ago, namely: The Prime Minister has indicated what matters he would regard as relevant if those circumstances arose. They are matters which, of course, are widely regarded as appropriate exemptions in all other countries. I ask the Leader of the Government: Is there a firm, unequivocal commitment, not from the Prime Minister personally but from the Government, as to its future intentions with respect to capital taxation? Is it a firm matter of Government policy that there will be exemptions with respect to the family home and exemptions or offsets for capital losses, or are they, as suggested in the words I have just quoted, merely matters which the Prime Minister regards as relevant and as matters to be considered in the review which the Government intends to have? Senator BUTTON —There is not a firm Government view in respect of exemptions which would apply if, as a result of a comprehensive review of the taxation system in this country, there were a recommendation which came to the Government that existing capital gains taxes be strengthened in the manner I referred to earlier. There cannot be any such firm Government view because there is no firm Government view that capital taxes of any kind should be introduced. There is a firm Government view that a comprehensive review of the taxation system should take place and that the Government should act on the basis of recommendations arising from that review. As I have said on a number of occasions at Question Time, if capital taxes are the subject of a recommendation of that review they will be considered by the Government. All the Prime Minister has indicated, in common with the views expressed or the policies operating in a wide range of other countries, is that if such a recommendation were made to the Government there would be exemptions in respect of it, one of which would be the family home. On a number of occasions Government spokesmen have indicated their concern about any consideration of capital taxes in the context of a comprehensive review of the taxation system as being fundamentally to stop tax avoidance finally in this country. That may be unpalatable to the Opposition, but the Government is bent on that course. That fundamental question is not an issue which goes to the sorts of questions I have been asked here today about possible exemptions in the light of a possible capital gains tax arising from a comprehensive review of the taxation system. Senator CHANEY —I ask a supplementary question. I want no possibility for confusion, Mr President. I simply ask the Leader of the Government: Is he saying that there are no firm and final decisions on any exemptions which might apply in respect of a capital tax? Senator BUTTON —I have said on numerous occasions in this chamber that the Government has not considered and has no plans for the introduction of any new taxes. What the Government has said-- Senator Sir John Carrick —The Prime Minister has said it will exempt private homes, so it must have some plans. Senator BUTTON —With the greatest respect, that is a conclusion bordering on the idiotic. The only person in Australia who has said that this Government, if re- elected, would introduce capital taxes of the kind that have been referred to is Mr Andrew Peacock, the discredited Leader of the Opposition in this country. He is the only person who has said that, and maybe the parrots in the Senate will parrot what he said. He is the only person who said that that will follow like the night the day, to paraphrase Mr Peacock's comment, which is becoming boring and repetitious in this election campaign. He assures us what will follow like the night the day but can assure of nothing else in respect of his own policies. He is the only person who has said that, if this Government is re-elected, capital taxes of the kind referred to will be introduced in this country. What we have said is that we will have a review of the taxation system and, arising from that review, if capital taxes of one kind or another are proposed, there will be exemptions, as there are everywhere else. The Prime Minister has made it clear that from the point of view of this Government if the comprehensive review of the taxation system recommended capital taxes of one kind or another, that recommendation would not be accepted unless there were an exemption in respect of the matters which he has specified. Senator PRIMMER —I ask the Minister representing the Acting Minister for Resources and Energy whether his attention has been drawn to a report quoting the Queensland Premier and Leader of the National Party of Australia as advocating the development of Australian nuclear weapons? Has his attention also been drawn to the proposal of the Federal Leader of the National Party that Australia acquire nuclear powered submarines? Can the Minister advise the Senate whether these proposals offer Australia any benefits? Senator GRIMES —I have noted the comments of the Premier of Queensland, Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen, and Mr Sinclair on the acquisition of nuclear weapons and nuclear submarines. Australia has reserves of uranium which will be developed under the present Government's policy, but only in a way which helps promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy and nuclear non-proliferation. Senator Mason —Absolute rubbish! Senator GRIMES —It is only people such as Senator Mason who cannot make a distinction between these two things. Every other country in the world, every other party of the left in the world, can make that distinction. Unlike the Queensland Premier but consistent with the vast majority of nations and the vast majority of this electorate, the Government has repudiated the acquisition or use of nuclear weapons. Only, apparently, the National Party now has developed such a policy. Senator Cook —Where are they? They are not even in the Senate. Senator GRIMES —The National Party in both places apparently has now done so. I do not know where Premier Bjelke-Petersen developed his policy-I suppose in that fertile mind of his. It does not seem to have the support of many people outside Queensland, and certainly none outside his own Party. As for Mr Sinclair's proposal, I am surprised he has only now discovered that he supports the development of nuclear submarines in Australia. If this idea is so urgent and so imperative for Australia's defence, one can ask why Mr Sinclair did not review the Oberon submarine replacement and come up with the answer to acquire nuclear powered submarines when he was the Minister for Defence in the previous Government. We have stated many times that nuclear powered submarines are not appropriate for Australia's use because of their initial capital cost and their considerable maintenance costs. Perhaps in government Mr Sinclair was deterred by the high cost of acquiring nuclear submarines at that time. Maybe he did not think he would get the support of the people of Neutral Bay where our present submarine base is. The element that puzzles me more than anything in this whole silly episode involving Mr Sinclair's extraordinary proposals is that the Opposition says that it is basing its policies in this country on the needs of Australian families. The only way the acquisition of nuclear powered submarines will affect the Australian family is that they will have to pay for their acquisition and their maintenance. No one takes Mr Sinclair seriously on this issue. No one would have taken him seriously if he suggested it when he was Minister for Defence not long ago. We believe this is another election stunt, but it is beyond me just which part of the Australian electorate this stunt is aimed at. Senator DURACK —Is the Attorney-General in a position now to say on what date the Government expects to receive the report from Mr Costigan? Senator GARETH EVANS —No, I have no further information than that which I had last week, which is that the report is not expected to be in our hands earlier than 26 October. The precise date on which it will be in our hands or whether there is a possibility of its arriving a day or two earlier, I do not know. Senator FOREMAN —My question is directed to the Minister for Industry and Commerce. I draw the Minister's attention to the report in Friday's Press which states that General Motors- Holden's Ltd intends to shed 3,500 jobs as part of its overall rationalisation plan. In August it was announced that only 600 jobs would be lost. Can the Minister comment on this large increase in numbers to be retrenched, and can he indicate how this will affect the motor vehicle industry employment prospects in South Australia? Senator BUTTON —I think the report to which Senator Foreman referred was in the Australian Financial Review. It suggested that GMH would shed some 3,500 jobs over the next 15 months. This is not in any way a new announcement by General Motors-Holden's. Senator Foreman will recall that, in announcing the Government' s policy for the car industry on 28 May this year, I went into some detail to indicate that as a result of a series of very heavy losses which General Motors has incurred over the last few years, the company had told me it was its intention to reduce its work force. I do not recall the figure exactly; I said either by 3,700 or 4,000, but it was in the vicinity of 4,000. I did that deliberately because I had been told that by General Motors. The article to which Senator Foreman referred draws on a document which General Motors has issued explaining the company's intentions regarding this matter. That document is designed to indicate areas of production in which the company wishes to concentrate its activities and areas where it would be out-sourcing components to component manufacturers when it has traditionally made those components itself. As I said, the actual and planned reductions in the company's work force take place against a background of very substantial losses by General Motors in recent years. Currently the General Motors employment level is around 14,500. That includes quite a bit of short term employment-around 1,300-for what is called the Commodore facelift. It also includes a substantial number of people currently at Acacia Ridge in Queensland, the company having announced last year its intention to close that plant, I think later this year. The latest information we have had from the company is that it expects its work force to be around 11,000 at the end of 1985. Senator Foreman particularly asked about the consequences for employment in South Australia. As I understand the document which General Motors has distributed on this issue, the company is concerned to consolidate its activities in particular plants and in particular regions. That was what led to the decision to close the Acacia Ridge plant in Queensland. One of those places where consolidation is intended to take place is Elizabeth in South Australia. I indicate to Senator Foreman that, unless I have been misinformed, it is my understanding that there will be no significant changes at all in the size of the work force at Elizabeth in South Australia, although he will, of course, be aware of the company's intentions announced last year in relation to the Woodville plant. Senator MacGIBBON —I address my question to the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs. I ask the Minister whether he saw Mr Dolan's announcement in Wellington which was reported last week in an Australian Financial Review article in the following terms: I think personally it is time that the Anzus Pact was looked at . . . It may mean scrapping, if you use that term, the present pact and arranging something somewhat different in its place. The article continued: Asked if he would like to see Australia in a pact with New Zealand and America, Mr Dolan said he did not believe a defence pact was necessary. Is the Minister aware that Mr Dolan's utterances are accepted both within Australia and overseas as having the imprimatur of the Labor Government upon them? Has the Hawke Government awarded the same status in foreign affairs, that is, de facto ministerial rank, to Mr Dolan as it has awarded him in Treasury where the Government has to get the approval of the Australian Council of Trade Unions before it can present a Budget and, as was shown in the revelation two weeks ago, again in the Australian Financial Review, that Mr Keating has to get the approval of bank unions before granting licences to individual foreign banks ? Finally, has the Government done a deal with Mr Dolan that he will stop calling strikes if the Government lets him and the unions run this country? Senator GARETH EVANS —Mr Dolan speaks for a great many more Australians than does Senator MacGibbon, and always will. But in this instance he is not to be regarded, assuming that he was reported accurately, as speaking for the Australian Government. The Australian Government's own support for ANZUS has been spelt out on many occasions since March 1983, most comprehensively, of course, in Mr Hayden's statement to Parliament on 15 September 1983 on the review of ANZUS. That statement followed a very comprehensive review undertaken first on a national basis and then in consultation with our Treaty partners. That review concluded, amongst other things, that it is in Australia's interest to maintain the ANZUS Treaty which supports Australia's security in current and prospective strategic circumstances and reflects a coincidence of strategic interest between Australia, New Zealand and the United States of America. Indeed , it is precisely because of the detailed review carried out last year that the Government would see no need to take up Mr Dolan's suggestions, assuming again, of course, that he has been accurately reported. The PRESIDENT —On Friday last, after Senator Tate tabled two documents relating to the power of the Senate or its committees to meet after a dissolution of the House of Representatives or a prorogation of the Parliament, Senator Georges asked the Deputy President, who was then in the chair, to make arrangements for the tabling of any other opinions held by the Senate on this matter. In response to Senator Georges I am now able to table copies of opinions by former Attorney- General Ellicott, Professor Howard of Melbourne University and Professor Sawer, formerly of the Australian National University. Senator CHANEY(Western Australia-Leader of the Opposition) —Mr President, could I just indicate to the Senate that the next item you will be calling on, I think , is a matter of public importance. I would like to explain that members of the Opposition will support the bringing on of this Australian Democrat matter of public importance because we have an arrangement with the Democrats that they should get a fair share of the debating opportunities. Although we would not necessarily have put this matter forward ourselves, we are supporting the Democrats in the spirit of the agreement that we have with them. The PRESIDENT —I have received a letter from Senator Mason proposing that a matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion, namely: The failure of this Government to ensure the full protection of our environment for future generations, particularly from the ultimate threat of nuclear war. I call upon those senators who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places. More than the number of senators required by the Standing Orders having risen in their places- Senator MASON(New South Wales)(3.15) —The Australian Democrats bring this matter of public importance before the Senate because, as the Government campaigns for the early election, it will have to face the community with an appalling record on the environment and an unsatisfactory record on its attitude towards the nuclear industry and nuclear war. The first 18 months of this Government have left a bitter taste indeed in the mouths of those hundreds of thousands of Australians who rightly expected the preservation of the environment to be a non-negotiable priority of the Labor Government. The election of the Labor Government saw the successful culmination of the Franklin River campaign which I think was a yardstick in Australian history. After three years of struggle that magnificent wilderness was to be preserved. It was a courageous decision-indeed, I repeat, an historic decision-that saw the need to preserve the environment triumph over party political considerations, and it without doubt had the majority of support of the Australian community, probably the first cause of its kind that ever had, for which reason it was also historic . Such courage held great promise. With a successful government and the nation's most popular Prime Minister there was a window of opportunity for the Labor Government to make environmental preservation part of its much vaunted national consensus and indeed to be a model for the world in a basic and desperately urgent area of need for this planet. That window has now been slammed shut by a return to party politics and to party expediency. In doing so, this Government has made it clear now that its concern for the Franklin River was motivated by electoral considerations rather than being part of an overall commitment to the environment. In other words, it made that commitment prior to the previous election and it could not get out of it, but it is not prepared to continue that commitment logically and reasonably into the future. The first disappointment has come with the circumstances of the compensation provided in Tasmania. Certainly Tasmania needed and deserved to be compensated. Nobody denies that, and certainly the Australian Democrats do not deny it; but that compensation needed to be for job creating and environmentally compatible projects, many of which were possibilities for Tasmania. Instead, this Government is paying Tasmania to build more dams in the beautiful south-west region. An amount of $200m out of a total of $277m compensation is to subsidise power schemes from the Anthony and King dams and hydro schemes. Both these dams are in areas listed on the register of the National Estate and both will destroy areas officially recognised as valuable regions of Australia's environment. That fact makes those compensation payments illegal. There is a legal obligation on the Government to conduct an inquiry into the environmental impact of its funding for projects in areas listed on the Register of the National Estate. It has not conducted that inquiry. It has indeed flouted the law. We call on the Government now to give a pre-election undertaking, a firm commitment, that it will obey the law. I look forward to the Minister, who will be speaking in this debate, giving that undertaking, which I assure him the Australian people will be waiting for. The Government's contempt for the environment has been illustrated graphically in recent months by the disgraceful nature of the Daintree decision. The Government has done nothing about the fate of Daintree Rainforest, one of the most beautiful and remarkable parts of Australia's heritage and an area unique in the world, with the most beautiful rain forests coming down over the hill right to the coast. Geographically, visually and aesthetically it is part of the Great Barrier Reef because the Great Barrier Reef and its fringe areas come close into the beaches at that spot. The two systems there, the reef and the forest, depend on each other. The destruction of the forest would in time destroy the reef. This has been proven. Among other things, the run-off into the sea from cleared areas of rain forest land which has become unstable destroys the coral reefs. Already that process has begun in the Daintree areas. We can only hope that the damage will not go further and that it will not prove irreparable. There has been a lot of talk and many conferences about rain forests over the last 14 months. All sorts of worthy things have been said, but they have not saved one single tree. The Minister for Home Affairs and Environment, Mr Barry Cohen, has strained mightily over this affair with words and memos and things of that sort and has brought forth a mouse. It is observably and plainly evident to the Australian people that that is what he has done. All I can say is that I hope he is proud of it. Perhaps he will reconsider this matter after the next election and understand that, if he does not care for the environment of this country, the people of the country do. We now have a generation, especially a generation of young people, who understand the threat to the planet and who regard it as one of the most important things in their lives, and rightly so. It is not merely a matter of idealism and optimism. It is a matter of deep conviction that it is necessary to preserve this planet, if we can, into the future in no worse a condition at least than we have found it. The rain forests of north-east Queensland, including Daintree, are recognised as being of outstanding universal significance. The Australian Heritage Commission has recommended that the area be nominated for the World Heritage List. That is no small thing. If these forests were in Japan, where I was not so long ago, the Japanese Government would be spending millions of dollars, if necessary, to preserve them. There would be no question of anybody doing anything that might disturb them. The people of more developed and highly populated countries understand that once we lose these things from our heritage we do not get them back easily. Not only has the Australian Heritage Commission recommended the area for world heritage listing but also four international experts have agreed unanimously with the assessment that the Daintree rain forests are worthy of being considered part of the heritage of this planet. What was the Government's response to this? It prevaricated, delayed and substantially ignored the devastation created by a 38 kilometre road torn through priceless rain forest. The area has been left in a virtually untrafficable state. The run-off, because it is near the coast, will damage the fringing reefs. Not only that, the Government also ignored the logging of core wilderness areas at Downey Creek in Queensland, and it has ignored the overall issue of our fast disappearing rain forests. That has occurred in spite of the fact that for three years there has been before the Senate a Bill, instigated by the Australian Democrats, concerning rain forests. It has recently been put forward with amendments which would provide a vehicle-it would not infringe on the sovereignty of any of the States-by which the Commonwealth and the States could negotiate to preserve these areas. I repeat that such areas are our national monuments. I was recently in the Daintree area. There is an enormous pattern of milling which is concentrated basically on the thousand-year-old trees. Any reasonable community would regard them as national monuments. These trees are being torn down, devastating the forest for a hundred yards around. There is no regeneration of the fragile rain forest. Thorny gympie bush grows. Weeds grow where there was beauty. I do not think any single decision of this Government has involved such gross deception of the community as the charade of consultation with the Queensland Government to save the Daintree. This was political chicanery of the worst order. When the Government announced its $1m package to Queensland it knew already that the Queensland Government would not stop destroying the rainforests and that it had no intention of doing so. The Labor Government knew that Queensland Ministers had publicly declared their refusal to nominate the area for the World Heritage List. The Commonwealth Government knew that the proposal it was putting forward to the Queensland Government was cynical and spelt the ultimate and rapid doom for our rain forests. What has the Government done since then? We know that Queensland refused to co- operate. The Queensland Premier wrote to the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) on 25 September this year. What has been the Federal Government's response? We have heard no more. The Government has been silent. I asked Senator Button a question in this place. He said that the Queensland Minister had refused unequivocally to co-operate. Mr Cohen made a later statement and said: 'We still hope that something will happen'. Since then we have heard no more. Nothing has happened. My prediction is that nothing will happen. The Federal Government has a duty and an obligation to nominate the rain forests of north-east Queensland for world heritage listing. It would be unthinkable for the Government to allow the destruction of an area which is recognised as the cradle of the world's flowering plants-it is one of the genetic pools of the world and an area of basic and fundamental beauty-for electoral considerations but, unhappily, that seems to be the case. The Labor Party is worried about the fate of one or two seats in Queensland. The consideration will be: 'Save your seats for the next election. Do not worry about the rain forest, let that be destroyed as so much else of beauty and value in his country has been destroyed'. If that is a reasonable way for any government to portend, especially the Labor Government which made such promises in this area before the election, I think we are living in a complete Alice in Wonderland world of politics. If that was not bad enough, there was worse to come. The ultimate and totally obscene environmental threat is nuclear war. A nuclear conflict could obliterate every living thing on this planet and render the environment lifeless for thousands of years, perhaps for ever-a thought from which I personally flinch, from which I think every human being flinches. No human being wants to think about it, but unless human beings think about it, it will happen. That is the lesson of history. Trends and cycles of that sort which are ignored go their full cycle and so will this one unless enough human beings have the guts, courage and energy to do something about it. Yet, just as this Government remains unmoved by the destruction of the Australian environment, the potential for world environmental catastrophe resulting from nuclear war has not encouraged any member of the Government to vote for change or to take any positive step for change. Every member of the Government has voted twice to defeat Australian Democrat Bills in this place to end uranium mining and prohibit the importation of nuclear hardware. It is quite likely that they will vote again in this place to prevent the passing of our Bill which puts the reasonable view that we should supervise whether nuclear powered ships should be in our ports. That means that every member of this Government has supported in the Parliament, by their vote, the continuation of uranium mining and the prospect of Australia one day having its own nuclear industry, including the world's biggest uranium mine at Roxby Downs, not an inconsiderable achievement for a government which has said it is opposed to nuclear war. In spite of what Senator Grimes might say, the experts everywhere see a very clear link indeed between nuclear power and the proliferation of small, dirty nuclear weapons. Every day that passes makes that link stronger. Why? Because of improvements in nuclear technology, because both centrifuge and other methods, particularly laser methods, of enrichment are now becoming much easier, cheaper and more easily concealed. Instead of being an option open only to the major powers, enrichment of uranium is now rapidly becoming an option which will be open to any country and perhaps, at some stage, even to determined guerilla groups, so that they could get sufficient enriched uranium to make a bomb. I admit that it certainly would not be the most efficient bomb and that a plutonium bomb would be better, but we all know that an enriched uranium bomb works because it killed 140,000 people at Hiroshima 40 years ago. In the unfortunate-I say it is unfortunate-ironic, tragic Jekyll and Hyde nature of the nuclear power industry, we are creating a situation where that will occur again. The sands of time are running out very fast for us. Every new piece of technology, every step in the research on laser enrichment, which is going on in several countries, takes us closer and closer to the prospect of the proliferation of small nuclear weapons being beyond control and of its being of no use to the five present nuclear powers. The Australian Government is saying: 'We are going to control it somehow. We will bring sanctions on them'. It will be beyond that. I am not speaking from the top of my head, I am speaking from careful research into this matter by my Party and by such places as the respected Peace Institute in Stockholm which is funded by the Swedish Parliament. These are facts. They are facts that are being ignored by this Labor Government to the detriment of the world and to the detriment of this country. No matter how many treaties we sign and no matter how many non-proliferation agreements we say we are contributing to, so long as this country continues to mine uranium we will be contributing to the increased risk of nuclear war. Small nuclear conflicts which will break out like bushfires throughout the world-each one as a result of the nature of the dirty, high fall out weapons being used-will increase the high level of radioactivity throughout the world. No one is naive enough to believe, least of all the Australian Democrats, that Australia's ending of uranium mining will end the nuclear arms race; of course it will not do that. What it would do is provide the world with an example of moral leadership that could well prove decisive. It would be a step back from the brink. The courage of the New Zealand Government in banning nuclear armed warships from its ports is one such example. The Australian Democrats commend the New Zealand Government for that decision, which was a proper and reasonable exercise of its sovereignty. It showed a dignity which our Government does not show. The world desperately needs such leadership. With 50,000 nuclear bombs stockpiled by the super-powers, nuclear war would be only minutes away, at any time now, tomorrow, next week or next year. To do nothing in the face of that destructive power is to perpetuate the insanity that threatens to unleash one and a half million Hiroshimas-the bomb load the world now carries will achieve this-and extinguish life on this planet forever. What generation has held the responsibility that we hold? None has done so. What person has the right to come into this place or any place and not say that this is, by far, the most important consideration in the life of every human being, every man, woman and child on the planet. It is of that order of importance and it must be seen as being of that order of importance. Unfortunately, doing nothing as opposed to saying plenty, has been the hallmark of this Government on disarmament issues. Australia hosts three United States of America bases which makes us nuclear targets. In our opinion, Australians have, at the very least, a right to know why they are nuclear targets. The Government claims to have told us the complete story about those bases. The Minister for Foreign Affairs (Mr Hayden), in response to one of my questions last week, stated: I also restate the Prime Minister's assurance that the Government is satisfied that all functions and activities at the joint facilities require and have its full knowledge and concurrence . . . Only the day before Dr Desmond Ball from the Australian National University's Strategic Defence Studies Centre was quoted in the media as saying: There is one part of Pine Gap called the Signals Analysis Section which the CIA runs and which is off bounds even to American contractors. Obviously no Australians are allowed in that room or are aware of its activities . Dr Ball continued: We should have at least a couple of Australians in that room, just to make sure that the intelligence that is picked up and analysed there does not concern Australia. The Australian Democrats would agree with that statement, but the Labor Government's blanket assurance is a blatant deception of the Australian people in light of those statements. The agreements covering those bases are due to be renegotiated in 1987 and 1988. They should be renegotiated so that no base in Australia contributes to the planning for, or conduct of nuclear war and there is no base over which Australia does not have total control and knowledge. We should have two requirements, that is, no nuclear war and we should have control . This is a simple matter of our basic sovereignty. It is only reasonable that, as an independent nation, we should make those demands. If the United States bases do assist world peace, so much the better, but the Government should not be afraid to tell us all what there is to know and to gain the support of the Australian people on a sound, rational and honest basis. The policy of accepting visits of nuclear armed warships to our ports is contrary to the goal of avoiding nuclear war. Two decisions by the United States Navy this year make this threat even greater; that is the fitting of Trident II missiles and sea cruise missiles on board United States submarines and other ships. Those deployments hold enormous consequences for Australia because they are first strike weapons and, as such, they would attract a first strike against us. The Democrats would preserve the environment and we believe that the Government should support us. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Colston) —Order! The honourable senator's time has expired. Senator GARETH EVANS(Victoria-Attorney-General)(3.34) —I think we ought to be clear right at the outset that this matter of public importance is not about any threat to the future of Australia's environment from this Government but rather the threat to the Australian Democrats' position from Midnight Oil and other elements of the Nuclear Disarmament Party. What an extraordinary mixed grab-bag we have heard of familiar Australian Democrats single issues. What an extraordinary combination of single minded approaches to issues which, as important as they may be in themselves, conspicuously, regularly and routinely ignore the kinds of constraints and realities within which any government has to operate. Moreover, they are approaches which conspicuously ignore-I think this is the fundamental defect of everything we have heard from the Democrats today- the fundamental differences in approach on these issues between the major parties. To attack, in the way that Senator Mason has done, the bona fides and the performance of the Labor Government in areas of environmental protection, uranium mining and nuclear armament and disarmament is to fail fundamentally to appreciate the massive differences which exist in the approach and in the sensitivity of the two major parties in this country. Although it would be impossible for any political party or government operating in the real world to come close to satisfying the miscellany of obsessions, prejudices and enthusiasms that beset the Democrats on this occasion, I think honesty would have obliged Senator Mason to acknowledge, in the context of the appeal he made to the Australian electorate today, that the Australian Labor Party comes infinitely closer to sharing the basic values that underline the concerns that Senator Mason has expressed than our political opponents. I find offensive the suggestion that there has been some fundamental resiling by the Labor Party in government from commitments that it had in relation to the environment and those related matters before it came into office. Our concern for the environment, properly so-called, could hardly have been more dramatically or graphically expressed than in the campaign we fought and won to save the Franklin Dam just 18 months ago. It is grotesque to suggest that that commitment was other than total or that there has been any resiling from it subsequently. It is the case, in the context of the Daintree, that we have had another set of Democrat and conservation pressure group enthusiasms at work in an entirely understandable way, given the beauty and significance of that wilderness area. But to assimilate those two causes in the way the Democrats have so glibly today and on many previous occasions is completely to ignore again the nature of the legal weapons available to the Commonwealth to deal with matters of this kind and to fail to appreciate the very significant differences in the practical situation that confronted the Government in looking, on the one hand, at the road building exercise in the Daintree and, on the other hand, at the complete and permanent despoliation of the environment that was involved with the Franklin exercise in South West Tasmania. These are issues to which I have addressed myself-Senator Mason is aware of it- in my capacity as Attorney-General in advising the Government on the legal options in this respect. It is also the case that those options were very limited indeed in the context of the Daintree and the Queensland rain forests. That has not stopped the Government, however, from pursuing very actively and very vigorously a policy to try to preserve the beauty and the significance of that area. It is the case that the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) has written to the Premier of Queensland offering to hold discussions on a package of proposals for the conservation of the wet tropic forests of north-east Queensland which includes of course the Daintree and Downey Creek areas. It is the case that the Queensland Government has, in its preliminary response, been somewhat less than enthusiastic about responding to that overture by the Commonwealth. But it is very early days yet and we remain optimistic that this is a problem we will be able to solve particularly in the context of our larger approach to the whole question of rainforest conservation which, as Senator Mason ought to know, has led us to establish a working group comprising a broad representation of rainforest interests, including government, industry, unions and conservationists, developing, as it has been, policy options for the Government to consider and advising on the kinds of measures that are open to us to initiate and actually to implement, as distinct from talking about them from the luxury of the cross benches which is the Democrats favoured perch from which to view the world with rose-tinted, trendy, single-issue glasses. It is a perfectly understandable viewpoint to be adopting and it is a perfectly understandable perch to want to be sitting on in the context of an election campaign. But it is not a perch which deserves to be taken particularly seriously by those of us who have to wrestle, in a way in which governments mercifully have never had to nor will they ever be likely to, with the hard realities of government and policy implementation in a world that is full of constitutional and other constraints that make life difficult in terms of bringing in the millennium overnight. There are a dozen or more other major initiatives which this Government has taken in the environment area which deserve to be put on record on an occasion like this. I will state them briefly. The first is the enactment of the Wildlife Protection (Regulation of Exports and Imports) Act which came into force on 1 May 1984 enhancing, as that does, the protection and conservation of wild plants and animals in Australia. I refer also to the extension of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park to include 98.5 per cent of the total region, the introduction of regulations prohibiting oil drilling in the parts of the region not included in the marine park and the development of that in the context of cost-sharing and management arrangements with the Queensland Government, which came into effect in November. This demonstrates that all is not lost in terms of negotiating with that Government over time on matters of environmental significance. We have established the national tree program especially utilising the links afforded by the community employment program with some $25m-worth of expenditure having been committed and over 2,500 jobs created in that exercise. We declared Stage 2 of the Kakadu National Park in February this year. We established title in the Aboriginal people to the Uluru National Park subject to lease-back arrangements, an act which I hope even the Democrats will acknowledge was one of some political courage given the political environment we have had to deal with and still have to deal with in the Northern Territory. We proclaimed and brought into force the sea dumping legislation in March this year. We established an Environment Contaminants Division within the Department of Home Affairs and Environment to develop the functions of the proposed environment contaminants authority. We introduced controls on interstate trade of protected fauna through a memorandum of understanding signed in July this year among all State and Territory governments to get national control over that particular unhappy trade. We have agreed on a draft with the Council of Nature Conservation Ministers for the prevention of cruelty in kangaroo harvesting. We introduced more fundamentally a national conservation strategy for Australia and had that tabled in the Parliament on 6 December. We reaffirmed our opposition to sand mining on Moreton Island in February this year and we have made it clear that, if it needs policy implementation through the refusal of export licences, that is exactly the course we will follow. We have supported voluntary conservation groups by massive increases in their funding-78 per cent in 1983-84 and a further 34 per cent in the 1984-85 Budget. We have established a States assistance program to assist the States in the management of parks and reserves of major significance and in wildlife management in the context of national parks generally. We have established a flora and fauna survey under the auspices of the Bureau of Flora and Fauna commencing with the first publication in September 1983. So the list goes on. Were the Minister for Home Affairs and Environment, Mr Cohen, in this place today he could point in a great deal more detail to the very proud record that this Government has established and continues to chalk up in terms of its response to environmental issues. On occasions it has been a necessity that any government confronts to do things less quickly, less dramatically or less comprehensively than we might like in an ideal world. But the suggestion that by our neglect, inattention or lack of enthusiasm, we are somehow putting at risk future generations of Australians by our lack of active support for environmental issues is a palpable nonsense. The Democrat excursion around the world proceeded then to touch inevitably on the Government's uranium policy. It is well known, as the Minister for Social Security, Senator Grimes, was saying before-although it does not seem to be a message that has yet penetrated the Democrat consciousness-that a wholly different set of arguments are appropriate to the uranium debate, depending on whether one is talking about the use of uranium for peaceful energy purposes or for the creation of weaponry. I refer also to the consistent position that this Government has adopted through its Party policy and through the comprehensive and interlocking set of safeguards measures that it has made part and parcel of any trade in uranium in which we as a nation engage. We have demonstrated our commitment to that distinction in doing our utmost to ensure that if uranium is to get into the world's fuel cycles from Australian sources, it does so subject to the kinds of conditions which make us a greater international contributor to environmental sanity than anyone else who is able to make a practical economic contribution in that respect. It ought to be appreciated-if it is not already- that current Government policy, as it relates to uranium, in any event restricts mining to the two existing mines in the Northern Territory, Ranger and Nabarlek, and if commercially viable, the proposed mine at Olympic Dam or Roxby Downs in South Australia. It is not an open slather policy. It never has been and is never likely to be. Our sensitivity to the environmental implications of uranium getting into hands that may be less careful about what they do with it than our own, has been demonstrated by our recent decision not to permit exports to France until that country ceases testing nuclear weapons in the South Pacific region. The rather larger preoccupations that the Democrats then have with defence- disarmament and nuclear weaponry-came to the fore as the final stage of their contribution to this debate. In relation to that there is again a very great deal one can say, did one have the time, to demonstrate that it is the Hawke Labor Government which is contributing meaningfully and substantially, in a way that is never likely to be the case with our opponents, to the processes of disarmament, nuclear proliferation and world peace. It is a travesty of an argument for the Democrats to put forward-in the context of this barely veiled attack on the present Government-claims that we are being less than wholly enthusiastic and less than wholly dedicated in our approach to these fundamental issues of life or death which make the rest of the environment debate pale into insignificance by comparison. In the context of our approach to these issues I think it needs to be put as follows, as briefly as I can in the time available: The Government accepts that the risk of nuclear war is low, for the moment, and will remain so. This is because, and only because, both super-powers are fully aware of the risks of nuclear war, and there is no prospect that either of them could hope to gain sufficient military capacity as to attack the other without facing massive retaliation. That is the risk assessment on which we proceed. I do not for the moment underestimate the risk of accidental nuclear war and the whole rest of the awful panoply of things that can flow from the present overheated and overarmed international atmosphere, but that is the basic strategic reality against which planning and Australia's approach to disarmament and the world arms race proceeds. It is a premise based on an appreciation of the force of the role that nuclear deterrence plays in avoiding nuclear war. That is not to say that we believe a better way cannot be found than a system based on mutual terror. The consequences of nuclear war would be so horrendous that we have to strive to find alternatives. It is in that context and against that background that realistically we are trying to achieve nuclear arms control and disarmament . We have renounced the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Australia. We have renounced the stationing of nuclear weapons on our territory. We are committed to do all that we can to bring about an end to the nuclear arms race and the elimination of nuclear weapons. The major disarmament initiatives of this Government have been many. Our efforts to strengthen the nuclear non-proliferation regime, including the vigorous pursuit of a comprehensive test ban treaty, have been our sponsorship in the South Pacific Forum of a South Pacific nuclear free zone; our efforts to achieve a complete ban on chemical and biological weapons; our support for efforts to prevent an arms race in outer space; and our ratification of the environmental modification treaty. The whole question of our approach to defence facilities in this country and the question of visits by nuclear ships is one that has been debated on many occasions in the past, and I cannot do more, in the very short time available to me, than to say that we undertake these forms of defence co-operation with the United States of America because we believe it is in Australia's interest to support a stable system of mutual deterrence between the super-powers, not as an end in itself but while the search goes on, for a better way through arms control and disarmament. This co-operation in no way limits our national ability to make independent judgments and to adopt independent positions. We have made it perfectly clear, for example, that the basing in Australia, on a permament status, of US warships of combat forces, would not be acceptable. Given the concerns raised by this matter of public importance-with which the Government obviously does have some degree of sympathy, against the background of this matter and against the background of those concerns-let me finish by spending just a moment or two on this amazing proposal which is now being put forward on the part of the Leader of the National Party of Australia (Mr Sinclair), on behalf of the coalition it seems, that Australia acquire nuclear powered submarines. Let us ask ourselves: Why does the coalition propose that Australia acquire such submarines? The coalition's policy in this respect is obviously a recipe for disaster; disaster in terms of defence policy, disaster in terms of budgetary policy, as was made clear by the Leader in Question Time today, quite apart from the questions of environmental policy which are in the forefront of this debate. As far as the Government is aware there are only four nations with nuclear powered submarines, and these are four of the five nuclear armed nations-the United States, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the United Kingdom and France. Only a proportion of the submarine fleets of these countries are nuclear powered. The chief role of nuclear powered submarines is to remain under water undetected for prolonged periods. Nuclear powered submarines are used for and armed with, accordingly, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and that is their function. What I ask the coalition and subsequent speakers in this debate to explain is whether they are proposing that Australia acquire submarine launched nuclear warheads. There would appear to be only two alternatives; two possibilities: Either the coalition has no idea of what it is talking about, which is quite possible but not highly likely, or it is proposing a back door nuclear armament policy for Australia, a course that was proposed by Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen over the weekend. If the coalition's policy is, as it seems to be, one of nuclear proliferation and nuclear escalation in which Australian armed forces would in the future play a role, this is lunacy of a kind we would unfortunately only in recent times come to expect from a coalition so obviously bereft of ideas and capacity to manage the Australian economy. The obvious reality is that nuclear powered submarines cost far more than conventionally powered submarines. They would require completely new infrastructure to maintain and overhaul the reactors which would power them. There is a whole series of questions. That gives rise as to whereabouts, which State of the nation, it is proposed that those facilities be located. There are questions, questions, questions but very few answers in anything we have heard from the other side, other than answers which lead one to believe that this is an irresponsible Opposition, confirming everything we have been led to suspect over the last few months. Finally, the reality is that the Hawke Government is committed to the care and nurturing of our environment in a whole series of ways, which it has been possible for me only to very sketchily outline considering the extraordinary amount of territory I have had to cover in the short time available. We are committed now, and for future generations. The Democrats' attempt in this debate to shore up their Green vote, so to speak, overlooks the determination and success of the Labor Government and it also ignores, in a way that is really quite indefensible in the context of this election campaign, the dangers that are posed to Australia by the Opposition and its threadbare policies and worse that it brings to this particular area of the national policy debate. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK(New South Wales)(3.53) —The Senate is debating a matter of public importance put forward by the Australian Democrats in the following terms: The failure of this Government to ensure the full protection of our environment for future generations, particularly from the ultimate threat of nuclear war. That is a matter that one could think would bring forth debate upon the various and numerous threats to this environment of ours and to the ecosystem of the world. One would expect that it would relate to the absolute threat to the environment-indeed it has-and that is from radioactive fallout from nuclear war. What a strange situation it is that we have had two speakers, one from the Australian Democrats and the other, the Attorney-General (Senator Gareth Evans), from the Australian Labor Party and they have not mentioned fundamental issues relating to the destruction of the environment. There has been no mention at all of the second greatest threat-quite apart from radioactive fallout-to the environment, one which is recognised by all the free nations and even, indeed, by the Iron Curtain countries, and that is the disastrous effect of acid rain upon the forests and the lakes of the world. This is caused by nitric acid and sulphuric acid components-emanating particularly from the oil fired and coal fired power stations-which are coming down and destroying the world. Two thousand lakes in Scandinavia were destroyed and the Black Forest of Germany was destroyed, and not a mention was made of this by the Australian Labor Party or the Democrats. No mention was made of the third great danger; that is, the danger of what is called the greenhouse effect, the use of power stations which emit hot carbon particles which, in turn, alters the whole temperature structure of the world, melts the polar ice caps and alters the sea levels around the world. Not a mention was made of the real threats, the fact that if we go on with these fuels, if we go on burning oil and coal we will destroy and remove forever from this world the non-renewables. Not a mention was made by the Labor Party or the Democrats that the greatest threat to the ecosystem of this world is not just Daintree Rainforest or one such forest but the fact that countries, particularly the developing countries, are burning wood, destroying the forests and creating deserts. Deserts are advancing upon us because of this, but no mention at all was made of it. What a strange situation that a matter of public importance about Daintree and nuclear destruction should be drafted and brought forward by the Democrats. I will devote the time available to me to talking about the nuclear issue. It is an overwhelming issue, the facts of which need to be understood. Everyone in the Senate will agree that we need to protect the ecosystem, that we need to protect the environment, that we need to stop radioactive fallout. That in itself is not in dispute. There are no warmongers amongst us. None of us wants to use nuclear bombs. What is in dispute is methodology. What I want to put forward is this: Whatever the Democrats' motives in wanting to prevent these things, they are absolutely wrong-the overwhelming judgment of the world says that they are wrong-in their methodology, in their approach. All the basic scientific authoritative people state that such is the case. The Democrats are wrong in the methods they are seeking to use, and the great danger is that the very methods they are advocating are likely to be the methods that will cause the very wars, the very conflicts, that they are saying they will prevent. It is like the advocacy of motherhood: It is no good saying 'I am in favour of motherhood and against sin'; one must look to the practical demonstration of these things. What the Democrats are saying in all their arguments on uranium and the nuclear fuel cycle is absolutely fallacious. Let me make it perfectly clear that if there were not a nuclear power station in the whole world, the world would still be able to make atom bombs. Even if a gram of uranium were not exported by any country it would be possible to make atom bombs anywhere in the world. It has nothing to do with power stations and nothing at all to do with the export of uranium. Yet time after time, in order to instil a sense of fear into this community, the Democrats say these things. The Australian Science and Technology Council, the top scientific body in this country, chaired by Professor Slatyer, made the situation very clear indeed. It stated: Australia will best be able to make a significant contribution to non- proliferation and world peace if it is actively involved in the nuclear fuel cycle including not only mining and milling but also possible enrichment, reprocessing and waste disposal. ASTEC went on to state: . . . such involvement by Australia will increase global energy security, strengthen the elements of the non-proliferation regime and reduce the risks of misuse of civil facilities and the diversion of nuclear materials from civil to military uses. Without that involvement, global energy security would be less assured and Australia's ability to strengthen the non-proliferation regime and to influence future developments in the fuel cycle would be reduced. ASTEC continued: . . . countries do not need a civil nuclear industry in order to make nuclear weapons. Yet here we have heard arguments to the contrary day after day. ASTEC also stated: . . . should a country embark on a weapons program, it is unlikely to use a civil power reactor to do so as this would be inefficient both in terms of producing weapons material and in terms of power generation. Again, argument after argument of the Democrats falls flat. The overwhelming argument against them is this: The Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons which today stands as the one great world safeguard to get together the nations of the world to strive to outlaw weaponry, to protect against the proliferation of weapons, says the very reverse of what the Democrats are saying . Article IV of the Treaty is of particular importance and the Slatyer committee drew attention to it. It affirms the right of all countries to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. It also requires those countries which are in a position to do so to contribute to the further development of nuclear energy in member countries. In other words, if a country is a signatory to the nuclear non -proliferation treaty it has an absolute responsibility to supply uranium for peace time purposes to those countries that are also signatories. The authorities say that to deny that is to increase the risk of war. The two key ASTEC recommendations are: The exports of Australian uranium should not be limited as a matter of principle but should be permitted subject to stringent conditions of supply designed to strengthen the non-proliferation regime. That Australian participation in stages of the nuclear fuel cycle in addition to uranium mining and milling be permitted where such participation promotes and strengthens the non-proliferation regime. So everything the Democrats have said has been refuted. Let us have another look at what they have said. The Democrats are saying three things that one must understand. They are saying that there must not be American installations in Australia, that they are a threat, that they will draw the bombs. Only recently I spent a month in various countries studying one subject-disarmament. I tried to find out under what conditions we could stop war-not just nuclear war but all war, because conventional war can grow into nuclear war and man must outlaw war. What did I find? I found, for example at the disarmament conference in Geneva, that virtually all those who sat around the table were trying to see whether they could put together a treaty agreed on by all 40 nations there represented to stop anti-satellite missiles. Why did they want to stop people being able to destroy satellites? It was because they all agreed that satellites are the best peacekeepers we have; that is, they are the best method of surveillance and monitoring that we can find. So there is in process the putting together of a treaty to stop the destruction of satellites. However, what use are satellites unless there are ground stations to receive their messages and interpret them? What use are satellites without Pine Gap and Nurrungar? I said, and the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Hayden, has now said, that any treaty to protect satellites must also protect the ground stations. The very thing that we are aiming to get a treaty to protect, and therefore the very great peacekeeper of this world, is the very thing that the Democrats want to destroy. What a crazy situation that they come forward appealing to the emotionalism of people without any reason at all. Let me go one step further. Wherever I went in the world, I talked to the top disarmament negotiators on both sides of the Iron Curtain-to the Russians, the East Germans, the Americans and the British-and every one of them said one fundamental thing: That the first step to disarmament is to stop the destabilisation; to get a balance or equivalence of forces so that one side is not ahead of the other to the extent where the other might think that he can pre -empt. That is fundamental. Anything that destabilises is dangerous and perilous . There can be nothing more destabilising than to act unilaterally against the Western alliance and to do nothing against the Warsaw pact. To say 'We will not allow the ANZUS treaty to mean that our allies can use our ports or our waters' is to destabilise. If one takes away the free right of the Western alliance to move in the Pacific, one is doing something that is absolutely ugly. If the Democrats are wrong, members of the Australian Labor Party are the repentant sinners-unrepentant if one heard the Attorney-General (Senator Gareth Evans) in his last remarks. Do honourable senators remember the Labor Party in opposition mouthing the very things that the Democrats have said? Today the Labor Party's policies are only supported by 50 per cent plus six votes of the national biennial conference and could be changed tomorrow. In any case, the Government's policy today is in refutation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It does not supply uranium freely and without limit to signatories of that treaty. In fact, it is limiting the situation. When Senator Gareth Evans recites what a wonderful job his Government has done, I remind him that all the safeguards that have been put in position-the basic safeguards for the mining and milling of uranium, for its movement overseas, for its supervision and surveillance-were put there by the Fraser Government. The great strengthening of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was a Fraser Government achievement. No country on this earth has stronger safeguards against nuclear proliferation than we have as a result of the efforts of the Fraser Government. Therefore, it is nonsense for Senator Gareth Evans to start these scare stories that we are now in favour of nuclear weapons. Let me make it perfectly clear, that there is no political party on earth that is ahead of the Liberal and National parties in their practical desire for peace with dignity and in their practical desire to outlaw war, both conventional and nuclear, and to limit and reduce nuclear weaponry around the world. To do that, we work together under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, under a regimen that we set up and that has not been disturbed. As good neighbours we should supply to the world the energy that it needs so that other countries do not need to burn down their forests, have acid rain or suffer the greenhouse effect. In fact, we can stop the deserts of this world. By providing uranium we can also reduce the risk of war. After all, the Slatyer committee has made it perfectly clear that the best thing we can do is to be good neighbours under nuclear non- proliferation. When we were in government we took our part in all these things- in our opposition to chemical, bacterial and nerve warfare and in fact that regimen is still in position. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Lewis) —Order! The honourable senator's time has expired. Senator HILL(South Australia)(4.09) —I am pleased to follow Senator Sir John Carrick in this debate because he was part of a government which played a much more significant role in the disarmament debate and in international disarmament fora than it was given credit for. I also am a Liberal and, like all my colleagues, I am com- mitted to a reduction of tension in the world, committed to finding ways in which Australia can better contribute to the peace process and committed particularly to reducing the possibility of a nuclear exchange, the consequences of which would be too horrendous to contemplate. I also attend international disarmament conferences, I monitor Australia's contribution and suggest initiatives; I speak on the subject to United Nations and other groups whenever possible; I am a member of the multi-party disarmament committee of this Parliament; I march in nuclear disarmament rallies and I am quite happy to stand here and say so. I do so because it is important to be well informed. In turn, it is important to inform others and it is important to encourage public awareness and participation. But I do so as a Liberal and, as I indicated, I am not unique. I say that because our commitment as Liberal parliamentarians is not as well known as the commitment and participation of some others. In that same way, the contribution of the former coalition Government may not be as well known as it might otherwise be. I am pleased to contribute to this debate also because it enables me to comment on the Australian Democrats' policy. I do not question the motivation of the Democrats; I think that they are well intentioned. But their policy, particularly as it has developed in recent times, appears to be swinging like a pendulum between the naive at the one extreme to something that is positively dangerous for Australia at the other. By coincidence, it is a policy which in some ways is similar to that of the left wing of the Labor Party and I will not speculate on the motivation of that group today. Fortunately at the moment it does not quite have a majority of seats in the Federal Labor caucus. The Democrats are pursuing for electoral fortune the joint goals of an anti-uranium mining position for Australia and an anti-nuclear weapons policy. They seek to link the two and that is what today's matter of public importance is all about. They appear to say that if Australia does not mine uranium, we will strike a blow against the use of nuclear weapons. That position is totally naive. The largest source of uranium in the world is in the Soviet Union. Certainly we will not be striking a blow against the Soviet nuclear force if we leave uranium in the ground. The United States has more than adequate sources of uranium for weapons. France has its own sources in France itself and considerable reserves in Africa. At times when the Democrats are inclined to accept that reality they then say: 'Ah, but to leave it in the ground would act as a signal to the world' . In some ways it would be symbolic. As the original argument is fatuous, our signal would only be interpreted as an indication that we are out of touch with reality. The rest of the world does not see mining uranium for peaceful purposes as part of the nuclear weapons debate. Only recently I participated in a debate on this subject-the arms race and nuclear disarmament-at a Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference. That conference was attended by more than 40 different nations, mainly from the Third World. They put many different arguments and solutions, but no one suggested that leaving uranium in the ground would provide a solution to this complex problem. I have read to the Senate before part of the final communique of the Second United Nations special session on disarmament, what is known as the 'Bible of Disarmament', which specifically acknowledges the legitimacy of states utilising uranium as a fuel source for peaceful purposes. I hold the view that Australia can play a significant role in halting and reversing the arms race but it will not do so by leaving uranium in the ground. In fact, the Democrats' policy would be positively counter-productive, First, it would build resentment, particularly among Third World countries, which in the spirit of the North-South dialogue are looking to the developed world to be more ready to share its resources. Not only, therefore, would the Democrats' policy be seen as naive; it would also be seen as economically selfish with the undesirable consequences that would follow in our international relations. Secondly, it would be counter-productive because, as was indicated by Senator Sir John Carrick, we would lose our specific entree to the positive disarmament process. As a supplier we have a significant input to the international protection regime which we would lose as a non-supplier. We would be reduced to the same position as those middle nations of the world, middle powers that do not supply uranium and can provide very little input to that process. The Democrats then continue to say: 'Leave uranium in the ground because it is not environmentally clean'. The reality is that the world has a continuing and growing need for power. We know the state of the world, with billions of people who are economically not well off; many millions are hungry, and many thousands, if not millions, are starving. This will be overcome only by greater economic growth in the world which will only be achieved by an adequate supply of comparatively cheap power. We hear the arguments that the Democrats put to the contrary. They say: 'But with greater conservation, with the use of wind power and sea power, alternatives are available'. But those foreseeable alternatives, if they can be developed-and the process is proving very slow-will meet only a minute share of the world's power needs. That is what the Democrats never seem able to grasp. There will always be a significant demand for conventional and nuclear power. We say that, acknowledging that there will always be difficulties. Oil is too expensive at the moment, and I think it can be argued that in many ways it is too valuable to be used as a base resource purely for electrical power. Coal in the land-locked regions of the world has transformed the environmental debate. One only has to look at the problems that have arisen with acid rain in Europe and the destruction of the forests by what is being emitted from coal-fired power stations. So there are problems in the use of coal. With regard to nuclear power, the problem is that it leaves a waste requiring careful management. But low level wastes are now being permanently and adequately handled and high level wastes are in temporary storage until a final long term solution is found. Obviously, the international community is putting a great effort and a great deal of money into finding that final solution, because it is desirable for all countries to find the ultimate answer. What the Democrats do not understand is that the world is not willing and not able in the meantime to cease utilisation of nuclear power, because in so many cases now, and in more cases almost every year, the fact is that there is no better alternative, taking into account all economic, social and environmental matters. Again, the Democrats want to find a simple answer to a complex issue and it is simply not there. They are out of touch with reality. They forget that as a supplier, we can demand the highest international safeguards in the peaceful use of uranium and the peaceful production of nuclear power, and the highest international safeguards are what we demand. Under the Democrats' policy our influence in that area would be lost. But it is when the Democrats shift from nuclear power for peaceful purposes to nuclear weapons that their policy swings from the naive to the arguably dangerous. The need to restrain and reverse the arms race-all arms, but particularly nuclear because of the immense potential they hold for destruction- is not in dispute. The question is how best to achieve that goal or contribute to achieving that goal whilst meeting the obvious major government responsibility of providing for the defence of Australia and her people. We say that the best way to protect our freedoms and values from those who might wish to deprive us of such benefits is in an alliance with like nations. We on this side of the House believe in collective security. We recognise that against a superpower we cannot have effective security without a notion of collective security. How effective that alliance will be as a deterrent in part depends on our dedication, our determination and our commitment to that alliance, as with the commitment of other members-in other words, whether it is a real alliance or simply a paper alliance. It depends so much on what we are prepared to put in, not simply what we are prepared to take out. So we run into the problems with Mr Lange, the new Labour Prime Minister in New Zealand, who says he wants to change the rules. We have it with the Australian Democrats, who want, unless they can be satisfied about various factors, to withdraw the United States-Australian communications stations from Australia. The Democrats are now saying they will also want to negotiate a new non-nuclear ANZUS treaty; as simple as that. The deterrent will be effective only if it has military as well as political clout. I would have thought it was obvious that the Western alliance would not be a deterrent to an opponent with nuclear weapons unless it had a nuclear force. We in this place accept that the real challenge, consistent with maintaining Western security, is not that proposition , which should already be accepted, but to reverse the process of nuclear proliferation. Both sides have massive excess capacity, excess to that which is reasonably needed for deterrence. How can warheads be reduced yet deterrence be maintained? So we get the whole of the mutually verifiable reduction debate, the intermediate nuclear force debate and the strategic arms reduction talks, and so on. How can the enormous expenditure on vertical proliferation to ensure the quality of one's nuclear weapons system exceeds that of a potential enemy be diverted to more worthwhile causes? Talks break down because neither party trusts the other, but of course, if they trusted each other there may be no need for nuclear weapons. Under the previous Government, Australia took the position that whilst there may be what is seen as an impasse between the superpowers, we can nevertheless make a positive contribution. We said that it is possible to break down the barrier by a brick by brick approach. Thus, we concentrated on things that could be achieved-upon, for example, the verification techniques. We argued that the Australian-United States bases provide a positive contribution to that, and we provided technical expertise to further improve verification. Additionally, we said: 'Let us limit further experimentation. Let us enter into a comprehensive test ban treaty'. That was the policy of the previous Liberal Government, which has, of course, since been taken up by the Labor Government. We supported talks in all the international fora by the use of our good offices. I have seen it in the United Nations, my colleagues have seen it there, and I am sure that Senator Sir John Carrick witnessed that good office in the recent tour he made. Apart from vertical proliferation, the other great challenge that we had to face and still have to face is that of horizonal proliferation. How did the previous Government address that question. It did so, again, through the policy of a comprehensive test ban treaty, and it did so through its support of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, its urging of other states to join, and its urging of compliance with that treaty, which remains the key point to limiting horizontal proliferation in the future. That brings us to today. As I have said, the Democrats' policy will weaken ANZUS and the Western alliance. The Labor Party has largely adopted our policy except that it has been put with a little more window-dressing. We are told that the agenda has been lifted and upgraded by Mr Butler being made an ambassador and by a nuclear free Pacific, which one finds from study is little more than what we had previously. Occasionally, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Hayden, gets carried away in an effort to attain international publicity and makes implied threats to the United States. But apart from that, what has been adopted is principally the Liberal policy. The Liberal Party policy for this election, developed over the last 18 months, is about to be released and will be a further worthwhile contribution to this debate from my Party. Senator JACK EVANS(Western Australia)(4.23) —Recent scientific studies into the ecological consequences of a nuclear war have produced devastating conclusions about the destruction that would result. The scenario portrayed has become known as the nuclear winter. These studies have agreed on the following broad conclusions based on a nuclear war involving 5,000 megatons, which is about 40 per cent of the total super-power stockpiles. With only 20 per cent of that yield expended on urban and industrial targets, the effects would be as follows. First, sunlight would be reduced to a few per cent of normal values. This would be too dark for plants to photosynthesise. Secondly, temperatures would drop to around minus 25 degrees centigrade and would stay at that level for some months, even if the war were fought in a summer period. Thirdly, one-third of the northern hemisphere land mass would receive a direct radioactive dose of greater than 250 rads-I interpolate here that 300 to 400 rads is fatal-and one half of the land mass would receive a dose greater than 100 rads. Fourthly, these effects would spread to the southern hemisphere with marginally lesser impact, within one month. These consequences would be the result of nuclear explosions producing radioactive dust, smoke and toxic gases that would saturate the atmosphere. The effects would not be over once temperatures rose again. After the thaw disease would be rampant as the one billion-one thousand million-at least human bodies began openly to rot. Agriculture and animal life would be irreparably damaged thereby depriving humans of major food sources. Starvation would obviously be rife. So the problems go on. The most disturbing feature of the studies is that the threshold of explosive power that would set off this chain of disasters is exceptionally low. A 100- megatonne war, which represents less than one per cent of the nuclear arsenals, would produce enough smoke from fires that alone would generate the cold and dark, almost as severe as the 5,000-megatonne war. These studies could render nuclear weapons even worse than useless. In these scenarios nuclear weapons are nothing more than instruments of national suicide. Dr Fred Ickle, who was Director of the United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, wrote in 1976 : . . . it now appears that a massive attack with many large scale nuclear detonations could cause such widespread and long lasting environmental damage that the aggressor country might suffer serious psychological, economic and environmental effects even without a nuclear response by the country attacked. Ickle's conclusion would be shattering for nuclear strategists if they understood that we have now reached the situation whereby an aggressor nation can wipe itself out by launching a first strike on another country. Conclusions such as this make nuclear weapons useless even as deterrents because they are no longer credible. Who will believe the threat of nuclear retaliation if we know that that retaliation will certainly be an act of national suicide? Into that scenario I project the post-Reagan climate in the world. I say 'post- Reagan' because I am working on the assumption that Reagan will be re-elected and that there will be another Reagan term, but this time without any concern about getting re-elected for a third term because as we all know, that cannot happen in the United States of America; a President is elected for only two terms. We have seen a fascinating little side step by President Reagan, but frankly it is no longer enough for spokespeople of the United States Administration simply to repeat that they are opposed to the concept of nuclear war fighting. Whatever they say, it is indisputable that the nuclear weapons which they plan to deploy are so accurate and so powerful that their only suitable role is in a nuclear first strike in a nuclear war fighting plan. These weapons include cruise missiles and defence cruise missiles; Trident II missiles ; submarines; Pershing II missiles; the MX missile and the Midgetman. The list goes on. Each one of those weapons has unprecedented accuracy. Each one of those weapons could fall within a circle of only 120 metres after flying thousands of kilometres towards its target. Therefore, each one of those weapons must be a first strike weapon. These are just the United States weapons. There are two good reasons for concentrating on United States weapons for the moment. Firstly, Australia is an American ally and thus has good offices with that country which it can use. Secondly, our national security is directly affected by United States programs, because of United States bases in Australia and the visits of United States nuclear armed warships. These effects do not diminish the Australian Democrats' opposition to new Soviet weapons which we can expect to be deployed in the same period. We oppose Soviet nuclear weapons as much as we oppose American nuclear weapons. I ask: What will the Australian Government's response be to these weapon deployments? It will no longer be possible for Government Ministers to get up in this chamber and say that once first strike weapons are deployed this Government is endorsing only weapons suitable for deterrence but unsuitable for a first strike. The reality of these weapons will have to change that stance. If Australia is to oppose the increasing risk of nuclear war we have publicly to oppose these weapons. Let us look at the world scene after the Reagan and Hawke re-elections. The potential for crisis has never been as great. Iran and Iraq are at each other's jugulars right at this moment. Afghanistan and the threat to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which threat is currently under containment in USSR terms, is as much of a hazard as is the Iran-Iraq conflict. That conflict could spread to international war at any time. Central America, which is in the proximity of the United States of America, must be having the same impact on United States strategy right at this moment. Korea and the north and south conflict is still simmering under the surface. There is the situation concerning Pakistan and India and there are the problems in Indonesia and the Philippines. These are all potential crisis areas involving relatively small nations. But each of those conflicts could lead to a nuclear holocaust if the larger nations became involved or even if those nations obtain their own nuclear weaponry. Several of them already have that. The crunch at this moment is the potential for war between the United States and the USSR. Maybe there is another one around the corner-the potential between China and an enemy. At present we are looking at potential wars based on political philosophy differences. There is nothing to prevent that from changing in the near future. We could have a war based on religious differences. We have already seen the potential there with the attitude of the United States to the Ayatollah Khomeini . We could have a war based on race differences, such as that which we are currently witnessing in South Africa. We could have a war based on the difference between white and yellow, white and black and white and red-we have even fought Red Indians in the past. We could have a war based on geography-an intercontinental war. I put to you, Mr Acting Deputy President, the potential there is for an unfettered Ronald Reagan, after November this year, lurching into his Star Wars. It was only a tentative pre-election plan which he had to put on the back burner while the election built up, but my God, the Star Wars have all the excitement that a Ronnie Reagan of the 1940s and 1950s in his B grade movies would have thrived on. One would think that Australia would resile from any involvement in such a gross strategy, but this Government is to be condemned for its duplicity in getting involved even in this area. The Government proclaims disenchantment with the Star Wars program but at the same time research that is playing a vital role in developing a technology suitable for a ballistic missile defence in space is going on right here, right now, in Canberra and Victoria. This Government has renewed a research agreement into electro-magnetic guns with the United States Department of Defense. That research, as is acknowledged by the agreement, is directly applicable to Reagan's Star Wars program. It is no justification to say that we have no interest in Star Wars technologies: The fact is that we are helping someone else who has an interest and who will use our work to further his aims. The end result will be an increase in the likelihood of that Star Wars scene. This Government is making us culpable. What is to stop the United States, Reagan and the Pentagon? It is certainly not the United States Senate or the United States Congress because Reagan has ensured that there will not be time for consultation with anybody. It will not be the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation or ANZUS. There is only one possible prevention, and that is by the uncommitted nations. That is why the Australian Democrats would like to see Australia as a leader in the anti-arms build up, not a coat-tailer which simply hangs on to the coat tails of the United States President of the day. We want to see an Australia with all the vigour and the integrity that the Australian Labor Party had before the 1983 election in terms of anti-nuclear and pro-disarmament policies. The Labor Party was voted in with the support of people who were opposed to nuclear proliferation. One has to ask: Why the change? Why the change to allow unfettered mining of uranium? Why the change to allow United States nuclear powered and nuclear armed warships into Australian ports? Why the change to allow United States nuclear armed aeroplanes on to Australian soil? I put it to Senator Ray and everybody else in the Labor Party: The Labor Party comprises people of great courage. Its courage temporarily has been denied it by a slim majority within the Party. Why does it not stand up and fight, as the Democrats are doing, to make Australia a leader in this world, a leader in the campaign for reducing nuclear proliferation and this dreadful risk to the world? Surely pragmatism in getting re-elected is not so important that the well meaning people in the Labor Party are willing to sacrifice and risk the future of mankind. Senator PETER BAUME(New South Wales)(4.37) —The Senate is debating a matter of public importance in the following terms: The failure of this Government to ensure the full protection of our environment for future generations, particularly from the ultimate threat of nuclear war. My colleagues Senator Sir John Carrick and Senator Robert Hill have with power and eloquence already addressed the nuclear issue, which has occupied the speaking time of most of those who have contributed to the debate. However, it is also necessary to address the other part of the terms of the matter of public importance, the first part, which seeks to condemn this Government in quite specific terms for failing to ensure the full protection of our environment for future generations. It is necessary to examine whether that claim can be sustained by argument. If so, it is necessary to set out in what ways the Government has failed in its duty to protect Australia's environment. Like most political parties, the Australian Labor Party put out a manifesto before the last election which contained quite specific and explicit promises in relation to a policy on the Australian environment. It promised to do things and it offered that as bait to the Australian people, seeking to obtain their votes. In terms of the matter of public importance which has been put to the Senate this afternoon, it is worth examining the extent to which this Labor Government in the time available to it, the last 18 months, has moved towards honouring those promises. It is desirable to identify the areas where this Labor Government has failed to honour its promises. It is the assertion of the Australian Democrats, although they have not really addressed it in their speeches, that the Government has failed to ensure the protection of the Australian environment. The Attorney- General, Senator Gareth Evans, in his response on behalf of the Government, addressed the Government's record on environmental issues. I take the Senate through a number of promises which were made and a number of responses from the Government. The Australian Labor Party promised in its 1982 national platform and its 1983 policy on the environment a national reafforestation program and rain forest protection. It has failed to deliver on that promise. It promised new employment opportunities in areas dependent upon rain forest timbers. There has been no action on that promise. It promised management of logging to phase out logging in rain forests. There has been no action on that promise. The Australian Labor Party made those promises when it was seeking to attract the votes of the electorate. The Labor Party promised to stop all programs designed to replace native hardwood with softwood. There has been no action on that promise. The Australian Labor Party promised to establish a national kangaroo monitoring study group to plan commercial exploitation of kangaroos and to ensure their conservation on both a national and regional basis. There has been no action on that promise. The Government promised to initiate programs with the States to obtain standards of management of national parks. There has been no action on that promise. There is a litany of promises, a whole series of promises, made before the election and conveniently not acted on since. In November 1983, almost one year ago, the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) and the Minister for Home Affairs and Environment (Mr Cohen) announced the extension of Stage 2 of Kakadu National Park and promised a package of $70m over six years for tourism facilities and park infrastructure. We should remember that-$70m over six years, or $12m a year. The 1984-85 Budget allocated a mere $1.7m for recurring expenditure on Kakadu National Park. It is fair to say that that explicit, specific promise, made by a Labor Prime Minister less than 12 months ago, was dishonoured in the first Budget that followed. In relation to environment assessment and conservation, the ALP promised in its 1982 national platform and 1983 policy to review and amend the Environment Protection (Impact of Proposals) Act 1974 to allow the Minister for Environment and Conservation to initiate action under the Act and provide means for individuals and groups to enforce the procedures of that Act. There has been no action on that promise either. It promised to introduce centralised machinery to integrate and co- ordinate individual departments in the assessment of the impact of development proposals. There has been no action on that policy either. We have a long list of dishonoured promises for which the Labor Party must answer. They were specific and quite exact promises at least some of which should have been honoured before the Labor Party sought to go to another election. What is so unfortunate is that the Liberal-National Party Government of Malcolm Fraser had a policy and the present coalition parties have a policy on the environment which is strong, definite, clear and committed. We have a record of achievement over seven years in government of which we are very proud and which we can put up to any group as a record of environmental protection better than that which Labor has effected-perhaps not as good as that which Labor promised but much better than Labor has done in office. It is a record of achievement by a series of Liberal and National Party Ministers over seven years. Alongside ALP broken promises it is worth while remembering some of the achievements of the Liberal Party Government. Our record in government was second to none. It must be remembered that all world heritage listings to date were placed there by Liberal-National Party governments. Not a single listing came from the Australian Labor Party. It was the Liberal and National parties that moved to support the banning of the slaughter of whales and seals. That was done by the Fraser Government. We established the Kakadu National Park and the Uluru (Mount Olga-Ayers Rock) Park. We established them and got them under way during our terms of office. It was the Liberal and National Party governments which negotiated successfully with the Queensland Government and moved to establish the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. It was put in place during our period in government. We have given the nation a gift in the form of the Great Barrier Reef national park. It was the Fraser Government that stopped the sand mining on Fraser Island. It was the Fraser Government that established Lord Howe Island and the Willandra Lakes as national parks on the World Heritage List. Those who know some of these areas will know just how precious they are and will recognise the contribution which the Fraser Government and the Liberal-National parties made in terms of a very practical commitment to the environment. We have been seeking environmental protection for all Australians. Certainly there is a role for governments; but we also see that families, individuals and corporations have to be involved if an environmental protection policy is to be effective and comprehensive. Our commitment is to see that kind of whole community involvement coming into place. Of course, our investment is to try to see that we leave to our children and grandchildren a land which they can use and enjoy. Senator Sir John Carrick, and I think Senator Robert Hill, drew attention to the problems of acid rain and loss of forests in Europe. I refer to the fact that the Schwarzwald is disappearing and to the greenhouse effect with carbon dioxide, which is likely to lead to temperature rises and to the melting of the polar caps. These are all problems which are before us today. We see the need for reafforestation. I have already drawn attention to the fact that one of the Fraser Government's initiatives was to seek the reafforestation of Australia. But so much can be done and so much is under way. For example, there is a project in which I am very interested at present. It is run by a group called Green Australia. A gentleman named Robert Vincin is hard at work trying to get not only government involvement but also community involvement across a number of levels. In connection with a group called the Water Research Foundation, he has undertaken a co-operative venture of massive proportions. The Liberals are keen to to support him. He wants to plant and grow trees right across Australia. He wants to enlist schools to set up shade houses to grow the trees from seedlings. He wants to enlist young people to plant the trees as a community service. He wants to enlist community groups; the Lions Clubs are interested. Large corporations are also already moving to help him to support the growing, the planting and the nurturing of trees. Next week I hope to be in Yass, which is not very far from Canberra, with my colleague Wal Fife at a meeting to be held by Green Australia to advance its tree planting program. I hope that all those who are interested in the environment will join me in wishing the group every success in what it is trying to do. Three sites-one affected by erosion and one affected by defoliation-are being examined close to Yass to start the first tree planting experiment. This project will provide temporary employment. If it can be done in Israel, surely we can do it in Australia. As I have said, the coalition parties are proud of their environment and conservation record. We pioneered the national conservation strategy for Australia when we were in government and we carried out all the other initiatives which I have mentioned. We have a policy on the environment; we have a policy for the protection of the environment. We cover matters such as Federal -State co-operation, which is so necessary in a federation. We cover the management of conservation areas. We have a policy on the international environment as it affects Australia. We have policies on coastal and marine management, environmental impact statements in Australia, an environmental databank, an Australian environmental corps, endangered species, animals, the national tree program and hazardous chemicals and toxic waste. This is what the Liberal and National parties have to offer. We have a policy on pollution and a policy on heritage protection. We are going to the Australian people with a comprehensive policy designed, as politicians should design their policies, to try to help with some of these issues set out by my colleagues and referred to by some of the speakers in the debate. I remind honourable senators that I am deliberately concentrating my remarks on the first half of the motion put up by the Australian Democrats. Both halves of it are important. Both halves require some answers. It is possible to say that the Labor Government has failed in the duty which it undertook when it made promises to the Australian people. It is fair to say that we, the Liberal Party, have a proud record on our environmental achievements. We have a policy of which we are proud. This Government has failed to deliver on its promises. It has failed in so many areas. It has failed in the tax area, failed with the assets test, failed with the tax on superannuation, failed on employment, failed on science policy and failed on education policy. It has failed to deliver on promises which it made to the Australian people when it was seeking votes. That it should now fail to honour its promises on the environment is just another tragedy, just another unnecessary impost, upon the people. But it is a failure- this is raised by the Australian Democrats in their motion and is supported by us-that all Australians will bear to their detriment over the years. The issues are important ones. We have a record of concern and achievement. We share the concern of every Australian for the environment in which we live and for the environment which we will leave to the next generation. We have a policy on the environment which promises effective, sensible, coherent and co-operative policies which will work and which will offer protection. These are policies which we shall begin to implement in government for the benefit of all Australians from 2 December when the Peacock Government takes office. Senator ROBERT RAY(Victoria)(4.51) —It appears that the Australian Democrats have at least learned one thing from the Liberal Party of Australia in the last few weeks; that is that if one wishes to raise a matter of public importance one makes it a very broad one. One does not make it specific. One takes the shotgun approach in the hope that one might hit some target. Senator Sir John Carrick identified three of the most critical environmental issues and acknowledged that he did not have time to develop arguments around them. I have to make the same acknowledgment. But Senator Sir John Carrick introduced into the debate the three most critical issues that will affect the environment to the end of the century. Senator Mason accused the Government of having an appalling record on the environment but was able to cite only two examples-post-Franklin Tasmania and the Daintree Rainforest. That was the basis for his accusation that this Government has an appalling record. He made no mention of the previous Government or that the current Leader of the Opposition (Mr Peacock) is toying with having the Franklin Dam built. There was no mention of that. What this exercise today is about, as the whole week will be about, is winning votes. I do not resile from that. I do not condemn him for trying to do that. It is his duty to do it. But he should not boast other motives and a purity that he does not have. Senator Mason made an amazing statement that the only reason we took any action on the Franklin Dam was political expediency. This was some sort of posthaste rationalisation by Senator Mason. He said that we tackled the issue of the Franklin Dam only because we would get some political benefit out of it. But the political price the Australian Labor Party had to pay on this principled issue was one of wiping off any chance of winning a Federal seat in Tasmania in 1983 when, I acknowledge, our vote went backwards. We only just fell into the fourth Senate position out of 10 on the preferences from Senator Harradine. That is the political price we paid. So it is no use anyone saying that the only reason we took action on the damming of the Franklin River was political expediency. I have moved within Labor Party circles around Australia and I can assure honourable senators that the motives were only sincere ones. Senator Mason also said that the Government is now acting illegally in its granting of aid to Tasmania. I am sure that if this Government were acting illegally Senator Mason would take it to the High Court of Australia because that would provide him with a bonus of publicity running into an election. That was not a genuine claim and not one really worth spending much time on. The Democrats always raise the question of the Daintree. I note here that the two issues that the Democrats have brought up have one thing in common-a conservative State government. But there was no real mention of that; only criticism of the Labor Party. What the Democrats have done with the Daintree is what they often do with issues in this place-annex the moral ground to themselves. They believe that they have a monopoly on morality and that the rest of us are just grubby little expedient politicians. I am afraid that is not the case. What we have to do is work in the real world, not in the fantasy world of the Australian Democrats. It is easy for the Democrats and for Senator Chipp-I do not want to get into him too much here because I know he is not in a position to respond-to go up to north Queensland and to describe the workers in the Daintree area as morons. That is what happened. Those people who may not understand the issues and who have not been educated to understand those environmental issues were described as morons in that sort of a throwaway line by the Leader of the Democrats when he was in the north of Queensland. I would have thought that it was our duty to educate people on environmental issues and to explain to them how important the rain forests of our country are and that there is no future in their destruction. It is not good enough to go there and abuse those people. The whole electorate does not consist just of middle class trendies. I am not now referring to the Sinclair type of middle class trendy who apparently has been discovered to be a bogey man by those opposite. The electorate out there consists of a complex group of people. If one wants to take a vanguardist position and lead all the time in politics one must to an extent reflect what the electorate wants. Senator Mason went on to use what is now a rather classic Democrats tactic. He said: 'We put up a private member's Bill'. The Democrats' solution to all the problems is to introduce a small private member's Bill. It does not matter whether we are talking about superannuation, nuclear disarmament or the environment. The Democrats will always come back and say: 'We have introduced a private member's Bill and that should solve all the problems of the world'. One of the problems that cannot be solved relates to the revenue implications of the Bills introduced. As a government we may be happy to pick up some of the Democrats' Bills provided they give us the capacity to fund those projects. Senator Jack Evans should be able to prevail on his three other colleagues who always intercede in this chamber to prevent revenue measures being passed, especially in regard to tax evasion. He may have an impeccable record on this. Where Senator Jack Evans is weak as a politician is in his inability to convince his three colleagues to vote in a similar way. Senator Gareth Evans has already put on the record in some detail this Government's environmental policy. I do not intend to repeat that this afternoon . Senator Baume came into this chamber and said: 'Here is the ALP policy as developed in 1982'. He then went on to make the quantum leap and said: This policy is therefore the ALP's promises in a specific period. I hate to disillusion Senator Baume, but the Australian Labor Party draws up its platform for a future government for a course not necessarily designated over one year, three years or six years. If just for once Senator Baume read the front of the platform he would see that it is stated that the platform is binding on the Labor Party and that Labor governments will implement it given certain priorities. As Senator Baume pointed out, we may not have implemented every aspect of the policy. However, if we did implement every bit of policy in that platform we would really be facing an increase in government expenditure of 400 per cent. The party platform is a matter which is acted on over time. Senator Mason moved on to the second great leg of the double that he introduced today, and that is world disarmament. He talked about an Alice in Wonderland approach by this Government. I must say that Senator Mason, if anything, reminds me of the March Hare in his approach to politics. When Senator Mason accuses the Government of taking no steps at all to prevent nuclear war I do not think he really believes it. Senator Sir John Carrick has already exposed the weaknesses in some of the Democrats' arguments in relation to the mining of uranium for peaceful power production and, in fact, its use for nuclear weapons. I think one thing that he said was quite correct; it would not matter one iota if we had not one power station left in this world; we would still have something like 60,000 nuclear weapons. That is the greatest problem. One of the difficulties I have in accepting the Opposition's attitude on this matter is that it never seems to give any concern to the disposal of nuclear waste out of power stations. That is a problem that does not exist for the Opposition. That is a vacuum. That is something which still worries honourable senators on this side of the chamber. There is not an inextricable link between uranium mining and use for peaceful power purposes and nuclear weapons. The biggest danger of a thermonuclear war will come not from vertical proliferation but from horizontal proliferation. The Democrats have yet to make out a case that mining uranium for nuclear power stations will add to that horizontal proliferation. If the Democrats do make out a case for that I assure Senator Evans and other Democrats that they will have a convert on this side to opposing any mining of uranium in this country. What has the Government done in this area ? It is all right to dismiss the fact that we have appointed an Ambassador for Disarmament. It is probably okay to dismiss a Cabinet decision made on 22 November 1983, the detail of which I read for the record. I am quoting what the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) said. The items were: (i) to promote measures to halt and reverse the nuclear arms race; (ii) to uphold the international nuclear non-proliferation treaty; (iii) to promote a comprehensive and verifiable ban on nuclear testing; (iv) to develop the concept of a nuclear-free zone in the South Pacific; (v) to support the achievement of an agreement to ban chemical weapons; (vi) to support the process of negotiations and the achievement of balanced and verifiable arms control agreements; (vii) to take an active role in pursuing arms control and disarmament measures wherever possible; (viii) to affirm Australia's readiness to join a consensus to hold an international conference on the Indian Ocean zone of peace question. We have taken those sorts of actions. It is no good coming into this chamber and saying, as Senator Evans did in his closing comment, that the ALP was condemning mankind to such a fate simply to win the next election. I do not think even Senator Evans believes that so I will not spend any further time on it. If we are genuinely concerned about the question of disarmament I believe that we should try to take it out of gutter politics. I do not think it is good enough to try to polarise honourable senators on this issue. I believe that absolutely no honourable senator would not support nuclear disarmament. What we are arguing about is the easiest way of proceeding to that. One group may well argue that by weakening America's nuclear capacity that will lead to a situation of nuclear disarmament. I am one who does not share that view. The major reason we have not had a thermonuclear war simply is mutual deterrence. If we weaken one side's capacity to respond-in our case it would be the Americans' capacity- that will do nothing to help nuclear disarmament. Why has this issue been brought up today? It could be that the Democrats-I have no doubt as to their sincerity on this issue-want to emphasise the matter at this time. I do not believe that that is so. I believe the reason the Democrats have brought the matter up is the very thing they accused us of earlier in the debate-political expediency. We have the situation in this country, when we are going to an election, of the Nuclear Disarmament Party being set up. The initial reaction of the Democrats was not to welcome that new party. Did they welcome the setting up of this new party? Immediately they asserted the setting up of the Nuclear Disarmament Party was a potential ALP plot to circumvent the Democrats and send preferences back to the Labor Party. That was in all the newspapers as soon as that party was set up. Suddenly we have this matter of public importance today. The fact is that the Democrats then took further action . They have always as an immutable principle said: 'Never allocate preferences at election time on the matter of principle'. Senator Crichton-Browne —Unless you are in trouble. Senator ROBERT RAY —What a perceptive comment from Senator Crichton-Browne; that surprises me. I remember in regard to the electoral Bill we had to go to all the trouble in the Senate of allocating preferences two or three different ways in the box at the top just to accommodate the Democrats. However, the moment it looks as though another party may eat into their vote, what happens? They come to an agreement to direct preferences and to swap preferences. That is good political expediency. Who could doubt it? I am shocked. It just amazes me that the moment the Nuclear Disarmament Party, embodying all the Democrats views, is set up they think it is an ALP ploy. The reason the matter of public importance has been brought on today is directly related not to the rest of Australia but to New South Wales where apparently Senator Mason has some problems. Who will finish closer to a quota, Senator Mason or a Mr Garrett? The matter of public importance today is meant to re-emphasise the Democrats' moral credentials on this issue. It is meant to say that Midnight Oil is out and Democrats greasers are in. I ask the Australian Democrats not to moralise in this chamber. They have raised a valuable issue. Nuclear disarmament is an issue on which no honourable senator disagrees. However, they debate the issue by the way they highlight it and impute to other people in this chamber the motive of political expediency when the real political expediency goes back to the Democrats themselves. I think the debate has gone far enough, and I move: That the business of the day be called on. Question resolved in the affirmative. Assent to the following Bills reported: Petroleum Retail Marketing Sites Amendment Bill 1984 Petroleum Retail Marketing Franchise Amendment Bill 1984 Industries Assistance Commission Amendment Bill 1984 Aliens Act Repeal Bill 1984 Christmas Island Administration (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill 1984 Australian Federal Police Amendment Bill 1984 Senator BUTTON(Victoria-Leader of the Government in the Senate) —by leave-Mr President, this is a follow-up to the list you tabled in the Senate on Friday. In my statement on 15 December 1983 to the Senate on the subject of outstanding Government responses to parliamentary committee reports, I indicated that the Government would endeavour to respond to all parliamentary committee reports within a period of three months. I also indicated that because of this reduction in the time limit, full responses would sometimes take the form of an in principle statement of the Government's intentions rather than a detailed accounting of each recommendation, and that interim advice would be provided where a final response could not be made in time. I further indicated that the Government would be endeavouring to respond to reports made during the term of the previous Parliament. Certain remarks were made by Senator Missen and Senator Baume last Friday following tabling of the list of outstanding responses by the President. In adding to Senator Coates's response to those remarks, I would like to say that most of these reports involve issues to which this Government has given considerable serious attention. The same serious attention has been afforded to the seven reports which were made to the previous Parliament and which were included in the list tabled by the President. The Government has made detailed announcements on policy developments in a great variety of areas including those covered by the various parliamentary committee reports. In some areas, for example those relating to statutory authorities and issues involving the burden of proof in criminal proceedings, the Government has taken into account or implemented many recommendations. However because these are complex and highly detailed matters, and often are related to issues unconnected to committee reports, they do not easily lend themselves to straightforward responses. I would like to take this opportunity on behalf of the Government to thank those honourable senators and the staff of committees who have put such efforts into making constructive contributions to committee reports. The Government looks forward to the continuation of such constructive relationships. Mr President, I now seek leave to have incorporated in Hansard a schedule in relation to those reports referred to by you. Leave granted. The document read as follows- SCHEDULE OUTSTANDING GOVERNMENT RESPONSES TO PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE REPORTS 1. Joint Committee on ACT Retail Trading Hours in the ACT tabled 21.10.1982 interim response 15.12.1983 This is currently the subject of a major review by the ACT House of Assembly. The Government would expect to respond to both the Assembly's and the Joint Committee's Report in the next Sittings. 2. Senate Standing Committee on Constitutional and Legal Affairs Burden of Proof in criminal proceedings tabled 25.11.1982 interim responses 2.6.1983 and 15.12.1983 The Committee Report recommended major changes to present and future legislation designed both to reduce existing persuasive burdens imposed on defendants to evidential burdens, and to limit the circumstances in which evidential burdens might be imposed upon defendants. The report raises not only difficult technical issues, but also complex issues involving the balancing of the interests of society in the administration of justice and the rights of individuals and requires a thorough review of the law of the Commonwealth. For example, the Human Rights Commission in its fifth Report entitled 'Review of Crimes Act 1914 and Other Crimes Legislation of the Commonwealth' briefly considered provisions which reverse the onus of proof and averment provisions. The Commission raised the inconsistency of such provisions with several articles of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and supported the recommendations made by the Committee. But as implementation of the Committee's recommendations could also involve consequential amendments to substantive offence provisions and to procedures applicable to the prosecution of Commonwealth offences it is necessary to view the Committee's recommendations in the context of a review of the criminal law of the Commonwealth as a whole. Senators will be aware that Mr Justice Watson is conducting a review of aspects of the criminal law of the Commonwealth. In view of the far reaching social and legal implications of any action in this area the Attorney-General has considered it desirable to include in the terms of reference for that review a reference relating to the onus of proof and averment provisions and specifically incorporating the Committee's report. Mr Justice Watson is due to deliver his report by 31 January 1986. Pending the receipt of Mr Justice Watson's report, the recommendations of the Committee will be taken very closely into account as individual burden of proof issues arise in the context of new or revised legislation, both Acts and regulations. The Committee's recommendations, and the principles underlying them , have already proved influential in resolving particular problems on a case-by- case basis, and no doubt will continue to be so in the future. Feasibility of a compact, or 'Makarrata', between the Commonwealth and Aboriginal people tabled 13.9.1983 A detailed examination of this Report has been undertaken and the Government expects to respond in the next Sittings. 3. Senate Standing Committee on Education and the Arts Tenure of Academics tabled 9.9.1982 interim response 15.12.1983 The Government has been engaged in consultation with the relevant unions and related organisations on matters associated with this report. There are still a number of issues to be settled. When these are finalised the Government will be in a position to complete its response to the Committee's report. 4. Senate Standing Committee on Finance and Government Operations Statutory Authorities of the Commonwealth: Fifth Report tabled 16.9.1982 interim report 15.12.1983 Certain Annual Reports tabled 2.6.1983 interim report 15.12.1983 The Government intends making a major policy statement on statutory authorities next year. That statement will encompass matters still outstanding from these reports. The Minister for Finance tabled in the House of Representatives on 4 October 1984 a consultancy paper related to this policy development. Regarding the annual reports no Government response is necessary. Superannuation Fund Investment Trust and the Commissioner for Superannuation Annual Reports 1980-1981 tabled 1.12.1983 The Government expects to provide a full response next Sittings. Income Tax Assessment Amendment Bill (No. 2) 1984 tabled 31.5.1984 Following the passage of the Bill introduced by the Australian Democrats no further Government response to this Report is necessary. 5. Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence Diplomatic representation in Africa and Indian Ocean Island states tabled 8.12.1983 partial response 4.9.1984 A final response is expected to be made early in the next Sittings. 6. Senate Standing Committee on Trade and Commerce Development of the Australian Fishing Industry tabled 21.4.1983 interim response 15.12.1983 The report raised a number of issues of significance which affect, not only Commonwealth and State governments, but industry as well. Throughout the last twelve months this report has been subject to wide ranging discussions at all levels of the industry and government. Many of the recommendations have been implemented and the status of all recommendations has been examined by the Minister for Primary Industry's Interim Fishing Industry Consultative Panel ( IFICP). In an endeavour to address all the major issues raised in this report, IFICP has initiated a national fisheries conference which will be held on the 31st January through to the 2nd February 1985. This conference has been designed to establish guidelines, a structure and machinery for long-term consultation and co-operation between the Australian fishing industry and the Commonwealth Government and to allow broad, analytically-based discussion of major policy issues affecting the fishing industry at the Commonwealth level. There will be five major topics addressed during the course of this conference. These are: fisheries management; domestic and foreign fishing operations in the 200-mile Australian Fishing Zone ; Commonwealth-industry consultation; fisheries research and development; and fishing-handling and marketing. This conference is expected to provide the government with a firm base from which future policy will be developed for the Australian fishing industry. 7. Senate Standing Committee on National Resources Development of the Bauxite, Alumina and Aluminium Industries tabled 25.11.1981 interim response 15.12.1983 Final response from the Minister for Home Affairs and Environment tabled in the Senate on 16.10.1984 Commonwealth's role in rural research and extension services tabled 30.11.1982 interim response 15.12.1983 Detailed examination of this has taken place and the Government has commenced its consideration and will finalise its response early in the new year. Plant variety rights tabled 3.5.1984 Complete response expected early in the next Sittings. 8. Senate Standing Committee on Science, Technology and the Environment Preservation of the Abbott's Booby on Christmas Island tabled 2.11.1983 interim response 7.3.1984 A formal response is expected early in the next Sittings. 9. Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfare Another side to the drug debate-a medicated society tabled 14.5.1981 The Government has given substantial consideration to the subject matter of this report and has announced a number of actions in the past nineteen months related to it. 10. Senate Select Committee on Statutory Authority Financing reports tabled 8.9.1983, 13.10.1983, see comments on (4) above. Senator CHANEY(Western Australia-Leader of the Opposition)(5.11) —by leave-I move: That the Senate take note of the statement. On behalf of the Opposition I welcome the statement made by the Leader of the Government in the Senate (Senator Button) which supplements the information which you, Mr President, provided to the Senate pursuant to the procedures of this place. I suppose that the statement incorporated in Hansard by the Leader of the Government does demonstrate one thing, and that is that by the Government imposing a heavier obligation upon itself-namely, the obligation to report after only three months-it can actually wind up with an obligation which is rather easier to meet because nobody expects a full, final and considered report after three months. We will get an interim report that tells us that the Government is looking at all this and then a rather long delay before anything actually happens. I mention that not wishing to be churlish but just to indicate that if the Senate is to follow up effectively the request which it has made of successive governments for a proper and detailed response to the views which, as the Leader of the Government says, are so carefully prepared and worked on by senators and committee staff, it is important that we see signs of a genuine and careful consideration of the recommendations made. Of course we will only find out if that consideration is given if we, as senators, take the time to consider what the Government response is. Clearly we cannot do that in what may be the last week of sittings of the session before the elections. So I simply make the comment at this stage that if we as senators-I say this speaking not as an Opposition senator in particular but simply as a member of this place-are to take seriously the work of our Senate committees, it is important that we find the time to follow up not merely the reports when they are put down but also the Government responses to them. I think it will be a test of the will of both Government and Opposition senators to see whether in fact they are prepared to allow time to make this a sensible and, to use I guess the modern term which I do not like, meaningful exercise. As Senator Baume would like to speak to this motion, I will not seek leave to continue my remarks but simply say that I welcome the fact that the Government has made some effort following your statement, Mr President, to explain the position in respect of outstanding reports. That was a most appropriate thing for the Government to have done. That is not to say that in thanking the Government for that I necessarily believe that it has given all reports the consideration they deserve . That is a matter what I hope we can look at in more detail when the Senate resumes in December or early next year. Senator PETER BAUME(New South Wales)(5.14) —Like Senator Chaney I want to thank the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Button, for this statement and for responding in what is really a brief period to the remarks made last week. But, Mr President, the remarks made last week were in the context of a motion I moved to take note of a paper which you put down and in those remarks I drew attention to two particular committee reports which were on important subjects and to which no definitive responses had been received. I have taken the opportunity in the last few moments to look at the statement produced by Senator Button in relation to the action which the Government has taken on those two reports. In each case the document which the Leader of the Government has given us really contains non-statements. It says merely that there has been no response from the Government because it has not taken any decisions. I draw the attention of the Leader of the Government in the Senate to the report of the Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfare. I was not a member of that Committee at the time it made its report which was tabled in May 1981, so I acknowledge, as I did last week, that the previous Government of which I was a member takes some of the responsibility- Senator Button —Is this the report on tenure of academics? Senator PETER BAUME —No, this is the one on a medicated society by the Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfare. The previous Government takes some responsibility for the fact that there has been no government response to it, but to say that 'the Government has given substantial consideration to the subject matter of this report and has announced a number of actions in the last 19 months related to it' is interesting, but is quite irrelevant to the issue which is raised by the Government's promise of a response in three months or by the tabling by the President in the Senate of a list of reports for which a response is outstanding. In the same way, I come back to the report of the Senate Standing Committee on Education and the Arts on the tenure of academics. This is an important subject and an important document for those in academe. Whenever we travel around Australia to universities or colleges we find that they look to the response to this report for the determination of national policy. I point out what I did not point out last week, which is that when I was Minister for Education that report actually came to me. At the time we left government, I had a response ready. It was a response of the Fraser Government. There is no reason, of course, for the Labor Government to wish to take the same line, but we actually had a response ready to bring into the Parliament. Our trouble was that the election intervened . Again, the document put down here does nothing to help the academics who are looking to some policy statement from government on this question of tenure. I emphasise again that I applaud the Government for its intention to respond quickly. I understand the problems which it faces on some issues which are complex, but on the two reports to which I drew attention last week, the responses tabled today say absolutely nothing. They merely indicate that there has been no response because decisions have not yet been taken. I urge the Government to address the questions, to take decisions, and to let us know what those decisions are. Senator JACK EVANS(Western Australia)(5.17) —I will speak briefly on the statement of the Leader of the Government in the Senate (Senator Button) on outstanding Government responses to parliamentary committee reports. Item 4 in the schedule to his statement contains a reference to the Government's response to the report of the Senate Standing Committee on Finance and Government Operations on the Income Tax Assessment Amendment Bill (No. 2) 1984 which was tabled on 31 May this year. The Government's comment reads: Following the passage of the Bill introduced by the Australian Democrats no further Government response to this Report is necessary. I ask Senator Button to look again at this particular report, because the Australian Democrats' Bill on the cherry-picker scheme-I am very grateful to the Government for its passage-deals with the problems of the cherry-picker scheme in prospect. The report which was handed down by the Finance and Government Operations Committee, of which I was a member, dealt with the retrospective aspects of section 23F superannuation schemes and made a recommendation to the Government that the Commissioner of Taxation take alternative steps to retrieve taxes that had been lost under that cherry-picker scheme. The Government and the Taxation Commissioner were asked over the succeeding 12 months from 31 May to take all steps necessary to endeavour to establish that it was possible to retrieve those lost taxes under legislation which was extant at the time. If this was allowed to go through unchallenged, it would be possible for that 12- month period to lapse and for the Government to not report back to the Senate on the actions that it proposed to take following the Tax Commissioner's report which is based on the recommendations of that Finance and Government Operations recommendation and report. Question resolved in the affirmative. Motion (by Senator Durack for Senator Chaney) agreed to: That so much of the Standing Orders be suspended as would prevent Senator Chaney moving a motion relating to the order of business on the Notice Paper. Motion Motion (by Senator Durack for Senator Chaney) agreed to: That intervening business be postponed till after consideration of General Business, Notice of Motion No. 164, standing in the name of Senator Durack and relating to the power of the Senate and its Committees to meet after dissolution of the House of Representatives, and Notice of Motion No. 166, standing in the name of Senator Durack relating to the proposed presentation of the Final Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union. [COGNATE DEBATE: ROYAL COMMISSION ON THE ACTIVITIES OF THE FEDERATED SHIP PAINTERS AND DOCKERS UNION] Senator Durack-Mr President, I wonder whether it would be convenient to take the two motions standing in my name cognately, as they deal broadly with the same problems. Senator Button-I do not know whether any discussions have been held between the Attorney-General (Senator Gareth Evans) and Senator Durack. It would seem sensible in a prima facie way that they should be dealt with cognately. Senator Gareth Evans-Yes. The PRESIDENT —Is it the wish of the Senate to have a cognate debate covering these two measures? There being no objection, I will allow that course to be followed. Separate questions, of course, will be put on the two measures. Senator DURACK(Western Australia)(5.21) —The two motions standing in my name arise immediately out of a single problem, that is, the projected receipt by the Government of a report from Mr Costigan at the conclusion of his inquiry, the Royal Commission on the Activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union. It is now common knowledge-we have it from the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) himself-that the Government expects to receive these reports on or about 26 October. When I say 'reports', I refer to the fact that it will be a very large report and will probably contain a number of volumes. The report will be received by the Prime Minister on or about 26 October. It may actually be received a few days before or perhaps a little later, but it seems to be almost certain to be received by the end of this week. The Government has said it then intends to make that report available to certain interested parties such as the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Attorney-General's Department and, I think, the Australian Federal Police. The process of vetting the report from the point of view of eliminating names or other sensitive pieces of information will be completed within a very short time, perhaps a couple of days. It is then intended that the report would be published in a rather limited fashion. What is intended is revealed in motions that were proposed by the Government in both the House of Representatives and in this chamber on 11 October. The motion passed in the House of Representatives reads as follows: That this House authorises the Speaker, notwithstanding the dissolution of the House, to provide to all members of the House of Representatives of the Thirty- third Parliament a copy of the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union in the form in which that report is received by him from the Prime Minister. The motion that was proposed in the Senate by the Attorney-General (Senator Gareth Evans) on the same day was to the same effect, namely, that the report will be made available to the Speaker and the President respectively, and that they then will be authorised by those resolutions to pass the report to the senators and members respectively. That is an unusual way for a report to be published by the Government and raises serious problems about the privilege that may be attached to it. The only other proposal offered by the Government to overcome these problems is that as this report from Mr Costigan will be made to the Victorian Government as well as to the Commonwealth Government-it was a joint royal commission granted by both the Commonwealth and the Victorian Governments-the receipt of that report by the Victorian Government at the same time as it is received by the Commonwealth Government will enable the Victorian Government to table the report in the Victorian Parliament, which will then be sitting. That will attract privilege in Victoria and, because of reciprocal legislation, in New South Wales , and the Government proposes to pass an ordinance in the Australian Capital Territory to give the same reciprocity in this Territory. However, the fact remains that legislation in other States-State legislation-does not apparently accord the same protection in those States to reports tabled in the Victorian or New South Wales parliament. Therefore, an undoubted problem arises in States other than New South Wales and, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory. The reason for this problem is that on the day on which it is anticipated the Government will receive the report, or on the day on which the Government will publish it to the President and to the Speaker, the House of Representatives will be dissolved. It has been known for some time, as announced by the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke), that the House of Representatives will be dissolved for the purposes of holding this quite unnecessary and premature election for the House of Representatives and for half the Senate on 1 December. The timetable for Mr Costigan's report was known in general terms by the Prime Minister when he made the decision to dissolve the House of Representatives on 26 October. Mr Costigan was given an extension of time for the presentation of his report from 30 September until 31 October. When the decision was made to dissolve the House of Representatives it was known to the Government that the Costigan report would be received at least by 31 October, and perhaps some days before that. The Government has made a deliberate decision to dissolve the House of Representatives at about the same time as Mr Costigan will be making his report. Even assuming that the Prime Minister was utterly determined to have this early and unnecessary election and wanted it desperately before the end of this year, he has deliberately decided to hold the election on 1 December rather than on 8 December, or an even later day. That would have been open to the Prime Minister and it would not have necessitated the dissolution of the House of Representatives on 26 October. I emphasise this point because only a few days longer life for the House of Representatives would have enabled a proper, privileged and orderly presentation of this major report by the Government to the Parliament sitting in the House of Representatives and here in the Senate. However, the Government has chosen a course which, very conveniently for it, has created problems for itself as well as for us and everyone else who is interested in this report. That happened because of the Government's determination to dissolve the House and to have an election on 1 December. Conveniently for the Government, it has created doubts about what can be done with the report in the public arena in the election campaign. We are faced in this election campaign with a situation that has been created by the Government and deliberately so, with full knowledge of all the facts and problems. As a result there will be serious doubts on the part of members, senators and all the media in publishing this report freely and openly, with the protection of privilege in States other than Victoria and New South Wales and, presumably, if the ordinance is in force, in the Australian Capital Territory. Honourable senators and the people of this country can make their own judgment about the bona fides of this Government in creating such a situation. It is a serious and major problem but one which somehow or other will give a cloak of protection, as the Government may think, in relation to any embarrassing matters that may be contained in the Costigan report. The Government's only solution to this problem was comprised in the quite inadequate resolutions that were passed through the Senate and House of Representatives on 11 October-the significance of that day being that it was the last day on which the House of Representatives sat. Even though that House was not to be dissolved until 26 October, the Government was anxious to get the House of Representatives up and packing as soon as it could. In the dying hours of the House of Representatives in this Parliament, it passed a resolution to enable the Speaker to be given a copy of the report. The same resolution was passed in the Senate, the Government no doubt hoping that the Senate would be up and away before now. There is a question which has been of considerable concern and debate for a long time-namely the position of the Senate itself following dissolution of the House of Representatives. We are now considering whether, despite the dissolution of the House of Representatives on 26 October, it would still be open to the Senate to sit in order to have the Costigan report tabled in this Senate, with the full protection of Senate privilege being attached to the report throughout Australia. Once the report was tabled in this place and the Senate ordered its printing, full protection of the Senate privilege would be given to that report. All members of the Senate and indeed anybody else, including the media, would then be able to publish the report freely throughout Australia. In that way the people would be informed of its full contents, recommendations, and so on, and it would enable adequate debate during the election campaign. There are differing views as to whether the Senate can sit once the House of Representatives has been dissolved. Opinions have been received from former Attorneys-General and Solicitors-General, and indeed the current Solicitor- General. One has also had the views of Professor Howard, who is an expert on constitutional law, and Professor of Law at the University of Melbourne, and the view tabled by Mr President in the Senate the other day, that of the Clerk Assistant of the Senate, Mr Evans, who I presume wrote the paper to express the advice of the Senate clerks. I do not propose to canvass these difficult opinions, opinions which are in many ways legalistic, as they should be, but which are not appropriate for the debate in which we are now engaged. I am concerned to say that views have differed in relation to this matter. Professor Howard has taken the view that the Senate is enabled to sit even after the dissolution of the House of Representatives and has given, I think, a rather convincing reason as to why that should be the case. He suggested that the Senate should take certain steps if it wished to assert its power to sit. The first motion which I propose to move today is designed to give effect to Professor Howard's proposal. I move: That the Senate declares that where the Senate, or a committee of the Senate which is empowered to do so, meets following a dissolution of the House of Representatives and prior to the next meeting of that House, the powers, privileges and immunities of the Senate, of its members and of its committees, as provided by section 49 of the Constitution, are in force in respect of such meeting and all proceedings thereof. I believe that the assertion of that power would be stronger if the Senate were to pass a motion in those terms, to make that assertion of its powers and privileges, while there is no doubt whatever that it has the power to do so. We all know that until the House of Representatives is dissolved on Friday the Senate is without doubt entitled to sit, to exercise all its functions, including its legislative functions. Therefore, nobody can doubt the strength of our right to pass a motion to assert that power and right at this stage. I am clearly conscious of the fact that it is open for debate as to whether that power asserted or claimed by the Senate will be effective after the House of Representatives is dissolved on Friday. It is still open to us to argue, as learned opinions we have received have argued, that it is not open to the Senate . Nevertheless, I believe that it is important that that assertion be made by the Senate at this stage, before the House of Representatives is dissolved. I have moved that motion for those reasons. The second motion that I propose to move is based on the assumption that the Senate either accepts that it does not have the power to meet after the dissolution of the House of Representatives, and for that reason does not meet, or that the Senate proposes not to meet for some other reason. There may not be enough senators who desire to meet. There may be, in the context of an election campaign, a difficulty in getting the Senate to meet at all after the dissolution of the House of Representatives. But that is a matter for honourable senators to determine in due course at the appropriate time and in all the circumstances, having received the Costigan report. The second motion that I propose to move is designed to cover the situation as far as possible, and again I put that qualification to it. We should be taking all steps we possibly can to protect ourselves, the media and the people of Australia if the Costigan report is presented when neither the Senate nor the House of Representatives is available to receive the report and to give it the privilege that it could undoubtedly receive if a chamber of the Parliament were meeting and received it in the ordinary way. I therefore propose to move: (1) That, in the event that the President receives the Final Report of the Royal Commission of inquiry into the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union in accordance with the Resolution agreed to by the Senate on 11 October 1984: (a) the Report shall be deemed to have been presented to the Senate; (b) the publication of the Report is authorised by this Resolution; (c) the President may give directions for the printing and circulation of the Report; and (d) the President shall lay the Report on the Table at the next sitting of the Senate. (2) That the foregoing provisions of this Resolution have effect notwithstanding any prorogation of the Parliament or dissolution of the House of Representatives. (3) That the foregoing provisions of this resolution, insofar as they are inconsistent with the Standing Orders, have effect notwithstanding anything contained in the Standing Orders. That motion is modelled upon the current form of powers which are given to Senate committees to deal with the situation that now arises from time to time in which Senate committees sit after a dissolution of the House of Representatives and may wish to make a report. These powers, in these terms, amended as appropriate to suit the committee situation, are generally passed when the Senate sets up a committee and appear in the Standing Orders of the Senate in regard to standing committees. Of course, those resolutions which are specific to Senate committees would not apply to the situation that may arise if the Government hands the Costigan report to Mr President or Mr Speaker and the report is then distributed in accordance with the resolution that we have already passed. The Government having failed to take adequate steps to cover this situation as far as it possibly can, I propose that the Senate pass this motion with the object, again, of maximising the protection that may be available to the media and ourselves if that is the way the report is made available to us; that is, on the assumption that the Senate itself will not sit but that the report will be received by Mr President and handed to us. The motion that I propose to move is based upon privileges that can be obtained for the tabling of documents under the Parliamentary Papers Act. That, of course , is a long standing power of the Parliament, one which has been available in England. The Parliament can clothe with its privilege a document which comes from outside the Parliament but which is presented and tabled in the Parliament and the publication of which is authorised by the Parliament. The privileges of the Parliament are then attracted to it under this legislation. I am well aware of the fact that there are arguments as to whether or not the Parliament can, under that legislation, clothe a report with that privilege when it is to be tabled not there and then but at a later date when Parliament is not sitting. Certainly, there are arguments one way and the other on that question and no doubt the Attorney-General will express some doubts about it. I concede that there clearly are doubts about it. Again, I do not propose to argue the legal issues in this chamber at this point. I have not proposed this motion for any reason other than to endeavour to maximise the protection which people are entitled to expect to have if the Government proceeds down the course that it proposes to follow, that of handing the document to the President, who will then hand it to us. We, as members and senators, will have to be cautious about the way we proceed. The media as well will have to be very cautious about the way it proceeds. As I said, the Government has created a very unfortunate and quite unnecessary situation. For one thing, if there were any doubts about the Parliamentary Papers Act, as there undoubtedly are, the Government quite easily could have amended it on 11 October last year to clear up those doubts. It could have authorised the publication of any future specified document, such as the Costigan report, which is handed to us in this way. We would have readily co- operated to give legislation of that kind a speedy passage. That could have been done by the Government. But, no, the Government did not choose to take any steps of that kind. The House of Representatives is to be dissolved on Friday and clearly the Government has no intention whatever of bringing the House of Representatives back as it could still do to clear up this matter. Of course, the Government is not going to do that. This is another reason for my very severe criticism of the way in which the Government has handled the publication of the Costigan report. The Government could have taken a number of steps all along the line which it has not taken. That is its responsibility. As I have said, people can make their judgment of the real bona fides of the Government when it says that it wants to have the Costigan report widely published and made widely available. The platitudes that the Government has been using are not matched by the actions it has taken to ensure that the Costigan report is widely available to the people of Australia for their consideration and judgment during the election campaign. All we can do now is try to maximise the protection that can be given to the publication of this report by all those who will be interested in its publication and who will have a responsibility to publish it without the fullest protection of parliamentary privilege because of the failures of the Government in this respect. I have moved the two motions simply because I want the maximum protection possible to be provided. It can be argued that the Senate can take this step under the Parliamentary Papers Act and, in fact, that argument may well in the end prevail. But there are clearly doubts as to whether such an argument will be effective and that only can be determined in a court. It is most unfortunate and undesirable that this situation should have arisen. It has arisen solely because of the Government's approach to this matter. Nevertheless, we in the Senate should pass the motions because we should be taking every step we can to enable the widest possible use to be made of the Costigan report when it has been received by the Government. Notwithstanding the total failure of the Government to take a lot of simple steps that it could have taken to ensure that full privilege be attached to the publication of the document so that people who publish the report are fully protected, we in the Senate should do the best we can in the circumstances that have arisen. Senator GARETH EVANS(Victoria-Attorney-General)(5.49) —Despite some rather extravagant suggestions that were made in the course of Senator Durack's speech to this effect, the Government has no wish whatever to do anything which would inhibit the widest possible circulation of the report of the Costigan Royal Commission on the Activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union when that is presented to the Government. For that reason, we will not oppose the two motions that have been moved this afternoon although, for reasons which I will spell out in a moment, the Government does not think either of these motions do anything to make the protection of those who might publish this material more certain. It is the case, as I, the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) and other Ministers have said on numerous occasions, that we will publish the maximum possible amount of the Costigan report in the form in which it is presented to us, having regard to only two considerations. They have been spelt out by the Prime Minister most specifically, I suppose, in his speech in the House of Representatives on 2 October when he said: Firstly, should anything be published the publication of which would effectively hinder the prosecution of organised crime? Secondly, would its publication involve an undue and improper infringement of the civil liberties of an individual? We will be making judgments about those matters after consultation with the Victorian Government and with the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Australian Federal Police, the National Crime Authority and the experts within the Attorney-General's Department. But they will be the only criteria we are applying and we would be hoping that a very great deal of the Costigan report would be able to be put very quickly into the public domain. We would propose to maximise the protection available to those who would publish the material by releasing it ourselves in three different ways. Senator Durack has referred to each of those in the course of his contribution, but let me track over the territory again. The first way is by tabling the report, in the form in which we think it appropriate for publication, in the Victorian Parliament. That means absolute protection within Victoria and, certainly clear protection, at least to the extent that no malice is involved in any subsequent publication, for fair extracts of that report published in New South Wales. That is the case in New South Wales simply because the statute law of that State is perfectly clear about reciprocal privilege extending to reports and other materials published in other State parliaments. There will also be protection of the same order as that afforded by New South Wales law in the Australian Capital Territory as a result of an ordinance, the text of which I have just approved a few days ago and which is on the point of promulgation at the moment. Elsewhere the situation is, as Senator Durack has pointed out following my own remarks to that effect in this place, a little bit less clear. In Queensland and Tasmania it appears that special protection would be available to people under the law of defamation if the report were to be regarded as coming within the State laws referring to inquiries held by the authority of Her Majesty. The question that arises from the context in which that reference appears is whether the provision is limited to inquiries held by the authority of Her Majesty in right of the State of Queensland or the State of Tasmania, as the case may be, or whether it extends to Her Majesty in other manifestations. In Western Australia, protection is given to the publication for the information of the public of the fair report of an inquiry held, among other things, under Commonwealth law. This would seem to be a clearer protection although it is a matter for argument, I suppose, whether this applies only to a report of the proceedings or extends to the report by the inquiry itself and how it operates, particularly where the document is the report by the inquiry with parts of it omitted. There does not seem to be any relevant statutory provision at all in South Australia or the Northern Territory bearing upon this which means that one is left to the uncertainties of the common law where, indeed, some protection may be available under the general rubric of qualified privilege but it is not possible to say that with any enormous confidence, and we have been quite frank about that. So that is the main vehicle through which publication, certainly at least in the more populous parts of Australia, will be assured. But there are two other channels which we endeavoured to clarify. The second one was distribution to members of the House of Representatives by the Speaker following receipt by the Speaker himself of the report and communication to members pursuant to the resolution, as Senator Durack has said, which was passed in the House on 11 October. With the House of Representatives about to be dissolved, clearly there can be only limited protection utilising the forms of the House of Representatives. What essentially is involved in this particular provision is an endeavour to clarify the basis on which a claim at least of qualified privilege could be made by the Speaker and by members respectively. It is not a large protection, but it is worth having and it is available as a matter of common law where there is a sufficient mutuality and reciprocity of interest on the part of the giver and the receiver of the information, which would certainly seem to be the case here. The third channel, which is controversial in terms of the motion which has just been moved, is in the same terms of 'distribution to senators by the President of the Senate' pursuant to the motion which we passed in this House on 11 October. This again provides for only relatively limited and qualified privilege to obtain and is only declaratory, of course, rather than necessarily accomplishing that in its own terms. But the reason it went only as far as that is that the Government perceived that that is as far as we could in fact go as a matter of law, even though it is of course the case that the Senate is not and will not be actually dissolved in the same way as the House of Representatives. That particular conclusion on the question of law is challenged by the two Opposition motions now before us. As I said, we will not oppose the passage of those two motions. If they prove, should the matter ever be tested, to generate some extra protections, that is well and good. If they do not-and we believe they will not-certainly nothing is lost by the exercise. On that basis it would be wrong to oppose what is occurring. Because this is something that will undoubtedly be pored over as a precedent for something or other in the future, let me spell out for the record why I and the Government take the view that nothing is added to the resolution we have already passed by the two propositions now before us. Let me begin with notice of motion No. 166 which basically seeks to bring within the protection of the Parliamentary Papers Act the communication of the report in question. Of course, were that to succeed, the Parliamentary Papers Act would afford absolute protection to those of us handling the material in the first instance and anyone else, for that matter, who published it. But it is the Government's view and my view that the provisions of the Parliamentary Papers Act cannot be applied prospectively so as to secure protection for a report which has not yet been laid on the table of the Parliament. There is a long line of Attorney-General's Department opinions to that effect, with which Senator Durack will no doubt be familiar, stretching back into the dim past, but I believe those opinions are well-founded. If I can be fairly swift about it, the reasoning is based, first of all, on the language of section 2 (1) of the Parliamentary Papers Act which says: It shall be lawful for the Senate, the House of Representatives or a joint sitting to authorise the publication of any document laid before it. The $64 question-and it is an esoteric, grammatical one of the kind that lawyers delight in, I readily acknowledge-is: Is the word 'laid' in its context here a simple past participle meaning 'has been laid in the past', or is it rather a contracted form of the future perfect meaning 'may be laid in the future'? Senator Durack —I thought you were a proponent of the purposive construction. Senator GARETH EVANS —Applying purpose techniques of construction, as Senator Durack has just reminded me I am usually keen to do, I think the compelling consideration in favour of the more conservative construction, namely, 'has been laid on the table in the past', is that the Parliament can hardly be taken to be authorising the publication of a document which has not yet been laid on the table and which may not yet even have been created when by doing so and giving it that protection it is in fact denying litigants out there rights of action which they might otherwise have. Let there be no doubt about it: For a resolution to be passed in terms of the Parliamentary Papers Act provision, while in a sense of enhancing the freedom of speech of those of us who might be the authors of the document or want to communicate it, equally clearly is an inhibition on the rights of others who might otherwise have an action in defamation. The view that has been traditionally taken by the Attorney-General's Department, I think accurately, is that when so much hangs on the content of the document as far as the rights of individuals are concerned courts would be very much inclined to adopt a construction of the legislation which would require Parliament at least to have actually seen the document before deciding to give it that kind of protection. I think that construction is particularly compelling in the context, as here, of a document which is externally generated rather than being the report of a parliamentary committee or part of the output of the Parliament itself. One has to take the legal argument a stage further and look at the force of sub-section (1A) of section 2 which is a deeming provision and which I shall read into the record as follows: Where a document is dealt with in such a manner that, in accordance with the rules or orders of a House of the Parliament, it is to be deemed to have been presented to that House, the document shall, for the purposes of the last preceding sub-section, be deemed to have been laid before that House. The legislative history of that provision has nothing whatsoever to do with the context we are presently debating. It was put there in 1963, as I understand it according to Sir Garfield Barwick in his second reading speech, to make it possible for various things that have taken place in accordance with the House of Representatives amended Standing Orders to be the subject of this protection rather than as contemplating any prospective operation so as to cover documents which may be the subject of some resolution now but in relation to a future tabling. Be that as it may, it may well be that the literal meaning of (1A) is such that it can apply to this situation and thus enable, on the force of Senator Durack's motion, the particular Costigan report to be now deemed to have been laid on the table. The difficulty about that, however, is that it still does not get us home in applying the terms of section 2 (1) because 2 (1) requires a resolution to authorise the publication of a document which has been laid or deemed to be laid, as the case may be, on the table. I read that, and certainly the Attorney-General's Department reads it, as requiring a motion for the authorisation of publication again to be passed chronologically after the document has been laid on the table or deemed to be laid, as the case may be. Of course, by this motion we are not authorising publication after the document has deemed to be laid on the table. We are doing it contemporaneously or in a sense slightly prior to that-certainly prior to the actual laying of the document on the table. For all those complicated reasons it is the view of the Government that notice of motion No. 166 simply will not do the job that Senator Durack claims it will do; that is, give prospective protection to this document which is not yet in existence but which will be communicated to the President and the Speaker after it has been received by the Government and appropriately looked at. That brings us to the second motion. The same question-- Senator Haines —Do you reckon you can do it in 25 words or less? Senator GARETH EVANS —No, but I am working on it. Senator Durack was going to speak for 10 or 12 minutes, I think he told me, and he took 28; I will be rather brisker than that. Senator Haines —Not much, the way you are working on it. Senator GARETH EVANS —I am working on it. There is only another page. All I want to say about notice of motion No. 164 is that it relates to the sitting of the Senate or committees of the Senate after the House is dissolved. It seems to be an attempt to assert the continued operation of the privileges of the Senate and its committees where there is real legal doubt as to whether those privileges can continue. The assertion seems to be being made in this proposed resolution perhaps so that we can get the benefit of any absolute privilege that would exist were the Senate to be reconvened after the House of Representatives is dissolved. But it also seems to be being advanced, if I understood Senator Durack correctly, simply perhaps to give some additional weight to the notion that the communication of the Costigan report to the President and his subsequent communication to members of the Parliament constitutes a ' parliamentary proceeding' in terms that might again attract common law privilege rather than just that available under the statute. For whatever reason the motion is being advanced, I simply make the point that there are very strong legal doubts-indeed, they have been acknowledged by Senator Durack himself-whether the Senate can in fact meet after a dissolution of the House of Representatives and continue, while so meeting, to enjoy the powers, privileges and protections normally available to it. Senator Durack referred to the conflict of legal advice about this. Like him, I do not want to canvass the merits of it in detail. I notice that we have the Ellicott opinion of October 1972 and the Griffith opinion of this year-that of the present Solicitor-General-supported also, in passing, by two earlier opinions that were tabled today by the President from Mr Greenwood and Professor Geoffrey Sawer, all concluding that the Senate could not sit after the House of Representatives had been dissolved and to a large extent, basing that reasoning on the language of section 5 of the Constitution which talks about the Parliament as a whole rather than Houses of it. Against that, there is only the contrary opinion, long and interestingly argued though it may be, from Professor Howard in March 1973. For present purposes it is not necessary to get into that argument. Whatever the law is-it might eventually have to be tested in some context because there is doubt about it-it is not affected in any conceivable way by the terms of, and the case cannot be advanced by the passage of, motion No. 164. Either the Senate has the power to sit with its privileges intact after the House of Representatives is dissolved, in which case this motion is otiose-unnecessary, redundant-or the Senate does not have the powers to sit with its privileges intact as the law now stands, in which case we cannot attract those privileges by any motion of this kind. Senator Durack —Professor Howard has some quite compelling arguments that you can. Senator GARETH EVANS —I would like to see Senator Durack quoting Professor Howard with as much passion as that on the events of 11 November 1975 because his reliance on the good professor is very selective indeed. Whilst under section 49 of the Constitution there is little doubt that Parliament could legislate to attract privileges to itself in a fairly open ended way, unless one hangs one's hat on very flimsy argument indeed it is impossible, I believe, to advance the cause in any way by a motion in the terms here proposed. That is the reason why the Government puts on record its belief that these motions will not be effective. That is the reason, and this is, of course, why I spell it out now , why we did not move in those terms although we were urged by the Clerks, properly cautious as always, to do so. The reason we did not put the motion originally in those terms was not because of any desire to minimise the protection afforded to the Costigan report or to create any degree of uncertainty about it but simply because we believe, for reasons that I think are compelling, that to put a motion in those terms would be ineffective. All that said, the passage of these motions cannot do any harm, even if it will not do any good, and we will not oppose them. Senator HAINES(South Australia)(6.08) — The Australian Democrats support the two motions brought down by Senator Durack. In explaining the reasons I certainly do not intend to attempt to match either the erudition of the shadow Attorney-General or the obfuscation of the current Attorney-General (Senator Gareth Evans), nor, despite my post-graduate studies in English, do I intend to get involved in a discussion of 'being laid'. We believe it is intolerable that the report of an inquiry initiated by the Parliament or by one House of it should not attract unqualified unequivocal privilege in all States of Australia. Senator Evans with surprising aplomb-perhaps not for a Victorian-wiped off South Australia, and presumably Western Australia by association, as being one of the least populous States and therefore not terribly important. I remind him that Australia does not end at the western border of Victoria, despite the fact that many members of Parliament seem to think so; nor even should Queensland have to worry about what manifestation Her Majesty chooses to appear in as far as privilege is concerned. It is important that both the report of the Costigan Royal Commission on the Activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union and the report that will ultimately come out of the Senate Select Committee on Allegations Concerning a Judge have privilege. There have been, as Senator Durack pointed out, conflicting views on this matter-conflicting opinions from some of the finest legal minds in the country. Senator Gareth Evans —And some others. Senator HAINES —And some others, including the Attorney. While that situation continues, the media, members of Parliament and others will all be somewhat less than enthusiastic about making comments on the reports and their contents. Whatever Senator Tate believes, and I think I caught an interjection from him earlier about privilege, whatever the Senate and members of the Senate believe, a vast number of people in the general community are unsure of whether privilege is attached to those two reports. Senator Evans does not believe that a resolution of the Senate makes any difference. He talked about arcane principles of law, prospective protection and all sorts of other things designed, I think, to make matters worse rather than improve them. Contrary to what he seems to believe, most of us believe that extra protection is provided by resolution of the Senate. Resolutions of the Senate are not to be taken lightly. They are certainly in a different category from opinions from various eminent legal minds in the country. They are seen differently by members of the community and certainly by the media. If these two motions do nothing at all, they quieten some of the concerns and fears that are being expressed currently about what will happen when the Costigan report is brought down and the Parliament is dissolved and what will happen to the report that will come out of the Murphy inquiry. Even if, however, no additional privilege attaches because of these motions, and I am by no means persuaded by the Attorney-General's arguments, at least what he said in his closing remarks is true: It will do no harm. For that reason alone, the motions require support from all sides of this place. Senator GEORGES(Queensland)(6.13) —I want to put a few words on the record. I believe that the report I sought has been tabled. I sought the tabling of that report to add to the other legal opinions that are available. I put on record my concern that, no matter what motions the Senate passes, a Senate committee's sitting or reporting may still be subject to challenge. The Attorney-General ( Senator Gareth Evans) said that the motions may go through. They may do so, but I do not think they add anything because, if anyone feels strongly about the matter, he will challenge any attempt by a committee to sit or, for that matter, to report. It seems that it is up to any person who may feel that he is or could be aggrieved or in some way disadvantaged by committees sitting or reporting to take the initiative. Question resolved in the affirmative. Motion (by Senator Durack) agreed to: (1) That, in the event that the President receives the Final Report of the Royal Commission of inquiry into the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union in accordance with the Resolution agreed to by the Senate on 11 October 1984: (a) the Report shall be deemed to have been presented to the Senate; (b) the publication of the Report is authorised by this Resolution; (c) the President may give directions for the printing and circulation of the Report; and (d) the President shall lay the Report on the Table at the next sitting of the Senate. (2) That the foregoing provisions of this Resolution have effect notwithstanding any prorogation of the Parliament or dissolution of the House of Representatives. (3) That the foregoing provisions of this Resolution, insofar as they are inconsistent with the Standing Orders, have effect notwithstanding anything contained in the Standing Orders. Senator CHANEY(Western Australia) —by leave-I think it should be part of the record of the Senate that there was no dissenting vote on either motion. Senator GEORGES(Queensland) —by leave- I think it ought to be made part of the record that I have some reservations. I do not think it is right for the Leader of the Opposition (Senator Chaney) to get up and put on the record that there was no opposition to these motions. There is some concern, but not to the point of opposing them. As I said before, someone who has a position to take on that matter may take it irrespective of the motions passed by the Senate. [COGNATE BILLS: APPROPRIATION BILL (No. 1) 1984-85 APPROPRIATION BILL (No. 2) 1984-85 ADVANCE TO THE MINISTER FOR FINANCE 1983-84] Debate resumed from 13 September, on motion by Senator Gareth Evans: That the Bill be now read a second time. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Colston) —Is it the wish of the Senate that the Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill, Appropriation Bill (No. 1), Appropriation Bill (No. 2) and the Advance to the Minister for Finance be debated cognately? Senator Walters-I gather that speeches on all the matters are in order now and later we will ask questions in the Committee stage. Is that correct? The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Yes, that is correct. Senator Walters-So the Bills are being debated cognately? The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Yes. Separate questions will be put on each Bill. Is it the wish of the Senate that all the matters be debated cognately?There being no objection, I will allow that course to be followed. Senator Dame MARGARET GUILFOYLE(Victoria)(6.17) —The Appropriation ( Parliamentary Departments) Bill, Appropriation Bill (No. 1) and the Appropriation Bill (No. 2) look to the expenditure of the Government in its Budget which was produced in August this year. It does seem some time since we concentrated our thoughts on the spending proposals of the Government for the forthcoming year and looked to its revenue collections. This is a big spending pre-election Budget and one that, on most commentary, is based on very risky assumptions about revenue. The only reason that the deficit is forecast to fall is that the Government hopes for the biggest ever real increase in revenue of some 10 1/2 per cent, lifting to a record 28 per cent of gross domestic product. This has enabled the Government to finance another excessive increase in government spending on programs following last year's enormous rise. The Hawke Government's two Budgets have increased government spending in real terms by more than the coalition totalled in seven years of government. Since coming to office it has lifted government spending as a percentage of gross domestic product from 29.9 per cent to a record 31.1 per cent this year, higher even than in the Whitlam years of budgeting. The huge rise in government spending is mainly to be financed through a 23 per cent increase in personal income tax; the highest since the Whitlam Budget years. This was one of the most significant matters of debate following the Budget's release in August. I will make some comparisons a little later on the expenditure of recent years. As a result of the income tax proposals, personal income tax is rising to a record level as a percentage of total receipts, despite the so-called tax cuts which give back only a small part of the extra personal tax imposed by the Hawke Government. The big rise of 15 1/2 per cent in personal income tax after adjusting for inflation is based on an expectation of average weekly earnings rising from 5.2 per cent to around 7 per cent with employment rising over the year by about 2 1/2 per cent. I might say that that rise in employment is not sufficient to reduce significantly the disastrous levels of unemployment because it is assumed by all that unemployment figures go into the next year and beyond at an intolerably high level. What has been noted with regard to this Budget is that it is a risky Budget in that it is a pre-election Budget. The risk is dramatised by the Department of the Treasury in its Statement No. 2 where it warns against excessive rises in labour costs, particularly from non-wage on-costs such as wider and more generous superannuation cover. That superannuation cover is a continuing argument and is one that is being put very strenuously by the trade union movement as an addition to the indexation under the accord which it has with the Government. Such things as superannuation cover and other changes in wage conditions add to the changes in the indexation of wages under the accord and non-wage on-costs are of considerable concern to those who are looking for improved opportunities for employment generally. While the Government forecasts continuing economic growth and a recovery in private sector investment, the Treasury papers warn that another year of strong growth in activity and profits might place considerable pressure on both wage restraint and other aspects of the accord which the Government says are central to continuing economic recovery. That is something that was stressed in the Budget Papers by the Treasury and I think it is a matter that we would need to look at if this Government were returned. We would need to look at what would be expected next year and beyond if the proposals that have been put forward by a number of the trade unions were to be seriously considered by the Government in the restructuring of the accord following the election this year. The Treasury says that the accord, which for the first time this year should limit rather than increase wage rises, must be adhered to if a continued fall in inflation is to be achieved. It will take enormous skill for the Government to convince the trade union movement that it has provided any real tax cuts when it is still collecting an extra $5.7 billion in taxes after theoretically giving away $1.3 billion in tax cuts. The tax figures have been argued about a great deal since the Budget was presented. In fact, the huge personal tax rise stems largely from the full year effect of last year's increased tax rates and the removal of the Fraser Government's tax rebates, along with the failure to increase the tax threshold for the second year in a row. This is why a huge increase in personal taxes has been forecast in the Budget figures. I think the removal of the rebates and the failure to increase the tax threshold have made people receiving their returns this year realise that the tax policy of the past has not continued. Their expectations of a refund have, in some cases not been met. Some have received a reduced refund and others have had to pay extra on the assessments that they have received. What is also significant in this Budget is the huge rise in total government spending resulting this year in a lift in the total government interest bill to $9.2 billion. The significance is that 64c of every dollar the Government borrows will be required just to meet the interest bill. One feels as though one is on some sort of a treadmill or a merry-go-round when one gets into the situation where one has an increasing indebtedness and one has to borrow to repay the interest to the extent that, for every dollar that is borrowed, 64c will be required just to pay the interest bill this year. I want to contrast the figures for Government outlays from the Whitlam, Fraser, Hawke years. The three Budgets of the Whitlam Government resulted in an average annual real growth in outlays of 10 per cent. The Fraser Government's seven Budgets resulted in an average annual real growth in outlays of 2.2 per cent. The two Budgets under the Hawke Government show an average annual real growth rate of 6.9 per cent. That, of course, is where some of the problem is. The real growth in expenditure over just two years is almost seven per cent, three times the rate of growth of expenditure under the Fraser Government, and almost as high as that of the Whitlam Government in its three Budgets. It was for this reason that the commentary on the Budget following Budget night was very mixed indeed. The Australian Financial Review said in an article titled 'The perfect Budget that has become a gamble for Hawke': . . . Hawke Government placed great store in gathering business confidence to underpin a lengthy period in Government. This confidence has now been jeopardised by the Budget that was presented recently. The trust of the business community generally has also been jeopardised by the fact that the Government devoted the extra revenue generated by strong economic growth to additional expenditure rather than to a reduction in the deficit or a further reduction in taxes. The Government has given itself the noteworthy tag of a big spender because it has economic growth and it had revenue coming in but we saw this enormous increase in government expenditure which placed at risk the confidence that business had in it by its statement and rhetoric that it was going to bring the Budget deficit under control. The Government has muddled any reputation for fiscal responsibility that it had tried to assume on taking office because it could now be said that its future rides almost exclusively on the continued success of the prices and incomes accord in moderating wages growth and keeping down inflation. Other than for that reason it would have to be said that business support is unlikely to stick. Business does not usually stick with a big spending and big taxing government, and I think that has to be regarded as the present situation. In responding to the Budget in August the Opposition argued that the Government is spending over 31 per cent of gross domestic product and that it clearly intends to increase this in the near future. Mr Peacock said: A rapidly expanding public sector . . . hardens the economic arteries and lays the foundation for future economic ill health; . . . it builds up long-term commitments that taxpayers will be called on to pay for, not only this year but throughout the future. Of course the future consequences of the Budget is the area in which the Government is most vulnerable, particularly as it laid down the structure in the Budget which is now before us. The Treasurer (Mr Keating) gave no priority to reducing the structural deficit. This was evident from his conceding that unlike last year this year's Budget Papers gave no structural cyclical breakdown of the deficit. Although the Government provided no basis for discussion of the structural deficit, that has been undertaken by those who have economic expertise. It would be argued at best that there has been no change in the structural deficit. If the projections which will come forward in October of this year are proved to be true, it will be shown that the expectations of revenue in this Budget are very optimistic. It could be argued that the structural deficit, given the situation with regard to revenue, is one that has serious consequences for the future. The Government's position contradicts a statement made by the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) to last year's Australian Financial Review post Budget dinner, in which he said: We will continue to re-allocate expenditure in line with the requirements of equity and growth as we reduce the structural Budget deficit in the course of economic recovery. The Budget itself, and developments since its presentation, indicate that the Australian Labor Party has jettisoned its undertaking to shrink the public sector to make way for private sector recovery. As we have quoted already, the figures with regard to Budget outlays of 31.1 per cent of gross domestic product and receipts of 27.9 per cent I think easily show alone that this is not a government that has any undertaking to shrink the public sector. In fact it is presiding over the largest commandeering of our gross domestic product that we have seen in recent history. Sitting suspended from 6.30 to 8 p.m. Senator Dame MARGARET GUILFOYLE — Before the suspension of the sitting for dinner I was discussing the Appropriation Bills that are before the Senate. I had again outlined the outlays which this year are 31.1 per cent of gross domestic product and government receipts which are 27.9 per cent. When looking at this Budget I think it is important to recall that the Prime Minister made an embarrassing mistake on the night after the Budget presentation by disputing an inference to a question from Mr Max Walsh that the Budget saw the Government's command over resources rise. The Prime Minister denied this. He said that receipts, as a proportion of gross domestic product, would fall. As we know it was later revealed that the Prime Minister had to acknowledge that he was wrong in making that assertion. It was claimed that he had been given out of date figures but the fact remains that the Government's command over resources is at an all time high in this Budget. The Government is caught in a contradiction. It is claiming strong economic growth in the economy but at the same time boosting spending at the expense of the deficit. By not reducing the deficit the Government is implying that it is not confident that there is sufficient strength in the economy to reach the high levels of growth which the Government has forecast. If the growth forecasts are doubtful so are the revenue estimates. Those comments were made in August following the Budget's announcement. It is fair to say now, in October, that the projections with regard to revenue are showing the doubt that was expressed. We have the sort of headlines that one has seen in the Australian on 17 October ' Rural production faces a grim year with 29 pc decline'. Statements were made by the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Button, with regard to the future-next year and the following years-difficulties in casting a Budget because of the revenue that will be received. At the time of the Budget comments were made about the illusory tax cuts and that 'But there are chickens to come home to roost', a comment on the Budget in general in the Australian by Des Keegan. As we are now in an election period we have discussion about the tax review which the Government will undertake and the spectre of capital gains tax, wealth tax, death duties and any other taxes that might arise out of that review . Before talking any more about tax I want to refer just briefly to the Westpac Banking Corporation Review of September in which a serious discussion was undertaken of the accord and the Budget. This matter has been referred to earlier and was referred to by me in a question I raised with Senator Button last week. The bank talked about the difficulties of the Budget. Part of the Budget cost of holding together the prices and incomes accord is $1.3 billion in government tax revenue forgone in 1984-85 and more than $2 billion will be foregone in 1985-86. The comment is made in this publication that the cost of higher Budget deficits each year will be less as tax cuts will generate some increase in economic activity. Other comments made regarding the accord are along the lines of questioning what will be the basis of its restructuring following the election and for the future. It was stated that many trade unionists have an incentive to keep the accord the way it is in 1985. It will be recalled that there are CPI-linked wage increases and these could be lucrative for trade union members with Medicare excised from the calculation. A productivity hearing and the prospect of benefiting from non-wage bargaining in such areas as national superannuation could also prove an inducement to ossify the accord. That, of course, is the big fear of those who are looking at employment prospects. If there is to be some review of the accord, it would be hoped by those with responsibility for employment opportunities that there would be some change and not a continuation of a CPI-linked wage increase with Medicare excised from those calculations, because that would simply institutionalise unemployment, and in particular youth unemployment, well into the future. The Government was overconfident about the Budget. In the weeks preceding its delivery the impression was given that senior Ministers believed they had produced the perfect Budget. yet the reaction was subdued, the media reaction was critical and probably the large increase in receipts and spending provoked the comment that the Government could have given more in tax cuts or had a lower deficit. However, it became clear that the Government's approach was in an election context and it wished to claim that on 1 November this year there would be tax cuts. It is not new for it to be said that this was simply an illusory tax cut, one that reduced what would have been an increase in taxes of something like 23 per cent in the Budget and certainly one that has put people into the 47 per cent tax bracket, even though they may be receiving below average weekly earnings. The tax measures in the Budget were not of relief, they were of an increase in collection. They have been recognised in the community as being a reduction in the tax creep that was being allowed to occur. I wish to say something about the coalition's tax policy and make the general comment that the overall tax burden can only be reduced by a combination of spending restraint and economic growth. That is something to which all governments should feel committed as we go into the future with this enormous control over the resources of this country in the hands of government in the present Budget. It will be the coalition's aim during its first term in government to achieve reductions in both expenditure and tax as a share of the gross domestic product. It is part of the current debate on tax that Australia relies far too heavily on personal income tax as a source of revenue. A coalition government will progressively lighten the burden of personal income tax by a combination of spending restraint, economic growth and broadening the indirect tax base. In reducing the personal income tax burden the Opposition is committed to give priority to helping families with dependent children. Remember that I have said that we are looking for a lightening of the personal income tax burden by a combination of spending restraint, economic growth and broadening the indirect tax base. This will be done by progressively introducing income splitting which will allow married couples with children to divide their aggregate income for tax purposes. This will be of most assistance to one income families and those two-income families in which the incomes are substantially unequal. We will progressively introduce tax rebates for child care expenses for two-income families and for sole parents. Single parent families will be given equivalent assistance in our tax policies. The coalition in government will ensure that changes in the indirect tax area are gradual, predictable and carried out in an equitable manner, so as not to disadvantage any sector. The coalition has given the firmest of commitments that in government it will not introduce a new capital gains tax or a tax on assets, nor will it reintroduce Federal death duties. A coalition government will maintain its strong line against tax avoidance practices. The fight against tax evasion will be greatly strengthened by a greater reliance on broad based indirect taxation. Among other taxation measures to which the coalition is committed are the abolition of Labor's 31 per cent tax on lump sum superannuation payments and a move towards providing a differential company tax for small business. I contrast the taxation approach of the Liberal and National parties with that of the Government. We now find that taxes are at record levels. Personal income tax has risen from 14 per cent to almost 15 per cent of gross domestic product under Labor's two Budgets. So we have a very big difference in the Liberal-National Party approach from that of the Labor Party. In the debate in the weeks to come, those differences will become very clear. These Appropriation Bills are Bills which deal with the spending of the Government for this year. They deal with the Government's programs for this year and with the Government's approach to expenditure and to government priorities in the coming year. In looking at the Bills we need to look at the Government's intrusion into the gross domestic product, the percentage of our resources which are now in the Government's hands for its priorities, and the requirements upon individuals in Australia through their taxes and charges to meet these priorities of government. On this Budget the Government will be judged. Whether government is to continue to take such a large percentage of this country's resources and to put into effect programs that leave little room for people to exercise their own choices, is something on which we will find judgment will be made by Australians on 1 December. These Appropriation Bills will be discussed at the Committee stage and a number of matters arising from the Senate Estimates committees will need to be discussed at that time. With these general comments, I think I have shown that the increase in spending and the increase in revenue collected mean that this is a big spending government and a big taxing government, and the judgment of Australians will be shown on those matters. Senator WALTERS(Tasmania)(8.12) —Tonight we are discussing the Appropriation Bills, which outline the proposed expenditure by the Government on its policies for this financial year. I would like to explain the areas of difference, as I see them, between the performance of this Government and that of the previous Government. I start with the economy. In 1981-82 the previous Government just about balanced the Budget. It had a deficit of $700m. The following year, 1982- 83, that deficit blew out to $4.4 billion at a time when the country was going through the worst drought on record. We all know the tremendous outlays that the Government made to drought-affected areas, to all country areas in Australia. We know the effect that that drought had on the economy. Our exports were so far down that the Government really had great problems. At the same time, the overseas economic climate was very low. All in all, it was a time throughout the world of a great downturn in economies, particularly in the United States. We were suffering the worst drought on record, which underlined the problems we were facing. In March that year, of course, we had a change of government. The drought broke , and there was an upturn in the economy. At that time, the first Hawke Government Budget allowed for a deficit of almost twice the deficit that we had left. We left the present Government with a $4.4 billion deficit. That was immediately nearly doubled, to $8.3 billion. The Government did that during a year of broken drought, and in a year in which overseas economies had a tremendous boost. Yet the Hawke Government doubled the deficit. As it worked out , the deficit came out slightly better than that; the eventual deficit was $7.9 billion. It was not much better; it was $400m less. But it was less by the end of the year. The second Budget deficit of the Hawke Government was still well up. It is estimated that the deficit for this financial year will be $6.7 billion. This estimate is made at a time, as I have said, when the country has seen a wonderful upturn in the farming area in particular and when our exports are at a tremendous high. Yet the Government in its advertising campaign has said that it has brought the deficit down. The deceit of that advertising campaign has to be understood by the people of Australia. The annual report of the Reserve Bank of Australia, which is not a political document by anyone's imagination, makes it very clear that the Hawke Government was left with a deficit of $4.4 billion. Yet the Government's advertising campaign says that it has brought the deficit down. The deficit for this financial year has gone up by $2.3 billion on the deficit which we left. A tremendous deceit has been going on all through the Hawke Government regarding deficits. When Senator Cook became a member of the Senate he was fooled, along with a tremendous number of other people in the community, into believing that the Hawke Government had been left with a $9.6 billion deficit. He said in this place that the Government had been left with $9 .6 billion deficit. At that time the Opposition said, 'For what year?', and he replied, 'This year'. Senator Cook was a candidate in that election and he believed the rhetoric of the Prime Minister, Mr Hawke, when he said that the proposed deficit was $9.6 billion. Senator Cook had to come into the Senate and apologise for misleading the Senate. He had not understood that the rhetoric of the Hawke Government had been a deceit. He had believed it, as a candidate in the election, and he had to come into the Senate and apologise. That $9.6 billion deficit that Mr Hawke still talks about as the reason for all the broken promises was an estimate at that time released by him of what the deficit could be for the following financial year. That estimate was made without a Budget ever being formed. In March this year, on the anniversary of this $9.6 billion deficit being put by the Treasurer, Mr Keating, Mr Howard asked Mr Keating for the estimate of the Budget deficit for the following year. Mr Keating said that he would not give it to him, that it was not appropriate for him to do so. He said that it was not in the public interest and was not applicable. When Mr Howard asked for the figure under the freedom of information legislation, he was told that he could not have it. I have never heard anything quite so hypocritical put forward by any group of people as the statements about the Budget deficit that were perpetrated on the Australian people at that time. Let us go back to the financial report of the Reserve Bank because I find it very interesting reading. Page 17 of that report assures the Australian people that we have now a $15.5 billion borrowing requirement for the public sector. That is the worst in Australia's history. The report says that the interest payment on the debt is just under 12 per cent of total public sector outlays in 1983-84. Twelve per cent of total public sector outlays for 1983-84 just goes to pay off our debt. As we all know, private enterprise, governments and people in the community generally who want to borrow money must borrow from the X number of dollars available in the community. If the Government and the public sector take up all that money interest rates must rise. That is plain, simple fact. We are assured by the Reserve Bank that offsetting factors last year stopped interest rates from rising in a large way. It said that one such factor was the decline in borrowing by the business sector because of the weakness of investment. In other words, it said that the business sector did not want to borrow. It did not have the confidence to do so. It did not think things were going well enough, so it did not borrow. That was one reason why there was no competition to borrow money. So interest rates did not go over the ceiling. The other reason given was an increase in lending by households as people's savings grew. In other words, the people of Australia also did not have the confidence to spend. Because there was an increase in their savings and consequently an increase in the money available for lending the Government was able to borrow large amounts without raising interest rates. However, the annual report of the Reserve Bank points out that that is a one-off situation and that a large deficit, and indeed, we are facing a very large deficit, will increase inflation . As I say, total borrowing for the public sector is $15.5 billion. Twelve per cent of total public sector outlays goes towards paying off that borrowing. There are many other areas where the two major parties disagree. We have been told by the Government that it has created a tremendous number of jobs for the unemployed. Yet unemployment is still rising. Those who are unemployed know full well that the jobs are not there. They know full well that under the community employment program they may have a job for a couple of weeks but then they go back to the unemployment queues. They know that full well; the Government cannot fool them. We come to the assets test, another area from which the Government is aiming to bring in quite a bit of money. Of course the fact that the assets test will cost us $35m in the first two years means nothing to the Government. That is a cost to the Government but the Government is ploughing ahead anyway. All the pensioners know that they are the only sector in the community to which death duties apply. They know that if they do not want to sell their assets and they need the unemployment benefit they can claim the unemployment benefit, but on their death the assets are sold up by the Government. We also know that pensioners are the only sector of the community to which gift duties apply. Pensioners are not permitted to give to their children any of their assets. The rest of the community is permitted to do so, but not the pensioners. If pensioners want to give anything to their children over and above $2,000 a year they have to pay for it. Their pensions are taken away. The assets they have given are valued and taxed. We have an assets test whereby this Government has said to the pensioners: 'You will not have assets over a certain amount. If your assets are valued over a certain amount, even though you have no income, you will have to sell up because you will not get the pension unless you do. If you do not want to sell up, upon your death your estate will pay'. Another issue on which we are poles apart is the dependent spouse rebate. Under the Fraser Government we took the dependent spouse rebate from $400 a year to $1 ,030 a year for mothers who were not earning but who were staying at home and had dependent children. We were working towards the splitting of incomes for taxation purposes. What has happened under this Government? We have had two Budgets from this Government and not one cent increase in the dependent spouse rebate. I do not think anyone queries why. We know why. We have been told by some of the radical feminists opposite that they do not believe in the dependent spouse rebate and that it ought to be abolished. We have been told that it is degrading for a woman to be dependent on her husband; in other words, that she should be out in the work force. What right has any government to decide on behalf of women what they should do? I was delighted when our policy was announced today. Our Party, if in government after the election, will bring in the splitting of incomes for low income families, whether two-income families or single income families. The situation will then be more equitable. Low income wage earners will then even be able to do what others who work for themselves can do, that is, split their incomes with their spouses. Under our policy, wage earners would be able to split their incomes with their spouses. The difference in the tax situation will be quite incredible. Our tax policy is very clear. It includes the splitting of incomes for families; a great saving of taxation for families with dependent children; no assets test; no tax on superannuation; no capital gains tax or capital taxes and no death duties. We have made it very clear what our taxation policy would be. On the other hand, the Government has said: 'We will review it all after the election. We will not let you in on it. We will tell you after the election what we will do'. Of course, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, Senator Button, and the Prime Minister have let slip that a capital gains tax or a capital tax will be in the air. Let us look at what capital taxes and capital gains taxes mean. There is no doubt-Senator Button made this very clear not only today but also last week-that next year will present a very difficult problem for the Government. It will have to collect more money. He has made that very clear. Let us look at what capital gains taxes and capital taxes mean. A capital tax means that each year one pays an additional tax on the valuation of one's assets . The Prime Minister has said: 'Well, we will not include the family home'. What does that mean to a farmer? What is the family home? The valuation of his farm could be quite considerable. I presume the family home in that case will be valued on the same basis as for the pension; that is, the family home and the curtilage. All the rest of it will be the farm-the equipment, stock, acreage and all the rest. Each year there will be a tax on the valuation of that property, stock and equipment. Let us look at what sort of assets would be included in a capital tax in the cities. The home will be taken out but if one dares have a country shack, beach cottage or whatever, that plus the valuation of the family car and the contents of the house such as antiques, jewellery or any possession that one may have saved up for over the years and done without trips for, I suppose what some people would call luxury items, would be added and a yearly tax would be put on them. Senator Button says that there should be a more equitable distribution of wealth in this country. He says that people should not be allowed to save or to accumulate the odd assets that they may want just because everyone else has not been able to do so. That is what a capital tax is all about-nothing more, nothing less. What is capital gains tax? If one sells an asset, the capital gain resulting from inflation or any improvement that one may have worked hard to add is taxed. It applies to any gain at all. These are the sorts of surprise packages the Prime Minister is talking about when he says: 'We will review taxation after the elections'. Senator Button has said: 'We are going to need more money. It is going to be a very difficult year for the Government'. We have been assured by the Prime Minister: 'Don't worry, we are going to keep the home out of this capital tax'. Another area of difference between the two sides is that the Government has increased tax on superannuation quite considerably. We have promised that such a tax will be taken off. Not only has the Government increased that tax but also it has imposed the Medicare levy on superannuation. We not only have the normal taxation of superannuation but also a one per cent levy on the lump sum. It is quite incredible to have such a tax imposed after one has saved for years and put money away for one's retirement. Where is the incentive for people in this country to look after themselves? The Government is frightened it will make little capitalists out of Australians if they save to look after themselves, if they own too much and if they dare to accumulate a few assets as they go on through life. The Government is going to make sure there is a redistribution of wealth. People will be taxed on these things. Let us look now at Medicare because the cost of that to the Government is quite incredible. Indeed, we have been told that the one per cent levy imposed on everyone to pay for Medicare was short by $830m this year. Did Dr Blewett increase the levy? He did not because he had said to people that the levy would not have to go up and that the Government could cope on a one per cent levy. He chose not to put the levy up. I was assured during consideration of the Estimates that that was a political decision. When I asked officers of the Department of Health why the levy had not gone up as a result of the $830m shortfall it was stated that that was a political decision. When I asked the Minister present about that, he said: 'Yes, that is right; it was a political decision. We decided not to put the levy up'. I asked whether that meant that the rest just came out of Consolidated Revenue, and the Minister said: 'Yes, that is right'. So the people will have no idea what Medicare is costing them. It is not one per cent. We know already that the one per cent levy has gone up by 0.7 per cent and that the levy should now be 1.7 per cent, but instead the $ 830m is just being snuck out of Consolidated Revenue without the people's knowledge. Let us look at a few other changes. The Prime Minister said: 'I do not like the anthem, so we will change it. By the way, I do not like the words, either. They are too sexist'. Many people believe that we ought to have an anthem of our own but I have not struck one person who says that one man should decree what the anthem and its words should be. Most people, even those who think the anthem should be changed, believe that the matter should be debated in this place. The Government attempted to change the oath of allegiance so that there would be no mention at all of the Queen of Australia. Fortunately the Australian Democrats supported the Opposition on that occasion and we were able to defeat that proposal. We said to the Government that the people of Australia, the majority of Senate electors, did not agree with the Government. I refer also to the crown on the passport. That has just gone. Nobody will know until they get a new passport that a crown is not to be found on it. It has gone-another decree by the Hawke Government. What has happened in the area of videos? There is a vast difference between the two parties. The Attorney-General, Senator Gareth Evans, Mr Hawke and all the feminists on the Government side of the chamber say that people ought to be able to see, read and hear whatever they want in the privacy of their own homes. However, we on this side of the chamber believe there is a limit to what could be seen and what could be hired. It was only because we were able to force the Government into setting up a committee that we now have a body to review the Attorney-General's decree that the people ought to be able to see, read or hear whatever they want in the privacy of their own homes. Even though the Attorney- General had all the evidence in the world to convince him he was going down the wrong track; even though he knew very well that the Standing Committee on Regulations and Ordinances, on which members of his own Party sat, had said that if he did change the regulations in the way in which he proposed the Government would lose control of the viewing by children of those types of videos; and even though the Victorian Psychological Council pleaded with him not to change the regulations until it brought down its final report, its interim report having stated that repeated viewing of violent videos has an effect on the average man in the street; he said 'Rubbish' and went ahead. Since 1 February we have allowed these X-rated violent videos into Australia. Even though the Attorney had reports from the United Kingdom, the European Parliament and West Germany on which he could have relied he still went ahead. The differences between our parties are very great. I do not believe that the people of Australia will be hoodwinked by the Government into believing that its members are a moderate lot. They are far from being a moderate lot. As my time is expiring, I get back to the original point that our parties are very different. Under our government the economy would be run in a totally different way from the way it is run under the present Government. The people of Australia will not have a bar of the Hawke Government going to them, saying: 'Trust us. Do not ask us what is in our taxation policy, do not ask us what we are going to rip off you next year. Trust us and put us back to do as we will in another few months time'. Senator CROWLEY(South Australia)(8.41) -What an extraordinary speech we have just been entertained with by Senator Walters. I understand that the debate is being broadcast. I do not know whether the people listening will be persuaded, but I hope at least to persuade them briefly that the chronic misrepresentation of fact as announced and elaborated by Senator Walters gets very close to being a chronic purveying of mistruths. Senator Walters is nothing if not selective in the way she deals with figures and facts, but on one point I have to agree with her: We are different; my goodness me, we are different. I am very proud to be part of a Labor Government which is unashamedly very different from that advocated by Sentor Walters in some of her proposals. I do not know that I could possibly range across the points raised by Senator Walters from wiping crowns off passports to non-sexist language in our national anthem. Senator Walters has misrepresented the fact of almost every item she raised. One in particular ought to be drawn to the attention of listeners; and that is the claim that this Government has not brought the deficit down. That claim is wrong and followed Senator Walters's clear elaboration that the first Budget this Government brought down and a deficit of $7.9 billion and the second Budget had a deficit of $6.7 billion. Therefore, by her own figures, this Government has brought down the deficit. Another point that needs mentioning is Senator Walters's presumption that the $ 9.6 billion projected deficit for the 1982-83 Budget was a figure introduced by the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) and/or Senator Peter Cook. As I recall it, that was the figure that Mr Howard and Mr Stone knew about just prior to the 1983 election. The figure was not a figment of the imagination of Mr Hawke or Senator Cook. The figure has been much more accurately explained by other people in this House. Once again, that point illustrates very well how the previous speaker slurs and dances across facts. Senator Walters's comments and statements about the classification of X-rated videos again quite grossly misrepresent the facts, but I do not think now is the time or the place to address that issue. The Budget that we are addressing in these Appropriation Bills is a very interesting and useful one. It is unashamedly a Labor Budget, not only because Labor introduced it but also because it so clearly has the bench marks of what Labor policy and aims are about. It is, as well, a very important step on the road to recovery, prosperity and security for all Australians. It must be remembered that this Government came into office in March 1983 with the horrendous deficit that was left to us by the previous Government; high inflation, high interest rates, falling investment, falling confidence, high unemployment, low economic growth and very few incentives for any Australians. This Government has changed that. At the same time we acknowledge that the Budget is only a step on the road to recovery, and I do not believe anybody on the Labor side would claim that it is the perfect Budget or the final answer. Given the conditions of the economy that existed when this Government came into office, it is clear, as the Government has said all along, that it will be at least three years before a significant change in impact will have been effected. Much still remains to be done to counteract the worst recession since the 1930s , a recession that was presided over by the Fraser Liberal Government and the discredited former Treasurer. Although any Labor member will acknowledge the serious and significant effect of the drought and/or the world international economic recession and allow that they contributed to the difficulties of the Fraser Government, it is clear that the Fraser Government did not have the answer to address those difficulties. I might add that the Fraser Opposition certainly did not concede that Mr Whitlam had any of those difficulties early in the 1970s. I do not argue that misrepresentation of the facts then justifies our continuing to misrepresent them. Of course, the previous Government experienced international economic troubles and drought, but it must be acknowledged that this Government has dealt most effectively with the economic problems it faced when it came to office. I wish to cite some other figures that are important in this context. When the present Government came to office, 186,000 Australians had lost their jobs in the preceding year. In the first year of the Labor Government 194,000 jobs were created. In our first 15 months of office, in excess of a quarter of a million jobs have been created. Forecasts indicate that the Government is still on its election promise target of creating about half a million jobs in its first three years. The unemployment rate has declined by 1.8 per cent since the Government came to office. Although it is still clear that the unemployment level is unacceptably high-a matter of the gravest concern for the Government-it must be acknowledged that the unemployment figure is falling. It is a sure sign that the Government is taking steps in the right direction. In the Budget the Government has given emphasis to a recognition of the continued problems of the long term unemployed, particularly young people and women. In a number of respects the Budget specifically addressed these issues. Overall, there has been a 146 per cent increase in expenditure on labour market programs since the years of the Fraser Government, and a number of substantial increases have been made in a variety of training support programs. Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle appeared to suggest that the view of most newspapers is that the Budget was not a very good one. Let me quote what some newspapers said of the Budget when it was introduced. The Canberra Times on 22 August 1984 described it as: . . . an economically sound document that should enhance Australia's hope for a strong and sustained recovery from the long recession . . . The Hawke Labor Government has indeed been blessed with factors such as the breaking of the drought and the strong improvement in the US economy. But the Government must be given credit for its intelligent handling of the economy since winning power early last year. It has taken every opportunity to promote growth and development, including deregulation of the financial market . . . The jewel in the crown, however, is the prices and incomes accord which, despite gloomy predictions, has held together and boosted confidence in Australia's ability to contain inflation. On 22 August the Age said that the Government had certainly given industry and business every incentive to invest and employ. The Sydney Morning Herald in relation to the Budget stated: . . . represents a continuation of the Government's strategy of combining the fiscal stimulus necessary to promote the recovery in business investment and employment with the wages restraint required to contain inflation . . . The Budget represents an intelligent, and generally fair, step towards the Government's ultimate goal of sustained economic recovery. The Australian Financial Review said: The Budget will deliver a considerable degree of stability to the Australian economy and, most importantly, Australians themselves see this Budget as one that will benefit them and their families. In the Age on 10 September the results of a poll on the Federal Budget were published. Most voters expected from that poll to be better off, which is a striking contrast with previous years. This Government has done more for all Australians since coming to office than any Liberal thought of doing. I quote Paddy McGuinness in the Australian Financial Review of February 1983: The Fraser Government has made a mess of wages policy, taxation policy and protection policy . . . The economic record of the Fraser Government over its more than seven years of office has been fairly dismal by any standard of judgment . . . (It) did little but introduce peripheral legislation and provoke the unions by empty hostile talk . . . The (Liberal) Government's failures in wages policy were the key to its overall failure in economic management. The severity of the unemployment problem has to be sheeted home directly to the failures of economic policy on the part of the Fraser Government . . . He said most indicatively: By its refusal to initiate rational tax reforms, it created the conditions in which bottom-of-the-harbour schemes and similar tax avoidance lurks could flourish. I think we have to recall that. Worst of all, during the period of the Fraser Liberal Government it was pointed out, not by what we might call an independent economic observer or by a Labor person but by one John Hyde: Between 1975 and 1980 Australia's per capita income increased by 7 per cent compared with the average of all OECD growth rates of 14 per cent. He went on to say: Until World War I, Australians were by an appreciable margin the wealthiest nation on earth. We are now less wealthy than the people of at least 15 other nations. In other words, this has meant that Australia is now a laggard, not a leader in many areas. Once the welfare state leaders in the world, we are now laggards due to the cut-throat policies of the Liberal Government. The 1984-85 Budget strategy, in comparison with the situation indicated by those remarks, is to promote economic recovery and maintain a standard of living for all Australians. Our prices and incomes accord is central to that and is the reason why we have tax cuts which will ensure the continued success of the accord. It is quite clear that this Government has not been able to effect the extent of redistribution that it would prefer, but it is also clear that the taxation changes introduced in the Budget and to come into effect on 1 November 1984 will have a considerable redistributional effect. Some of the other changes introduced into the tax system in our first year of office contribute to making our tax system more equitable and fair and include measures regarding tax avoidance, sales tax, excise and superannuation lump sums. A number of new measures introduced this year will ease the burden on the pay as you earn wage and salary earners and also contribute to making the system more equitable. The most significant, of course, are the personal income tax cuts to take effect from 1 November this year, which I have mentioned. For a person on the average weekly ordinary full time earnings of $370 as at the December quarter 1984 there will be a real increase of $21.12 a week, after accounting for lower health insurance contributions, lower interest payments on housing loans and the reduced taxation from 1 November. One of the things that quite amazed me was Senator Walters's claim that we have actually increased inflation. I find that to be a quite remarkable claim when on any evidence inflation has been halved since the Government came into office. This year inflation is particularly low due in large part to the Medicare effect but, even discounting the Medicare effect on the consumer price index, inflation has been halved by this Government since it came to office. Senator Walter's claims grossly misrepresent the truth. The fact is that inflation has fallen. It is also interesting that the prices and incomes accord has contributed enormously to that fall in inflation. The tax cuts, if I may return to them, will be proportionately greatest for the lowest income earners. The new five-step rate scale for personal tax gives a single taxpayer in the $4,596 to $12,500 a year range a tax cut of almost 17 per cent. Taxpayers earning between $12,500 and $28,000 a year will get a tax cut of $7.60 a week. Much more than a majority of wage earners in this country are in that wage and salary bracket. People on unemployment, sickness and special benefits will get tax rebates which should mean that they do not have to pay tax . Pensioners eligible for the existing $250 rebate can now have an income of up to $5,532 before they are liable to pay tax. Another initiative which is aimed at helping the low income earner is the increased level under which people are exempt from paying the Medicare levy. This level has been increased from $6,698 to $7,110 for single people and from $ 11,141 to $11,803 for couples. I think the exemption from paying the one per cent Medicare levy makes a considerable difference to people in the lower income or earning category. Of course, many of the increases in specific Budget items under the social security appropriations focus particularly on Australians in the greatest need. While the increase in pensions and benefits of $2.50 a week for a single person and $4.20 a week for couples is a gain and an improvement, the Government acknowledges that it is insufficient. It has made a clear promise that it will attempt by way of a three-year program to get the pension to 25 per cent of average weekly earnings. The Opposition claims the right to phase in or phase out its tax policies. However, it does not seem to want to allow the Government to have that same right. The Government is clearly aware that it has not done sufficient-perhaps it would be better to say that it is aware that there is more to do-but it has taken steps to try to address the needs of all people. However, it has a particular understanding of the needs of the poorest in our community, specifically pensioners of whatever age. I turn now to the impact of the Budget on women. This Budget is most significant in that for the first time ever a Budget paper specifically addresses itself to the impact of the Budget on women. That Budget Paper argues, as this Government argues, that the restoration of economic prosperity is the single most important thing that we can do for all members of this community. Of course, that economic prosperity will enhance the status of women. It will provide a greater range of opportunities for women in whatever their preferred or chosen occupation-whether they choose to be employed or are in employment, whether they are in business, whether they are engaged in full time child rearing, home making, running a home or being housewives or whether they are involved in education. In other words, the Budget affects women in all walks of life. The benefits, some of which I have already mentioned, that are of particular relevance to women include an income tax cut of $7.60 per week. Of course, 2.6 million women taxpayers will benefit from that tax cut. There has been a considerable increase in the children's services program, including $30m for new and expanded child care services which will meet the needs of over 62,000 children. The increase in the rate of unemployment benefit will assist women who are unemployed. I note again the particular disadvantage of women who are not eligible for unemployment benefit if they are married to a working man. Another initiative of the Government is the requirement that where possible 50 per cent of jobs under the community employment program should be provided to women. This initiative specifically addresses the clearly acknowledged huge unemployment levels amongst women. An additional $1.45m allocated under the community youth support scheme will include programs specifically designed for training women. Priority has been given to making child related payments to low income females. Any analysis of where the poorest people in our community are will indicate that supporting parents and single parent females with children are the most disadvantaged people in our community. Of course, the majority of sole parents are women. This is not to say that these benefits are not gladly provided to male sole parents. However, I am specifically addressing the benefits that are set out in the Budget paper relating to women. The additional pensions and benefits for children have been increased by $2 per week per child. The family income supplement has been raised by $2 per week to $14 per week. Women receive 99 per cent of all family allowances, which are paid directly to the recipient and which benefit over two million families and 4.3 million children. Many other items in the Budget are addressed specifically to women. That provokes me to address another point raised by Senator Walters, an outrageous claim if ever there was one, that this Government wants to do away with the dependent spouse rebate. I presume that I am one of the radical, lesbian, Marxist feminists on this side of the chamber that she and Mr Hodgman referred to-a remarkable ambit claim, I would have thought. I am fascinated how Senator Walters, as ever and in most situations, seems to be very clear about what other people are thinking. She says that we want to do away with the dependent spouse rebate by forcing women into the work force. That is not necessarily so. It is quite possible for that allowance to be paid directly to women. Senator Walters must presume that all men in our community are generous, obliging and caring and share their pay with women. But there are many examples, as everybody in this place knows, perhaps with the exception of Senator Walters, of women who are not able to have access to the single income that goes into a family if the man does not wish to pay any of it over. Many of our payments to families-the introduction of the family allowance by the previous Liberal Government is a very good example-go directly to the mother because of her specific role in caring for the children. That shows that it is possible at least to consider that alternative. If and when Senator Walters again claims that that is what the Government is going to do, once again I will categorically deny it. I am simply suggesting to Senator Walters that there is an alternative view, but perhaps her creative thinking does not extend that far. Many other items in this Budget are addressed specifically to women and I would like to mention a few in relation to the Human Rights Commission. I was interested to notice that there has been an increase in the allocation to the Human Rights Commission in 1984-85 of more than $500,000 which represents expenditure directly associated with the implementation of the sex discrimination legislation. There has been an increase in funding for legal aid. This again is addressed in the women's Budget document because it is estimated that women are the major users of legal services. Statistics on the use of services by women will be kept from the end of 1984. That clearly indicates a lack of statistical data from which we can make that claim with assurance, but it is an uninformed guess. Fortunately we will be able to rely on adequate data after 1984. Another important thing is the establishment of family dispute resolution centres. The sum of $639,000 has been granted to establish a pilot of two such centres, one near Dandenong in Victoria and one at Wollongong in New South Wales . These centres will provide mediation, counselling, legal advice and financial counselling. It is expected that the majority of users will be women, including women under the threat of domestic violence. I think it has another important contribution. My experience in community health centres is that the lack of advice to people in matters legal can allow them to set off down a track which then proves very difficult and disadvantageous to them later in the working out of solutions. In particular, families in the process of splitting up can proceed much more amicably and successfully if given legal advice and support early in the difficulties rather than the legal solution being brought in at the end. I think this is well recognised from some of the difficulties seen in the Family Court. There will also be an inquiry under the Law Reform Commission during 1984-85 into domestic violence in the Australian Capital Territory. While many of us would prefer that inquiry to extend across the whole of Australia, at least the inquiry in the Australian Capital Territory may be a first step in such an inquiry extending across the country. It is a matter that many of us are acutely aware of, particularly the extent of the damage to the men, women and children involved. Hopefully such an inquiry will precede the necessary legal and/or other steps to try to prevent the extension of domestic violence, which certainly at the moment seems to be an expanding problem. As my time is running short, I cannot elaborate in great detail the benefits of this Budget to my own State of South Australia. One of the points I would like to highlight in the Budget is the support for water resources in South Australia . The lack of clean water in South Australia has been a recurring problem but, fortunately, this Budget has appropriated funds for the continuing improvement and treatment of facilities for water supply to all of South Australia. In particular, the provision of funds will address the maintenance of the Adelaide and northern towns water treatment program to filter the good brown mud out of it, particularly that which is visible in any Adelaide tap water this spring. Money is allocated to the South Australian salinity control program and further money is provided for the extension of the water research program. Continuing funding has been provided for the final sealing of the Stuart Highway. It is expected that its entire length in the State will be sealed in time for South Australia's 150th anniversary in December 1986. The economic indicators point to a very good recovery in South Australia. My State suffered a very high unemployment level. In fact, unemployment, while it fell nationally by 11.3 per cent, fell by 12.8 per cent in South Australia. The consumer price index increased by only 3.6 per cent in South Australia over this time compared with an average increase of 3.9 per cent for the other capitals. South Australia has scrubbed up very well in its own economic recovery. Part of the reason for that can be sheeted home to the Federal Budget's contribution to the South Australian Government's proposals. Another item that I am brave enough to mention, particularly as Senator Elstob sits beside me, is the imposition of the 10 per cent wine tax. I do not think anybody argued better for that than Senator Elstob in a debate earlier in this place. It is quite true and it needs to be noted that for too long the wine industry in Australia has enjoyed a charmed life. The imposition of this tax so far seems not to be damaging the industry. There will, no doubt, be some complaints but certainly those people in the wine industry to whom I have spoken have acknowledged the unfairness competitively of having no tax on the wine industry but a tax on every other drink industry in this country. I, and I have no doubt everybody else, will look at how it will operate over the next couple of years but so far the evidence is that the wine tax has been accepted without too much difficulty. Senator Withers —Ha, ha! Senator CROWLEY —Senator Withers obviously drinks expensively. I mention one other interest of mine, that is, the non-government organisations. I am a director of an organisation called APHEDA-Australian People for Health Education and Development Abroad. This non-government organisation is entirely supported by the trade union movement of this country. It is, if you like, the aid arm of the union movement. For this reason I was interested to look at the foreign aid allocation in this Budget. The Government will provide some $992m in 1984-85 as official development assistance, an increase of about $60m over last year. Faced with stringent budgetary circumstances, due as I have argued to the difficulties left to us by the previous Liberal-National Party Government, our steps to recovery and a limit to the available resources, government priorities have precluded any greater increase in aid this year. APHEDA, as any other non-government organisation, will be entitled to support through a number of schemes. The project subsidy scheme funding has been increased to $5.2m. Another $2.5m will be provided from the bilateral projects appropriation for non-government projects. There is further money for volunteer programs which include the Australian volunteers abroad scheme and the Australian executive service overseas program, as well as the contribution through the Australian Overseas Disaster Response Organisation. I presume that APHEDA will not benefit under that item-at least I hope not. Another innovative program by this Government is the allocation of $500m for women in developing countries. Women make an important contribution to the economic and social development in these countries. They are particularly responsible for agricultural production, distribution and marketing. It is interesting that this Government supports, through its foreign aid program, rights for women in other countries as well. My time has come to an end. I very happily support these Appropriation Bills and the Government's Budget. They have dealt very effectively with a wide range of economic matters. This Budget addresses the continuing falling inflation, the creation of jobs, the lowering of interest rates and, in general, it is of benefit to all Australians. I support the Bills. Senator MacGIBBON(Queensland)(9.11) — The Senate is debating Appropriation Bill (No. 1) and Appropriation Bill (No. 2) at this rather late stage of the year. It is a fair comment on the managerial ability of the Australian Labor Party that so many months after the Budget was brought down these Bills finally appear in the Senate. They appear at a time of listing of the Government; the Opposition has nothing to do with the time they are brought in. They are brought in in the dying stages of this half-life Parliament before we go to an unnecessary, premature election. Since there are many speakers on this list and time is restricted, I will confine my comments to only a few topics in this Budget. The first is the Labor deficit and its consequences for Australia. Secondly, I wish to make a few observations about the paucity of defence spending. This year the Government plans to spend $64 billion of the taxpayers' money. More importantly, it plans to spend $6.7 billion of money it does not have. I might say in passing that that is a very rubbery estimate. The true Budget deficit will probably be considerably higher than the $6.7 billion because that figure includes quite a bit of cosmetic trimming with an election coming up. Because the Budget is so heavily overspent, we face the certainty of a mini- Budget in the new year. As Senator Button said in Melbourne last week, the recovery, despite all the hoo-ha from the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) and the Treasurer (Mr Keating) has been very patchy. In Senator Button's words again: ' Next year the prospects economically for Australia are distinctly poor'. We are dealing with the biggest taxing, the biggest spending and the biggest borrowing government we have seen in Australia since 1945. We have a Budget that has reached record levels of expenditure with respect to the gross domestic product of Australia. Some 31.1 per cent of the gross domestic product is now involved in government outlays, a figure never before attained in peacetime. The sad thing about all this is that the Government is spending huge amounts of money that it does not have. Well might Mr Keating say on television that our first concern is to get the size of the deficit down. As the father of that deficit, he has certainly got a parental responsibility. The concern to reduce the deficit is very laudable, but regrettably we see no signs of it in this Budget. Let me take half a minute of the Senate's time to put the record straight on what happened in the seven years of the Fraser Government. In 1976-77 the Budget deficit was $2.7 billion; 1977-78, $3.3 billion; 1978-79, $3.4 billion; 1979-80, $2 billion; 1980-81, $1.1 billion; 1981-82, $.5 billion and 1982-83, $4.5 billion. That was the deficit position when the Labor Government came to power, a deficit described by the previous speaker, Senator Crowley, as 'a horrendous deficit left to us', a horrendous deficit of $4.5 billion. My source for that information is page 367 of the Commonwealth Budget Statements for 1984-85, Budget Paper No. 1. These figures show that the deficits for the Fraser years ranged from a low of $0.5 billion to $4.5 billion-the horrendous deficit that Senator Crowley talked about, as so many Australian Labor Party politicians do. Using the same references document as our starting point-Budget Paper No. 1 prepared by the Treasurer (Mr Keating)-we find that in the first year of the Labor Administration the deficit was $7.96 billion, nearly $8 billion, almost twice the maximum figure that through the Fraser years. This year the estimate is $6.7 billion. As I said before, that is a very rubbery estimate which will blow out by 30 June next year. The facts of the matter are that in two years the Labor Party has spent $14.6 billion more than it has received against an accumulated deficit of $17.6 billion-over the seven years of the previous Fraser Government. This point has to be driven home to the Australian taxpayer. This Government is a big taxing, a big spending and a big borrowing government. If one spends money that one does not have one has to balance the books in one of two ways: One either prints the money or one borrows it. This Government has borrowed it. It has borrowed its way into a huge public debt. That debt will not be paid for by the Ministers of the Hawke Labor Government and it will not be paid for by the politicians of the Labor Party; it will be paid for by every taxpayer and every person who owns any assets in the whole of the Commonwealth of Australia. On many occasions in the recent past Senator Townley has informed the Senate of the way in which the debt borne by the average Australian is comparable with the debt borne by people in Argentina. Per head of population the average Australian's responsibility for the public debt we have is comparable with that of a person in the Republic of Argentina. If we turn to page 267 of Budget Paper No. 1 and we look at the section that deals with public interest we find that the estimated gross interest payment for 1984-85 is $5.6 billion. That is a huge figure. That is money lost. That is money paid on interest that has been borrowed by previous governments. That figure has been added to enormously by the huge deficits in the two Budgets that the Labor Party has brought down. It is an increase of $1.27 billion, $1.270m, on last year's interest payment- an increase of 29.4 per cent. We are spending $ 5.6 billion this year on interest payments, which is more than the $4.5 billion we are spending on education. It is almost as much as we spend on defence. We are spending $5.6 billion on interest payments and $5.8 billion for defence. As I said earlier, the tragedy of all this is that the Australian people will work for years to pay off this debt. Because of this gross overspending it is certain that we will have a mini- Budget. It is certain that the Labor Party will have to get more money to pay for its excesses. We are looking at the certainty of assets tests, capital gains taxes, wealth taxes and death duties. Whatever it calls them, the Labor Party will be in the market trying to skim off as much as it can from the productive sector of Australia. That was tacitly admitted by the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) and the Ministers in this Senate throughout the last week. As surely as night follows day we face these taxes on the thrifty, the provident and the creative in Australia. Those taxes are unfair. They are also very shortsighted for the welfare of Australia. When the Labor Party sees a tax it immediately raises it. If it does not have a tax on some item, such as wine, it puts a tax on it. It cannot keep its sticky fingers off anything. Beyond the effect on the individual, the policies followed and to be followed by this Government in imposing these capital gains taxes will have a tragic effect on the wealth and the standard of living of the whole of Australia. The more that people are denied profits, the less money there is to be invested and the less employment there is in the country. All assets tests, whether they are called capital gains taxes, wealth taxes or death duties, reduce the rate of saving in the community and therefore the rate of investment. When the rate of investment is driven down a damper is put on the growth of commerce, which further paralyses the economy. The person who saves and invests for his old age is the most creative person we have in the community, and he is also the person who is most legislated against. Last year the Labor Treasurer (Mr Keating) removed entirely the concession that the Liberal Party of Australia had introduced to grant a concession on the first $1,000 of dividends earned from investments. That has had a great effect of depressing the interest of the small investor in the stock market or in any other form of investment from which he can get a dividend. I return to the effect of a capital gains tax on savings, because those countries which have high savings have higher growth rates, and because they have higher growth rates, they have higher standards of living. We cannot have savings unless there are investment opportunities because people simply will not go through the self-denial of saving money and investing in a business if they are not going to get some return at a future date. They will do the obvious thing and enjoy the pleasure of the money at the time and at the end of their lives they will end up by being a burden on the community. I seek leave to incorporate in Hansard a table showing the relationship between savings, as a percentage of the gross national product, and productivity gained. I show this to the Minister for Education and Youth Affairs (Senator Ryan). Leave granted. The table read as follows- ANNUAL AVERAGE RATES OF INVESTING AND PRODUCTIVITY GAINS FOR SELECTED COUNTRIES BETWEEN 1960 AND 1978 Productivity Investment gain as (increase percentage in output Country of G.N.P. per hour) Japan (1) 26.44 8.8 West Germany (1) 18.43 5.4 Canada (1) 17.45 4.5 France (1 ) 16.85 5.7 England (1) 14.69 3.3 United States (1) 13.41 2.6 Australia (2) 11.4 2.5 Sources: (1) American Iron and Steel Institute. (2) Reserve Bank of Australia, Occasional Paper No. 8A. Senator MacGIBBON —I thank the Senate. This table lists those countries in as rank from those with the highest percentage of savings, as a percentage of gross national product, to those with the lowest. Japan has the highest level of savings invested as a percentage of gross national product. The table is over a time span of 18 years, from 1960 to 1978. This shows that the Japanese invested 26.4 per cent of their gross national product through those years, and they had a productivity gain of 8.8 per cent. In the middle of the scale is France which invested 16.8 per cent of its gross national product, with a productivity gain of 5.7 per cent. The country which is lowest on the scale is Australia, with 11. 4 per cent of savings as a proportion of its gross national product, and with the lowest productivity gain of 2.5 per cent, which is just about one-third of Japan's. If we want to lift Australia out of the doldrums and make it a vigorous country once again we must induce people to save more. At present there is not incentive to save and invest. The taxation system in effect punishes those who wish to do this. The Japanese do the opposite. They have direct tax incentives for saving. They save about a quarter of their gross national product, and because of this there is plenty of money available for business, and because there is plenty of money available, interest rates are lower. The cost of capital for a Japanese businessman contemplating an investment in a new factory, for example, is very much lower than it is in Australia-it is about a third of the rate. He pays about 6 per cent for his money, whereas in Australia, where there is competition for capital because people do not save to the degree that they do in Japan, the investment rate is about 20 per cent. Putting that another way, it means that a business can be profitable on about half the margin in Japan as it is in Australia. That means the Japanese can employ more and ultimately their standard of living goes up. These are the sorts of fundamental issues that are not perceived by the Labor Party when it talks about a capital gains tax. It gets carried away with some obsessional greed about people who have saved and been thrifty and productive through their lives. By taking on these people and stripping them of their assets the Government is very much killing the goose that lays the golden egg. I turn now to defence. We live in dangerous and unpredictable times. We live in an age of new technology, of rapidly changing technology, where threats can emerge at very short notice. I will not accept the doctrine that if we are harmless and undefended no one will worry us. I have the view that if we are able to protect ourselves as a nation it is unlikely that we will be challenged, given the geography and the assets that this country has. It is the first duty of any government to protect its people. Under this Government we have seen a run down in the defence preparedness and defence capability of Australia. Last week this chamber had a report presented to it from the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence. It was a report from a bipartisan committee of the Parliament, from both sides of politics in both houses. It was an apolitical document and I regret very much that we do not have time to debate it. However that report found major shortcomings in Australia's defence. They are shortcomings with the capabilities we have at present and with respect to the direction in which we are going. I would like to debate the direction in which we are going at a future time; there is not time for it tonight. But I would like to look at some of the shortcomings we have at present which come as a consequence of the inadequate funding under this Labor Government. Quite simply, at present we do not have enough money for defence. The fourth paragraph on page 75 of Budget Paper No. 1 states: It should be noted that Table 4 to Statement 6 shows real growth of only 1.5% for the Defence function in 1984-85 over 1983-84 expenditure levels . . . So much for the huge figures that have been put about by the Minister for Defence, Mr Scholes, in his defence statement made in the last week that the House of Representatives sat. The fact that there is a 1.5 per cent growth in defence expenditure is absolutely meaningless given the savage cuts that took place last year under the Labor Government. We are coming off a base which was too small to be supported. A 1.5 per cent growth on a level that was inadequate is purely a notional and meaningless increase. The problem is that the three armed services do not have the money they need for ammunition, fuel and exercises. Because they do not have this money they cannot maintain the level of operational readiness that we must have from the forces we have in place. We have only very meagre forces in Australia. We have only a very small number of soldiers, airmen and sailors who we can commit immediately if we have an emergency. In those circumstances it is most imperative that they are kept at the very limits of their capabilities. If we do not do that there are three consequences. The first is that we literally will not have any defence at all; the second is that lives will be lost in training accidents; and the third is that if the situation goes on much longer we will lose not only operational readiness but also expertise. As the Joint Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee report argued, even if our forces were operationally ready they are inadequate with respect to numbers and capabilities. I do not want to argue the case about numbers at the moment, but I want to hammer this business of capabilities. With the low numbers of servicemen we can commit in an emergency, the matter of capabilities is absolutely paramount. At present with this lowered level of operational readiness, we simply could not cope with any emergency at all. The second point is that if we continue at this level we will lose lives of servicemen because of the lowered level of training to which they are subjected. When anyone enlists in the armed services it is implicit in that contract that his life is on the line for this country if the country needs him. But the other part of that contract-the unspoken part of it-is that this country must do everything it can to give that serviceman the chance of staying alive if his services are required in an emergency. Inherent in being a serviceman is the fact that it is a high risk occupation and it needs a very high level of training. A country cannot train its servicemen if its battalions are under strength and it only has two companies out of three or two battalions out of three in a brigade. A country cannot train its servicemen if it does not have the equipment, the fuel and the ammunition. Service personnel cannot drive tracked vehicles if there is an inadequate allowance for track times. Naval personnel cannot operate ships to the limits as they would need to in war time without adequate sea time and, most important of all, pilots cannot fly aeroplanes on combat roles without doing a lot of flying. There is an enormous difference between flying an aeroplane absolutely safely in all weathers and coping with all types of emergencies from here to there or in the circuit area or in peace time tasks and flying with the levels of competence that are required in combat where a pilot is operating an aeroplane at the limits of its flight envelope, as our pilots are called upon to do. I have been flying for 20 years. I have some experience of service aviation. I was the first Australian civilian to fly the F18, on 29 January 1982. I have flown all the supersonic types of aircraft in the Royal Australian Air Force inventory and have flown on the latest air combat manoeuvring ranges in the United States. I am absolutely emphatic that one cannot fly safely in a training combat situation unless one is doing it all the time. Unless one is doing it all the time, one just does not have that heightened perception which saves lives and prevents accidents. A large part of this can be achieved on simulators, but we do not have any modern simulators in Australia for combat aircraft. The latest generation of simulators are incredibly complex and capable and they are very essential teaching adjuncts. Apart from the P3C simulator at Edinburgh, which is right up to the latest state of the art, we do not have any simulators for combat aircraft. We do not have an advanced Mirage simulator. If we have one at all it must be very old. I have flown the F111 simulator that we have in this country and that is a very useful tool, but it is not comparable in any way at all with the latest type of combat simulators. I come back to this essential point: If we are going to train fighter pilots and strike pilots we must provide the money to enable them to fly constantly in combat simulation exercises. Otherwise we will have an increasing number of accidents in this country and the lives of young servicemen will be needlessly lost-whether it is in flying combat aircraft, driving tanks or sailing ships. The final consequence of this low operational status is the fact that we lose not our operational capability in the short term, but we also lose the expertise within the individual units. We lose the whole way of being able to do things- the doctrines that have been built up over the years. Once we get to that point where we lose that expertise, we have at least a 10-year task in rebuilding it. The cause of all this is very simple. We are just not devoting enough money to defence. The defence percentage of the total Budget outlays in the two Labor Budgets has declined. In other words, the percentage going to defence, in last year's Budget and this year's Budget, is less than it was in the preceding years of the Fraser Administration. Compounding this has been the effect of the increase in capital expenditure as a component of the defence budget. In the last full year of the Fraser Government, 1981-82, 12 per cent of the defence vote went on new capital equipment; this year it is at least 22.6 per cent. The Labor Party is making a great virtue out of the fact that the percentage going to new capital equipment is up 10 per cent to a figure of 22.6 per cent. It is making a virtue of it because it has no option. The previous Government locked the country into purchases of overseas equipment, equipment that is absolutely essential, such as the FFGs and the FA18s, and those contracts have to be honoured. Rather than putting the defence budget up 10 per cent, which is what should be done, it has taken that money out of the Defence budget and left it in almost the same levels as preceding years. That is disastrous because it means that 10 per cent has to come out of other operational expenditure. When the defence forces are already running on the bare minimum for fuel, for ammunition and for exercises, there is no room at all. It has to lead to a drastic reduction in housekeeping expenses. It means that spares holdings are run down to nothing, that fuel holdings are minimal, and that fuel for exercises is hardly obtainable ; there is very little ammunition, and very little exercise time is available. This is absolutely intolerable. We cannot go on this way. There has to be a very significant increase in the defence vote. I have chosen to speak of only two of the many defects in this Budget. As I said at the outset, we are dealing with a big spending, a big taxing and a big borrowing Government. As Senator Crowley has also said, regrettably I cannot highlight any of the benefits of this Budget for my own State because there simply are none. The day of reckoning for this Budget is yet to come. The day of reckoning will be borne by the average Australian taxpayer and property owner. This Budget does nothing to correct the very serious structural defects in the Australian economy, defects that price us out of producing goods and services that the world wants. This Budget does nothing for the families or for the people of Australia. This Budget just proves how easy it is to spend other people's money. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK(New South Wales)(9.38) —These appropriation Bills give effect to the recent Federal Budget. It is now being recognised widely by the community that this Budget is simply a stop-gap. It is quite clear that the only possible reason that the Hawke Government is running to the electors well before its time, some year or more before its time, is that it fears what will happen next year and knows that it must take drastic action, and indeed must have a mini-Budget. There is no other reason for an early election. It will, in fact, not bring the Senate and House of Representatives elections permanently together . They can become unstuck frequently in the future. The alibi of the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) is completely false. There can be only one reason. The Government knows that it is planning to do some very serious and severe things in the months ahead if re-elected. It wants to get an election over before then. It wants to pretend it is not so doing. Of course, the Government will say that there will be no mini-Budget. After all, the Australian Labor Party did not indicate in February 1983, a month before the Federal elections, that it would bring in a mini-Budget in May. Two months after it was elected it brought in a mini-Budget. Tonight I want to examine what has emerged as a result of the two Budgets and the mini-Budget of the Hawke Government and to do so against the Government's invitation that it should be examined upon its economic policies and its economic successes. I think that any such examination will show a total score of failure. I start at the focal point. The Government said at the outset that its main task was to tackle unemployment- to get jobs. The Federal President of the Australian Labor Party, Mr Neville Wran, said: 'There are three issues-jobs, jobs, jobs'. Let us start with that point of economic policy. Let us ask ourselves: What has the Labor Government done and what does it plan to do? Of course, the first thing I must do is call upon the Treasurer, Mr Keating, and his National Economic Summit Conference documents, his own documents, as evidence. The Summit Conference itself stated that even on the basis of projections A and C the overall unemployment rate, on average, in 1985-86 would be only a little different from that in 1982-83. In fact, it is projected in the table to be the same. After the election the Government admitted that in three years it would not have reduced unemployment. Let us look at the official figures for unemployment. In seasonally adjusted terms the average rate of unemployment for the two years prior to the defeat of the Fraser Liberal Government was 5.8 per cent in 1981 and 7.2 per cent in 1982. On the same basis the average unemployment rate under the Hawke Labor Government was 9.9 per cent in 1983 and 9.2 per cent in 1984. So here again is a chronic pattern. It becomes much more obvious when one looks at the participation rate; that is, the labour force as a percentage of the civilian population aged 15 years and over. Throughout the whole 18 to 20 months of the Hawke Labor Government the participation rate has fallen. In March 1983 the figure was 61.2 per cent. It averaged something like 60.5 per cent over the course of the ensuing months. That means, of course, that a chronic and growing unemployment rate has been disguised. The Labor Government says that we must look at the jobs which it has created; that it has created some 200,000 jobs. That sounds great, except that one needs to remind oneself that every two years the population of Australia grows by something like 450,000. At best the Government is simply absorbing the increment into the ranks of those who wish to be employed. The Government is not touching the unemployment rate. Under Labor the number of jobs has risen but the situation has remained static in that regard. But people are now becoming unemployed for longer periods. Unemployment has become chronic for those who are unemployed for a period of six months or a year. Lest anyone should feel that I am quoting a subjective view, let me read from the Westpac Banking Corporation's Review of September this year. It deals with the ugliest part of unemployment; that is, juvenile unemployment. The one thing that the Hawke Government claims as its great virtue is the prices and incomes accord. It says that all virtue flows from the accord. The Westpac Review stated: As it stands, the accord is all about keeping happy the 91 per cent of the labour force which has jobs. It does nothing to alleviate unemployment by, for example, allowing scope to change wage relativities. It went on to say: Centralised wage indexation is the core of the accord. It is a system which virtually institutionalises unacceptable high rates of unemployment among the group which has suffered most, those between the ages of 15 and 19, one-quarter of whom do not have a job. It is a horrible thing to have said of a government that it virtually institutionalised by its action unacceptably high rates of unemployment amongst the 15-year-olds to 19-year-olds. That is the picture, whether one looks at the seasonally adjusted figures, the participation rates or the 15 to 19-year olds age group. Honourable senators should bear in mind what the Westpac Review said that one-quarter of that age group is unemployed. The Government knows that come November or December of this year or January of next year the school leavers will be looking for jobs. It knows that they will not get jobs. Let me test that statement not subjectively but by objective statements. In the areas which might employ those school leavers such as manufacturing, mining and primary industry the pattern throughout the Labor Government's years of office has been very severely declining employment. Manufacturing has suffered the greatest. Month by month there has been a fall in employment in the manufacturing area. Some years ago manufacturing absorbed some 28 per cent of all those employed in Australia. It now absorbs 17 per cent, a figure which is falling. No wonder the Secretary of the Vehicle Builders Employees Federation said on radio tonight that the present Minister for Industry and Commerce and the Leader of the Government in this chamber, Senator Button, should be sacked from his job. No wonder Joe Thompson said there was a failure to deal with manufacturing and unemployment and that the Minister for Industry and Commerce should be sacked. Those are not my words. The figures are objective. The statements came from a Labor sympathiser, a very well respected union leader who said that there has been a failure by the Leader of the Government in the Senate in the manufacturing area. Of course, the world knows that investment in manufacturing has declined by more than 30 per cent and continues to do so and that investment in mining has also fallen. We have before us the figures for primary industry. We have now had before us the Bureau of Agricultural Economics' estimates that this year the revenue from primary industry will decline by 29 per cent. That figure should be put against the fact that primary industry is heavily burdened by debt and struggling to survive. It is a highly efficient industry but it has huge problems. It is an industry which has been burdened down by this Government. Bit by bit the Government has piled on the burdens. Without telling people what it was going to do, in the mini-Budget it reduced the subsidy paid under the freight equalisation scheme on petroleum products. It altered the tax averaging component in respect of the incomes of primary producers. It extended the depreciation period from three years to five years on farm machinery. It increased the excise on avgas by 2 cents a litre. Wherever one turns, except in two sectors-the Public Service sector and the building sector, temporarily-there is a decline. Senator Crichton-Browne —Where is the growth going to come from next year? Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —That is a good question. Westpac said there is chronic unemployment. The projection of the Government itself is that there will be no change in that. Statistics show that the participation rate is falling. The Government has said that there will be no change for the next two years. That was the Economic Summit Conference's prediction. If we are failing in manufacturing, if Joe Thompson is right and the Minister has failed completely in this area and there is a decline in mining and primary industry, where are the jobs? We test first on employment: 'Jobs, jobs, jobs', are the three issues. No wonder that gentleman, Mr Neville Wran, finds himself totally discredited today. His prediction then was wrong and his leadership in his own State has proven very faulty indeed. Let us take any test. Let us take the test of inflation. To start with I look at interest rates. The Westpac Review, that same document, states, in analysing the Budget: Indeed, the risks associated with this year's budget, especially in terms of upward pressure on interest rates, escalate next financial year. I repeat: 'Upward pressure on interest rates, escalate next financial year'. Of course, with the presidential campaign in America over, the likelihood of pressure on interest rates would be very real indeed. The size of the deficit and the funding method of the Government on the deficit are such that there must be a further pressure on interest rates. The only reason they have not altered further is that there is not competing demand from the private sector. The only reason is that there is no competition against the Government. It is virtually alone in the market-place for borrowing except for housing and its own bonds. There has been talk that something has happened to interest rates so I looked them up and found that in fact trading bank interest rates have been unchanged over the period since this Government came to office. But that does not mean that interest rates have not changed because, of course, interest rates bear a relationship in their real value to inflation. If inflation has fallen-indeed the wages pause instituted by the Fraser Government brought about that fall; together with the artificial adjustment of the consumer price index for Medicare , there has been a fall-and if inflation is now at the level of some 7 per cent, interest rates should have fallen because real interest rates are now substantially higher than they were when the Fraser Government came to office. I also notice that in terms of inflation the Australian Financial Review states: The slowdown of Australia's inflation rate could be short-lived, according to an assessment of the economy by the Commonwealth Bank. Where do we stand? Where are these achievements? Here is a Government which came to office making some 120 promises which it broke. Of course, it hides behind one alibi, that it did not know the size of the deficit. I want to explode that quite clearly. In February, some two or three weeks before the Hawke Labor Party won the election, it put out an economic document. I hold it in my hands. That document ridicules the idea that a large deficit is a danger. I will read from it. After it has ridiculed it altogether, talking about the false assumptions underlying the Fraser Government's policy concerning the relationship between Budget deficits and inflation, it states: Therefore on the basis of the Australian experience it is difficult to sustain the argument that deficits are a basic cause of inflation or that the higher the deficit the higher is inflation. Analysis of the experience of other countries confirms the remoteness of any relationship-with some countries running high deficits associated with low inflation and others having low deficits with high inflation. Three weeks before Labor won the election, it was saying that there was no relationship between these problems and higher deficits. Of course, now, because it needs an alibi, it is saying something entirely different. But let us remember that the Government did bring in a mini-Budget two months after the election. In that mini-Budget it broke promise after promise. Who would have thought, having indicated that it would not alter age pensions, that it would within two months wipe out the non-means-tested pension for those over 70 years of age? Who would have thought that it would alter-and what a mean-minded show it was-policy to reduce the then current $1,040 threshold for minors to $416. Remember its attack on the news boy situation of the past? Remember that the Government abolished the $1,000 dividend rebate? We should remember all those things. The Government abolished the interest rebate on home loans. The Government did all those things it said it would not do, step by step-a little matter which this year added up to around $1,400m that it took back, one way or another. That is not a bad little mini-Budget. It is not a bad sign of what will happen. Let me now look at what the Government has done in the Appropriation Bills and in the Budget. The Government says that it has given tax cuts. My goodness, people know that even if they get a $7.60 a week tax cut they are still something like $16 a week behind after the compulsory Medicare levy has been taken out and because of the failure to index taxation to take account of inflation, and all the other burdens. In fact, total taxation revenue is expected to grow by a massive 17.9 per cent this year. This is a record. It will have increased by almost 30 per cent over just two Budgets, even allowing for the so-called tax cuts. In fact, the so-called tax cuts have been gobbled up by a 30 per cent increase in taxes. Let us examine this further. Honourable senators would know that last year about 400,000 Australians with modest incomes moved into the 46c tax bracket. It is estimated that a further one million Australians will move into higher tax brackets during 1984-85. What kind of tax cut do we have if last year 400,000 Australians moved into the higher tax bracket and this year more than one million Australians will move into that 46c bracket? To get this into perspective, two years ago a person had to earn 10 per cent more than the male average weekly earnings before entering the 46c tax bracket. By the end of this financial year someone earning 8.5 per cent less than the male average weekly earnings will pay 46c in every extra dollar plus the one per cent Medicare levy. Those people who are below the average weekly wage are now copping 46c in the dollar, and this is supposed to be a tax cut. A fascinating situation has resulted. Tonight I listened to the tremendous defensiveness of Mr Keating against the announcement of the foreshadowed great tax reforms of the Liberal and National parties. One would fear that the Government was speaking with the voice of doom. I invite the Senate to listen to what the Secretary of the Australian Taxpayers Association, Mr Risstrom, has said. Mr Risstrom frequently is quoted by members of the Australian Labor Party when it suits them. Mr Risstrom, a quite independent representative of the taxpayers, is reported as having said: The Liberal Party's tax reform package would be very attractive to Australian families and could save a one-child family up to $11 a week, Australian Taxpayers' Association Secretary Eric Risstrom said. Mr Risstrom said the optional income splitting and child care rebates for working couples and single parents were good vote catchers for the Liberals. 'Considering the deficit it is as much as we can afford, as much as we can hope for and it is achievable,' he said. We have heard Mr Keating say that this cannot be done and that this is all wrong . I repeat what Mr Risstrom said: 'Considering the deficit it is as much as we can afford, as much as we can hope for and it is achievable,' . . . Mr Risstrom estimated the income splitting would cost $650 million in a financial year. As couples would have to lodge their return to claim it, the cost would come in the following year. Therefore there should be no indirect taxation needed to pay for it in the first year of operation. Mr Risstrom said he was pleased that the policy recognised the dangers of indirect taxation in admitting that it caused price increases. He calculated the savings to a couple which split its income for taxation purposes would range from $2.30 a week for a combined income of $240 a week to a maximum saving of $8.50 a week for a combined income of $365 a week or more. The child care rebates would most likely be 30 cents in the dollar, with no more than $500 to be claimed, he said. Mr Risstrom said he based this on the fact that the policy document used the word rebate, rather than deduction, and the standard rebate rate is at present 30 cents in the dollar. A family which split its income and claimed the child care rebate for one child could save up to $11 a week, he said. 'We have to back it. Most people feel others are getting away with murder because they can go into company partnerships. This offers the same benefit to those on salaries', Mr Risstrom said. He said the last Budget had moved one million people into a higher tax bracket. The Liberals had not said they would turn back those tax scales which was a pity , but Labor might decide to do so. I think that is wishful thinking. This is a classic situation. In recent days members of the Australian Labor Party have said: 'We will not tell you what our tax policy is; indeed, we do not know. We will set up a committee of investigation and reform. True, we have had nearly two years to do this but we will not do it until after the elections. So we do not know the figures but we want you, the people of Australia, to accept our blank cheque proposal. We want to tell you that we are putting no conditions at all on this study; the examination will include all range of taxes including capital taxes. We are not in any way at all excluding them and we will not tell you what we are going to do'. Senator Crichton-Browne —We know what Mr Hawke said in 1979 at the ALP conference. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —I do not know; help me. Senator Crichton-Browne —He said they could not fund their program without a capital gains tax. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —That is right. We know that, and of course the Minister for Industry and Commerce, Senator Button, is a great advocate of capital gains taxes. As distinct from that, the Liberal and National parties have come forward with quite clear statements on what they will do. The Labor Party has asked the people for a blank cheque for these proposals. If the Government were not going to have capital gains taxes, it would have said it would have a study excluding capital gains taxes. We all remember that when the assets test was under review members of the Government said: 'We forgot to tell you that we never meant to include the family home in the assets test'. They were quick to say that but, given the chance, time after time the Government has said it will have a review of taxes and that that review will include capital taxes. That means taxes on capital gains, taxes on wealth and death duties-the whole range. Lest anybody should think that this is simply a raid on wealth, let me put it in perspective. The kind of money that this Government needs to get itself out of the strife it is in can only be got out of the hides of the millions of Australian taxpayers. The Government has made great claim about getting tax dodgers. Unfortunately for the Government the Australian Taxation Commissioner in his report for the period ending June this year, and which covers the work of the Fraser Government, has said unequivocally that tax avoidance is dead, it is gone, and all the bottom of the harbour schemes have been caught up by legislation and administrative action. Of course, the legislation and administrative action were put into practice by the Fraser Government. So there is no scope there. Let nobody believe that the Government can raise this kind of money by attacking the tall poppies. If all their money were taken away there would be nothing left. The real proof of this position is that the Government is now financing its Budget out of the hides of people earning below the average weekly wage. It is taking 47c in the dollar from those people. Even if it wanted to reduce that tax rate and try to get its money out of a few wealthy people, it could not do it because the money is not there. So it will have to impose capital gains taxes; it will have to do more. The Minister for Social Security, Senator Grimes, who has left the chamber, last year said that the Government hoped to get in the order of $300m or $400m from the assets test. He thought that it would affect fewer than 400,000 people. That was the kind of money he envisaged. The Government then took fright and so, for the moment, we have an assets test that is not an assets test in the real sense. The real assets test is not the one for which forms are now being filled in; it is the test that will come next year and the year after if this Government is returned to office. Why otherwise would the Government introduce an assets test? There is no reason for it to do so. The Government made it clear from the outset that this assets test would be introduced to earn money so that the Government could do other things. Of course there will be a raid on lump sums, on assets and on the capital of people. That is not mentioned in the election campaign. It is not good enough for the Government to say that it will not touch people's homes. What a funny business it is that it can be specific on homes but cannot tell us whether there will be an upper ceiling on the value of a home or whether it will be on the value of a home in Sydney, Bourke or Bunbury . The Government cannot be specific because, in fact, it knows it is treading on quicksand, but it knows that it will do something. This is, therefore, an election based on failure. A test can be applied to everything that the Hawke Government said it would do. It said it would fix unemployment; in fact, unemployment is chronic and growing worse. It said it would reduce interest rates; real interest rates are worse. It said it would give an uplift to manufacturing, mining and primary industry; the decline in manufacturing and mining is very sad indeed. A union secretary is calling upon the Government to sack the Minister concerned. What a picture to come forward to ! We now have a situation in which the Government is so debt ridden that next year the Budget will be engulfed by debt servicing, and the need to pay interest on loans. That is the situation of a government which came to office with a mass of promises and which now has a tissue of at least 120 failures. This election campaign is like a blind date for voters. They cannot be blamed if, as is predicted, there is a mini-Budget, the squeeze, and next year, as the authorities are generally predicting, is a very bad year indeed. The Government hopes to hide all this by having a snap election. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Lewis) —Order! The honourable senator's time has expired. Senator MAGUIRE(South Australia)(10.08) —I support the Bills before the Senate this evening. We are jointly debating Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 1984-85 and Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 1984-85 and two other finance matters. Together they constitute the second Budget of the Hawke Labor Government. I will just summarise the main features of the Budget as I see it. The main features are: Income tax reductions, with a focus on lower and middle income earners: a lift in social security spending, again with a focus on the neediest social welfare recipients in the community; and a reduction in the Budget deficit to a figure proposed for this financial year of $6,700m, compared with the deficit for the financial year just ended of around $8,000m. It is of some interest that in the last financial year the Government finished with a lower Budget deficit than was forecast. The deficit came in at a figure $400m less than was budgeted in the August 1983 Budget. That is quite an achievement. It is certainly a turn-up, something totally different from the performance of the previous Government which, on several occasions running, forecast Budget deficits which were doubled or trebled when the final figures came in. In 1983-84 the deficit was reduced from the proposed figure. The economic context in which the present Budget was framed was one of very rapid growth in employment. In the financial year just ended 230,000 extra jobs were created in Australia, both in the private and the public sectors. Overall, employment grew by 3.7 per cent. That figure was well in excess of the figure budgeted in August last year when we forecast a job growth in the economy of around 1.5 per cent; but the reality was a figure of 3.7 per cent. Again, that was different from what had happened in past years in Australia. In the financial year to June unemployment was reduced by 60,000 and inflation was brought down to 6.5 per cent, the lowest for a number of years. This brought Australia's inflation rate to a similar level to that of our principal trading partners. Again, that is a different situation from what happened under the previous Government when Australia's competitiveness was eroded by an inflation rate that exceeded that in other countries. Under the present Government interest rates have fallen significantly. I instance savings bank interest on home first mortgages. At the beginning of last year those rates were 13.5 per cent but are now 11.5 per cent. Furthermore the number of bankruptcies in this country has fallen markedly. In the financial year 1983-84 the number of bankruptcies fell for the first time in years. The figure was down by 5 per cent, compared with an increase of 170 per cent in the number of bankruptcies in the life of the previous Government-a shocking record for the Fraser-Howard Government. This year's Budget was framed in the context of high real economic growth. In the 12 months to June this year real economic growth in Australia was 10 per cent, the highest in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development-that is, the developed Western economies. That was the best growth in Australia for 25 years. The Budget was framed with the economy in a recovery phase but with a couple of lagging areas. Investment and retail sales were sluggish, but both are now picking up. The strategy in the Budget for 1984, as I see it, is to consolidate on last year's growth achievements to enable further recovery in association with further reductions in inflation. The Budget is designed to continue further improvement in job prospects and particularly to provide a boost in social security spending for the neediest members of our community. The summation of those processes is a reduction in the deficit which, in turn, will cut pressures on interest rates in the economy and reduce the cost to the Budget itself in terms of interest payments. What is clearly identifiable is that the Budget embarks on a course of redistributing our economic resources. The total increase in Budget spending is some 13 per cent-a lower real increase in expenditure compared with the previous financial year. A principal feature of the Budget is the reduction of income tax which will come into effect on 1 November, just under a fortnight's time. A new five-step income tax rate scale will be introduced, with a bottom rate of 25c in the dollar on incomes up to $12,500 per annum. The best the previous Government could manage in income tax was a bottom rate of 30c in the dollar. I repeat that Labor has been able to reduce the first step in the tax scale to 25c. For taxpayers earning up to $28,000 a year the tax cut will average $7.60 a week, and for those earning above $28,000 the tax cuts will be somewhat smaller. I am pleased to say that that is the opposite of what tended to occur under the former Fraser-Howard Government where, year after year, the largest absolute reductions in income tax tended to go to the wealthy and to people above middle incomes. Senator Sir John Carrick referred to a claim that a million persons will move into a higher income tax bracket this year. I wish to record the fact that 2,250 ,000 taxpayers in this financial year will move into a lower tax bracket. That is something that members of the Opposition have very studiously avoided. They have neglected to tell the people about this. They have gone along with claims that possibly one million persons will move into higher tax brackets but have neglected to tell the people that two and a quarter million people will move into lower tax brackets. They will move down from 30c in the dollar to 25c in the dollar. It should be borne in mind that while the 25c in the dollar tax rate applies to incomes up to $12,500 it also applies to higher incomes. So all taxpayers benefit from the reduction in the bottom tax rate to 25c in the dollar . One of the principal effects of the restructuring of the tax system will be that the largest proportionate reductions in income tax will apply at the bottom of the income scale and it is possible to calculate that taxpayers on the lowest incomes will receive taxation reductions of 17 per cent, which is a large reduction indeed. The tax cuts in the Budget are very real. They have been accepted by the Australian Council of Trade Unions as genuine tax cuts. In a full financial year the revenue forgone as a result of the income tax reductions will be $2,100m. I point out that the principal reduction, $7.60 a week, is equivalent to a money wage rise of some 4 per cent. The Budget provides for a range of other measures. It provides for the first time taxation rebates for people receiving unemployment and sickness benefits. There will be a $50 tax rebate for single people receiving such benefits and $75 for married couples on various benefits. In most cases the income tax liability for social security beneficiaries will be removed as a result of the introduction of those rebates. Senator Grimes pointed out to the Senate last week in response to a question from me that some 25,000 Australians will no longer pay income tax as a result of the introduction of those rebates. I think that is a fine achievement. The introduction of those two rebates will mean that 25,000 Australians will no longer be liable for income tax. It is possible to identify another 60,000 Australians who will benefit from another reform in the Budget-the combined effect of the new 25c in the dollar tax rate and existing rebates. For example, I refer to the sole parent rebate, the dependent spouse rebate and other rebates. When those existing rebates are combined with the 25c in the dollar tax rate many more thousands of Australian families-in fact, 60, 000 taxpayers-will no longer pay tax. In the case of the dependent spouse rebate the effect of the new tax rate will be to lift the income threshold to $8,715 compared with $8,028 which applied under the previous Government. This Budget enables more families to be exempted from the one per cent Medicare levy. In the case of a family with two children the income threshold for the payment of the one per cent Medicare levy will now be $14,460. I also place on record the fact that that increase in the exemption levy, freeing Australian taxpayers from a tax liability, will benefit 120,000 taxpayers without dependants and a further 35,000 taxpayers with dependants. So 155,000 taxpayers will no longer be liable for the Medicare levy. For the last 12 months in various parts of my State of South Australia, in this chamber and elsewhere, I have heard the Opposition claim that the Medicare levy was to be raised from one per cent. The Minister has repeatedly said that it would not be raised. Here is the proof in the figures. We have been able to free 155,000 taxpayers from paying the levy. We have not increased it; we have reduced it. The Budget reduces the burden of the bank accounts debits tax which, as honourable senators know, was introduced by the Fraser-Howard Government. That tax has now been eased in this Budget. Non-business local councils and government bodies will no longer be liable for the bank accounts debits tax. School parents and citizens bodies and other support groups for exempt bodies will no longer pay the bank accounts debits tax. That will be of great relief to those bodies. I know that most senators on this side of the House have had correspondence from local governments and from parents and citizens groups about that tax. I am pleased to say that that burden has now been eased for them. When we look at the total summary figures in the Budget we see that gross pay as you earn income tax collections in relation to Australia's gross domestic product-Australia's gross income, if one likes-will fall in 1984 from the figures which applied under the previous Government. For example, 1982-83, the last year of the Fraser-Howard Government, the gross PAYE income tax collections represented 12.7 per cent of Australia's gross domestic product. In this current Budget they will be reduced to represent 11.9 per cent. I think that sort of figuring makes nonsense of the claims that have been made in this chamber and elsewhere that the present Government is a high-tax government. Turning to the outlays side of the Budget, the largest increases in outlays are in health, for which expenditure is up 40 per cent; in housing, for which it is up 21 per cent; and in public debt interest, for which it is up 29 per cent. They are the main areas of growth. I also point out that education spending is up 11.2 per cent and is growing at a faster rate than is the inflation rate. The large health outlays are due to a further upgrading of the health system under Medicare. Housing is a major growth area in terms of Budget expenditure. Of course, in this Budget there will be further large expenditure on the first home buyers scheme, which was introduced by this Government as a replacement for previous schemes which provided for income tax rebates on housing interest. The first home buyers scheme is a much better targeted device for enabling families to purchase homes. In this financial year we will be outlaying some 85 per cent more on that very successful scheme than we did last financial year. As a result of that initiative, we expect that some 80,000 dwellings will be financed this year under the first home buyers scheme. It is very easy to point to the fact that this scheme has had a tremendous effect in boosting building industry activity, boosting home building and, in turn, boosting the Australian economy. This is a very clear area in which the Government has embarked upon an expansionary policy. It has not waited for external effects to have an influence on the economy. It has embarked on its own expansionary policy by boosting housing expenditure and in turn this has stimulated the level of activity in the Australian economy. One only needs to look at home building approvals for Australia in the last financial year to see that compared with the situation in the last year of the Fraser-Howard Government there was a 29 per cent rise in home building approvals. Social security expenditure in the Budget is focused on the neediest members of the community. The various discretionary measures we took in the Budget will mean that the cost over and above the cost of indexation for inflation will be some $680m. The principal measures include a rise of $2.50 a week in the single rate pension and $4.20 a week in the married rate pension. There will be a similar increase in unemployment and other benefits for adults. We are providing an extra $2 a week for the children of pensioners and beneficiaries and a further $2 a week for sole parents under the mother's or guardian's allowance. We are lifting the maximum rental assistance from $10 a week to $15 a week-a 50 per cent increase. All those who have been making calculations about the levels of benefits and pensions in relation to the poverty line have ignored the existence of rental assistance for those pensioners who are forced to rent in the private market. This program of rental assistance substantially improves the real circumstances of such pensioners. I turn to education. The tertiary education assistance scheme allowance has been increased by 10 per cent and allowances for students at high schools have been raised by 15 per cent. There will also be a more relaxed income test for those allowances, the family income level to be raised by 10 per cent. Overall, there is a 4.5 per cent real increase in expenditure on education in the Budget. That real increase in excess of the inflation rate will include funds for 30,000 extra tertiary places in Australia by 1987. I turn to the figure of $5,600m for interest payments on the public debt. That is one of the most rapidly rising elements of government outlays, as I pointed out, but it can be explained by the relatively high world interest rates we are facing at the moment. I should also point out that it is due partly to interest paid by the Commonwealth Government through the Commonwealth Budget on State public debt. This is something that the Opposition has studiously ignored in its articulation of public debt interest as an issue. It has refused to acknowledge that a substantial element of public debt interest paid through the Commonwealth Budget is paid in respect of State government debts. Budget Paper No. 1 shows that over $1,800m of interest is paid in respect of the debts of State governments. Not so long ago Senator Bjelke-Petersen from Queensland asked in this chamber a question about the rapidly rising public debt interest and blamed it on the present Government but, I must point out, refused to acknowledge that a substantial element of that rising interest burden was in respect of debt in her State. It is very easy to identify in the Budget Papers that a minimum figure of $2,000m or $3,000m of public debt interest in Queensland is part of the principal on which this rising interest burden is being paid. One can calculate figures in respect of the States from which come other honourable senators who have been creating a lot of misinformation about public debt interest. Overall, the Budget has a deficit of around 3.3 per cent of our gross domestic product, a reduction from 4.3 per cent last year. The Budget encompasses a number of redistributive measures. There are more jobs provided, with lower inflation. There are income tax reductions. As I pointed out earlier, they are focused on lower and middle income earners. There is a further phasing out of tax rebates of advantage to the rich. I heard Senator Sir John Carrick earlier this evening bemoaning the abolition of the divident rebate of $1,000. When we were told some years ago by Mr Howard that that rebate was being introduced we were told it was to advantage and encourage the small investor in Australia. Then we found that the $1,000 rebate was going to the super rich as well as to average and small investors. It was a straight handout to very wealthy people in the community. I am very pleased that that sort of rebate has been abolished by this Government. It is very easy to calculate from the taxation figures provided with this Budget that the per head saving of that rebate was very large for people on extremely high incomes but minimal for people on average and lower incomes. That is an important progressive step taken by this Government. Debate interrupted. The PRESIDENT —Order! It being 10.30 p.m., under sessional order, I put the question: That the Senate do now adjourn. Senator REID(Australian Capital Territory)(10.30) —A letter I received recently said of the Canberra postal service: 'The postal service is an absolute disgrace .' Unfortunately, that is a very mild comment amongst others that I have received in letters and telephone calls from private individuals and business firms in Canberra presently suffering as a result of considerable delays in the postal service. For a while one was perhaps somewhat amused by the stories of letters taking, five, six or even seven days to get around Canberra or a week or two to get from Sydney or Melbourne to Canberra. One constituent told me of a cheque he sent to Sydney which took 13 days to get there, causing him considerable embarrassment. The Fyshwick traders have certainly been concerned. Most of them are small businessmen and it is a matter of some concern to them that documents and cheques are held up in the mail. A comment on 23 July 1984 by Mr Mailath, the President of the Australian Capital Territory branch of the Australian Small Business Association, was reported in the Canberra Times. He suggested that pigeons were faster these days. Mr Mailath may have been exaggerating but he certainly put his finger on what most people think about the mail service. The national consumer conference in Canberra dealt with the question of the postal services in Canberra and the Australian Federation of Consumer Organisations said that our mail services were abysmal. I would like the Minister for Communications (Mr Duffy) to explain why, in spite of recent reassurances that the backlog would be cleared up within two or three weeks, there are a considerable number of complaints in the community about the mail delays. In May it was suggested that the cause was staff shortages and an industrial dispute in Sydney. In June the Sydney Morning Herald told us that there was a dispute at the Rosebery mail sorting office over a racist remark which had been made. Some people feel that as the postal service is a monopoly it ought to be able to be managed efficiently and provide a reliable service to the public and the business community. I am beginning to wonder whether the Minister is aware of the number of small business people who are experiencing difficulties with the delay in mail and whether he has any explanation for the comment a week or so ago that the city courier services were very pleased with the significant increase in their business. No doubt they appreciate the increase in their business but it comes as a result of the Government's failure to maintain mail deliveries. I ask the Minister to pay some attention to this very small part of his portfolio, the mail service in the national capital. I hope that he is not seeking to boost the courier service component of the Post Office. There have been great technological advances in the area of postal services and substantial sums of money have been spent. Many people are surprised and confused that we seem to have a worse service now than we have had in the past. From May until now it has been a continuing saga of poor mail services. They get better for a while and they seem to get worse again. The Canberra Times has reported on this matter frequently. A heading in the Canberra Times on 21 October stated: 'Back to pack-mules for faster mail?'. An editorial in the Canberra Times today was headed 'Adventures by Post'. The editorial is quite riveting really. It states: Canberra's postal service has become a joke. I think it has passed the stage of being a joke. The editorial continued: People now swap yarns about the time it takes for a letter to get around town, around the suburbs, and interstate. Posting a letter these days raises feelings akin to putting a note in a sealed bottle and casting it into the sea. Receiving one is like finding someone else's bottle. The editorial deals with the problems and suggests that the comment 'It's in the mail.' sounds less like an assurance and more like an act of spite these days. It is not a joke any more to those who are suffering. I ask the Minister for Communications to pay some particular attention to this matter to try to find out what is going on and to give some assurance to the people of Canberra that the mail services will be improved. With the advent of Christmas mail quite soon , I suggest it may only get worse. People must, I think, realise that they will need to post their Christmas mail in Canberra two or three weeks earlier than they might normally do. Hopefully that will not exacerbate the matter but will assist them in getting their Christmas mail at the right place at the right time . There is another aspect of the service which is causing a fair amount of amusement, I guess. As I said, plenty of machinery has been put in and technological advances have taken place. The Post Office puts out a schedule which indicates-I think this came about six or eight weeks ago-that the mail closing time to all States except New South Wales would be advanced from 3 o' clock to 2 o'clock, Monday through to Thursday. Of course, for many small businesses that effectively means 11.30 in the morning by the time one takes into account the processing of the mail and the lunch hours that the girls must have. If it is a small office there is not a lot of choice as to how they go about adjusting for these things. I would have thought that the trend would be towards allowing later closing times and still being sure of the letter being delivered interstate the next day as I think at one time we had come to expect. The fact is that the closing times have been brought forward to 2 o'clock which I said is inconvenient for many small businesses in particular. I think perhaps those who depend on the post for their business mail would also be interested to know why that has come about and why it has been necessary to, in a sense, reduce the service by that hour rather than perhaps extend it to 4 o'clock which would seem the more logical course. There are significant questions which this community would like answered. I hope that the Minister for Industry and Commerce (Senator Button) who represents the Minister for Communications will produce some answers quite soon. Senator GIETZELT(New South Wales-Minister for Veterans' Affairs)(10.37) —I have no personal knowledge of the matters that have been raised by Senator Reid. They are matters that would concern the Government. Therefore, I undertake to have the matters referred to the appropriate Minister, the Minister for Communications (Mr Duffy), to see whether we can have the matters investigated and a report given to the Senate if the Parliament is still sitting. If not, I will reply direct to Senator Reid. Question resolved in the affirmative. Senate adjourned at 10.38 p.m. The following papers were presented: Navigation Act-Marine Orders-1984- No. 9-Part 4-(Marine Qualifications-Masters and Deck Officers). No. 10-Part 5-(Marine Qualifications-Engineer Officers). Governor-General's Proclamation-Commencement of Act: A Proclamation by His Excellency the Governor-General was presented, notifying that His Excellency had proclaimed the following Sections of an Act to come into operation on the date specified: Australian Federal Police Amendment Act 1984-Sections 3 to 8 and 10 to 19-20 October 1984 (Gazette No. S 419, 19 October 1984). The following answers to questions were circulated: (Question No. 682) Senator Jones asked the Minister representing the Prime Minister, upon notice, on 2 March 1984: (1) Will the Prime Minister list and describe all the royal commissions set up by Commonwealth governments since 1966. (2) Will the Prime Minister also detail the cost to the taxpayer of each of these royal commissions. (3) What, briefly, were the concrete achievements of each of these royal commissions. (4) Will the Federal Government examine the possibility of resisting the establishment of royal commissions in the future until every possible avenue of investigation that is cheaper than a royal commission is explored. Senator Button —The Prime Minister has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) and (2) The following royal commissions have been established since 1966: Approximate Topic of Commission Established Report(s) presented cost $ Statements of Lieutenant Commander Cabban 1 June 1967 13 March 1968 371,000 Great Barrier Reef Petroleum Drilling 5 May 1970 30 October 1974 771,000 Aboriginal Land Rights 8 February 1973 19 July 1973 3 May 1974 48,000 Australian Post Office 22 February 1973 19 April 1974 360,000 Land Tenures 4 May 1973 29 November 1973 24 March 1976 224,000 Petroleum 12 September 1973 15 October 1974 20 December 1974 19 September 1975 15 April 1976 7 October 1976 1 November 1976 1,768,000 Maritime Industry 25 September 1973 6 May 1974 7 November 1974 12 February 1976 25 June 1976 595,000 FM Broadcasting 27 November 1973 8 March 1974 47,000 Transport to and from Tasmania 10 April 1974 5 March 1976 501,000 Australian Government Administration 6 June 1974 22 July 1976 2,038,000 Intelligence and Security 21 August 1974 24 April 1976 1 November 1976 24 December 1976 21 April 1977 672,000 Human Relationships 21 August 1974 12 February 1976 21 November 1977 1,032,000 Alleged Payments to Maritime Unions 5 September 1974 8 July 1975 23 April 1976 225,000 Aboriginal/Police Incidents in W.A. (staffed by W.A. Government) 23 April 1975 13 April 1976 161,000 Norfolk Island 15 May 1975 15 October 1976 220,000 Drugs 13 October 1977 18 August 1979 21 December 1979 3,219,000 Electoral Redistribution of Queensland in 1977 24 April 1978 3 August 1978 188,000 Efficiency and Administration of Hospitals 29 August 1979 30 June 1980 29 December 1980 1,237,000 Christmas Island, Phosphate Industry 20 December 1979 15 February 1980 54,000 Activities of Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union 1 October 1980 30 March 1981 30 July 1981 21 December 1981 27 July 1982 25 July 1983 (Final report yet to be submitted) *13,900,000 Drug Trafficking 25 June 1981 21 October 1981 21 May 1982 4 August 1982 30 August 1982 28 February 1983 *8,693,000 Activities of the Nugan Hand Group 28 March 1983 13 October 1983 (Final report yet to be submitted) (amount included in Drug Trafficking figure above) Activities of the Australian Building Construction Employees' and Builders Labourers' Federation (staffed by Victorian Government) 20 August 1981 27 May 1982 46,000 Australian Meat Industry 12 September 1981 17 September 1982 1,143,000 Use and Effects of Chemical Agents on Australian Personnel in Vietnam 13 May 1983 Report yet to be submitted *3,516,000 Australia's Security and Intelligence Agencies 17 May 1983 1 December 1983 16 February 1984 (Final report yet to be submitted) *2,410,000 Compensation to be paid to Former Defendants in the Social Security Conspiracy Case 9 February 1984 Report yet to be submitted *646,000 British Nuclear Tests 16 July 1984 Report yet to be submitted *1,417,000 * includes 1984/85 estimates. It is not possible to give complete and accurate figures for the costs to the Commonwealth Government of the royal commissions listed above. For example, the remuneration paid to some royal commissioners, such as serving judges, is not separately identified. Accordingly, the cost figures shown above are based on expenditure and, where relevant, projected estimates, from Budget appropriations identified for the royal commission in question and from other appropriations where the proportion attributable to the royal commission is clear. (3) Given the great variety of royal commissions and complexity of issues addressed, it is not proposed to attempt to summarise adequately their achievements. Some royal commissions have led directly to administrative and policy changes, for example, the Australian Post Office Commission of Inquiry led to the establishment of Telecom and Australia Post, and the Independent Inquiry into FM Broadcasting led to the introduction of frequency modulation broadcasting. Other royal commissions have been directed towards establishing the truth concerning a particular incident or series of incidents, for example, the Inquiry into Allegations made by Lieutenant Commander P. T. Cabban and the Royal Commission into the Australian Meat Industry. A judgment of the achievements of each royal commission must rest with individuals on the basis of the report of the commission and subsequent action. (4) The Government, in determining the most appropriate form for an inquiry, takes into account, and will continue to do so, all relevant factors, including cost. (Question No. 930) Senator Kilgariff asked the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations, upon notice, on 1 June 1984: (1) What funds have been allocated under the community Employment Program (CEP) : (a) national; and (b) to each individual State and Territory. (2) How many projects have been funded by the CEP in each State and Territory. (3) What was the nature of these projects. (4) How many people have been employed through the program in each State and Territory. (5) What is the average period of employment for these people. (6) How many public servants have been employed in each State and Territory to administer the scheme. (7) What is the anticipated total cost of the CEP in administration. (8) What will be the total amount expended on grants through the program. (9) When does the Government anticipate the CEP will close. Senator Button —The Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) Allocations for the 1983-84 financial year under the Community Employment Program were: $mNew South Wales 86.297 Victoria 64.012 Queensland 41.268 Western Australia 22.986 South Australia 21.739 Tasmania 7.509 Northern Territory 2.822 Australian Capital Territory 3.367 Total, State/Territory 250.000 Commonwealth CEP 50.000 Total Australia 300.000 (2) and (3) The number of CEP projects approved and recommended awaiting approval to 30 June 1984 in each program element was: STATE/TERRITORY COMPONENT OF THE CEP JOLOR COWSIP State Local Community State/Territory (a) (b) Govt. Govt. Groups Total New South Wales 373 17 1,378 1,114 902 3,784 Victoria 212 70 321 288 480 1,371 Queensland 210 63 234 355 171 1,033 Western Australia 150 6 158 231 201 746 South Australia 179 6 153 159 289 786 Tasmania 66 17 150 84 120 437 Northern Territory 14 2 11 9 33 69 Australian Capital Territory 1 (c) 52 (c) 117 170 Australia 1,205 181 2,457 2,240 2,313 8,396 COMMONWEALTH COMPONENT OF THE CEP Repairs & General State/Territory Maintenance Dept. Women Aboriginal Total New South Wales . . 28 6 21 55 Victoria . . 6 10 6 22 Queensland . . 6 1 20 27 Western Australia . . 2 1 11 14 South Australia . . 8 2 17 27 Tasmania . . 6 2 1 9 Northern Territory . . 2 . . 29 31 Australian Capital Territory . . 42 11 . . 53 Not Allocated by State 1 21 18 . . 40 Australia 1 121 51 105 278 (a) Jobs on Local Roads (b) Country Towns Water Supply Improvement Projects (c) Not applicable. (4) Estimates of placements under CEP are not yet available for States and Territories individually; the total for Australia is estimated at 28,400 to 30 June 1984. Positions created in CEP projects to 30 June 1984 are shown below: No. of Jobs Created State/Territory Commonwealth State/Territory Component Component Total New South Wales 18,780 1,373 20,153 Victoria 8,998 1,010 10,008 Queensland 8, 178 932 9,110 Western Australia 3,729 515 4,244 South Australia 4,710 482 5, 192 Tasmania 1,658 96 1,754 Northern Territory 510 375 885 Australian Capital Territory 681 297 978 Not Allocated by State - - - AUSTRALIA 47,244 5,080 52, 324 (5) The average duration of jobs created in CEP projects to 30 June 1984 was 26 .8 weeks. (6) The CEP is jointly administered in each State/Territory by the Commonwealth Department of Employment and Industrial Relations and the relevant State/ Territory Government departments. The information sought in respect of State/ Territory Government staff is not available to the Commonwealth and should be sought from relevant State/Territory Government departments. As at 30 June 1984, the number of officers of the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations actually involved in the administration of the CEP was: State/Territory Officers New South Wales 40 Victoria 33 Queensland 21 South Australia 16 Western Australia 18 Tasmania 10 Northern Territory 7 Australian Capital Territory Regional Office 4 Department Central Office 54 AUSTRALIA 203 (7) The total cost of administration of the CEP to 30 June 1984 was $8 million, excluding costs of administration borne by State and Territory Governments. The total cost comprised an amount of $5.5 million for administration of CEP through the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations and $2.5 million from the 1983-84 CEP allocation paid to the State and Northern Territory Governments to assist with the costs incurred by the principal State/Territory Government Departments administering the program. The overall cost to the Commonwealth of administering the CEP in 1983-84, $8m, represented 2.7 per cent of the 1983-84 allocation for CEP of $300 million. (8) The value of approved projects and projects recommended for approval to 30 June 1984 was $728.8m, involving grants of $564.3m of CEP funds. In 1984-85, $410m has been allocated for job creation through the CEP. However, the total amount to be expended on grants under the program will be dependent upon budgetary considerations in 1985-86. (9) Under Section 12 of the Community Employment Act 1983 which established the Community Employment Program, no new liability to be discharged out of moneys appropriated under the Act may be incurred after 30 June 1986. The continuation of the program beyond 30 June 1986 is an issue still be be decided by the Government. (Question No. 1146) Senator Reynolds asked the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations, upon notice, on 13 September 1984: Can the Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations advise if any form of special allowance is available to unemployed student architects, in view of the fact that, at the present time, unemployed student architects who are required to attend courses both during the day and in the evening are unable to obtain either the payment of unemployment benefit-because they are not available for full time employment-nor are they entitled to payment of TEAS allowance because they are not full time students. Senator Button —The Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: The only possible allowance under a program administered by the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations is the general training assistance (GTA) allowance. However, to qualify for an allowance under the GTA program, prospective trainees must have spent a period in the workforce equivalent to that for which they seek training and the occupation in which they seek training must be in balance or in demand. At present, architects are considered by the Department to be in minor over-supply in all States except South Australia. (Question No. 1180) Senator Reid asked the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations, upon notice, on 3 October 1984: In respect of the Minister's Department and statutory authorities responsible to the Minister: (a) how many motor vehicles did they own before 2 March 1983; (b) how many motor vehicles do they now own; (c) how many motor vehicles have they purchased since 2 March 1983; (d) what type, size and make of motor vehicles have they purchased; (e) what was the individual and total cost of these vehicles; and (f) for what purposes were the vehicles purchased. Senator Button —The Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: Vehicles utilised by my Department and statutory authorities within my portfolio are hired from the Department of Administrative Services. Senator Button —On 10 May 1984 (Hansard, pages 1931-2) Senator Lewis asked Senator Grimes the following question, without notice, concerning the Community Employment Program: Is it a fact that that program for this year allocated $64m to Victoria but that up to the beginning of this month only $35m had been spent, leaving $29m in Victoria's kitty? I remind the Minister that, when Mr Willis introduced this program, he said that only projects of real value to the community were to be funded and that they would not be for frivolous purposes like weeding lawns or painting goal posts. Is it a fact that in Victoria the Congress for International Co-operation and Disarmament has received funding for propaganda- three jobs-to the tune of $47,568; that Pax Christi, run by Dr Joe Camilleri, has received an allocation of $71,061 for five jobs; that Harry Van Moorst has been able to organise for the Coalition against Poverty and Unemployment six jobs at a cost of $155,975; and that the Young Women's Christian Association, as recommended in this week's Bulletin, has adopted a very good means of achieving funds by giving its project the title of the Migrant Women Developmental Research and Resource Centre Co-operative and managed to receive $689,423 for 41 jobs? What actions will this Government take to protect the $29m left in Victoria's kitty? In his reply, Senator Grimes undertook to obtain a more detailed answer. The Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations has provided the following additional information: Yes, it is a fact that $64.012m was allocated to Victoria under the Community Employment Program in 1983-84, and that $29m remained unspent at the beginning of May 1984. Yes, it is a fact that the Congress for International Co-operation and Disarmament, Pax Christi, the Coalition against Poverty and Unemployment, and the Young Women's Christian Association received grants under the Community Employment Program. The remaining $29m in Victoria's allocation was subsequently allocated to projects assessed according to CEP guidelines by the Victorian CEP Consultative Committee and approved by my delegate, the Regional Director of my Department in Victoria, and the Victorian Minister for Employment and Training. Senator Gareth Evans —On 18 October (Hansard, pages 1973-4) Senator Missen asked me the following question, without notice, about the Government's response to the OECD guidelines on the protection of privacy and transborder flows of personal data: My question, which is to the Attorney-General, relates to the guidelines on the protection of privacy and trans-border flow of personal data that were adopted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and became applicable on 23 September 1980. Does the Attorney-General agree that the guidelines, which were developed by a group of government experts under the chairmanship of Mr Justice Michael Kirby, the then Chairman of the Australian Law Reform Commission, would help harmonise national privacy legislation and, while upholding such human rights, would at the same time prevent interruptions in international flows of data? If so, I ask the Attorney: Firstly, why has the Australian Government so far abstained from adopting the guidelines? Secondly, are we among the very few nations that developed the guidelines that have so far failed to ratify them? Thirdly, will consideration be given by the Government to ratifying the guidelines at an early date? I now provide the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) I agree with Senator Missen that the OECD guidelines would help to harmonise national privacy legislation and that they would assist to prevent interruptions in international flows of data. (2) The guidelines are an important element to be considered in the development of privacy legislation in Australia and the Government has, in fact, been giving consideration to adoption of the guidelines in the context of its consideration of the ALRC Privacy Report. (3) In the Privacy Report the ALRC recommended the establishment of a number of statutory principles in relation to information handling practices and said that in formulating these principles it had drawn primarily on the OECD guidelines. (4) Australia has not so far adopted the Guidelines because it has been thought appropriate to consider adopting the guidelines in conjunction with consideration of the Privacy Report. The Privacy Report was not, of course, brought down by the ALRC until late 1983 and I tabled the Report on 14 December 1983. (5) My Department is at present considering the Privacy Report and has had consultations with other Departments on the implications of the Report. It has also been in touch with leading private sector organisations. (6) Canada only recently adopted the guidelines and apart from Australia, I understand that Ireland is the other OECD country not yet to have adopted the Guidelines. (7) I would hope to be in a position to recommend to the Government that legislation based on the ALRC Privacy recommendations be introduced for exposure during the autumn sittings of Parliament next year. (8) I would hope also at that time to indicate that Australia proposes to adopt the guidelines. I note that the Prime Minister has written to the State Premiers and to the Northern Territory Chief Minister about the Guidelines and has been told by all of them, except the Queensland Premier, that they, in effect, see no practical difficulties in Australia adopting the guidelines.